ESL teaching techniques

Synchronous vs. Asynchronous Learning
What is the difference between synchronous and asynchronous learning?

The time has come – or rather it was hastened  by a pandemic – but in any case, a digital transformation in education has arrived.

Many teachers are needing to be quick studies, as they discover new tools and methods to streamline teaching and administration. And in doing so, many are coming to understand the power of a hybrid approach. Some of the biggest advantages of online course delivery are flexibility and the availability of options. This is where Synchronous and Asynchronous classes come in to play. Which method to use, and when, can make all the difference for a successful outcome for both teachers and students.

What are Synchronous and Asynchronous classes?

For synchronous classes, the instructor and the students are present online at the same time and in direct communication. Teachers instruct through video or audio conferencing, or live chat. The lectures and discussions are at a fixed time and students can only access the lecture if they are present online at the time it takes place.

Asynchronous classes refer to classes where the instructor and the students are not present online at the same time. The instructor uploads material, lectures, and assignments to a designated portal that students can access anytime, and from anywhere. 

Both synchronous and asynchronous classes have advantages and disadvantages. Let’s dive in and cover some so that you can make a decision as to when to use what method.

Synchronous classes

Advantages:

– Interactive sessions

-Immediate answers to their questions

-Easier sharing of ideas between student and instructor,  or among students

-More in-depth instructions

-Spontaneity and flexibility in lectures

In synchronous classes students and teachers can interact, ask questions, and present ideas spontaneously. For example, teachers may ask students to have a conversation about what they did on the weekend or present something to show they understand how to use vocabulary and expressions in context. The instructor can give them immediate feedback and the student can feel motivated and connected to their teacher.

Disadvantages:

-Rigid time constraints

-Dependent on connectivity and bandwidth

Unfortunately, synchronous classes can be a problem for students who have a hard time logging on at a certain time, or who have poor internet connectivity. And slow learners may find it difficult to grasp concepts during synchronous classes. 

Asynchronous classes

Advantages:

-Flexibility: time and pace

-Less chances of technical problems

-Less formal compared to synchronous classes

-Immediately informed of digital quiz results

Disadvantages:

-Lack of real-time interaction

-Difficulty in staying on track or meeting deadlines

-Delayed feedback with some tasks

Asynchronous classes are convenient for students who struggle to attend online classes. They allow them to work at their own pace and on their own time. In asynchronous classes, the instructor assigns vocabulary, listening, reading, writing tasks, etc., and the students can complete the work any time prior to the deadline. There is, however, a chance that they will procrastinate and try to complete all the work right at the deadline. Other important things to point out are:

1. The instructor only provides feedback after the assignments are submitted

2. There are no real-time question-answer sessions

Pocket Passport provides teachers with tools to create extremely fun and interactive lessons and courses. And they can use materials and resources  for both synchronous and asynchronous learning. Teachers can share illustrations to initiate conversations, show a video, assign tasks in breakout rooms, and a lot more.

Pocket Passport’s lesson and course builder gives teachers options to create bite-sized lessons that students can complete on their own time. It also gives educators tools to gamify lessons with badges and stamps as they achieve lesson and course objectives.

Conclusion

The best results come from using a combination of both synchronous and asynchronous classes. It’s important to provide students with real-time feedback and opportunities to practice the language on one hand. On the other, it essential to provide fun and engaging materials to acquire new vocabulary and expressions, practice listening, reading, and writing. When done properly there is unlimited potential to maximize students learning. 

How will pictures and illustrations help my students to learn?

 

  • Will pictures really keep my students talking?

 

  • Can students learn with pictures?

 

  • How will storytelling help my students remember vocabulary?

 

  • Does storytelling help students understand the deeper meaning of words?

 

Many teachers dislike it when students are reluctant to speak out of fear they’ll make a mistake. Teachers and leaders need to facilitate conversation and learning. We need to break the silence, get students talking, laughing and communicating.

 

Students who lack imagination, can’t think of a word, struggle to create full sentences… storytelling can help. 

 

There are students who know 10,000 words, but can barely utter a sentence. There are others who know 1500 words and sound fluent (at least to someone new to teaching).

 

Memorizing words is very different from being able to use them correctly and effectively.

 

There was one person who you may have heard of that is especially well known for thinking and creating with images.

 

And that’s my story for today…

 

Have you ever heard of this guy? 

 

 

He was a very quiet kid.

 

He hardly spoke at all until he was three years old. His parents thought that something was wrong with him and they consulted a doctor.

 

He was even told that he would never amount to much.

 

When he was about 5 years old, his parents gave him a magnetic compass.

 

And that is where it all began.

 

He was fascinated by the fact that no matter which way he turned the compass, the needle always pointed in the same direction. This new “toy” made him curious. It made him wonder about magnetic fields, which led him to become interested in physics.

 

That’s how his lifetime journey of exploration started. Many years later, he wrote about the compass saying: “That experience made a deep and lasting impression on me. ”

 

His name: Albert Einstein.

 

Most of us are not that level genius. But we do have the same capacity to be curious about new things. We love novelty.

 

Albert Einstein once said what?

 

He once said that all of his most important and productive thinking was done by playing with images in his imagination, “imagination is more important than knowledge.”

