Teaching methods for Thai and English Classes

[EVENKEEL]

So my kid goes to an EP school. As an example Thai math and Thai math should teach the same lessons so kids can better have an understanding of what the english terms mean. One teaches fraction while the other is doing division. It's necessary for me to go over my kids English math and explain terms used. If both Thai and English teachers did the same lessons it would help with learning. Also I have my kid doing multiplication tables on her own because the kids aren't given this basic tool in class. Without knowing the times table by heart how can you do the simplest math problems. 

 

Math is the one universal language all kids should be fluent in.

 

Another complaint with Thai classes is that learning projects turn into Art projects. I don't get it. The educational channels on TV shows teenagers drawing pictures for their class. I can only imagine the dismal teaching going on in Gov schools.

[allane]

And what exactly do you expect anyone here to do about this ?

[EVENKEEL]

1 hour ago, allane said:

And what exactly do you expect anyone here to do about this ?

Just venting, but thank you for a well thought out response.

[Scott]

Most reasonably good schools would have classes working in tandem at least until they are reasonably fluent in the 2nd language.   We have teacher's meet weekly to go over the lesson plan for the upcoming week.  The Thai teacher teaches the lesson in Thai and then the Foreign Teacher does the same in English.  The math problems may be different, but the level and concept is the same.   The English also focuses a little more on terminology and understanding the meaning of things like word problems.  

 

As students get older and more fluent, the curriculum can diverge, but students must be grounded in a subject in their native language.  It's not feasible or possible for students to learn a concept in a language they don't understand well.  

 

[EVENKEEL]

5 hours ago, Scott said:

Most reasonably good schools would have classes working in tandem at least until they are reasonably fluent in the 2nd language.   We have teacher's meet weekly to go over the lesson plan for the upcoming week.  The Thai teacher teaches the lesson in Thai and then the Foreign Teacher does the same in English.  The math problems may be different, but the level and concept is the same.   The English also focuses a little more on terminology and understanding the meaning of things like word problems.  

 

As students get older and more fluent, the curriculum can diverge, but students must be grounded in a subject in their native language.  It's not feasible or possible for students to learn a concept in a language they don't understand well.  

 

Right now in English they have fractions and the Thai math they're doing long division in P 4. I'll bring it up tomorrow in the parent teacher conference. 

[DavisH]

This sounds liek a bilingual program rather than an EP. I say that because they are learning maths in 2 languages. EP's normally teach most subjects in english only (aside from Thai social. Thai language and Buddhism). 

But yes, they should be learning the same topic more or less at the same time. 

When i worked in a bilingual school, the Thai teacher would write the key words I used in Thai on the side board. Occasionally, she had to use a dictionary to find a word I used. 

I don't think the school were concerned if we taught exactly the same or not. Their argument at the time is that they got most of the content in the Thai class - my job was to do more conceptual development / experiments and activities. I still taught basic concepts though. But in my current EP, they learn their main subjects in english - and do so from kg1. So by grade 1 they already have basic language skills and can communicate quite well in english. 

[EVENKEEL]

47 minutes ago, DavisH said:

This sounds liek a bilingual program rather than an EP. I say that because they are learning maths in 2 languages. EP's normally teach most subjects in english only (aside from Thai social. Thai language and Buddhism). 

But yes, they should be learning the same topic more or less at the same time. 

When i worked in a bilingual school, the Thai teacher would write the key words I used in Thai on the side board. Occasionally, she had to use a dictionary to find a word I used. 

I don't think the school were concerned if we taught exactly the same or not. Their argument at the time is that they got most of the content in the Thai class - my job was to do more conceptual development / experiments and activities. I still taught basic concepts though. But in my current EP, they learn their main subjects in english - and do so from kg1. So by grade 1 they already have basic language skills and can communicate quite well in english. 

It's an English Program school, they have English Math and Thai math as well as Thai science and English science and of course English language and Thai language. The rest is all Thai.

[MarcelV]

As a math teacher in an EP I try to teach both the English and Thai terminology for my subject.

Any good math teacher would make sure to take care of that as well.