Episode Guide: Conversation, Grammar and Teacher Personality – S07E01

How to English TEFL Podcast: Conversation, Reflection and Teacher Personality – S07E01

Season seven opens with practical reflections on spontaneous lessons, lower-level conversation and being yourself in class

Gav and Em return for season seven with a freer conversational format. They compare approaches to grammar and speaking, discuss what to do when a lesson runs out of momentum, celebrate authentic conversation at lower levels and consider how gradually teachers should reveal their personalities.

Episode Chapters

00:00 Welcome and a new season format

01:40 Planning and confidence in conversation lessons

04:20 Conversation-led and grammar-led teaching

10:30 Turning grammar exercises into discussion

13:30 Hot feedback and teaching journals

15:45 What to do when conversation dries up

24:10 Authentic conversation with A1–A2 learners

30:00 Bringing teacher personality into class

39:40 Closing reflections

Complete Cleaned Episode Conversation

Em: [00:00:00] Welcome everybody. This is How to English: teach and learn with Gav and Em.

Gav: It’s a podcast about teaching and learning English as a foreign language.

Em: All opinions stated are personal and references will be given when necessary.

Music: Roller disco music.

Em: We’re back.

Gav: We are back with season seven of Gav and Em’s: How to English TEFL Pod. Are you ready Em and the followers for a whole new season of Gav and Em’s podcast all about teaching and learning English?

Em: I am ready, willing, and able to talk to you all about the world of TEFL.

Gav: I’m very excited to hear your ideas. So Em, how are we going to approach this season? Because it has to be different from all the other six.

Em: It does. And I was thinking maybe we should relax a bit and just chat.

Gav: Are you trying to tell me I was not relaxed in the previous six seasons?

Em: [00:01:00] Huh. you were relaxed. I was relaxed, but we did do a lot of thinking and prepping and collating, I think, activities, which is all great, but I’d like to prefix this season with the sentence, “Lately I’ve been thinking about…,” and let’s just get thoughts going. Let’s just chit chat.

Gav: I like the idea of that. You mean we shouldn’t spend hours preparing games and activities that we might want to share with our teacher and learner followers?

Em: Well, we have done that quite a lot, so, no, I was thinking this time let’s just free wheel it and think about conversational topics. It kind of brings me to my first topic, Gav, because lately I’ve been thinking about what it’s like to teach conversation lessons, and I think I’ve evolved as a teacher because [00:02:00] maybe at the beginning of my teaching career, I would’ve had a conversation lesson and I would’ve prepped for hours and I would’ve had lots of pair work and speaking activities and topics written on pieces of paper.

Gav: Which is not a bad idea.

Em: It’s not a bad idea.

Gav: Certainly for beginner teachers.

Em: All that scaffolding is necessary.

Gav: And I think students probably expect it.

Em: Perhaps they do, and I still do that sometimes because it does create a great lesson. But I have been reflecting, and lately I’ve been thinking about how much confidence it takes to just go into a lesson with no planning and create the lesson from the students, and what they talk about. As a teacher, our role is obviously to lead. Correct. Get everybody talking equally. So we are, sort of, orchestrating these lessons. And if it’s a conversation lesson, you have to be [00:03:00] aware of who’s talking, who’s dominant, who’s not talking, bringing people in, who aren’t talking by softly or, you know, encouragingly asking them what they think or getting other students to ask them what they think, but to do that for 90 minutes or 60 minutes or 45 minutes, I think takes quite a lot of confidence – to know that you can actually do that and that it will last that long.

Gav: How can you know that you can do that until you’ve tried?

Em: That’s where I think I’m at, Gav. I think I’m at the point of realizing I can do it. And I need to have the confidence to know that I can do it. And that is easier said than done. And it doesn’t matter how many times you do something, sometimes you still don’t feel that confident. But as we go through our TEFL lives and teach more, we do grow in our confidence. And perhaps that’s something to be gained as a veteran teacher that you know you can. Obviously, it [00:04:00] does depend on the group. It does depend on the students. If you’ve got students who are not that chatty, you might need all those activities to help you, but I think if you relax a bit, it’ll generally help you. How does it go with you in your conversation classes? Do you have conversation classes?

Gav: I’m not entirely sure what you mean by ‘conversation class’ because my classes are often conversation based, but we might slip into a little grammar activity if I think it’s necessary.

