Meine Name ist David Koch und ich bin Experte in der Vermittlung von Englisch als Fremdsprache. Ich war während meiner bisher 13-jährigen Lehrtätigkeit fünf Jahre lang an einem Privatgymnasium in München als Englischlehrer tätig und habe dort in mehreren Oberstufenjahrgängen (Klasse 11 & 12) alle meine Schüler erfolgreich zum schriftlichen oder mündlichen Abitur in Englisch geführt, viele mit ausgezeichneten Noten.
Mein Expertenwissen zur Sprachenvermittlung sowie meine Unterrichtserfahrung am Gymnasium machen es mir möglich jeden Oberstufenschüler perfekt auf das Abitur vorzubereiten, so dass sie / er das Maximale aus ihren / seinen Fähigkeiten herausholen kann um das Abitur in Englisch erfolgreich zu meistern. Unter dem Menüpunkt Nachhilfe & Abiturvorbereitung für Englisch kannst du / können Sie dazu mehr erfahren. Ich habe auch mehrere Unterrichtseinheiten, die ich in der Oberstufe verwendet habe, zur Verfügung gestellt, um einen Einblick in die inhaltliche und auf die schülerinteressen abgestimmte Bandbreite meines Unterrichts zu geben. Meine Abiturvorbereitung ist auf den jeweiligen Lerner und dessen Bedürfnisse individuell abgestimmt um den bestmöglichen Erfolg zu gewährleisten. Bei Interesse und offenen Fragen bin ich am Besten per E-Mail zu erreichen. FOLLOW ME ON FACEBOOK: DNK TUITION How I teach the days of the week to beginning learners of German (for children and teenagers)10/6/2017
In order to teach the days of the week to beginning learners of German, I make use of the Youtube video ‘Wochentagelied’. But I do not only let my students listen to the song and then make them memorise the words. I apply what I know about language learning to guarantee the successful acquisition of the words. I start off by just playing the ‘Wochentagelied’ to the students and they have to listen and figure out what it could be about. This is part of my content driven approach to language teaching as the main focus in the beginning is to understand the general content of the song, the students do not focus on the days of the week yet. There are several words in the song that resemble words in the English language and so far the students have always worked out what the song is about. I continue the lesson by explaining the meaning of ‘der Wochentag’ = ‘day of the week’ before handing out the lyrics of the song and playing it again. I ask the students to read along while they pay attention to the pronunciation and intonation. After that I play it again and give them a chance to sing along and practice their pronunciation and intonation while doing that. I then give them an empty sheet of paper, they turn their worksheet with the lyrics over and they have one minute to write down the days of the week which they have just read and heard about. This is very difficult for the students and rarely does anyone manage to do that correctly. I do this exercise so that the students (actually it is their brain that does it for them) focus their attention on the days of the week and the spelling of the words when they listen to the song the next time. The brain does that because it experienced failure and noticed that it had a lack of information to complete the task and now it will try to make up for that at the second attempt by focusing on these words. Before I play it for a fourth time, I write the days of the week on the board so that I can briefly point out how the ‘ie’ in ‘Dienstag’ and the ‘ei’ in ‘Freitag’ is pronounced. The students then copy these words from the board onto another empty sheet to practice the writing of the words. After they have completed writing down the days of the week, they turn this sheet over as well so that they cannot access this information when they listen to the songs. Then I play the song for the last time and afterwards ask them again to write down the days of the week on an empty sheet of paper. At this point they generally get the spelling of most of the days right and manage to reproduce the correct order of the days of the week. As a homework task they have to memorise the words and write them down as a vocabulary item and practice them. Over the course of the next lesson(s) I make the students recycle the newly learned vocabulary by giving them different follow up tasks. One of these follow up tasks can be found on the second page of the worksheet. You can just have the students fill in the gaps from their memory or play the song again. There is no perfect way to do this and both options are fine depending what you want to focus on. The gap fill in activities are a good way of getting students to pay attention to the correct spelling of the words and give them practice in writing the words out. I have attached another worksheet with a variety of follow-up activities so the students can practice the days of the week while focusing on meaningful language. This is a very simple and basic topic but it exemplifies how I use the knowledge about language learning and apply it in practice to maximise students' success in learning the language. This approach to making a student learn the days of the week in German will be more successful than just having them memorise the words. The reasons for that is that the students have received meaningful input before they were even exposed to the actual lexical item (= word) that needed to be learned and because the days of the week were embedded in meaningful content as well. FOLLOW ME ON FACEBOOK: DNK TUITION
I am very interested in positive psychology, the science which focuses on well-being, happiness, flow, personal strength, wisdom, creativity and imagination (Hefferon & Boniwell, 2011). I integrate the knowledge into my teaching which has proven to be beneficial to the students as well as me.
I developed several teaching modules on positive psychology for students who are learning English (EFL/EAL). I used these modules successfully to strengthen their self-confidence and improve their positive outlook on (school) life by teaching them the scientific knowledge behind happiness & flow and success & failure. The main focus in those lessons is the content, but at the same time I connect it to several tasks that develop a learner’s skills in the foreign language. One of the resources I use in the teaching modules about positive psychology is the TED talk ‘The Surprising Science of Happiness’ by Dan Gilbert, an American social psychologist and Professor of Psychology at Harvard University. It is a very interesting talk but rather challenging and that’s why I generally do this with advanced learners of English (EFL/EAL). I use this video in a sequence of lessons to help learners develop their listening, reading, speaking and writing skills while learning about the advantages that the knowledge of positive psychology holds for them. In this lesson sequence, the students are provided with a handout with questions that they need to answer about the video. The students are then given 45-60 min to watch the TED talk individually at their own speed (with English subtitles if necessary). This gives the learners the freedom to decide when to stop the talk to listen to something repeatedly or when to check online for words or concepts they are not familiar with. Thus they are in control of the tempo of their own learning. After this initial lesson, the students come together in pairs or groups and share their answers with their partner or group members. Then a classroom discussion opens up where I discuss the answers with everyone or guide them to the answer if they did not manage to find one. I also explain some of the concepts in more detail to make it easier for the learners to understand. After that, I give them a writing task on how they could apply this knowledge in their own life so they can personalise what they have learned. This sample lesson is an example of my content driven approach to language learning with the added element of personalising the content. As part of the initial consultation session I will find out which topics you are interested in and then I will teach lessons that develop your language skills by making use of the content you have selected. Feel free to watch the talk and post your answers to the questions, maybe even comment on how you could use this knowledge in your own life. FOLLOW ME ON FACEBOOK: DNK TUITION Learning a foreign language is per se not a very difficult task. If you know what to do and how to do it, it is surprisingly very straightforward, no matter which modern foreign language you are trying to learn. It will take time to become proficient and you will need to be dedicated to improving your skills.
However, that does not mean that it will take you months or years until you can enjoy using the language successfully. Learning a language is not a tiring, boring and arduous task. It can be fun, entertaining, enjoyable and extremely gratifying. One way of speeding up the language learning process and making it more enjoyable is to have private lessons. Learning a language does not require a special skill from you, you do not need to be gifted or talented, anyone can learn a foreign language successfully. With the help of the right tutor, you will be able to make progress very quickly because the lessons will be targeted to your needs and interests. The language learning process is closely monitored and corrections are made on the spot. Do not underestimate the social component of language learning. It will be easier to establish a strong connection between you and your tutor and this will give you the confidence to use the language creatively and take away the fear of asking the 'wrong' questions or making mistakes. |
AuthorDavid Koch- Language Teaching Expert Follow Me
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