ESL Management

Attract and Retain Online English Students
Attention Online English Teachers: Here's a few easy ways to get and keep students for online English classes.

Every student that starts learning English has a different background and a

different motivation.

This means that you can’t just send the same lesson materials to everyone in

the same week. The lesson won’t be productive and the student won’t get all

that much out of it.

There are several online platforms for teaching conversational English. iTalki

and Preply are just a couple of examples.

The primary reason students choose iTalki is to have a conversation. It’s

a platform for conversational English and students (generally speaking) haven’t

signed up to master the TOEIC or IELTS tests.

Doing grammar exercises and correcting your students every mistake will not

make you a popular teacher. They are there to practice speaking and listening

primarily.

Talk about what your students are interested in and not what you are interested in.

What are good topics for conversational English?

Everyday topics of course, but it’s best to find out what they’re interested in

and plan accordingly.

Everyday topics may include:

  • Family – nothing too personal of course. Do not make them feel uncomfortable
  • Work – same as above. Don’t ask intrusive questions related to money, etc.
  • Interests
  • Travel

A lesson about family can be as basic or advanced as you tailor it.

For example, Beginner: “Do you have any brothers or sisters?” vs.

Intermediate/Advanced: “Tell me a story from your childhood about your

brother or sister.”

You should always send or assign lesson materials to students in advance. This

will give them extra confidence, show them that you’re prepared, and give

them something to look forward to. It will also help you retain students longer.

If you aren’t guiding and leading them, they’ll quit.

How are you different?

What’s your special sauce? How will you help them more than other teachers

will? How is your lesson different from other teachers?

Differentiate yourself by creating and providing lesson materials that stand

out.

Tell them how you are different and how your materials and method will help

them to progress faster than other teachers.

Simply sending them a PDF with 5 -10 questions will not pique their interest or

motivate them.

You don’t need to follow the lesson exactly, but use it as a guide for the

student. Give them something to prepare and look forward to.

Beginner to upper-intermediate students often prefer something more

structured. It’s important to show them that you have a plan.

For example, “We are going to work on small talk, pronunciation, and follow up

questions in tomorrow’s lesson.”

Upper-intermediate to advanced students on the other hand may prefer

something more natural and unstructured.

I’ve touched on feedback and evaluations in past blogs. However, it’s important

to point out quickly again that you shouldn’t current every mistake beginner and intermediate students make.

Listen and identify what types of mistakes they are commonly making and correct them. Be careful not to overcorrect.

It’s sometimes more challenging to do with advanced students. However the

same goes for them. They’re there to practice speaking because it’s not their

native language. Therefore it’s absolutely necessary that you correct them and

give them more natural phrases and expressions.

You should be jotting down notes during the lessons in order to give them

feedback at the end. This will show them that you were paying attention and it

provides tremendous value.

Your students should be talking, not you!

Student Talking Time (STT) vs. (TTT) vs. Teacher Talking Time

Many teachers feel uncomfortable with silence and start filling it with rants.

This isn’t going to make you a popular teacher! They are paying for this lesson

and they’re paying to practice speaking. You need to facilitate that in every

way possible. Yes, listening is another key skill, but talkative teachers aren’t

generally popular ones.

Just like many things in life the 80/20 rule applies here. Your students should

be speaking 80% of the time and you 20% of the time.

If you’re asking them questions and they’re answering with one-word answers,

then you should be prompting them to elaborate.

What types of things can you do to get them to speak?

Create a follow-up question wheel.

Just a simple wheel with questions words around it: what, when, where, why,

how, and who. Ask them a question with each.

Create a conjunctions wheel (be careful that the conjunctions are within their

level. For beginners this should be limited to: and, so, because, or)

For intermediate and advanced, you can add more conjunctions according to

their level.

Just point to a conjunction to encourage them to continue speaking.

Listening: play a short (and I do mean short) video and ask them questions

about it.

Finally and perhaps most importantly, give them quality feedback.

Include examples of things that you spoke about, constructive comments

about natural expressions, and hint at something that you might cover with

them next time. Make sure you give them an idea and sense that you have a

plan. This shows them that you understand what their strengths and

weaknesses are and most importantly that you have a plan on how they can

improve.

