DISTANCE LANGUAGE TEACHING AND LEARNING
distance teaching
There are many internet companies nowadays that can provide free voice, chat, and video; for instance: Google, MSN, Yahoo, and Skype. They help to fuel the interest on distance education and online tutoring. Online tutoring help ESL/EFL students learn English easier and more comfortable in their own home. What the students need is just a computer running the program, an internet connection, and of course an ESL/EFL instructor who is willing to tutor them online.
This kind of learning has been becoming a popular alternative for classroom learning due to its instant and interactive service. Moreover, student can practice their English more effectively as they learn individually; they can get personalized help such as grammar, sentence construction, essay writing, proof reading, conversational English practice and much more.
For the teachers, distance language teaching of course provide benefits as they can conduct their own private online classes with an ESL/EFL student from any part of the world. VoIP software such as Skype, YM, Google, and others have empowered and allowed TEFL/TESL teachers to work from home, allowing them to start up their own online tutoring service with low risk, and little to no capital investment. The features offer support teachers to have excellent communication with their students; the useful features provided such as chat, voice, file transfer, and video conferencing.
However, in conducting an online English class, what you have to consider is the internet connection and electricity. Make sure that you have a good internet connection. You do not want your class end up in the middle of conference because of your bad internet connection, do you? Besides, learn about the VoIP software first before deciding to use one of them. Browse for information on their benefits and weaknesses. You can also directly try them to have conference with your friends or relatives before really having it with your students.
Check other related articles: tips for classroom success, ESL certification tips, TEFL online course
