Tips to Build A Good Relationship with Your Chinese Students

Establishing a good relationship with students can create a pleasant and orderly classroom, allowing you to win the respect and trust of students. Teaching English in China is not that difficult, here are some things you need to know.

Set up your classroom rules

Making rules does not mean that you will become a strict "bad teacher", but set your tolerance level with your students, make sure they know what you expect and what they should do, such as:

• Respect teachers and classmates

Listen attentively when other people are talking, don't concentrate on doing your own thing, and don't interrupt arbitrarily when the teacher is talking with classmates.

• Never laugh at classmates who answered wrong questions

Chinese students often choose not to answer the teacher’s questions in order to avoid the risk of making mistakes, so you should encourage students to speak more English to improve their oral skills. Being laughed in the class will make them lose confidence.

• Try yourbest to do everything

Whether it is doing homework or participating in class activities, tell them not to give up easily.

[Recommended Reading: SOMETHING YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT CHINESE STUDENTS’ BEHAVIORS ]

Know their names

Knowing the names of students is very important, and they will think "Our teacher cares about us." If you cannot pronounce the students’ Chinese names correctly, try to have the students introduce themselves one by one and tell you their English names. Writing their names in your notebook, or even ask them to bring a photo of themselves to paste under their names so that you can identify them more quickly.

Tell them about yourself

If your students are very young, it may be the first time they have seen "real foreigners". Therefore, they will be very curious about you (excited or scared) and tell them about yourself is useful to relieve their anxiety. You can tell them your full name, nationality, university, major and even describe your travel experience and life in your hometown with them.

Learn some Chinese phrases.

Students at almost all ages will like this. Your Mandarin with a "foreign accent" will make them think you are funny and friendly. such as:

666--- (Liu liu liu in Chinese) which means that they are very good at doing something

Jia You --- equivalent to the English "Come on", “Keep going” and “Way to go!”

Zhen Bang --- equal to "good job", which means they do a great job.

You may also find 7 Tips on How to Get Students Fully Concentrated here