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For three years, I earned my living as an English teacher, teaching English as a second language to Germans. A lot of my clients were corporate guys, wanting to learn English for their next trade negotiation with investors.
One even told me that she wanted to learn English because she was determined to topple her rival in the company, the boss’s assistant, whose English was terrible. So I may have been responsible for a mini coup d’etat in Germany!
Some of my clients though were children and they were a challenge all by themselves. As I discovered, children thought and felt differently than my adult clients. They weren’t concerned at all about boardroom coups or the upcoming speech that they would have to give in English to a group of Japanese businessmen.
Children just thought about how much they hated their parents for hiring an English teacher for extra-curricular lessons, and how could they get out of this hellhole as soon as humanely possible so they could get back to their computers or games consoles.
Therefore it wasn’t easy but the money was good, so I persevered. And throughout, I developed some ways to get them to engage. If you are teaching students English as a second language, in the interests of saving you from a heart attack, I am going to share my hard fought for tips.
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