What is Our Purpose for the Language School?

 

What is Our Purpose for the Language School?

When we created Optimus Language School, we had a certain kind of student in mind: the kind who is highly motivated, is serious about studying, and has a clear goal of learning the English language. Whether it is for the sake of living and working in the U.S., going to college in the U.S., or even taking their skills back to their home country, we want students who take their education seriously. 

So, what do we do to help these students stay motivated and achieve their goal of English proficiency? As we created our ESL program, we kept in mind the focus on communication skills—being able to understand and be understood by others.

 Optimus makes sure you are motivated and committed to success:

Before you even begin our program, we want to set you up to be successful and make sure that you don’t lose any of the enthusiasm you had when you signed up. For four weeks prior to the start of your first quarter here at Optimus, you will be taking a free ESL e-Learning course online to get you ready with common conversational vocabulary, idioms, and verb phrases that will help you understand American English better. We also give you an incentive to do well in this course—students scoring 90% or above on the course will earn FREE textbooks for their first quarter (that’s a $60 value!!). 

Another way we make sure you are the serious student we are looking for is by using a quarterly system instead of a monthly system. Students who are there to just have fun and learn a little English while focusing on other things are happy to have a monthly system because that means they can easily quit or take a break when they are getting a little tired. Optimus, on the other hand, wants students to be committed to their education with us. We also don’t allow rolling enrollment, which would otherwise cause distraction and slow down class progress. We instead ask students to wait until the next quarter begins so that they can make the same commitment to their class as the other students will. Consistency in the class makeup means that we have a greater ability to provide a more personalized education because we are not constantly dealing with new students who are behind. 

Optimus helps you build your English communication skills:

Studying in large classes with many students can really work against your goal of learning to communicate in English. Students can often go long periods of time without speaking at all in large classes. We wanted to make sure our students had ample opportunities to actually use the language they were learning in class. With only 4-8 students in each class, you are guaranteed to read, write, listen, and talk in English every single class. You can ask as many questions as you need to, and you can bring in real materials (mail, magazines, newspapers, advertisements, etc.) to learn more about them and have a discussion. We can focus on helping you learn about the parts of American culture that confuse or fascinate you. 

Optimus makes sure you are getting results:

In addition to the plentiful opportunities to practice in class, Optimus also gives students opportunities to show what they’ve learned and what they can really do with their English skills so they can see the results of their hard work.

Through weekly activity projects, students use what they have learned that week to create a real-life scenario that they can present in detail to the class in English. Students are prepared to answer questions posed by the teacher or by classmates. This is a chance for your teacher and your classmates to help push you further with your skills. These projects are also added to your portfolio so that you can see the progress that has been made from the beginning of the level to the end of the level and from the beginning of the program to the end.

 At the end of each quarter, students spend a week exploring cultural materials together, going out into the community to practice their English skills, and learning more about American life. This is a fantastic opportunity to visit places you are curious about (such as local restaurants, landmarks, malls, city centers, etc.) and build your confidence in conversing with native speakers while still having the support of your classmates and your teacher with you to make the experience more comfortable. You will notice as you progress through the levels of our ESL program that your communication skills will come a long way. Even when communicating with someone still feels a little difficult, you will begin to feel comfortable asking the right questions that will help you understand them, and you will know how to explain your meaning so that you can be understood.

Depending on your learning goals, the final measurement of your English proficiency will either be our Level 5 ESL Final Exam or the TOEFL exam. Students who are learning English to benefit their everyday life and/or to open up new professional opportunities will likely finish with our final ESL level. On the other hand, those who plan to progress to college after will need to take the TOEFL exam in order to prove that they have sufficient English proficiency and have learned enough academic English to be able to succeed in regular college classes. This is a unique challenge that goes beyond conversational English, and most students will need a bit more preparation before taking the TOEFL exam. For this reason, we are currently creating a TOEFL class** that will teach students the strategies they need in order to do well on this type of exam. It will also help you focus on the kind of academic texts and vocabulary you will need to be able to navigate on this exam and in college classes.

**Opening in 2019.

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Published on July 3, 2018

A leading English language school accredited by the CEA (Commission on English Language Accreditation) and approved by SEVP (Student and Exchange Visitor Program) located in Los Angeles, California. Learn English in LA with our ESL classes, TOEFL preparation, and English speaking classes. Are you serious about improving your English? Join a class today!