Thank you to those who have contributed.

I find it heartening to have my ideas about reading books validated. For over a year I have been in consultation with colleagues at UQ who have so far sent 20 Australian books. Throughout this semester, I have had English Majors reading and assessing them for suitability in a Chinese context. My ambition is to make English contemporary literature a component of English classes at all levels. Rather a confronting task for a lowly foreigner.

Although the suggestion re language tapes (CD's these days) is good, as I said in my opening post, the students hate them. I don't blame them, and refuse to use them in my classes. They just don't work for many reasons:they all employ American English; they are situationally unrealistic; language is delivered so slowly that students are completely confounded when hearing English spoken in situ.

Movies are also good - I make it a rule only to show Australian, English, South African etc. movies to accustom the students to different ways of speaking English as well as to different cultures. One free period I showed "Strange Bedfellows": unexpectedly Hoges in China had one of the most interesting impacts of all the movies (apart from "Hotel Rwanda") I have ever shown!

Yvonne - why don't I come home to teach? I got embroiled in the clutches of Centrelink and for 7 years - admittedly 4 of which I was a student; though desperate for part-time work as a single mum - the only jobs I was offered (and had to take as work for the dole) were as a cleaner or kitchen-hand. Yet I landed this job with exactly the same qualifications I'd had before my Dram/Lit degree - the same experience, the same persona and intelligence. Yet here I have won awards, conducted other seminars, delivered papers at international conferences and designed language programmes and courses.

I have this fear that if I come home I'll be set to scrubbing out other peoples toilets again!

I very recently started teaching English as a foreign language - the very little experience I've had so far basically is along the lines of what you were saying.
The English classes I sat in on tended to consist of repetition, and while I suspect most of my lessons will be attached to the english curriculum being provided, I can also see opportunities to make it a little more interesting for the students.
The greatest difficulty I perceive so far is making lessons that can accommodate the distinct gap in English language skills between the more inexperienced and experienced students.
Though I'm very interested to see the contributions to this thread.

Hmmm, under one God, using the American Education System compared to ours is like using a train wreck compared to an Australian beach.

Romany

The best advice I can give for 'reaching' your students is to localize and personalize the lessons (e.g., make them relevant to the specific students and geographical area in which you are in by asking the students - how do you do or say X in your language/culture/country). All cultures have life events like weddings, holidays, etc., so all students can relate, and the differences are in how they are done (which gives them something to talk about).

BTW: There are some very good ESL resources available on the internet, which you could use to supplement your classroom activities: lesson plans, online listening, speaking, reading and writing activities, discussion groups, etc. Try doing a google search on "esl" or "esl resources" - Dave's ESL cafe is a good starting place. News sites like the BBC also have language learners sections with video clips, activities, etc. Asking your Chinese students to also search for interesting/useful sites gets them involved.

Go for it Romany! Reading and understanding the text in a foreign language is so encouraging to continue learning. Understanding the rapidly spoken words from native speakers takes more time than learning the language itself to read. And then all those accents come into it!

Of course, native speakers in any language also have difficulty understanding some accents in their own language. When learning a new language that is important to remember. 'This problem is not unique to me'.

I hated tapes (I'm pre CD's), made me feel inadequate, especially when I had no idea what was said.

But, I could read very sophisticated literature and answer in writing complex questions in English before I could fully participate in spoken English. Movies were also great. Language in context, but not aimed at me, as with tapes/CD's.

My daughter has just started corresponding via e-mail with a French speaking student learning English. French from her and English comes back. They help each other and lose some of that self consciousness that often stops new learners practice their skills. Both learn that the primary goal is to get the message across, if the other understands that means successful communication, finesse comes with practice.

She also has a few favourite French movies which get watched regularly. Every time she understands more of the spoken words.

Regardless of your previous experiences, sounds to me like you have a lot to contribute towards language learning. This coming seminar will look great in your resume when you're ready to come back!

There are many great ideas here from other posters.
Foxy, that story about your dad's note is hilarious!
My compliments to you, Romany, for your hard work and talent in this area.

When I was at school (in Holland) we were taught French, German and English as foreign languages and English was by far my favourite language, and was popular with all my classmates, too, because we had so much fun learning.

One lesson out of 6, taking turns, someone could bring in a lyric from a favourite song.
If it was your turn, you had to bring in a tape with the song, a printed copy of the lyric and tell the class what you thought the song was about.
If we didn't get the translation right the teacher would help us translate it properly, and we had to make a list of the new words and learn them as homework.

The teacher sometimes used drama as well- e.g. having an English tea party (and drinking real English breakfast tea) and discussing certain topics including the weather.

Like Yvonne said, we had to read quite a lot of books, I remember "Lord of the Flies" being one of them.