Most teachers have no idea why they do what they do.

The best teachers you’ll ever meet are those who take the time to analyse their actions and decisions in TEFL teaching. They consider how each action affects their students and colleagues.

They act deliberately rather than randomly. Every action has been thought about (often many times, for each class or even each student).

I love the autonomy that TEFL teachers have to manage their own time. However, that freedom comes with a price.

The price of freedom is taking responsibility for your actions and making a vast number of decisions to support those actions. Many unconscious habits build up if you don’t consciously make those decisions.

Look at the decisions below. There are no correct answers; each teacher must decide the right balance for themselves. A lot of these are on a continuum, a sliding scale, they’re not black and white.

Your decisions will depend on you, your students, your classroom dynamics, your teaching assistant, your curriculum, your school policies, and your personal preferences.

Having a deliberate reason for doing what you do is a great start.

Inside the Classroom

• Time helping individuals vs helping the class

• Teacher talking time vs student talking time vs quiet time.

• Co-operate with teaching assistants vs Ignoring them

• Individual work vs pairwork vs group work vs whole-class work

• Classroom routines vs no routines

• Teaching vs facilitating

• Instructing vs motivating

Outside the Classroom

• Planning time vs teaching time

• Inductive vs deductive grammar

• Time at work vs time outside of work

• Professional development vs time in the pub

• Respect and socialise with local staff vs ignoring them

• PPP vs ESA vs TTT vs TBL vs Dogme vs Silent Method vs….

• Being organised vs a chaotic mess

The Most Important Decision of All

• Caring vs not caring (do you want to make a difference in every lesson, every day?)

See you again in two weeks.

Whenever you're ready, there are three ways I can help you:

1. Learn how to plan better, faster and stress-free with my book Lesson Planning for Language Teachers (90 ratings, 4.5⭐ on Amazon).

2. Develop calm students, a relaxed mind and a classroom full of learning with my book Essential Classroom Management (16 ratings, 4.5⭐ on Amazon).

3. Improve your teaching in five minutes daily with my Reflective Teaching Practice Journal (4 ratings, 4.5⭐ on Amazon).