Em: So you are saying, your whole teaching style is conversation based?

Gav: For my general, and most of my business English classes, yeah, they’re fairly conversational based. But again, if I have errors recurring amongst the students, I will whip out a worksheet and say, “Hey, you lot, do this worksheet, and if you make the same [00:05:00] mistake in the future, I will be hot on your heels.”

Em: But that takes confidence too, doesn’t it? To have those activities or grammar points ready. How do you feed them in so that it doesn’t interrupt the flow or make the lesson feel very disjointed?

Gav: I don’t know if my students would say my classes are disjointed.

Em: Well, they clearly don’t, Gav, you’re very successful. But I’m asking, how do you achieve that?

Gav: Well, I don’t know. Maybe they do say, “Oh, teacher Gav’s lessons are really disjointed, but he does hammer home some of those key grammar points that we need to fix.”

Em: I don’t know about that. I’m not sure I can imagine your lessons going in that way and your students saying, “Yeah, Gav’s all over the place, but we get it done.”

Gav: I’m not sure it’s a problem to be all over the place because life is all over the place. Conversations are jumping around quite often.

Em: They are jumping around, but they don’t usually involve, “Oh, and by the way, this is the way we use [00:06:00] articles correctly.”

Gav: Well, this is why it’s an English lesson and not a normal conversation.

Em: Yeah, and I think that’s a really hard skill and to get the right balance with it becoming a conversation that’s educational and also a lesson, and not just a chat, because I think that’s a problem that can occur – when you have conversation lessons – that you forget you’re there to teach and you just get involved in the conversation. But that’s really hard as well to actually make it feel like a lesson, but a conversation at the same time. I think conversation lessons are quite a challenge, to be honest.

Gav: I think they are too. And on top of that, you may have a student who actually just wants to have a conversation and not be corrected very much at all.

Em: Well, that’s why needs analysis are very important to understand what students are expecting.

Gav: Needs analysis? What’s that, Em?

Em: When you ask at the beginning of the [00:07:00] course, “What do you want from this…?”

Gav & Em: Course.

Em: Hahaha. And you’ve have to really pay attention. And I don’t know, because some students say they don’t want correction and then they do. Or they say they do want correction and they actually don’t – when you come round to doing it. It’s hard. But I think I’ve just realized that maybe conversation lessons are one of the hardest sort of lessons ’cause compared to just a page in a book, it’s different, isn’t it? I think a page in a book is a walk in the park compared to – you’ve got 90 minutes with six people to keep a conversation going. For me anyway.

Gav: I’m not sure I can agree with you there.

Em: Okay.

Gav: I sometimes open books and tell my students to do activities and then suddenly find that everything is unraveling where the students are either incapable, unwilling, disinterested.

Em: Mm.

Gav: Or perplexed as to why they should possibly be filling those gaps with these words in brackets?

Em: Oh, [00:08:00] well, I warm to books because for me, they offer a safety blanket of when the conversation dries up, “Oh, well, let’s look at exercise C now,” and then that gives me time to think of some conversation topics that come out of that exercise. So I love books because they give me the foundation for the conversation.

Gav: How could you be thinking of other things while you are doing book activities with your students? Are you not a hundred percent fixed on that activity with your students?

Em: Not a hundred percent. Obviously, I’m thinking about the answers and I’m checking the students are getting them right and thinking about the next one. But at the same time, my brain is thinking, right, what can I talk about as we’re going through this? How does this relate to my students? What can I generate from this exercise to create a conversation, even if it’s very grammar based. I think you could still pick out one or two things from those sentences.

Gav: Are you [00:09:00] integrating conversation skills into a grammar lesson now?

Em: Yeah, all the time. Well, now – we’re talking about two different things, but I’m saying that I can get a lot of conversation out of a grammar based lesson. That comes to me more naturally than feeding grammar into a conversation lesson. Which seems to be your strength.

Gav: That could well be. I think I approach my lessons more like a conversation from which the grammar may evolve or need to be refined.

Em: And I think I create conversation from grammar that is already being presented. So we’ve got two very different approaches there.

Gav: Do you think that your teaching may move away from grammar based lessons into more conversational, now you have this confidence?