Final thought…

No matter which platform you’re using, give your students feedback via chat

throughout the lesson.

We have a ton of awesome materials for conversational English. Attract and

retain students with engaging, quality content and students accounts that will

keep them motivated.

We give away lots of conversation material on our Facebook, Instagram and

YouTube channel. Follow us!

Retain your English Students
Students give up learning English all the time.

How do your students know that they are actually making progress? An

absolutely essential part of any student’s development is receiving honest and

accurate feedback from their teacher. 

Learning English isn’t easy and without regular feedback, students will quickly get

discouraged and give up. 

It’s wise to sit with your students on their first day to make clear goals. They

should be the one making the goals and you should be the one guiding them and

asking them the right questions. 

These goals should be part of their student file. They should be what you the

teacher is giving them feedback towards and occasionally referring to.  

Tips for setting goals for your students learning English

Set goals for your students learning English
Set clear and achievable goals

What is their “North Star”? In other words, what is their ultimate goal for learning

English? 

Travel, to get promoted, to move to another country …

What is their goal for the next 30 days? This is the one that you really want to put

emphasis on and help cultivate. Remember that the first 30 days are the hardest.

Set a goal that they can and will achieve. 

Simple answers like, “to speak more confidently” or “to take 2 classes per week”

are not quality goals.

The goal “to take 2 classes per week” helps to answer how they’ll achieve the

goal but not what the goal actually is. 

This is where you can start guiding them right away. 

Instead, ask them, “how many new words will you learn?” Or if their goal is to

travel and make foreign friends ask them, “What are you into?”  – if they can’t

explain it in detail in English, then this is a great example of a short term

achievable goal. The same can be done with food, their job, their family… set

goals around things that they are into and passionate about. Make their goals

about them and not about a general textbook or curriculum. 

What is a goal they want to achieve in the next 6 months? Set a measurable goal

here. If you can’t measure it, they’ll never know if they achieved it. Recording a

conversation is also a great way to keep a record and show progress. 

Once you’ve established their short term and long term goals, setting something

in between is a piece of cake! 

If their North Star is work related, their short and mid-term goals should reflect

that. The same goes for interests, travel, etc.

Giving up on learning English is easy. It's the teacher's job to keep students motivated.

It’s easy to give up

Like going to the gym, the first days and first month are the hardest. Establishing a

routine and looking at the tough road ahead often discourages students from

pushing forward. 

I often use the gym analogy because learning English draws several good

comparisons. When people start going to the gym to lose weight, they often look

in the mirror and to their dismay they don’t see any results. Then one day, they

give into the temptation of eating the muffin or pizza and suddenly they’ve

completely given up. The next day is even harder to go to the gym.

Learning English is similar. Students take a class, study a few words then try to

listen to a song or watch a program in English only to realize how much work is

left.  

Bite-sized goals of 5 or 10 words at a time will help them tremendously. It will help

them see and feel progress.

And the same as the gym analogy, it’s often the people with a personal trainer

that get the best results. You need to be that personal trainer. 

You are their teacher, motivator, coach and mentor. 

What is “quality” feedback?

There is verbal feedback and written feedback. Giving students both types is

equally important. Often written feedback can summarize some or all of the things

that you covered in class. 

If you are teaching classes online via Skype or Zoom or another platform, it’s

good practice to pause and message them feedback. It will show them that you’re

listening to what they’re saying.

Take notes during the class. Do NOT rely on your memory! Taking notes of

mistakes will make the feedback process 3 painless and rewarding minutes

instead of 15 painful minutes of trying to recollect what they said.

Also include a variety of feedback: vocabulary, grammar, intonation,

pronunciation, sentence structure, etc.  

Effective feedback should be:

1. Constructive

It’s essential to give honest feedback. Include a balance of positive and

constructive comments. Too much positive feedback can sound insincere, while

excessive constructive comments can be perceived as negative and cause self-

doubt. Constructive feedback will encourage students to think critically about how

they can improve. Give concrete examples of what they said and how they could

or should have said it. 

