TEACHING VERY LARGE ENGLISH LANGUAGE CLASS: WHAT TO DO?

Abstract

Studies have shown that the rapid expansion and global acceptance of English as an international language has led to an increase in the number of people learning the languages especially in Africa and Nigeria in particular. Teaching a large English language class can be a serious challenge to
many teachers due to the many problems associated with the sheer size of the class. This paper examines the problem of teaching a large English language class in Nigeria and explores ways of managing the class. Starting off with a discussion on the problems of a large language class, the
paper provides some practical ways of dealing with the problems as they relate to teaching English language class in Nigeria. The paper shows and indeed concludes that a large language class is not necessarily less effective than a smaller one, but it does require extra efforts from both the
teacher and students to cope with the challenges.