Em: Well, I think that’s where I started. I’m learning to enjoy conversation lessons and see them more as a, a road to [00:10:00] traverse and guide my students down rather than this expanse of desert in front of me that is endless and could go in any direction with no refreshment or help available. I see it more as a fun thing, you know? And that doesn’t mean I don’t like the grammar based conversation lessons, but I’m getting there, I think.

Gav: Could you give us an example of how a grammar based lesson would look like? For our teacher and learner followers – compared to simply a conversation based lesson.

Em: Can I think of something just off the top of my head? Right. So we were doing prefixes and suffixes last week. Standard gap fill exercise. Is it un, dis, ir? It was all negative prefixes.

Gav: And that naturally led to you saying to your students, “Are you disinterested in theme parks?”

Em: No, hah, I think it [00:11:00] was a little bit more natural. I mean, that’s not a bad question, but yeah. If maybe the gap fill was…

Gav: Have you underestimated anything recently?

Em: Haha. Yeah, okay. You are making it sound really dry, but it doesn’t go like that. I mean, it essentially does go like that.

Gav: From your point of view or from the students’ point of view?

Em: I don’t know their point of view. I’m not them, but I think it’s okay because you do four or five sentences and then you do a few sentences with the gaps, and then you say, “Well, who is the most unpopular person in the news at the moment?” And you could get an hour out of that.

Gav: That’s nice, and that’s an example of a join together activity rather than one that’s jumping around?

Em: Well, I don’t know about that. I – sorry I mentioned that. Obviously hit a nerve. I’m just saying anything can generate a conversation for me, but I work really well when I’ve got a starting point, whereas you seem to be able to go into the lesson, ask somebody about their [00:12:00] weekend. You get 90 minutes out of that and you might have a exercise about buy and until because they’re using it wrong, or you have to teach them a bit of past continuous because they weren’t using it, and you can feed that in really easily. Whereas, I feel like that’s stopping the flow. And I would probably start with the past continuous exercise as a sort of, this is what we’re doing today, everyone. And then the conversation will be generated from the grammar

Gav: And just a beside question, how do you explain that you’re teaching that grammar and what’s the reason that you gave at the beginning of the lesson?

Em: I have a lead in, of course. You know, I can set that up in a way that’s – but then maybe it does seem a bit more ‘lessony’ from my students’ point of view. Whereas, your students just think, oh, we’re having a chat with Gav today. Oh, and I did do a bit of grammar afterwards. Whereas, with me, they think, oh, Em’s doing this grammar, and we have a good chat about what comes from that. We should probably ask them, shouldn’t we, [00:13:00] sometimes, if they like that format? I’d say there’s probably a bit of a mix anyway with students and their preferences.

Gav: I think as long as you’re covering the bases, a bit of grammar, a bit of conversation, the students are probably okay.

Em: Mm. But this is a good way to come at this. ‘Cause I do agree with you. I think from a student’s point of view, as long as they get a nice variety of activities and they feel like they’re learning something, it probably doesn’t really matter, maybe. Because we should always reflect on our own strengths and weaknesses and maybe push ourselves to do things that we’re not comfortable with as students and teachers. So, I think it’s good sometimes to think about what you’re doing well, and what you’re really enjoying, and what you’re good at, and maybe get better at the things you’re not so good at.

Gav: How can you know you’re not good at them?

Em: Because it feels hard. Hah. I guess. You’re asking me a lot [00:14:00] of questions anyway.

Gav: Sometimes everything seems hard, Em. I’m not sure it’s because I’m not good at it or quite competent.

Em: Oh, I think after a long time of teaching, you do understand what your strengths are and maybe what you’re struggling with, and maybe this is why we are talking about it now because maybe you do go through each lesson and you don’t think about it, and sometimes just talking to somebody else, another teacher or colleague can actually give you a bit of distance to see where you’re at.

Gav: I think hot feedback might be a nice tip here. Where every teacher and student after the lesson could jot down just a few words or sentences about what they learnt, what they enjoyed, what wasn’t so interesting. What was done well?

Em: That’s a good idea. Even just do it for a month. Just tell yourself you’re going to keep a journal, a teaching journal, and write down your thoughts [00:15:00] after every lesson, because we do it, anyway. I think we all stop teaching for that class, and we think, oh, okay, let me go through that just in my head. What was good, what was bad? But if you write that down, you might start seeing a pattern that every time you teach vocabulary, you feel rubbish afterwards, and that’s where you need to get better skills and work on it.

