It is vital to practise speaking and listening while you are learning, and having other learners to communicate with from all over the world is a great benefit of going to class.

So why bother with 121 classes?

Individualised learning.

Group classes, while very beneficial, are not always convenient. A student has to fit their schedule around the class. This is not easy if the student has other commitments. 121 classes can be scheduled at a time agreed upon by both the student and the tutor and can be held online or at the student’s home.

A Business English student might not want to learn about ordering at a restaurant. An adult might not want to translate nursery rhymes. Students do not need to know every word on every subject. A tutor can streamline and teach the student what they need to know to fit their goals. This makes learning far more efficient than traditional classes.

While it is usually important to follow a curriculum so learners are exposed to what they need to learn in a scaffolded order, it is easy to rush through it when teaching a whole class. Teachers, while mostly very good, are not superhuman and can miss when a student is struggling. Sometimes, students do not understand a particular grammar point, word or instruction. They can be left behind and do not always have the confidence to ask for help.

121 sessions are amazing for identifying knowledge gaps and addressing issues as they arise. Tutors focus on just one pupil and structure lessons around what they need the most help with. Not only can the tutor speed through the parts of the lesson that students understand well, but they can also slow down and spend more time on the parts students struggle with.

A few examples.

Today I had a lesson with a B2 student. Normally, he speaks very well. His vocabulary is huge. He is a writer and hugely accomplished in his own language. But he does have a few tiny bad habits that we are ironing out in class. He tends to miss out prepositions, and we are working on this in situ. During our lesson, I had to spend a little extra time guiding him through the “Future Continuous” and “Future Perfect” Tenses, as we discovered partway through that the understanding and structure of verb tenses in his country are different from those in English.

Another student, a child, was learning about Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter, and the activities we do in each season. It quickly became clear while we tried to sort the months into seasons that she didn’t know the months in order. So we paused the lesson and learned them instead. We can now go back to continue the lesson in the next session, and she will be able to complete it more easily and learn the vocabulary taught more effectively.

Recently, I taught another child how to tell the time, as we were learning to do so in English. It became clear that they couldn’t read a clock in either English or their own language. Neither their parents nor their school had taught them this basic life skill, and the student was too embarrassed to ask.

These things could easily be skimmed over in a group class, or be quite embarrassing for the student who couldn’t complete the task because of a basic knowledge gap. But in 121 sessions, we can pause the lesson and go over the information needed to assist the student with the tasks set.

This means that 121 classes are even more effective for neurodivergent, nervous, or anxious learners, as the tutor is non-judgemental and there to support them in every way to help them succeed.

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So I’m going to tell you about the three websites that I use most often, and that my students like the best.

It is worth noting that many other websites provide effective lesson plans for groups, but if you teach 121 online, as I do, then adapting those plans to your lessons can be challenging. In this article, I will focus on resources that work for me and my own 121 online learners. Let me know in the comments about the sites you find work for you!

My Top Three Ready-Made Lesson Plan Resources:

1. ESL Brains

I can’t express in words how much I LOVE ESL Brains. These are the plans I use most often, and all of my students start their time with me using ESL Brains. The approach is friendly and accessible, building learners' confidence from the outset.

The subscription plans are certainly not the cheapest, but there are some free lessons available to try. In my opinion, the paid membership is more than worth it. Unlike some websites, you can download the lesson plans you use and continue to keep using them forever (even if you do not continue your subscription).

The lesson plans come with both PDF files for students and teachers, as well as a set of Google Slides which integrate seamlessly with your own Google Drive, making saving the resources from these plans a breeze. The plans are a great mix of in-class and out-of-class activities, including flipped lessons and preparatory reading exercises to complete at home ahead of lessons.

Some lessons themselves are arranged into “flows”, which is the ESL Brains suggested curriculum. Flows include all CEFR levels, as well as business, legal, and teen flows.

Many other lessons are available on the website, covering a wide range of topics, and all lessons are neatly categorised by CEFR level, skills, lesson type, and topic, making them easy to search and use.

These plans have been crafted with clear goals in mind for each lesson outcome, and the write-up for each lesson details exactly what the learner should achieve during the class.

Although there are no children’s lessons, ESL Brains is a brilliant resource for those who teach teens and adults, and one that all EFL/ESOL tutors and coaches should have in their arsenal.

2. Linguahouse

For those who prefer a more traditional textbook style of learning and teaching, Linguahouse is your new best friend.

PDF worksheets form the backbone of the website. The worksheets are linked to various audio and video files, which you open in separate tabs to accompany the worksheets.

While the worksheets are not as colourful or easy to use as ESL Brains slides, they can be written on in class by uploading to the online class whiteboard. They can also be collected together to form course books. In fact, the worksheets are available on the site both individually and as fully formed PDF coursebooks.

