Learning a language has become less of necessary skill and more of an enjoyable hobby in recent years. In 2024, this trend is expected to continue as most people will be able to speak at least two languages or more, and many people will learn new languages just for fun. Yet despite these cultural changes, some still see learning a foreign language as beneficial to their careers, whether they have aspirations of working abroad or need that competency for their job domestically.
Blended Learning
You may have already heard the phrase blended learning, which essentially involves “blended” learning, where you go through part of the material online on your own and the other part in real-time with a teacher. What are the advantages of this method?
Online Learning
No: canceling classes, transferring to other days, travel time, “Mom, I’m just too lazy to get up.” There are applications, dictionaries in the gadget, blogger pages on Instagram, Telegram, and YouTube channels with valuable materials, tips, and new teaching methods.
It is all – learning online. It will actively expand in the coming decades. Now qualified teachers are available wherever there is fast enough InternetInternet for a Skype conversation. Children like to do tasks right in the room, receive stars for their successes and hear pleasant words from Charlie’s animated character.
Children are no longer limited to one school teacher and an English curriculum textbook with very formulaic topics. The whole world of English opens up before children, and they can feel organic, and you can find the most suitable online tutor in Preply!
Gamification
Children learn the world by playing. Learning for them is knowledge. Therefore, it is both more accessible and more enjoyable for a child to learn through play and interactive tasks.
Gamification is a learning and motivation method for a child. The main plus is that the child wants to be better, to improve himself, this process goes through competition and teamwork. In other words, he sees the result of his work and wants to achieve even more.
Activities for a child are more like quests, competition, and different formats of games. Involved in the game, the child experiences positive emotions and better remembers the material, whether words on a new topic, grammar rules, or dialogue lines.
Written Speech
As we have already mentioned, gadgets with children are now always: they write SMS hundreds of times more than communicating by voice. Messengers, social networks, applications, and games: children can use all this in English and write as well. At the same time, written speech lends itself significantly to changes: abbreviations appear, emoticons to express emotions. Children need to be able to write correctly to communicate with friends and foreigners and understand blogs and posts with deliberate grammatical and spelling errors.
Communication with Foreigners
Borders are blurring, and people travel, get to know the world and other people. They are happy to make foreign friends, visit each other, and communicate more. English is the principal assistant here, for which we live and learn.
The internet and all “digital” also did not stand aside. Children can communicate with foreigners on forums, online game chats, and social networks thanks to technology. Fortunately, modern children are free from stereotypes, rarely held back by the language barrier. The fear that their words will sound wrong and the interlocutor will laugh at him disappears. Older children travel abroad for exchange and international camps, teenagers take exams and enter foreign universities. They want to be open, see and know more. In this direction, their motivation to learn the language and communicate more with foreigners is growing faster.
Pronunciation with an Accent
Learn sounds in front of a mirror, and practice pure British pronunciation. Easier because it is faster. The world is moving and developing at a breakneck pace. Children do not need to study pronunciation and speak when it is perfect.
Instead of spending hours on it, children around the world communicate successfully – and are understood. Fortunately, new textbooks contain audio recordings with different accents, and the global trend is not “to speak English without an accent,” but “to distinguish between different accents of English and be proud of your own.”
Mobile Learning
“I don’t have time” is a weak excuse not to learn English when you always have your phone with you. There are lots of apps that let you study grammar every time you have 5 minutes to spare. If you still use a pen and notebook to learn new words, try the Quizlet app. Create flashcards with new words, sort them by topic and periodically open the application and check how many words you have memorized. It sometimes feels like playing 2048 or Flappy Bird because you are trying to beat your record every time.
Last but not least, a massive plus of “mobile” learning is that you always have the opportunity to meet and communicate with Anglophones from anywhere in the world.
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Constant Feedback and Informal Learning
Do not be afraid to ask your teacher questions, practice “conversational” phrases, make suggestions about adapting the program and choosing topics. In the modern world, an English teacher is not a lecturer but a facilitator and interlocutor. In the contemporary world, a person learns English with a specific goal – to communicate and build relationships with other people. Therefore, the environment in the classroom should be as “lively” and not as artificial as possible. There are all solutions to problems, and discussions are held in English.
Summary
Teaching English in 2024 will be more challenging than ever before. There are plenty of trends worth keeping an eye on to help you prepare for the future, and we’ve touched on a few of them here. Whether or not you face any specific trend that we mentioned here today, it’s always essential to stay up-to-date with what is happening in your profession so that you can keep teaching English throughout the next decade! Let us know if there are any other trends to know of!