Phrase your comments like:

Positive

  • Great job with … (what exactly did the student do/say?)
  • You used the perfect expression to talk about/express … (what exactly did the

student do/say?)

  • You’ve made great improvement with … (what exactly have they made great

improvement with?)

Constructive

  • Don’t forget to … (what exactly was the problem?)
  • Remember to … (what exactly was the problem?)
  • It will help you to review … (what exactly was the problem?)

2. Timely

It’s important to give students timely feedback. What is “timely”? Within 12 hours

of them taking their class is in most cases considered timely. Giving students

feedback more than 24 hours after the class won’t have the same impact or

effect. It needs to be when it’s still fresh in their minds in order to motivate them. 

3. Meaningful and Specific

Quality feedback should target individual needs. You need to focus on the skills

that each student needs to improve. Too much feedback is discouraging and will

just overwhelm your students. Choose 3 things that they can improve on and

make them specific.

For example, “You said, ‘He’s going friend house.’ – The correct way to say this is,

‘He’s going to his friend’s house.’ – Remember ‘going to’ and ‘his’ – Make 10

sentences with ‘going to’ and send them to me before next class.”

Note also how I gave them a specific task and not a general. Guide them and tell

them exactly what they need to do. 

Feedback will help your students in several ways and will help you retain them

both short and long-term. 

Helps to improve performance

How motivated students continue to be is mostly dependent on learning

outcomes. An excellent way to gauge this is by evaluating students. Feedback is

an integral part of how much effort they put forth between now and the next class.

It helps students understand and work on the things they aren’t good at. It’s a

written record that you can both refer back to and something they’ll actively try to

improve on each class.

Source of quality information

Teachers play a vital role in enhancing the overall learning experience. They help

to detect mistakes and highlight the key areas that require improvement. They are

a source of external feedback, support and motivation.

Positive feedback should result in a feeling that encourages the student to keep

learning. It should motivate students and make them feel like they’re progressing.

Offering constructive and clear feedback can help to optimize students learning

potential. You are their teacher and they trust you. 

Gives them a sense of gratification

Everyone loves to feel valued and appreciated. Think of how your students will

react to your comment. If it is constructive feedback, it will encourage the student

to perform better. Feedback is also in itself an accomplishment. Students will feel

gratified when seeing and feeling progress. Your feedback will keep them inspired

to continue learning. 

Keeping all of these things in mind when giving feedback will help you motivate

your students take more lessons but also to continue.

Check out Pocket Passport’s feedback and evaluation and counseling tools. They

make everything easier, more organized and help ensure that your students keep

coming. 

Rules for English Schools
There are a few things that you need to consider when deciding on rules for your English school.

There are lots of things to think about when making rules for your school.

 

In this blog, I’ll cover 5 things that every English school should think about

when making rules for class reservations. Specifically I’ll touch on what you

need to think about when making rules for when and how often students can

cancel their lesson. Also, what types of lessons they can take if they’re allowed

to take makeup lessons.

 

The answers to these questions really depend on the type of classes that you

are offering.

 

Remember, if you are too lenient, it will negatively affect your bottomline. If

you are too strict, you may scare students away.

 

A lot of what you choose to do also depends on how you market it. I’ve given a

few examples below and will touch on more on this in future blogs.

 

Here are 5 things to get you started!

 

How’s your schedule look?

 

1. Consider your schedule

 

If you’re offering more options to take makeup lessons, will you be able to

cover them?

 

Will you be opening up and offering new lessons or will they be joining lessons

that already exist?

 

If they’re able to join other classes, it might not affect anything. If you’re

creating a new class, how much will it cost you to open the new class? Is it

worth it?

 

Can you monetize it?

 

What extra value does this add for students? What is that added value worth?

For example, creating a super flexible membership level should come at a

premium.

 

How you advertise and market it is also key.

 

Premium: For the super busy businessman/woman, Mom or Dad whose

schedule often changes at the last minute due to responsibilities.

 

Basic: For those who have control over their schedule and come whenever

they want.

 

The way that you advertise and market the different membership types you

have will help your customers decide which tier they fall under. Worded

properly it will also help persuade them into buying one membership over the

other. People want to be looked at in certain ways.

