Speaker 1: So, that ends the lesson and that's a review of the past and future tenses. Did everybody... Did you all understand what... Did you all like the present... Well, that wasn't good. Confidence. So many teachers struggle with confidence in the classroom. Those feelings of inadequacy can be so crippling and powerful. As a teacher trainer for nearly 20 years, I've worked with over 3,000 English teachers at the Language House and confidence plays a huge factor in their success. I can tell you with absolute certainty that if a teacher doesn't feel confident in their teaching, and especially when they're up in front of the class, they won't last long. So, how do you become more confident? Most of what we're covering in this video are slight changes to create a positive feedback loop. You'll do things that will make you look more confident. Because you look more confident, your students will respond to you better. Because they're responding to you better, that will make you more confident, and so on. I've got 16 tips. Confidence begins by clicking that subscribe button. It couldn't hurt. Tip number one is to control what you can control. The first thing that you can control is your appearance. So, let's change that. Your appearance matters. Not only will it give you a little bit more of professionalism, but it will help you feel more confident when you step foot into the classroom. This doesn't mean you have to dress like a penguin, but you should dress at a level that's greater than your students. You're also going to want deodorant, a mint, mouthwash, and even a change of clothes. You're going to keep these things at the school at all times in case you have an accident. Another thing that I can control is usually the classroom itself. Take an inventory of how everything looks. Arrange the desks. Add new pictures or things if you can. You want to modify this space so it looks like your own. The more you feel comfortable in the classroom, the more that's going to boost your confidence. Number two, know your students. If you are teaching a new class, ask the right questions to find out as much as you can about your students. How many students are going to be in the class? What's the nature of the class? What are their expectations? What's their age level? You might even connect with a past teacher of the class to find out if there are troubled students or things that you need to look out for. Case in point, if I'm teaching a business class, and I know it's a business class, I can assume that the level of professionalism is going to need to be higher. Thus, the way that I dress, the way that I conduct myself, the type of materials that I use are all going to be different. If I'd simply walk into that business class without being aware of that, it's going to throw me off a bit and that's going to decrease my confidence. I've got a great video covering teaching your first class. Check it out. In short, the more I know about my students, the more I can meet their expectations, the more I can plan material around things they'll like. Psst, if you really want to improve your confidence, train with me in Prague at the Language House with the rest of our talented staff. We train new teachers every single month on our four-week TEFL certification course. Teachers, get your materials right. The right materials will make your confidence and your lessons shine. It's going to be hard to cover in this video what makes really good teaching materials, but I can give you a recommendation. If you are struggling in the production process and you feel it's dragging a bit, and it's taking a long time to produce materials for all of your lessons, do check out a company that I endorse called Fluentize. This is basically a lesson planning website where you go to their site and they have hundreds and hundreds of pre-made lesson plans. And if you use my code CHRIS20, you can get 20% off their entire site. It's the only company on my channel that I endorse, so do check them out and save some money. Fluentize is a game changer and a lifesaver. Use my code, get 20% off, and enjoy. Be an expert. Or fake it. One of the main reasons why teachers lack confidence in the classroom is they don't feel confident in their own understanding of the material. Don't do that. Take the time in advance to really study up on whatever you are teaching. The more you know about it, the more breadth of information you have about the topic, the more confident you're going to be. The details matter. Students love it when they know that their teacher really knows their stuff down. If you step into a classroom and your knowledge of the subject matter is greatly higher than that of your students, you are naturally going to feel more confident. And if it's the reverse, well, it's a nightmare. Presence is everything. Aside from your clothes, you're going to want to work on your overall presentation. This is going to be your body posture, your hand gestures, and the overall way that you carry yourself. I've seen a lot of people who were clearly confident in real life get into the classroom and it all falls apart. And the reason is that they simply were not used to their role as a teacher. They weren't used to having, you know, a dozen or so strangers look at them. If you can, get to your class early and really work on your posture, work on your body language, work on using big gestures when you interact with people and not just, you know, small little things like this. This classroom is your space. You command it. You'll also want to find a relaxed position too. You can't be straight as a board all of the time. That looks tense. Intense people don't give off that confident feel. So look in your classroom, find a spot where you can relax. I don't know, maybe put your feet up if you feel comfortable doing that and get used to this state. Confident people are relaxed in their own space. Your voice is king. It's queen. It's everything. Your teaching voice is the singular tool you have to teach your students. So overlooked. So important. It's everything. I've got a great video that deals with everything you need to do to improve your teacher's voice. Check it out over here. The main thing that we're looking for is an economy of language. This means lowering your TTT, teacher talking time, because confident people don't ramble. They don't talk a lot. They don't mumble. So everything needs to be clear, direct. You want a volume that is relatively high, but of course not overbearing. You don't want to be shouting at your students. You want to have some emotion in your voice. You want to have some inflection and tone in your voice. You want it to be when you speak, people will listen to you and don't speak that much. All right. This may take a little bit of practice to get used to. So work on it. The way that I talk in real life is nothing like how I sound in the classroom. It's a different thing completely. Spend the time and work on your teacher's voice. Check out the video for more details. Practice with your peers. Your technical skill as a teacher matters. What a lot of teachers do before they teach is they look at their lesson. They go over it in their head and what they're supposed to do. That's not going to help. I recommend grabbing a coworker, grabbing a peer, grabbing a partner, grabbing whoever, and practice the actual components of your lesson. If it's a language lesson, that's going to be all of your listening, CCQing, demos, and everything else that you need to teach well. But this can work for any type of teaching. I mean, people need to practice the actual skills. The more practice you have, the more confident you're going to feel when you do it in real life. Sitting and looking at your lesson is just going to stress you out, which is going to make you feel less confident when you actually have to do it. That's eight, and that's a great start. Check out video number two, and we'll finish off the list. Thanks so much for watching.