Kaibell Subject English Classroom Solution is implemented in an American teacher-led classroom environment, and it is part of Kaibell's English immersion based total solution. By integrating language teaching with the teaching of curricular content in thematic units, Kaibell Total English Solution simultaneously develops students' language, subject-area knowledge, thinking skills, team play, and creativity. Furthermore, combining the teaching of subject matter with the language specific to that subject area constitutes the ideal learning experience.
In contrast to some training institutions which heavily rely on computer based courseware for teaching subject English, Kaibell Subject English teachers play a very important role in teaching subject English. Each of the Kaibell Subject English classrooms is led by an American teacher assigned from the United States. We believe good teachers must be in possession of a strong sense of responsibility, high qualities of leadership, strong ability to motivate students, and right skills to promote critical thinking and in-depth understanding. By playing a role of coach in the classrooms, Kaibell Subject English teachers create interest, encourage, confidence, cooperation, and desire to explore for the classrooms, and help get rid of fear, frustration and disappointment from the students.
In Kaibell's classrooms, teachers base their instruction on a thorough understanding of learning theory, including metacognitive, cognitive and social/affective strategies and processes that learners employ to enhance their linguistic and content-area knowledge. The Subject English teachers teach students by interaction with students rather than depending on lectures alone. Teachers plan instruction around themes to maximize opportunities for students to acquire language and concepts, and promote creativity and originality in students.
The characteristics of Kaibell's Subject English are summarized as follows.
(1) Classrooms are organized to teach students through multiple teaching strategies and grouping patterns.
(2) Teacher's lesson plan includes a set of standardized activities, such as simplifying sentence structures, responding to students' language errors, using directed reading activities, actively engaging students in exploring, analyzing and understanding the subject knowledge, clearly marking transitions during classroom activities, encouraging students to rehearse information or instructions orally, providing written notes, summaries, and instructions, promoting students' independent reading and writing, and establishing a homework club.
(3) Group activities are designed to facilitate communication, team work, interaction, and critical thinking, and sensitizing the students to the value of paired and group work.
(4) Students' learning process is enhanced by group-learning projects, contests, competitions, debates, cultural activities, entertainment and field visits to create interest.
(5) Students are provided opportunity to actively explore contents and concepts. They view learning as the on-going process of extending and fine tuning their ideas and understanding through application. As a result, they take responsibility for their own learning and make connections to the world beyond the classroom.
(6) Teachers take an integrated approach to address following issues associated with the students' learning process:
· The student avoids eye contact
· The student tends to smile when disagreeing with what is being said or when being reprimanded.
· The student shrinks from or responds poorly to apparently inoffensive forms of physical contact or proximity.
· The student refuses to eat with peers
· The student does not participate actively in group work or collaborate readily with peers on cooperative assignments.
· The student displays uneasiness, expresses disapproval, or even misbehaves in informal learning situations or situations involving open-ended learning processes (e.g., exploration).
· The student refuses to participate in extracurricular or in various physical education activities (e.g., swimming, skating, track & field).
· The student seems inattentive and does not display active listening behaviors.
· Performance following instruction reveals that the student is not understanding the instruction, even though she or he exhibited active listening behaviors that suggested understanding and refrained from asking for help or further explanation.
· The student is unresponsive, uncooperative, or even disrespectful in dealing with teachers of the other gender.
· The student appears reluctant to engage in debate, speculation, argument, or other processes that involve directly challenging the views and ideas of others.
· The student exhibits discomfort or embarrassment at being singled out for special attention or praise.
· The student fails to observe the conventions of silent reading.
(7) Through a joint effort between the teacher and the students, students' communicative competence is gradually developed to a level commensurate with the student's American peers, according to the full extent of the student's potential, in the areas of listening, speaking, reading, and writing skills.
In assisting the implementation of the Kaibell Subject English Classroom Solution, Kaibell assigns each group of ESL students a local Family Liaison as a connection between the student's family and the classroom. The local Family Liaison's responsibility includes: as an initial and ongoing point of contact for the ESL student's family, use the students' native languages to check comprehension and clarify problems, facilitate communication with parents through interpreters and translations, facilitate the involvement of ESL parents in school activities, help interpret cultural and educational practices and expectations for parents and students.