Support and guidance for students

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SUPPORT AND GUIDANCE FOR STUDENTS

Introduction

For most teachers, managing and supporting students constitutes the main substance of their work. There is a great deal of importance in further education on supporting and managing students while they are studying and learning. Students are offered with various services which includes advice, guidance, tutoring and counselling. These services are offered to students as soon as they enrol into the college. Teachers and existing students describe the learning opportunities which are available and experts give advice on issues such as Educational Maintenance Allowance and advice for those with learning difficulties.

At present, I teach the ESOL students of Brooke House Sixth Form College Information Technology. During my teaching, I managed and supported my students by acting as a mentor, by communicating effectively with them, by actively listening to my students, being empathetic and providing constructive feedback to them.

The Teacher as mentor

A mentor is someone who takes a special interest in helping another person develop into a successful professional. A mentoring relationship develops over an extended period, during which a student's needs and the nature of the relationship tend to change. A mentor will try to be aware of these changes and vary the degree and type of attention, help, advice, information, and encouragement that he or she provides.

* Mentoring skills: - This means teachers treating students with love and respect, encouraging right behaviour and correcting wrongful actions. At present, I serve as an effective caregiver to my students, loving and respecting my students, helping them succeed at their work and building their self-esteem by treating each student as having worth and dignity. I demonstrate a high level of respect and responsibility both inside and outside the classroom.

Effective communication

Communication is essentially about one person who sends a message which is received by a second person1. It is important to maintain eye contact with students when a teacher is talking to them, this shows that the teacher is interested in what the learners have to say. When communicating with my students, I try to eliminate distracting behaviours such as playing with my hands, staring out of the window or doing something else whilst listening to them. My job as a teacher is to encourage my students and not to put them down or control them.

When communicating with learners, a good teacher should let learners know the importance of the topic they are teaching, use questions to involve the students and monitor understanding. They should include examples from the students experience, I do this with my ESOL students. Teachers should also use an appropriate level of work, be aware of new vocabulary and recap at the beginning of every lesson and summarise at the end. Teachers should not use unexplained jargon, they should let students know that they are talking to them for their benefit and finally a good teacher ought to use language appropriate to the ability of the students
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Effective listening

Few people are very good listeners because they are too busy thinking about what they want to say next. Teachers often hear what students are saying, but are they really listening?

On a weekly basis, I provide an informal after class consultation group where by I listen to students in order to ascertain any problems or issues which they might have. I listen to students' comments and queries with regards to how the class went and their issues of concern. The aim and objective of this consultation group is to improve the lesson. ...

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