Marmara Elt Resources

Maximizing your Space
Hands up if you work in a school that has small classes, is well-equipped with all the latest high-tech equipment and there is lots of space in the classrooms to move around. My guess is that most of your hands have stayed down.
Large classes (over 40 students and sometimes as many as a 100), limited resources (only a course book that may be culturally inappropriate or too difficult), cramped classrooms and mixed ability students are the norm rather than the exception in schools around the world.
Teachers want to give their students variety and help them to learn English effectively, but so many nice ideas for language learning tasks seem impractical because of the lack of resources in schools..
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Using Volunteers in your ESL Classroom

Volunteers can be a tremendous asset in the ESL classroom. They can help you give extra attention to all of the students while the class is engaged in practice activities, or they can give extra help to small groups or individuals in the class.

However, as you begin to use volunteers in your classroom, you will need to put a little extra time into planning how you’d like to put them to use, and you will need to designate time either before or during class (sometimes volunteers have to arrive late because of their work schedules) for clarifying your plans with the volunteer. The time it takes to do the extra planning is well worth it, though; it also decreases as you get used to it and build up your supply of strategies for using volunteers. And as your volunteer becomes more acquainted with your students’ needs and your teaching style, he or she usually requires less explanation of activities. In general, the gains to your students and yourself far outweigh the bit of extra effort initially needed in using volunteers. Read the rest of this entry »

Teaching English Tips to Stay in Control of a Large Class
Teaching English with games is becoming standard through
out ESL classrooms of the world. And this is good news,
because children love to learn through games, and become
much more motivated students as a result. However games
often make children excited, and if you have a large class
you need a few things up your sleeve to bring the class
into line immediately if things get a little over-heated.

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Teaching Research Skills to Students For the Twenty-First Century
Many teachers are afraid to allow their students to use the Internet to write research papers. Teacher complaints that I have heard regarding this topic are: “Students plagiarize by cutting and pasting information from websites.” “Students will not search beyond the first few sites they Google.” “Students cannot distinguish an appropriate site for information from an advertisement.”
As a high school English teacher, I shared these same concerns; consequently, I discouraged my students from using the Internet for research. That was before I heard the complaints of professors and college librarians. The essence of their complaints was the chorus of a familiar tune: “What are they teaching them in high school?” They were baffled as to why college freshmen were clueless about how to use the Internet as a research tool. Below are classroom tested solutions to typical problems students and teachers face when students use the Internet for academic research purposes.
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