Gav: And not bury those feelings and wait for them to rise up again next time you teach that class.

Em: Yeah. ‘Cause you can avoid negative feelings in the future if you can recognize why you’re feeling that. I wasn’t planning on getting this deep about feelings and emotions.

Gav: No, no. We can come back to this another time.

Em: The psychology of it, but it is very complicated, I think, the way you approach that.

Gav: But that’s a topic for another time.

Em: It doesn’t have to be

Gav: Because…

Em: Oh, go on.

Gav: Something I’ve been thinking about recently is, what do you do when you run out of ideas? I know what I do.

Em: What do you do?

Gav: I look out the window [00:16:00] for inspiration.

Em: Do you? In the middle of a lesson?

Gav: Yes.

Em: And then what? If you see, you see a car park, for example.

Gav: Yes. If I see a car park, I think, oh, students, do you have a car park near where you are?

Em: Are you in this lesson with the students in the same room, or are you sitting at home on a computer looking out your window?

Gav: Either.

Em: Can they see what you see?

Gav: Possibly or possibly not? It might just be in my head. I might start thinking about car parks, for example. I don’t often think about them, to be honest, Em.

Em: Can I just visualize this? So you’re teaching and suddenly it all just dries up. Everybody’s quiet, you go blank, and then you just sit there and you look out the window and you say, “Have you got a car park near where you live?”

Gav: Yeah, that’s a great topic. My students would talk about car parks for hours.

Em: Okay.

Gav: If I let them. Because then it leads to a hundred other questions like, what’s it made of? Is it tarmac? Has it got lines? What colour are the lines? Do you have your [00:17:00] own allocated space? Is there an electric charging station? Is there a barrier to let you in and out? Is it under your house or apartment building? Is it outside? Is it on street parking?

Em: That’s amazing. Yeah, you’re right. That is endless amounts of conversation and grammar. Perhaps, you know, how does it work? Do you have to put tickets on the wind screen? Do you have a subscription? I don’t know if that’s the right word. You might need to check some of this.

Gav: Where’s the grammar there, Em?

Em: I’m just getting there.

Gav: Ticketing grammar.

Em: Modals of obligation. I have to buy a ticket, and I must put that ticket on my dashboard. It’s great. And how often does this happen in this way?

Gav: It does happen from time to time. I’m not completely sure why I might dry up in the middle of a lesson, but sometimes I look into my mind and there is nothing there.

Em: But That’s because you haven’t planned it?

Gav: Or I’ve used all the materials I had planned.

Em: Well, now I’m confused because we are just before – [00:18:00] talking about your amazing conversation style lessons –

Gav: According to you.

Em: Well, this is what I’m thinking. Is this how it works? You just, you do dry up and then your brain just finds another thing to talk about.

Gav: Yes. Or perhaps the topic I had in mind is not suitable and the students were perhaps not willing to go with me on this topic, so I have to pivot and find something else to talk about.

Em: The only fear I have with that technique is that the car park thing might not work, and then you are literally just scanning the room saying, what about plants? Who’s got plants? No? Nobody likes that topic? Okay. carpet. What colour’s your carpet? It just seems a bit desperate and a bit unprofessional, and maybe I wouldn’t do it myself that way.

Gav: I might also think back to some previous lessons I had that week and think, oh, that was a really interesting topic. And say, “Well students, this reminds me of a [00:19:00] student I was talking to the other day who told me this thing. What do you think?”

Em: And that is conversational. And I like the segue because I would probably just say, “Right, we’ve done this, now we’re going to open a different folder and start looking at future going to.”

Gav: This sounds very disjointed to me. You’re jumping around, Em.

Em: It’s very clunky and I don’t like it. So I would learn from your technique and definitely have the confidence to just say, “I bought a new pair of curtains. I’m not happy with the colour. It doesn’t quite match my sofa, and the curtain rail broke when I tried to put them up. Has anyone had this sort of experience?” And hope that there’s somebody in the room that has something to say.

Gav: There’s always somebody.

Em: Hopefully, otherwise you’re not really doing your job. That is quite scary for me. I need to do that more.

