Guest post for Cambridge Conversations (Cambridge University Press ELT)

1. Recognize and accept the fact that we are in a marketplace

Most of us non-native speaker language teachers want to pass their passion for the language on to their students. We know the value we bring into the classroom, and it can feel disheartening to see the evident favouritism of native-speaker teachers in the language teaching space. The best way to educate employers on the benefits we bring to the table is to show them exactly what we have to offer and why their students need us in the classroom. Like any other profession these days, language teaching is an industry with different businesses covering different needs. We can resist this reality, or we can choose to accept it and see it as an opportunity for personal and professional growth. The truth is, in a competitive marketplace it’s not about being better qualified anymore – it’s about being unique. Many non-native language teachers are equally qualified in terms of certifications and language skills, but this is just a small part of our profiles. What makes each profile unique is the personality of the teacher – and it is up to you, as a language teacher, to reflect on and to show recruiters your uniqueness.

2. Show your uniqueness

First, let’s take a closer look at your motivation to teach English (or another language). Ask yourself the following questions: Why do you teach? What was that pivotal moment in your life that led you into the teaching profession? Be specific and avoid vague answers, such as “I went into teaching because I love seeing students grow” or “Because I fell in love with the English language.” How exactly did that happen?

Next, think about the way you teach. How do your backstory and your past (teaching) jobs impact your teaching style today? Again, be specific and illustrate qualities such as “creative” or “innovative” with successful projects you’ve done in the past to show your teaching approach. Make it as tangible as possible, so that a potential recruiter gets a feel for your (teaching) personality – not just your formal credentials.

3. Position yourself – for the right teaching job

You now have a unique narrative that you can tap into to articulate your uniqueness, including your non-nativeness.

Now, once you’ve found an exciting teaching position ask yourself why you feel compelled to teach in that particular environment? What makes you think that you are the perfect fit for this position? The right working environment for you is the one in which you don’t need to hide out, where you can be fully self-expressed and completely yourself. And if you truly believe in your non-nativeness as the core benefit, try to articulate why and how exactly it is going to benefit their students. Be specific: general qualities like being able to speak their students’ L1 may sound persuasive to our colleagues, but recruiters want to hear and see concrete examples.

This self-assessment requires a lot of honest self-reflection, but the clarity that comes from it is worth the time and effort. Being clear on your uniqueness you can seek out the employer who wants to hire you precisely for your personality – because you are the language teacher his clients need.

So what makes you unique? Choose one aspect of your story or your personality and post your answer in the comments section below.

 

Guest Post for Cambridge Conversations (Cambridge University Press ELT)

https://www.cambridge.org/elt/blog/2015/07/08/land-job-non-native-speaker-teacher-three-simple-steps/

For me, as a language teacher, getting students to speak up in class and motivating them to participate in discussions is a challenging task. But, as a language learner I know that speaking a foreign language can be a vulnerable, scary and stressful experience. Whether in a class setting or in real-life situations with native speakers, under the pressure of “having to say something”, a lot of language learners start feeling self-conscious and insecure.

As someone who has spent her entire life as an expatriate in multilingual environments, I still feel this way in certain situations, and I believe that there are certain underlying issues that need to be addressed, in order to encourage language learners to speak up, and to engage them in conversations.

Figure out the reason behind their speaking barrier

The first step towards encouraging learners, without leaving them feeling pressured and inadequate, is for language teachers to understand the different types of communication profiles their students represent, as well as the challenges they might be experiencing.

Since not all students experience these insecurities to the same extent, it is crucial to understand the root of the speaking barrier for the quieter ones: Why are they quiet? Do they lack the necessary language skills they need to express themselves? Or are they lacking confidence, and if so, where does that stem from? There is also a difference between people being shy and people being quiet. The first group are insecure by nature, no matter what language they’re speaking. The latter group are observers by nature: they accumulate and absorb information during their silent period, before going out into the world and starting speaking. As a language learner myself, I am definitely the observant type of learner: I’d rather wait and keep quiet until I have acquired all the information I need and feel comfortable enough to express myself correctly.

Honouring that initial silent period, and the degree of readiness that a certain type of quiet language learners might experience as a natural part of the learning process, is an essential strategy that I’d recommend to any language teacher.

Stimulate their desire for self-expression

When I first started teaching oral expression in German to undergraduate students in France, I was asked to choose topics centered around the German news. As you can imagine, motivating a group of people to talk about topics that aren’t part of their world was quite challenging and felt tedious. However, once we got sidetracked and stumbled upon other topics, my students started to speak and engage in discussions. Those engaging topics had nothing to do with German politics, culture and economics. Instead they had entirely to do with funny stories my students wanted to share with me. It could be a comment that would make them think of a funny experience they once had in Germany or a similarity between our everyday lives that came up during our discussion. Those were all topics they could relate to and, most importantly, they wanted to share them with me. And that is key: their desire to share has to be bigger than the fear of embarrassment. The more they can relate to the subject, the more they are willing to express themselves.

This approach certainly requires a lot of empathy, flexibility and experimentation from the teacher, but I believe our students deserve a gentle and empathetic guidance towards fluency.