 

His work on gravity was influenced by imagining riding a free-falling elevator.

 

Everyone is born with an imagination. Storytelling is engrained in us. We are all storytellers to some degree. 

 

We are nothing like Albert Einstein, but visual images do help connect our thoughts. They can help us retain things by sequencing ideas together and putting words in context.

 

New words are novel and we should explore and create with them.

 

The mind and imagination are wonderful things. Our job as teachers and leaders is to give our students opportunities to use words. 

 

Don’t just ask them to memorize a random list of words and expect them to pass the test you give them. Give your students opportunities to grow. Ask them to tell you a story about their weekend (I mean a real story with adjectives and suspense, etc.)

 

Here’s some food for thought:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/rethinking-thought/201602/new-look-visual-thinking

 

http://content.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1936731_1936743_1936760,00.html

 

Keywords: overcoming shyness, how to overcome shyness in the ESL-EFL classroom

pexels-pixabay-267669

High Frequency Vocabulary 

 

What things do you consider when planning a lesson or course? How useful is

 

the vocabulary you’re teaching?

 

Did you know that your students can understand 90% of English with less

 

than 12% of the average native speaker’s total vocabulary?

 

There are over 600,000 words in the English language (of course this differs

 

like everything according to which dictionary or other source you refer to)

 

That’s pretty much impossible for anybody to learn.

 

Of course, almost nobody knows all 600,000 words.

 

So, how many words do you think the average university educated

 

English speaker knows?

 

About 20,000.

 

However, in order to understand 92% of English on TV, in movies, magazines,

 

online, in books and newspapers you only need to know the top 2800.

 

Who in their right mind figured this out?

 

Well … a guy named Charlie Browne … Actually …Dr. Charlie Browne led some

 

research (you can learn more and download all of the lists yourself using the

 

links below).

 

He based it off of about 273 million words taken from a variety of British and

 

American sources.

 

They discovered that 2800 words would give you 92% coverage of general

 

English (this is known as Zipf’s Law)

 

 

Basically, Zipf’s Law states that some words are used much more frequently

 

than others.

 

 

And that the most frequent words make up a larger percentage of everything

 

we read, watch, listen to and hear.

 

 

So we often use the same words over and over again.

 

 

So what exactly is the NGSL word list?

 

The NGSL is a list of 2800 of the most frequently used words in everyday

 

English.

 

The list does not include proper nouns, numbers and dates.

 

 

The NGSL is ordered according to frequency. In other words, how often the

 

word is used throughout the English language.

 

 

This can be quite challenging for ESL and EFL students as is.

 

 

It’s a powerful tool, however we caution it should be used with thought and

 

planning.

 

Let’s look at some examples of why you need to order the words according to

 

your needs, student levels, interests, course goals, etc.

 

 

Words such as political, process and policy are all in the top 400 words.

 

 

Other words such as telephone, weather and cook are not as frequent. These

 

words are listed after the top 1000.

 

 

For beginner and low intermediate students, we don’t recommend assigning

 

vocabulary based on frequency. This is putting the cart before the horse so to

 

speak.

 

A group of experienced ESL-EFL teachers have re-ordered the NGSL wordlist

 

to make it friendlier for lower level students. We refer to it as PESL and is

 

simply the NGSL reordered to be more ESL friendly for beginner students.

 

 

This is just one example of how we are a simple and practical approach to

 

teaching and learning English.

 

Learn more about the NGSL, NGSL-s and research involving his high frequency word lists: http://www.newgeneralservicelist.org/

vocabORgrammar

Which do you focus on more in class?

 

This is always an interesting question and one that we as teachers will

inevitably always debate. The truth is that they are both very important.

 

There really is no clear cut answer for one or the other, but most teachers

push one more than the other.

 

That together with depending on which country you live and teach, the school

system will push one over the other.

 

As native speakers, we don’t typically study grammar patterns of our native

tongue. At least I can’t ever remember studying them in school.

 

Instead we learn first from hearing and repeating. We try to copy our parents

or siblings.

 

Then pointing and repeating. We want something, we go for it.

 

Then being read to or reading, singing and playing.

 

Speaking and short conversations. Practice, practice and more practice.

 

And on and on.

 

So as a result of the above… we believe that vocabulary is key to learning a

language. We think that it’s the foundation for which we communicate.

 

Putting the words in the right order (structure) will come with listening

practice, reading, and speaking in a variety of situations. Practice, practice and

more practice.

 

It really isn’t just that simple though.

 

Why is it more than just words?

 

English isn’t just a bunch of words or words that are structured in a way that

are meaningful.

 

Collocations, idioms and chunks are equally important. The higher the level of

the speaker, the more of these we see.

Many words in sentences when taken out of context make no sense at all.

 

English really isn’t a piece of cake (this idiom would make no sense at all to an

EFL-ESL student)

 

It’s raining like cats and dogs (your students would be lost if they looked up

each of these and tried to make meaning of this idiom)

 

Words have multiple meanings. Depending on the intonation or rhythm we

use, they can mean something completely different.

 

Let me stop there before I completely go off on another tangent.

 

There’s a lot to learning a language. Students need to start somewhere, and I

think that somewhere is vocabulary.