 

How much time do you need to prepare for lessons?

 

2. Consider what goes into planning a lesson

 

How much time is spend tailoring lessons depending on who’s in your class?

 

This is especially important when determining the “How far in advance” rule.

 

This doesn’t affect some teachers, schools and systems.

 

How will the quality of lessons will be affected?

 

Will this reflect in my lessons?

 

How will this potentially be looked at by students? By this last question, if

you’re selling a premium lesson at a premium price and you’re allowing Jane

Doe to sign in for a lesson one minute before it starts … that isn’t going to look

like much of a premium lesson.

 

On the other hand if you’re offering a free conversation lesson, it won’t matter

as much.

 

How many students should I allow to take my class at the

same time?

 

3. Consider occupancy rates

 

Occupancy: What are the maximum number of seats in each class? How many

seats do you have to fill in order to break even?

 

If the maximum number of students per class is 4, how much profit will you

make?

 

“My two cents” tip: Do not try to pack in 10 or 12 students per class. Of course

this depends on the type of class that you’re offering.

 

Yes, there are methods and techniques to maximize student talking time in big

classes. On the other hand, the amount of quality feedback that you (or other

teachers) will be able to give them will be very limited. This does of course

depend on the type of lesson. Conversation based lessons demand more

immediate input and feedback from the teacher than a writing class (which

you can give written feedback after the class) Choose accordingly, but choose

wisely.

 

This is another example of how you might market lessons.

 

For example, “We only allow a maximum of 4 students per class in order to

maximize student talking time. We want to ensure there’s ample time to give

students immediate quality feedback.”

 

How many levels should my school have?

 

4. Consider your curriculum and level structure

 

How many levels does your school have? If you’re just starting out and offer

group classes, go lean.

 

This is an important thing to consider because if you offer makeup lessons,

you need to think about whether they’ll be too challenging.

 

If your school doesn’t have many levels, there will be more challenging going

from one level to next.

 

Generally speaking the more levels you offer, the easier the transition from

one level to the next.

 

However, keep in mind that the more levels you offer, the less likely you may

be to fill the seats until your student numbers increase.

 

The number of classes that you offer should reflect your student

demographics. In other words, how many students are false beginner,

beginner, low intermediate, etc.?

 

If you’re just opening your English school it’s wise to start with 2 or 3 levels

and tell students that you plan to add another level in “x” number of months.

 

There are many more things to consider, but these are 4 things that will get

you started when deciding whether or not students can cancel lessons.

 

As the owner of your English school, you need to define what your rules are.

Every sustainable business that offers a service has rules. 

In order to create value for students and maximize profit, you need to set and stick to the rules. 

One important thing to keep in mind when setting up your school rules is that

one you should only do it once. 

It will hurt your school’s bottomline to change them. Inform your students and

be clear about what the rules are, and only budge in extreme cases. Being a

pushover won’t help you in the long run. 

 

Pocket Passport: Save time, eliminate mistakes and offer value

 

Managing reservations is a lot of work. It can eat up large parts of your day

very quickly. 

 

The Pocket Passport online reservation system is very flexible and is designed

for school owners to create a variety of classes and options to maximize your

class capacity. It gives you options to up sell students on benefits for premium

membership types.

 

Students will pay extra for flexibility. Offer a premium ticket package that

gives students makeup chances if they cancel their lessons. 

 

Another option might be to offer students makeup lessons that are above

and/or below their level. By offering a plan like this, students will have more

options to take makeup lessons.

 

Types of Students and Tickets

 

Note: 1 class = 1 ticket

 

There are typically two types of tickets: Fixed and flexible. 

 

Students with Fixed Tickets come at the same time and the same day every

week. 

 

Students with flexible tickets come whenever their schedule permits and

according to what’s available at your school. 

 

Cancelation Rule & Grace Period

 

The first rule you should consider is your cancelation rule.

 

There are three things to keep in mind here.

 

1. If a student cancels a lesson after this cancelation rule, they will lose their

ticket. For example, if your cancelation rule is one hour before a lesson and the

student cancels their lesson 30 minutes before the lesson, they will lose their

ticket.

