THE PROBLEMS OF TEACHING MIXED ABILITY CLASSES

Abstract

Working as a teacher in English provides challenges every day. The teacher has to face 25-30 students at a time who are all at different levels of ability, have varying motivation for working with English and have their own special interests and experiences. The teacher meets these mixed-ability classes each day. I am going to write about what mixed-ability classes are and the challenges they present but most of all how a teacher should work in these classes in order to help all the students, especially the weaker ones. I have chosen to write about this because I feel it is a problem that all teachers are faced with. I myself have encountered this each time I have been out on my school placement, and most teachers I have met on those occasions have talked about the difficulty of teaching large mixed abilityclasses. I have found it difficult to know how to motivate all the students in each class, especially the weaker ones.