Clap!

Practices: listening, speaking
The teacher starts telling a story.
After a few sentences, she claps her hands and asks a student to continue the story. After a few more sentences, the teacher claps hands again and asks another student to continue. Repeat as necessary.

Diposting oleh Unknown 11.19 0 komentar

Beat the Teacher

Objective: lesson revision. If you tutor a student one on one then this game is perfect for revision of your previous lessons, as well as finding out how much the student may already know. It's a form of Naughts and Crosses or as the Americans would call it - Tick Tack Toe.
Before your lesson write down as many questions that you can think of to ask your student and number them 1 to whatever.
What is the simple past tense word for Run?
What is an Abstract noun?
etc...



Ask your student to draw the nine squared naughts and crosses grid by overlaping two horizontal and two vertical lines.

       |       |

       |       |  

-------|-------|-------

       |       |

       |       |

-------|-------|-------

       |       |   

       |       |

Let's say, you thought of 60 questions to ask your student. Ask your student to write down on a piece of paper the numbers 1 to 60.
The student first chooses a number from their list of numbers. Let's say for example, the student chooses number 3, then question number 3 on your question list is the question you will ask them. Note: after the student chooses a number they have to mark it off their list, so that, that question can only be asked once.
You ask the student the question. If they get it right then they get to place their naught or cross, whichever symbol they choose, in whichever square they like on the grid.
But, if the student gets it wrong then the teacher places their symbol in whichever square they like. If the student gives an incorrect answer then don't forget to tell them the correct answer afterwards. The game goes on like this until the winner gets three symbols in a row.

       |       |

    X  |       |  

-------|-------|-------

       |   X   |

       |       |

-------|-------|-------

       |       |  X

       |       |

This game is great for the teacher because it gives them an idea of how much the student has retained from previous lessons, and also, what they already know. My student likes playing this game because she beats this teacher - a lot!

Contributed by: Tom

 

Diposting oleh Unknown 11.19 0 komentar

Authentic Cooking Experience

Level: Elementary and lower-intermediate

Target Learners: Teens and adults

Language: Imperatives used for instructions; vocabulary for food and cooking; adverbs of sequence (first, then, etc.)

Authenticity: Directions from packages

Comprehensibility: Bilingual instructions

Materials: Instant noodles, canned soup, jelly or pudding powder, popcorn, pancake mixture, cocoa drink, etc; cooking utensils; home science lab

Introduction & Aim

An English exam question given to my son sparks off the idea of an EFL lesson based on authentic, practical language use. My son did not write a single word on the answer sheet, and upon my inquiry, he confessed that he did not know how to attempt the question. First, he did not understand what instructions were and the language required of him. Second, he had no hands-on experience in baking a cake or cooking noodles, which was more of an excuse than the fact.

Goals

The purpose of this lesson is to teach authentic language use and provide hands-on experience, catering for learners with different intelligence profiles, namely bodily-kinesthetic and interpersonal talents. It also opens avenues to cross-discipline cooperation between EFL and home science. An added benefit is cultural awareness of western styled food and meal.

In Class

Briefly introduce the theme and objectives. Teacher presents common instant or easy-to-prepare food products. Point out western-style ones. Ask if learners like them. Students are to share their favourites and cooking experience, if any. Draw their attention to vocabulary. Pick one exemplary item. Two learners come forward, one being the reader and the other writer. Open the package and copy the preparation instructions on to the chalkboard. Remind them to replace the brands with the generic name of the food item. Check class comprehension. Introduce adverbs of sequence, and add them in the right place. Students pair up and are assigned different food products. They are to work out the meaning of instructions and prepare the food items. The class share among themselves the final products and elect the 'best cook'.

Follow-up

Home assignment: Learners pick their favourite easy-to-prepare recipe and write up the preparation directions. Additional credit will be given if they demonstrate mastery of imperatives and adverbs of sequence.

Next session: Pairs agree on a recipe to prepare. Bring their own ingredients and present their method of preparation. Extra credits are given for pooling of effort to prepare a 3- or 4-course meal with starter, soup, main dish, desert and/or drink.

Lesson Plan Highlights

Involvement. Most of the time, learners are busy working out the language themselves. Scaffolding. The lesson is structured with language explanation, demonstration, pairwork and bilingual package instructions. Hands-on experience. Projection effect. Learners are directed to pay attention to names of food, preparation instructions, simple recipe, courses of meal, package descriptions (ingredients, expiry date, weight and serving size, storage instructions, nutrition information, etc.)

