Viatouch Teacher Articles
Teaching Tips

Building Confidence in Students
by Neerja Sharma

As a teacher, my personal experience tells me that it is very important to build the confidence of the students, to encourage them to participate in the class, and to help them acquire proficiency in a language effectively. I am a non-native speaker of English. It was the confidence fostered in me by my teachers that encouraged me to learn the language and to communicate in it effectively.

When I go the class, I easily relate myself with the students as it reminds me of my own student days. I can imagine the plight of the students coping with different subjects. Students are all a bundle of excitement, curiosity, and energy to learn anything new. They have idealistic notions and dreams of attaining success in the area of study that they have chosen for themselves. They want to prove themselves to the world, to their families, and to friends and teachers. Students experience pressure to achieve something in life. Too much is happening in their lives with lots of assignments, study work, examinations, and presentations.

Building confidence in students is essential in order to help them perform efficiently. I will take the example of my subject, the English language, in order to illustrate and explain the importance of confidence building in students so that they start using or communicating in the language without hesitation. I have noticed that a small word of appreciation or a clap of applause motivates a student to perform with double the energy. Not only this, it also engenders a positive and constructive kind of competition among the others to perform better. Students feel proud of their achievements and really happy, if their work is appreciated in the class. In addition, they show interest in the lessons and start participating more actively in the class. In other words, their confidence level increases. They actually start feeling competent enough to use the language. Thus they start using the language correctly out of that newfound confidence that they can interact in a different language.

Building confidence can have many benefits for the teacher. In fact, half the battle is won when students ooze with confidence and have faith in themselves and their capabilities. All that I do in the class as a way of building their confidence is to appreciate even the smallest of their achievements, which makes them feel important. They try their best to perform better every time to keep up my faith and confidence in them. Believe it or not, it has helped me a number of times, especially in the case of students who are very weak. When they are applauded, their hearts swell with pride. I can clearly see it on their faces, in their expressions. Those very students, whom I had applauded in the previous class, participate and concentrate on the lesson in the next class.

A confident student definitely performs better, concentrates more, and acts as a model or motivator for others. This is something I have realized and discovered in my classes. I always try to keep boosting the confidence of my students by a simple exercise: appreciating and applauding their work.

The author is an ESL teacher, who has taught English for the last six years in a Canadian college based in India. Neerja is also a freelancer writer. She regularly contributes articles to a locally based current affairs magazine. One of her short stories has been published in a New York based publication's anthology titled Grab Your Tiger.