 

2. By default, Pocket Passport offers a grace period for flexible tickets. The

grace period is 24 hours. So if a student cancels a lesson 24 hours or one full

day before the cancelation rule they will get their ticket back with no penalty.

 

So for example, if the cancelation rule is set to 60 minutes…

 

– the student can cancel their class 24 hours + the cancelation rule. In this case

it’s 60 minutes or one hour, so the student must cancel their class 25 hours

before the class starts in order to get their ticket back.

 

3. If the student cancels their lesson after the grace period, but before the

cancelation period, the student will get a makeup lesson (if you’re offering

makeup lessons).

 

If you don’t offer makeups, they will lose their ticket completely after the

grace period.

 

Offer value to your students

 

Remember you can create multiple ticket types with Pocket Passport.

 

So for example, your “Basic Plan” might not offer makeup lessons, but your

“Premium Plan” might. If the student didn’t buy the “Premium Plan”, they’ll

lose their ticket when they cancel. If they did buy the “Premium Plan”, they’ll

be able to take a makeup lesson according to your school rules.

 

With Pocket Passport’s flexible reservation system, you can assign different

types of tickets to different students in the same class.

 

 

What are Makeup Level Rules?

 

There are 2 kinds of makeup lessons.

 

Renewable and non-renewable

 

Renewable

 

A renewable makeup lesson means that the student can cancel their lesson

multiple times within the renewable period.

So for example, if you set the renewable period to 10 days, and Angela cancels

her lesson on April 1st, she has until April 11th to make that lesson up.

 

If she cancels her lesson again on April 5th, the expiration date remains the

same: April 11th, BUT she can reserve a makeup lesson again.

 

Non-renewable

 

A non-renewable makeup lesson means students only have one chance to

make up the canceled lesson before they lose it. If they cancel the makeup

lesson when it’s non-renewable, they lose it entirely.

 

Of course, you don’t have to offer any makeup lesson if you don’t want. 

 

Again, this is a great option and up sell to offer your students. Offer 3 types of

packages:

 

1. Basic (no makeup lesson)

 

2. Silver (non-renewable makeup lesson)

 

3. Premium (renewable makeup lesson)

 

NOTE: the makeup level rules are the only rules in school set up that can be

changed.

 

What is the Upward/Downward Rules for Makeup Lessons?

 

Next, let’s look at the upward/downward rule for makeup lessons.

 

If your school allows makeups:

 

a. are they permitted to take makeup lessons in their level only?

 

b. are they allowed to take makeup lessons in classes above and below their

level?

 

If they are allowed to take them in other levels, how many levels above or

below?

 

NOTE: This is JUST another option and level of flexibility. You do not have to

offer makeup lessons above and below their level. However, this is something

that you may experiment with and change as your school grows.

 

What’s the Global Setting in Pocket Passport? 

 

The global setting is for flexible tickets only. The global setting is for schools

who allow students to take lessons in other levels. This is a great option to

offer for students with low or high confidence. This allows the student to view

and reserve lessons in other levels in addition to their own.

 

If your school is set to GLOBAL, this will allow students with normal or monthly

flexible tickets to see and reserve classes in other levels.

 

If this setting is not on, students will not be able to see other other levels.

 

What’s the Advance Appointment Rule?

 

Far in advance rule – how many days in advance are your students allowed to

reserve lessons?

 

How far into the future can they view the schedule. For example, can they see

lessons 30 days into the future?

 

Last minute rule.

 

How many minutes before the lesson can a student reserve the lesson?  If a

student can reserve a lesson right up until the lesson starts, you can just set it

as 1. If students must reserve a lesson 60 minutes before the start of the

lesson, you would set this at 60.

 

The flexibility for students to book right up until the start of the lesson is great

on one hand. On the other hand, if there’s a big gap between student levels at

your school, you may need time to prepare the right lesson material.

 

Final thoughts

 

Before you set your rules, there are things that you should carefully consider.

Check out tomorrow’s blog to learn the top 4 things that every school owner

should consider when setting your school rules. 

