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Ask any linguist if people control language or does language control them and you will get reasoning and answers completely different each time. Thus, it is a conundrum always open for debate. We know that humans process information using the words that they speak, the definitions of these words and their meanings are therefore omnipresent in their minds and subconscious as they go about their daily endeavors. One professor put it to me this way;
"Are people whose first language is one of the romance languages with their gender assignments to all nouns more outgoing in their expression of affections? If so, is it because of the language, or did some early Italian tribes that had that attribute evolve a language that was attuned to their culture? We can spin the globe and ask similar questions about the linkage between cultural norms and the attributes of the local language that seem to be at least attuned to those norms. I suspect that there is no easy answer to this question."
Indeed ...

What is a power struggle? A power struggle is the fight for power in the classroom. The typical power struggle occurs when a teacher implements consequence and a student refuses to comply to that consequence.
When a student acts out in class it is hard not to yell right away at the student especially when it is a students who always misbehaves. The best way to confront a student who misbehaves is to address the problem the first time it happens! Do not wait until the third or fourth time because by then, students already think they can walk all over you. If rules are made in the beginning of the school year to follow, students should know the consequences to their wrong actions already.
After the student is told that they did something wrong, as a teacher we need to speak with them in private so no words are not said that the teacher or student will regret in front of the entire class. It is good to do this in private so there is no power struggle created.
However, these types of ...

Now that the new school year is fast approaching, it's important that teachers get to know their new students, students get to know their teacher and students get to know each other. During my 30 plus years of teaching I have used several classroom activities as a fun and non-stressful way to get the school year started on the right foot.

As a teacher, classroom management problems occur every now and then. It is like a web that traps educators when they least expect it. Much more, it can further drag you down the drain if pre-emptive measures are not taken. Without immediate action, it can consume your entirety, both professionally and personally.

 Having difficult classes at some time in your career is part and parcel of the profession to which we belong. This is especially true in a high school situation where there is potential for a teacher to have more than one difficult class. 'Difficult' could be in a behavioural or academic ...

Teachers should attempt to create a class environment which is conducive to learning. Achieving this is not always easy as there are students who respect classroom etiquette while others do not. However, if you conduct your classroom in a manner that respects your rights and the student’s rights, this will create a positive and supportive classroom environment

Are your students loathe to practice as much as they should? OK, you can stop laughing and pick yourself up off the floor now. I know it wasn't the brightest question. But I asked it to make a point, of course.

Planning a grammar lesson for a TESOL / TEFL class is something that many new teachers find very difficult and this article is designed to offer some advice. Here we are focusing our attention on lessons where the focus is grammar as teachers often find this most difficult of all.
1. The first thing to say is that lesson planning is very important whether a teacher is newly trained or experienced. It is true that an experienced teacher may not need to do as much preparation on a day-to-day basis as a newly trained teacher but, nevertheless, it is important that every lesson is prepared with care.
2. When planning a grammar lesson try to embed the grammar in a typical situation so that the new language is easier for the students to understand. For example, if you have a class of adults you could build your lesson around having a car serviced in a garage to introduce or practise the Present Perfect tense. In the course of your lesson, sentences like this could naturally arise. They've ...

For long time and new teachers, how to avoid teacher burnout is perhaps the top thought that they always want to solve. But with pressure, stress and routine activities in school, a majority of our teachers are left tired, uninspired and unenthusiastic even before they start their working day.

The reason I like the end of the year so much is because it is such a clean break. At no point during the regular school year do I feel anything but an impending sense of doom every day when I get home from work. I am always behind and playing a game of catch-up.