Gav: Does it feel like standing on a precipice?

Em: Yeah, because I think I have actually got the same [00:20:00] thing written down to talk to you about when you go blank. I wrote down that feeling of, oh shoot, I should have planned this more because you might run out of things to do, or not really think through how long activities take.

Gav: Could this be an issue of when you are eliciting your negative prefixes and then you suddenly realize you can’t think of a good question, or maybe nobody’s interested in the question, “Have you ever discovered something surprising in your home?”

Em: Where’s the prefix there?

Gav: Discovered.

Em: That’s not prefix. You haven’t taught prefixes recently.

Gav: For example, “What’s the most unambiguous answer you received this week?”

Em: That is quite, quite an ask. Yes. I think my skills lie with good questions that actually are quite easy to answer and lead to better [00:21:00] conversations.

Gav: You might find some of those as simplistic, rather too simplistic if they come from a student’s book, Em.

Em: Yes. But you can always make them more than they are. You can always build on it.

Gav: Can you?

Em: I can.

Gav: Can everyone, Em?

Em: I don’t know. This is what we need to understand about ourselves as teachers. Where are our strengths? And if you need a dry gap fill to get that, you know, creative juice going in your mind, that’s fine. That is what you need to do. You open a folder or another page of the book and you just crack on. But if you can just out of nowhere, bring a conversation out of your room or the car park, then that is what you need to do. But I would fear that situation, and I suppose that’s what I’m learning, to maybe try a bit more of the experimenting, which for me is the conversation out of nothing. But for you, experimenting might be, how do you make a dry grammar exercise more fun?

Gav: I’ve certainly tried that.

Em: And abandoned it? You mean – then you don’t want to do that anymore? [00:22:00]

Gav: I think I’m – without wanting to sound slightly patronizing – was where you are a few years ago.

Em: Oh, maybe I’ve gone full circle and I’m back to where you were when you started realizing – I don’t know. I’m not sure what that means, but…

Gav: I’m not sure I want to be reliant and anchoring myself on a student’s book or a series of pre-written questions, but I can see the benefit in them, especially if you…

Em: That really does sound patronizing now, but okay.

Gav: Especially, if you run out of ideas.

Em: Hmm, not panicking helps to generate the conversation when you run out of ideas.

Gav: I think panicking is, is the first thing you should do because…

Em: What, that’s the adrenaline that keeps you…

Gav: Absolutely.

Em: …going, is it? Okay. I hate that feeling. I mean, that is, for me, the worst thing to run out of things to talk about.

Gav: That creeping sense of, I’m not sure where this conversation’s going.

Em: Yeah.

Gav: And it’s soon going to end and I’m not sure what’s next.

Em: And I’ve still got 48 minutes of a 60-minute [00:23:00] lesson left. That’s my worst nightmare. I can’t say it’s really happened though. If I think about it, it’s always finished. I mean, the time does pass, but I have always made it work. Can’t really say it’s ever just ended and we’ve all sat there. Just nothing to say.

Gav: But answer for me this question, Em, what if you had your five activities, or worksheets, or discussion topics all prepared and you start the lesson, and within 15 minutes you’ve used them all up. Then what do you do? Give us a little insight into Em’s cognitive process.

Em: I just told you. I would just pick another page of the book, or just go on, or find a…

Gav: Unplanned?

Em: Yeah, probably.

Gav: This is all very spontaneous, Em.

Em: Does sound quite spontaneous.

Gav: Doesn’t sound very Teacher Em.

Em: Eh, well, I do avoid it. Literally doesn’t happen very often. I don’t let that happen. Maybe I should. [00:24:00] Maybe that’s my New Year’s resolution. Let that happen. And I know it is a bit of a cliche, go in unplanned! It’s what, you know, every teacher, TEFL book, trainer says. But who actually does it? I dunno. I do want to, one day I will. Just not today.

Gav: Well, I respect that.

