Наталья Н.

Each of the approaches is quite good in its own way. As for me, the communicative approach is preferable because it combines everything I need to do in my lesson. In addition, I use the course based on this method. My experience proves that it gives basic knowledge of all aspects of English, with helpful activities such as speaking, listening, reading, and writing.

I can say that it’s worth including various methods during the teaching process. The teacher’s flexibility is important as language acquisition as the key! The retention of new information is often a problem, this why I prefer using elements from both the Grammar teaching and the Direct Approach. The Grammar teaching approach is focused on translation, memorizing of vocabulary, and comprehension, but this requires a lot of effort and patience. I studied neuropsychology and according to this science, the Grammar teaching approach is quite effective because we use resources of our memory so much while we are looking for words through the dictionary (it doesn’t work with a digital translator, of course). However, expanding vocabulary with long lists is not the best way; we can memorize 100 words a day but only 10 of them we will remember after a few days. Speaking about the Direct approach I can say that it’s possible to practice many things using this approach, but it shouldn’t be your main method. Adults can’t memorize in the same way as children because an adult’s brain works differently. There is no doubt the visual content is helpful for people of any age, but it must be used in addition to other ways of teaching. So both of the above-mentioned approaches deserved to be used because each of them has its own pros and cons.
My students are not just students to me. I know that teachers can change lives because we give much more than knowledge, we share the best things we have learned and in some cases we are guides to expanding possibilities and opportunities for our students; that’s why I love working with children from 7 to 18 and hardly ever young adults or adults. Above all my teaching style is always individually tailored for the needs of my student. It is possible to try different methods and activities. First I analyze which tasks are more successful, bearing in mind that we are all different, but all of us are potentially capable students. Then I offer stimulating materials that are relevant to the students' lives and interests. All in all, it motivates them to do their best.