The website also includes a membership to its Expemo app. In all honesty, I have not yet explored that feature as I’m not allowed to take my Preply student’s personal details, and would need their email addresses to add them to my Expemo account. When I eventually take on private learners, I will explore that option and let you know if it is useful then.

3. TEFL Lessons

While there is no scaffolded curriculum here, TEFL Lessons offers a massive range of free and paid worksheets, all CEFR-graded and easily searchable by topic. These sheets make excellent homework to accompany your lessons, or can be used during a lesson to illustrate the point you wish to teach. TEFL Lessons also have some fantastic resources, such as information sheets that make grammar easy when pre-teaching new concepts. My particular favourite is the English Tenses Chart, which is among the many free-to-download goodies you will find on this very useful website.

4. BONUS Website - Fluentize.

I almost omitted Fluentize because there is no clear lesson progression or curriculum on-site, and the lessons can lack reading and writing exercises, instead focusing on conversations about the videos. The lesson slides often do not include an answer key, leaving students without visual confirmation of their correct and incorrect answers.

However, the lessons prove very popular with my students, especially older teens and younger adults. It just takes a little more time to search through the lessons than ESL Brains to find something relevant to the day’s learning. The lessons have a fun, fresh feel, which can appeal to students who prefer a less formal approach. The videos are engaging and raise some excellent discussion points.

Help Your Learners Succeed.

Of course, each student will still require extra help with certain parts of the lesson, and it is up to you, as the tutor, to identify these areas and provide targeted assistance and additional learning opportunities accordingly.

Not all students will understand all parts of your lesson with ease. Many lesson plans assume that a subject, particular vocabulary, or grammar points have already been taught to the student. For this reason, it is essential to read all pre-made materials before you whip them out in class. You need to know what to pre-teach your students before they start on ready-made plans.

You should provide additional support and advice in every lesson, and not rely entirely on a pre-made worksheet to do the work for you.

Many worksheets and slides include many practice activities. Still, it is ultimately down to you, as the teacher, to teach the concepts and points BEFORE the student practises those parts, and to check the student has understood the learning before you move on with the lesson.

Your Suggestions.

What lesson planning websites do you enjoy? What worksheets do you find useful? Where are the best classroom resources found? Please drop me a comment and let the world know!

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A New Role: Coaching and Tutoring English to Speakers of Other Languages.

I officially have a new career at 45. I’m starting all over again, and I think I have about enough working years left in me to actually make a go of it.

I’m leaving behind my past life as a dog behaviourist, which I have been for many years, due to some ill health and a few financial issues, and am settling into life behind my laptop screen.

Ideally, I would have loved to have been a full-time writer, but despite a book and numerous blogs, it never came about. So, I’m blogging for fun and using my experience with language to teach others online to ramble away in English, too.

Preply.

I’ve been plugging away on Preply since January. At first, it was a means to an end. A way to earn a few quid from home, while I wait for an operation. But then I found I really quite enjoyed it, and as much as I love teaching dogs, I have a new passion for teaching humans.

I’m not daft enough to put all my eggs in one basket, especially on a website as saturated as Preply, so I have started to put the bare bones of a self-employed business together. I even created a website of my own to make it official. I’m taking on private students as well as those who find me through Preply, so if you need help, let me know by clicking the button at the end of this newsletter.

Preply seems to have a bit of a bad reputation, which isn’t helped by some of the tutors who slag it off constantly on the likes of Reddit, but actually, I’ve found it to be a very welcoming place.

Provided you stick to their rules, and understand they are running a business and therefore make decisions that suit their business (and not always to the joy of their tutors), it is a pretty easy place to be.

You set up your profile and add any relevant qualifications. Set your own hours, your own rates, and your own teaching preferences regarding what kind of students you wish to teach. Work your way through their academy and in-house certification, then wait for students to notice you and book a trial.

Sure, trials are not paid (at least, YOU do not get paid), and commission is high (going from 33% down to 18% as you gain teaching hours), but you earn almost immediately and as far as jobs go, sitting at a laptop chatting to people all over the world is not too terrible at all.

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The Difficult Bit.

The scariest thing I’ve found is the sudden realisation that native English speakers use grammar naturally, but unless we go to college, we are not taught grammar.

Like most English speakers, this little factoid never occurred to me until it was too late and I was knee deep in a conversation, trying to explain to a Korean about using Zero, First, Second and Third Conditionals. Or the time I was asked when to add a second consonant when spelling verbs (such as running, putting, and stopping) and when not to bother or to do something completely different (typing, drawing, eating).

I completed a 200-hour, Level 5 TEFL/TESOL Diploma, which gave me a better idea of what I’m doing and what I still need to do. To skill up further, I’ve applied and been accepted for a CELTA course at Cambridge next year to give myself even more grey hairs.

And of course, I’m going back to my old love of writing, to document the process.