Em: Hah. Thank you. Nobody’s going to make me go in unplanned, are they? Another thing I’ve been thinking about is when you’re teaching low-level students, so A1, A2, maybe getting onto B1, and you’re trying to keep it real, let’s say, so you don’t want to do the, you know, typical book page lesson. You want to make it more conversational. You want to make it quite authentic. And I’ve had lovely classes that have been very low-level, A1, A2, but we’ve managed to have [00:25:00] quite dynamic conversations and it’s lovely because I think that is the great level of when students become able to start forming ideas and sentences and it, it might be even the first time they’ve ever had a proper conversation in English rather than just sentences or repeating things. So when you get that magical moment where the group is starting to ping pong back and forward and talk to each other and do those sort of response, answer, question type conversations, I think that is for me, some of the best teaching experiences I’ve had. And I’ve had quite a few classes recently that have been quite low-level, and I’ve seen that confidence start to grow, and I think maybe that is just amazing for them. That they’re having these sorts of conversations. I was also thinking about the language we use as teachers, and even from my students, I’ve learned some really funny phrases that they’re able to use [00:26:00] because they’ve picked them up from TV shows or maybe they’ve seen them online. They’re really basic phrases. English phrases that we use all the time, but you can use them with low-level students and it’s really nice to say things like: it is what it is, because it’s basic grammar, but they can understand it or: go with the flow.

Gav: Oh, I like both of those.

Em: Yeah. Some of these are actually similar. Go with the flow is a bit like trust the process. And they can use these phrases and if you use them as a teacher, they can pick them up really quickly. It’s like three words. One step at a time. Could be worse. Can’t complain. Things like that. Even like shit happens.

Gav: Would you write all of these down?

Em: I don’t know. I think, no. I’ve been pretty much just saying them and then really loving it when they react. ‘Cause you, you say it in the conversation very naturally. You know, students say things [00:27:00] like: happy wife, happy life. It is a bit cringe, but they know that phrase and they think it’s amazing that they get a chance to say it to someone and then, you know, everyone laughs. But you can feed these in, I think, quite naturally. That’s what I’m saying. Don’t just teach them as a list of phrases and then say, right now we have to have a conversation where we put them in. But you can do that. Of course. That’s a great way of teaching idioms or phrases, but for very low-level I think it’s just nice to have real chit chat conversations like, what did you do at the weekend? And then react with these short phrases that sound very natural that they can then take away and think, oh, I know what that means and I can use that.

Gav: Are the students teaching each other or are you coming out with these phrases?

Em: Yeah, I wasn’t very clear about that. I think sometimes I just say things that are easy to understand – these little phrases, these little snippets – and they can understand them, but they may not have heard them before. But I see the realization of when they do understand it. [00:28:00] But other times I think the students do come with their own little phrases that they can enjoy using and they learn from each other. So it’s a kind of bit of both. But recently I’ve been doing that myself, just ways of teaching phrases by reacting to the students in a conversational way, not a present this grammar, present this phrase. Now you’ve have to learn how to use it. Just say it to them.

Gav: I really like that suggestion because my students also love simplicity in my language. Whenever I reformulate something they might say to me, I can see a little acknowledgement with them that, ah, that was a much easier way that Teacher Gav said that, and I should remember – simple is more effective.

Em: You’re talking about higher-level students now sometimes?

Gav: Em, not necessarily. These could be low-level students where they say, “The brother of my sister is,” no, it’s me.

Em: [00:29:00] Hahaha.

Gav: The. Where the student might say, “The house of my mother is very far away,” and I say, “You mean your mother’s house?” And they say, “Yes.”

Em: Okay.

Gav: I’m pretty sure my students realize there’s a simpler way to say these things.

Em: I’ve had that too, where students have just slapped their forehead and gone, “Oh, it’s so simple in English.” That’s not to say we don’t have complicated concepts and grammar and language that is incredibly complex, and rich. But yeah, I think everyday language a lot of the time is quite basic. There is a lot to be said about simplicity, Gav.

Gav: I think reducing language down to its simplest form can be a great way to communicate.

Em: And these phrases are so good and they’re so catchy. And if you just go online and Google, you know, ‘Short everyday phrases in English,’ there’s loads of them, and they’re lovely. You might want to just have a few up your sleeve. So that students maybe don’t [00:30:00] realize you’re feeding them in, but you are.

Gav: You’ve got that choice.

Em: Yeah.

Gav: Em, lately I’ve been thinking about how to bring your personality into the class.

Em: Not my personality? You mean one’s personality?

Gav: Well, you can come in my class if you want to. I’m sure my students would be very, very happy.

