Obrigado por complementar a ideia do artigo.

Happy Blogging! ;-)

I don’t think you should worry too much about avoiding Portuguese by all means when teaching English (unless you’re working for one of those schools that demand so – after all, you don’t want to lose your job…). I suggest reading methodology books on teaching English. You’ll see that good authors say the mother tongue is to be avoided when the students come from different backgrounds (languages), but when they have a common first language, this is to be considered an advantage, and we can take advantage of the similarities and contrast for them to understand the topics better. I’ve done it myself several times and it’s helped both me and my students. I believe you should remember that all extremes are BAD! Being radical doesn’t help at all! I wonder how these teachers/courses who say they use only English in class explain the meaning of words such as “have”. I insist: read about methodology, really good books on the subject. I’m sure it’ll do you good. Good luck!

Thank you for your long comment and for sharing with us part of your story. I wish you a tremendous success in your new job as an English teacher, I root for you my friend. Cone of Experience is indeed very interesting. Speaking about a good site, I highly recommend the bbc website for learners of English. Please visit the link:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish

Best,

I guess It’s been a while since the last time a posted a comment here, right? Well, among the various things that have happened in my life since my last participation I believe it’s worthy to recount a particular one: At the end of last year there was a downsizing at this company I was working at, which somewhat spurred me on to look for a job as an English teacher once I’ve always considered the possibility of getting some hands on experience in this field. Summing up, I’ve been trying my hand at it lately and that’s been a great experience so far as the whole process of having to prepare classes, coming up with clearer ways to teach a topic and so forth, is very enriching. Anyway, I’m printing this “cone of learning” and using it in class… It’s great, I can’t agree more with it… Throughout this short time in the classroom I’ve realized that when I just tell the students the meaning of a particular word, expression and the like, they tend to forget it; whereas when I give them an example, perform or draw, in the following class they still remember it. However, most of the time I give up, I mean I just give away the information since they can’t understand and start mumbling a lot.
Anyway, I wonder if you guys know a site or book which helps teachers to teach English through English. For instance, how would you explain in English topics such as: present perfect, going to x will; ever; present perfect continuous and the like in a way that even a slow-minded student could grasp? Any help on this matter would be greatly appreciated. Have a great new year.

All the best.