Teaching English to adults

[Shincantsen]

I've recently been 'volunteered' by my boss to do a weekly hour-long English lesson for some of my Japanese coworkers. I taught elementary school as a JET and have next to no experience teaching adults. My students will all have at least basic English, and probably are quite good at reading and writing (just not speaking and listening). I'd like to do an assessment for the first lesson, but I'm not sure what that will be yet (maybe reading a news article and discussing it).

Does anyone have any tips on teaching adults? Things like how you structure lessons, activities you do, topics you cover, etc.

[vaterross]

As with most things, if this is a real class then you have to set goals and expectations and a curriculum and blah blah blah. If not, turn it into a topical discussion class. Set a theme that you think the majority will talk about, throw in some grammar points as things develop, maybe a few drinking games without the booze, and a related video or article for the people who like to read. Get them to talk to each other and keep track of common mistakes. Most adults appreciate knowing what they're doing wrong.

note: this is based on doing a less serious discussion based class with little prep from you.

[Jiggit]

Set up your own "Japanese People React" youtube channel. You'll make thousands.

[alee50]

Teaching adults are quite different, but I find this to be very useful and I think you will too.

Breaking News English Lessons: Easy English News | Current Events

Just choose what you want to teach and has a lot get you're started.

[Jiggit]

Every time I see people recommend breaking news English I feel a little bit less bad about myself.

[elmaldito]

I've recently been 'volunteered' by my boss to do a weekly hour-long English lesson for some of my Japanese coworkers. I taught elementary school as a JET and have next to no experience teaching adults. My students will all have at least basic English, and probably are quite good at reading and writing (just not speaking and listening). I'd like to do an assessment for the first lesson, but I'm not sure what that will be yet (maybe reading a news article and discussing it).

Does anyone have any tips on teaching adults? Things like how you structure lessons, activities you do, topics you cover, etc.

It's been a while since your post. How is this going? I think this is a good opportunity and you can put it down on your CV showing you've experience teaching both kids and adults.

How many of them are there?

For me one of the problems with Breaking News English is that the guy on the listenings has a very unnatural voice and then there's a more advanced version of each mp3 which is simply that same guy's voice speeded up! Totally unnatural, but I guess it can give you some ideas and/or you could use bits you like and modify them.