Em: How do you, as a teacher, bring out your own personality?

Gav: Is it necessary? Do we need to do that? Should we, shouldn’t we?

Em: Well.

Gav: I personally…

Em: Haha.

Gav: …am quite happy bringing my personality into the class. I think it’s the one thing that I’ve got.

Gav & Em: Hahaha.

Em: Personality?

Gav: On top of my vast knowledge of teaching, of course.

Em: Right. When you say personality, what do you mean?

Gav: I mean my charisma, my sense of humour, my curiosity. All of these are key factors. That I bring into the class, and I think they’re an essential part of my personality.

Em: If the students react [00:31:00] positively, of course, that’s all great, but if they seem a little bit, I’m not saying they do, Gav, I’m sure they…

Gav: Apprehensive?

Em: …Love you. I’m not saying your students don’t love your personality, but maybe if you’re getting a bit of a vibe of they don’t want the humour or they don’t like the creativity, or they’re just not gelling. You can’t obviously click with everyone, would you tone it down or are you saying it’s me or nothing? Like this is who you get? I am… Because I’ve actually got this topic to talk about as well. I, I wrote down, are we chameleons as teachers? Should we adapt to our students or should we just stay a constant of ourselves? Which may be a slightly different direction to go in. But I do wonder about this myself.

Gav: Em, are you going to ask me one of those questions and wait for an answer or are you just going to keep talking?

Em: I just, I’m telling you my thought.

Gav: No, it’s fine. I’ll, I’ll just sit back. It’s, I’ve got a very comfortable chair. I’ll wait.

Em: Is this is what you mean about your personality? [00:32:00] Is this what it’s like? I mean, I’m just saying I have also had these thoughts about what we are like as teachers and how we present to our students. But you’re saying you’re you and that’s for them to accept.

Gav: No.

Em: What then?

Gav: I am, as you suggested in the reference to chameleons, that I am many different teachers to many different students.

Em: But all of those are your personality? You think they’re all like true representations of who you are? You don’t mold yourself? You don’t maybe change for your students to be what you think they want you to be?

Gav: I might begin with what they expect me to be.

Em: How do you know what that is?

Gav: Because I guess.

Em: Just from their reactions and how they are with you.

Gav: Yes. I think students expect you to be calm, considerate, professional, friendly, and you probably shouldn’t have too much personality at the beginning [00:33:00] of a course.

Em: I’ve course so many questions. So when do you bring out the personality then?

Gav: A little at a time, over a few weeks.

Em: In small doses?

Gav: Yeah. I’ve got a big personality, Em.

Em: You have, and I guess it, you know – I think there’s a lot to unpack here, and I agree with you about half of those adjectives you said. I don’t know, some students, I’m sure, don’t want calm teachers. They want fun filled, energetic, exuberant teachers.

Gav: Once I’m assured of that, then I will bring out the fun Gav.

Em: So you just give them a little bit of a taste and see if they respond.

Gav: If they look terrified, then I’ll step back and,…

Em: Right.

Gav: …go a bit more formal.

Em: Well, it’s hard to say. I mean, I would agree with the word professional. We of course, should be professional, but that as well is quite an open word because some people in some businesses, industries, countries, might think that fun and jokey is not professional. But other cultures see that [00:34:00] as part of small talk, and it’s really important to have that sort of relationship with someone. So this is where I come back to the chameleon thing. I’m a bit guilty, I think, of molding myself to my students a bit too much. Maybe I mirror them and reflect their vibe, but I think sometimes they do want something different or they just want you to be you. And when you are yourself, they love it.

Gav: There could be cultural differences as well, and when the student realizes they’ve got a foreign teacher, they might expect something different and you shouldn’t reflect their culture too much.

Em: Nah, I wouldn’t try and do that. I don’t think that’s the right thing to do. But as for being yourself and your own personality, I think it’s hard. I think we are all different in different situations. If you’re saying that you’re relaxed, and you don’t try and be somebody you’re not, then I totally agree we shouldn’t be doing that as [00:35:00] teachers. But as for, you know, how much of your own humour and opinions you give your students, I do tend to rein that in a bit, I think.

Gav: I do too. Definitely at the beginning. Once you establish the relationship with the students and find out where they stand on particular issues, then I think you will feel more secure in sharing things about yourself.

