Teach English in LanshAn Yuanzhongchang - Yongzhou Shi

There are plenty of challenges, other than language barrier that seems to be the common problem that the students of different nationalities face, these students come across other common challenges such as homesickness, culture shock and financial instability. Homesickness is the discomfort caused by being away from home. It is the combination of depressive and anxious symptoms. Dealing with homesickness makes it harder as an educator to teach in the classroom as those students that are homesick have a withdrawn behavior and a difficulty focusing on topics unrelated to home. It may not seem like a common issue that most international students would have but it is in the top five (5) of difficulties that international students have to deal with as the separation from their family and friends take a toll on the students and getting their undivided attention is almost impossible in the classroom as all they can think about is home and how different it is adjusting and making friends. Some ways of helping those students is getting them involved in exciting activities with their classmates and probably try to find out about what it is that is preventing them from being able to pay attention when the lesson is being taught and by putting together a culture day, and you as an educator would be able to find out what it is they miss instead of trying to find individual time for those students that are affected by homesickness. It can have a serious effect on successfully teaching the lessons you had prepared for your students, and as a result of not handling the students with homesickness properly, getting your lesson across to those students they may not be prepared to attend the lectures you had planned for them, also another result of this would be poor grades thus being left behind in the class and these students left with the stress of having to do it all over or not completing the goal they had in mind which is to pass the course successfully. One of the hardest things for a student is having to deal with culture shock. It can be interesting for a student to be able to study in a different country up until all of that fades away and they begin to realize that you are in an entirely different country, one that the people may be speaking different languages, having to understand the different slangs and the way it is used and differs in the country that they are in, having to eat different food, or having to grasp unfamiliar customs of that particular country, the foreign habits and social expectations, for example: in Jamaica whenever you enter a place or mode of transportation or even simply passing a person it is expected of you to say , Good morning, Good afternoon or Good evening based upon the time of day. Joining into a new culture with new people is never easy but it is nothing to be fearful of as it is a normal reaction to culture shock coming into an unfamiliar surroundings. Financial instability is one of the strongest difficulties faced by an international student. A number of students drop out as a result of this. The cost of these students’ parents sending their child/children to school in another country is already hard enough to deal with let alone having to think about the up keep for the funding towards a place for their child/ children to live and food and transport expenses, a lot of pressure would be put on the student to do their best and for them to keep in mind that a lot of their parents money is at stake. In the students’ perspective being in a new country you would want to explore new places, try new local food places / restaurants and buy new stuff. However, knowing that they are on a budget or low spending fund would not always allow them to do so. The money is very limited in this case and has to be used wisely for future upcoming assignments to get some additional help if the grades are not looking so good or they think they have an issue fully grasping in a particular area of their study. Some ways of helping these students with their financial problems as well as doing well in their studies could be to give out awards or cash prizes for students that average above (80%) eighty percent with their assignments along with their tests and offer personal one on one help within a time frame that would be helpful to them to get them back on track as you can observe as an educator that they need it or even to offer money to students that would be able to help set up the classroom as a means of helping them earn some cash to better assist them with the problems they are having financially. These problems that face students of different nationalities can be a multitude of things. They all fall under different categories as to why they are having these difficulties, like being financially unstable can be because of family poverty or the expenses became very high to allow that student to be able to learn in another country. Culture shock can occur when that student was never exposed to much, outside of their culture and is much more difficult to deal with for those introverted students, it lasts up to weeks even months. Last but not least homesickness, it may not seem that detrimental in the learning world but it is taken seriously as any of the problems listed as it is experienced by many. It makes it very unfavorable for one to focus on learning or anything other than the idea of them not feeling at home or feeling like they do not belong and having a hard time making new friends. They will start to miss their family and friends thus creating an unfocused and depressed student.