ESL Placement

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The last important step in being a successful adult education ESL teacher is student assessment and placement. It is critical that adult students be properly placed otherwise they will quickly lose interest and drop out. If the material you present in any level ESL class is too easy, students will become bored. If it is too hard, they will not return for the second class.

Regardless of the placement technique used for adult students, the first impression is an important one. Many adult students come to the ESL classroom with a lot of fears. In some cases their last experience with school was a negative one (e.g. they may have left school as teenage drop outs). Consequently, it is very important that the teacher establish a friendly, enthusiastic rapport free of any academic pretense. This friendly social approach is especially important for the more undereducated adults. Even though their fear level is very high, it can be broken down by a friendly smile and pleasant small talk.

How do you place adult students according to oral ability?

Literary Assessment

How do you place more literate students?

What other ways of deciding on placement are there?