What important ways of teaching English do you know?

What motivates children to learn a language?
There are two main types of motivation.

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  Learning English for a particular purpose – for example to get a job, get into university, to travel.
  
• 
  Learning English because you enjoy learning, having fun and making progress. This tends to be the most effective form of motivation.¹
  

Children are also more motivated when they have a positive impression of English-speaking people and cultures. If they like the music, films or sports, they are more likely to want to learn the language.
What motivates children at different ages?
Essentially, it’s the same. Learners of all ages achieve more when they are intrinsically motivated. In other words, when the learning experience is fun, interesting and meaningful.
Children will want to learn if they have extrinsic motivation, such as getting a reward for good results, or needing English for university studies. But as Steve Jobs said: ‘The only way to do great work is to love what you do.’
How can we use question-answer exercises and translation exercises?
Nowadays, teachers are constantly reminded to favor student-centered activities over teacher-centered presentations of learning materials.
Nevertheless, you may still be forced, as a teacher, presenter, or public speaker to deliver traditional lectures because of a variety of reasons—such as, for example, dealing with a very large audience, limited time to prepare learning activities, or even a request to teach asynchronously online rather than synchronously.
Do you know that, even in these mentioned cases, you can still do a lot to steer your lesson away from the tedious presentation of a stream of overflowing content?
This is because there is a simple and effective method to grab your audience’s attention, interact with them, and put them in the center by asking questions. In addressing students with questions, they can be made to feel engaged no matter the group’s size or location (if online).
Accordingly, asking questions allows you to switch from a teacher-centered to a student-centered perspective, and it is equally effective in synchronous as well as in asynchronous contexts (e.g., many cases of online learning and teaching).
If you wish to dig deeper on the topic focusing on synchronous contexts, have a look at our teacher training course on how to promote a student-centered classroom.
Also, if you are interested in finding more about teaching in asynchronous contexts, check out our blog article on student-centered online learning.