Claudine Williams
I believe in creating a stress-free, friendly, and encouraging learning environment where students are free to ask questions, voice their ideas, and improve their communication skills. With the right support, students who are accustomed to the scenery surrounding China’s mighty Great Wall of China, can meet new people and enjoy the Statue of Liberty.
I believe that students thrive on learning opportunities that they could genuinely use to succeed in their professional and personal lives.
“The best methods are therefore those that supply ‘comprehensible input’ in low anxiety situations, containing messages that students really want to hear — Stephen Krashen’s Theory of Second Language Acquisition, emeritus at the University of Southern California.
It is my opinion that some adults struggle with learning because they feel insecure, and their feelings of insecurity and disrupt their ability to learn. To combat their insecurities, I believe in taking an interest in my students career and personal goals for language acquisition. A supportive, friendly atmosphere, and proper scaffolding and skills-building activities will prompt my students to participate in class.
I teach strategies for understanding words that my students do not understand. For example, I teach my students to identify words they do not know and look them up, use cues from other words they do know, and I encourage them to ask for help, so they could be provided with synonyms.
It is important that students understand grammar in their target language, but it is equally important for them to understand how to communicate and comprehend written and spoken communication. I want to help my students enhance their ability to communicate socially and professionally. Most importantly, I want to help my students to use their learned skills and apply what they have learned to cope in unfamiliar environments.