Time. Each person’s most limited resource. Its incessant flow can be extremely limiting to what we can accomplish. This is especially true in the language classroom, and time management is one of the most tricky things to deal with as a teacher of a foreign language. Depending on the institution, the level of the students, the duration of each class period, etc., we language teachers have varying amounts of time to reach our communicative and grammatical goals. Because of this, it is important that we are frugal with this most limited resource.
For me, this is definitely the most difficult thing to manage in my classroom. I always seem to have way too much planned for a single class period and so I wind up trying to rush through my material at the end of the period, trying to meet all my communicative goals. In my case, I only have 50 minutes per class to meet all my objectives, which means that any time lost on one activity will inevitably lead to the the reduction or the complete cutting of another. For this reason, it is essential to cut the fat, so to speak.
Personally, one area that I spend too much time on is grammar. In general, students that are a product of the American school system are severely lacking in understanding of grammar. From a teacher’s perspective, grammar is a very useful tool for understanding why a language functions the way it does. But for most students, learning the complex terms of metalanguage, the words we use to talk about a language’s structures, can be just as complicated (and much less useful in real life situations) as learning the language itself. Because of this, I suggest cutting down lengthy grammar explanations and making them as elegant—pleasingly ingenious and simple—as possible. Try not to avoid grammar completely, as it still can be useful in helping some students understand, but don’t make it the focus of your lessons because it will probably be completely lost on the majority.
Here are some other ways to help manage your classroom time:
• Schedule your activities on a written lesson plan. Stick to the plan.
• Build in time for transitions and questions
• Practice your transitions and explaining your activities before class begins
• Pay attention to your students’ body language and end activities early if most seem to be finished
• When recapping an activity, only answer a sample of questions
• Rather than wait for students to volunteer to answer a question or share a response, predetermine who you are going to call on or pick people at random