Em: I agree, and I think you have to share things in order to get things back sometimes. If everybody’s all buttoned up and prim and proper and, you know, don’t want to share anything, then actually it’s going to be quite boring, maybe. I’ve had lessons where students have said to me after I’ve told them a story or something, they’ve said, “Oh, I feel like I know you a bit better now.” And you can really feel that they’ve relaxed and actually they don’t see you as this figure of authority, or they don’t see that as a [00:36:00] restriction anymore that you’re a ‘teacher’, you know, in inverted commas, they see you as a person and that they can relate to you and they can tell you things.

Gav: They might feel inclined to share their own opinions once they feel secure with you.

Em: And if that’s what you want to do, obviously – you’ve have to judge each course and each student individually because as we’ve said, you don’t want to open up that floodgate too much ’cause you might become a therapist instead of a teacher. Or that student might think, well actually I’m not happy with this relationship and I don’t want this teacher to be like my best friend. They just need to present figures in their company and they don’t want to talk about their hobbies or whatever. So I think you have got to be very mindful of how much of your personality to give. And, you know, what you said about drip, drip. How much of that tap do you want to open? And that takes time. I wouldn’t say go in first lesson completely yourself. Hah. I know that sounds really bad, but I think you [00:37:00] have got to be quite cautious and feel it out a bit and see, you know, where everybody’s at. And then after time you can show a bit more. Like you said. So as to your first statement of how do you bring your personality in? I would say slowly, gradually, bit by bit. And you can always give more. You can’t give less. Once you’ve given it.

Gav: You can’t take it back.

Em: No.

Gav: It’s out there.

Em: It’s out there. Maybe just be a bit cautious of how much you give, because I would prefer a student to go away thinking, well, that was a bit dull, rather than, wow, that person really overshared and – not sure I want to go back for that reason. You know, I, if I have to choose between the two, I’d rather be on the dull side than the too much and not professional side.

Gav: That is very good advice for anybody in life.

Em: But I have met people – on this topic – I have met people that are very much, I am me, and I [00:38:00] will be me forever, and I’m not changing and I will just be the same teacher no matter where I am and what I’m doing.

Gav: And these are my opinions, and I’m going to share them with everybody whether they like it or not.

Em: Yeah, there’s a bit of that as well. And I honestly think that is a bit rigid and maybe a teacher, a bit controversial, but maybe a good teacher is a teacher that molds and is flexible and can change.

Gav: Molds themselves or the students, Em?

Em: Well, I’m talking about ourselves, the way we act with our students. I think we have to, as teachers, be very malleable, and flexible, and adaptable. I don’t know how it goes for those people that are very much – this is me and I’m not changing. I’ve not had so much or feedback from how it goes with them, but I imagine they do get a bit pushback and…

Gav: And risk offending students?

Em: Maybe. I think if you are so rigid in what you’re presenting to [00:39:00] people, you are going to find that people don’t like it. That’s not to say you can always get it right. We are just naturally going to come up against people who we don’t click with. But if I do come up against somebody who I don’t think is my personality type, or very different, I do try and find the level of ground, at least.

Gav: Finding the level ground seems like a very good place to be.

Em: Yeah. For teachers and students, Gav, I think we can all pay attention to how much we are sharing and how big our personalities are, and if they’re shadowing other people’s personalities. Maybe our students should think about that too.

Gav: That is a very wise statement and, and possibly the wisest statement of the whole episode, Em.

Em: Oh, really?

Gav: Because I’m afraid I’m going to draw it to a close.

Em: Oh, well that was just a nice way to say stop talking then, wasn’t it?

Gav: Yes.

Em: Hah.

Gav: And I’m off to make some notes on today’s episode to see [00:40:00] what I can reflect on.

Em: Ah, you’re going to hot feedback yourself and your big personality.

Gav: That’s it. If I can rein it in long enough.

Em: Well that was fun, Gav. I really enjoyed talking to you. It’s good to be back with my pod buddy. Looking forward to another year of chatting, sharing, reflecting, blah, blah, blah.

Gav: Thanks, Em. And thank you to the followers for coming back and joining us on our journey of a seventh series of Gav and Em’s How to English TEFL pod. Catch you next time.

Em: Bye for now.

Music: Roller disco music.