iTTi New York Interview

I love English, and I love teaching it even more. I enjoy observing people progress towards fluency.

Being a teacher is a great job. I have done is for so many years and have never been bored a minute. It’s a job that challenges you all the time and requires you to give your best. It is beautiful to watch students grow. Apart from a decent salary, you work in a nice environment. Plus, you get to see the world while being paid.

It was Teachers Day. My English students had placed a large pail filled with vanilla and chocolate pudding on my desk to congratulate me. In that class, we all ate pudding.

In fifth and seventh grade, I started learning languages. The classes were utterly boring due to the lack of meaningful context. Whatever language I started to learn, I had never been able to really use it. I recited a few phrases. That was it. That changed at the university level when we students had to only converse in the foreign language. Our teachers asked for fluency in a grammar-translation setting. That was really tough. When I eventually graduated and started to work at a high school, I was able to speak more than my students ever would.

When I became a teacher, I was taught to use the Grammar Translation Method. I recall that I always tried to make my classes interesting. My students would not talk or write fluently. In 1984, I got exposed to the Direct Method. I suddenly realized that all my struggle to make students learn English at the high school level had been in vain. The Direct Method taught me that students can learn a language successfully within a three-month period. The experience in that language school has definitely influenced my work as a language teacher. Eventually, I used Communicative Language Teaching in another school. Until today, I have been teaching prospective teachers to successfully use CLT in their instructional practices. CLT produces good results over a longer period of time and is more suitable for the large number of students you encounter in the public schools.

I am more of a facilitator and encourage self-learning in the classroom through increased peer to teacher learning. Throughout the lesson, I ask students to question rather than simply have the answer given to them. In this style, activities are used to promote self-discovery and develop problem-solving skills. Doing so can often lead to the student developing a much deeper understanding of the topic.

I am a visual learner. I like to have things written down, including instructions.

I would consider time management.

Whenever they learn new concepts, they often have difficulties. We have to review it several times to really have everybody understand it.

I use all available technology from the internet to audio, video and cell phone. Technology makes my classes varied.

A 21st Century Teacher is adaptive to our ever-changing classrooms. If a tool changes, he/she makes immediate efforts to update their knowledge. He/she engages in lifelong learning. Such a teacher is tech savvy and can handle all the technology in today’s classrooms. The 21st Century Teacher is forward thinking in terms of his/her students and knows how to collaborate with others.

It’s an individual who knows how to collaborate, think critically, communicate well, and have a high level of creativity. Considering that technology use continues to expand in schools, it’s worthwhile to think of how that technology can function in assignments designed to develop the skills our students need.

I see it as an opportunity to make language classes more effective through the use of AI. AI will support certain activities; however, it will never replace the teacher entirely.