There is a number of soft skills that teaching in China can help you to develop. An opportunity to teach in China can be both exciting and interesting from the perspective of self-development.
The work environment can be competitive especially for those who wish to explore their capacity to push their skills to the limit.
As with any job it requires not only a good knowledge of teaching, with a solid theoretical foundation, but also a confident personality with a number of key skills that are connected to personal attributes, this is directly related to how well an individual can work with and interact with others.
What are eleven soft skills that we think teaching in China can help you to develop?
We’ve selected the following eleven soft skills that an individual can mostly develop in due course if they teach in China:
1. Leadership
2. Flexibility
3. Patience
4. Thinking critically
5. Problem solving
6. Oral skills/speaking skills
7. Listening skills
8. Inter-personal communication
9. Positivity
10. Time management
11. Team work
What does every soft skill that is on the list imply?
Being a teacher means that you are a leader for the students, they must be a role model that inspires the students to learn from and follow. A teacher should be interesting and approachable, help the students to study, learn with interest, help them to map their future and inspire them to follow their dreams and aims, and enable them to achieve successful results.
A good teacher will remain in the memory of an individual for a very long time, perhaps for life! Every teacher will influence the future of every student, a good teacher will ensure that their influence is positive and beneficial to the student.
Flexibility is the ability to change according to the situation, or be changed easily accordingly.
A teacher needs to cope with many different and unexpected events, foe example there can be changes in the schedule (another teacher became ill).
Being a teacher will help to develop the skill of flexibility through planning and adjusting.
If a teacher acknowledges the changing needs of the students in a rapidly changing environment, then it’s possible to balance between subject matter focus and learner-focused approaches.
Patience can help to deal with unexpected situations in the classroom more efficiently, Students can ask some very unusual and difficult questions, or they may not understand an answer, so they might ask the same question again.
Patience is key when being a good teacher.
Patience can also help a teacher to address the nature of every student and help build friendly communication with the students.
To have a real impact in the classroom and to reach those challenging students, one must think critically and outside of the box.
Teaching forces one to examine their own methods of explaining things and to experiment with new ways of assessing results.
Problem solving is something that one needs to deal with on a daily basis, a teacher cannot bury their head in the sand, they need to find solutions for many problems, both academic and for a student’s personal needs on a daily basis.
Speaking in the classroom every day, exchanging questions and answers with the students, addressing weird, funny or tricky questions will stretch and develop oral skills.
Listening stands alongside with being attentive.
Listening is a skill that can be developed by a teacher because attentive attitude of a teacher can help a child to study better. This can be achieved through being a good listener.
Listening and hearing are not the same thing!
Practising attentive attitudes can help to develop listening skills.
Listening can help to build a strong foundation that can lead an individual to find the right solution.
By listening to other people’s perspectives on a problem, you can understand them better, and answer such questions when you really know where they’re coming from, and why they think the way they do.
In order to obtain real and positive results in the classroom, or in school in general, one has to be effective at communicating, both with the students and other staff members.
The added barrier of dealing with people for whom English is a second language, forces one to enhance their communication skills and to experiment with novel ways of doing this.
Being optimistic is an ability that can help one to cope with stress, it can help the immune system to stay strong, and has an impact on one’s overall well-being.
It is important to be positive because it will help to boost ones relationship with the work environment, bring one inner peace, happiness and allow one to receive positive emotions from one’s colleagues and students.
Time management is how an individual arranges, manages and uses their time before, during, or after work.
Good time management can increase an individual’s’ productivity and efficiency.
A teacher needs to work with their colleagues and students, this can require different approaches when building communication and trust.
Each class is a team, as well as just the teaching staff.
Remember – The best teachers are those willing to learn!