 

Online Reservation System for English Schools
Does your English school offer online reservations?

Should my school offer make up lessons?

 

When I took over the school that I used to own, I took over all the rules and

 

guidelines. Actually, I took over a school that didn’t have ANY rules!

 

Students were free to come and go as they pleased.

 

There were 3 ways that they could sign up for lessons:

 

1.  there was a book with a calendar in it. They could write their name in the

 

time slot they wanted to take a lesson.

 

2.  call me or the part-time staff that I had (the part-time staff only worked

 

about 8 hours per week back then)

 

3. they could email us

 

 

Scheduling the old school way

 

 

Scheduling and handling the reservations was a pretty big job in itself.

 

Students had cards with squares on the back that we ticked off each time they

 

took a lesson.

 

Sometimes they forgot their cards and we had to try to keep track of that as

 

well.

 

About a year later when we grew a little bigger a friend

 

recommended I look into an online reservation system. After a few months of

 

procrastinating I finally did and it saved me a lot of time, energy and money.

 

I readily admit that I should have changed the rules and implemented more

 

structure as soon as I took the school over.

 

 

Students could cancel without any penalty. They could just not show up and

 

still not lose the lesson.

 

Students often asked for extensions on their contracts. No problem!

 

 

What kinds of rules should my school have?

 

The first rule that I suggest implementing is your makeup rule.

 

Should you offer make up lessons or not? How many per month or year? How

 

far ahead of a lesson should my students have to cancel lessons before

 

they’re penalized?

 

 

First off, let’s define what a make up lesson is, since some schools may have

 

their own idea or definition of what that may be.

 

 

A make up lesson is when a student is absent from a lesson due to illness or

 

for personal reasons.

 

 

Every school should have a rule that explains and clearly defines:

 

 

a. How many make up lessons students are able to take each month or year.

 

For example, students can cancel and make up one lesson per month.

 

 

b. Schools define the deadlines for when students must cancel their lesson by.

 

For example, students must cancel by 11:00pm the night before the lesson or

 

they’ll lose that lesson credit entirely.

 

 

Or students must cancel no later than three hours before the lesson or they’ll

 

lose the lesson credit entirely.

 

 

IMPORTANT: Set a time limit for how long students can

reserve makeup lessons

 

 

c. How long is the make up lesson valid?

 

 

For example, when a student cancels a lesson, how long do they have until that

 

“make up lesson” expires (for example, 21 days)

 

 

So Yuko cancels her lesson before the deadline and she has 21 days to make it

 

up.

 

 

IMPORTANT: if she cancels the make up lesson, the original expiration date for

 

that make up lesson applies.

 

 

Scenario A: The deadline is 11:00 pm the night before.

 

 

Yuko cancels her lesson at 10:30pm on August 1st.

 

 

She’s given a make up lesson and has 21 days to do the make up lesson, which

 

means the expiry date for the make up lesson is August 22nd.

 

 

Yuko reserves a make up lesson on August 7th.

 

 

She cancels the make up lesson on August 5th – The deadline remains the

 

same.

 

 

The deadline is not for an additional 21 days from the date that she canceled,

 

it’s the original make up lesson deadline.

 

 

So even if Yuko cancels her make up lesson on August 5th, the make up date

 

wouldn’t change to the 26th, it would remain August 22nd. It DOES NOT

 

continue to change each time that she cancels the make up lesson.

 

 

Of course there may be exceptions to the rule, when admin chooses or needs

 

to override the system and allow for a student who needs to miss an entire

 

month because of influenza, etc. However having clearly defined rules in place

 

is critical to ensuring that students (or parents) are not taking advantage of

 

you.

 

Be careful how many make up lessons you offer.

 

 

I’ll cover more things about ticket types and rules in next week’s blogs. Having

 

clear rules in place will save you a lot of headaches, time and money.

 

Structuring rules the right way can also create extra revenue. More about that

 

next week!

 

Keeping track of all of this… isn’t fun! Pocket Passport’s online reservation

 

system is a flexible solution for language schools. Cancelation rules, makeup

 

lessons, level up, level down and lots more.