Contributed by: Connie Chow

Diposting oleh Unknown 11.17 0 komentar

Animal Adventures

Practices: listening, speaking. The teacher tells a story about an animal, but repeatedly asks the students to guess what, why, where, what next etc. Example:

Teacher:	A cat did something very naughty. What did it do?
Students:	It ate some cheese.
Teacher:	No.
Students:	It attacked the pet bird.
Teacher:	Yes! That's right! But why?
Students:	Because it was hungry.
Teacher:	No.
Students:	Because it was jealous.
Teacher:	Yes! What do you think happened then?
Students:	The owners came home.
Teacher:	Yes! (or No.)
etc, etc, etc

Each time the students "guess" something, there is another question. In reality there is no original story. It is the students who unknowingly invent it.
Of course, the "story" could be about other subjects too, and used at other levels.

Diposting oleh Unknown 11.15 0 komentar

Anecdote

Practices: listening, speaking
Each student thinks of a true personal anecdote, something that actually happened in the past.
He or she then starts to recount the anecdote but stops after a while and asks the others to guess the end.

Diposting oleh Unknown 11.09 0 komentar

FILL SOMEONE’S SHOES: FUSING ENGLISH FOR CHILDREN WITH AKHLAQ TEACHING TO SHAPE CHARACTER EDUCATION BASED ENGLISH FOR CHILDREN TEACHING THROUGH THE USE OF EDITABLE ROLE PLAYING VIDEO GAMES

A. Background
Character education in English for Children (EFC), to some extent, limits its development on the role play application in the English teaching. The choice of role play application to deal with language teaching and learning and to bring a real life experience has always been a good one even since the first time Jacob L. Moreno applied it for his research on applying role play to resolve individual and family problems. Even in the scope of EFC in which character education is always open for a fusion, role play displays nothing than benefits. Priscillia Clarke in Supporting Children Learning English as a Second Language in the Early Years (birth to six years) proposes that the most appropriate program for children in the pre­school years is a play based program (because) the way the indoor and outdoor space is arranged will convey messages about the value placed on the culture and language backgrounds of the families.[1] It implies that besides functioning as a bridge to learn English, play is also able to fuse cultural values the society in which the children live with English learning. Though possessing benefits, role play owns common significant problems teachers usually perform. Those problems are warming up, contextualization, and adjustment.[2]
 

Warming up refers to the lack of preparation from the teachers. Contextualization denotes the difficulties the students might face when encountered with specific requirements to play certain roles. Adjustment deals with the basic abilities students have to master before engaging themselves to a role play.[3] These problems basically revolve around what Stanislavski called Emotional Memory, an action which requires that an actor recreates an event from the distant past in order to regenerate the ‘feelings’ experienced at that time.[4] It denotes that the role play doers are demanded to feel what has been felt in a new circumstance. Linked to the aforementioned problems role play has, Emotional Memory contributes a significant role in the three of them. In the warming up problem, if the teachers focus only on asking students to memorize the dialogue, the essence of performing a role play is lost. The teachers should touch also the attempt to spark the feelings the roles the students have in order to let the students fill someone’s shoes. What implies by this statement is that besides learning English, the students can feel the roles they do; if one’s role is a beggar, the expected feelings coming out from the role are 1) I have to donate some money if I meet a beggar 2) I must work hard so that I will not be a beggar in the future. This implicative imagination is what is expected from Emotional Memory on the scope of warming up. Thus, the warming up should be done under the application of Emotional Memory. The same case also works for the second problem, contextualization. The difficulties of contextualization actually roots from the absence of Emotional Memory in the process. If a student is asked to play as a queen but the society in which the student lives is not a monarch, then, the difficulties of contextualization will rise up. If the teacher instructs the student to imagine how her parents spoil her and tell her that being a queen is being a spoiled woman: to get anything she wants, the similar feeling of being a queen will surface. In the contextualization aspect, Emotional Memory can be done also through regenerating what has been experienced virtually. Watching movie is one of the examples. By watching movie about a queen, the student can regenerate the same feeling she obtains when she watches the movie in the role play. What becomes a problem in the role play is that the teachers contextualize what the roles are from explanation only. The next contribution is on the adjustment level. This level engulfs mostly on the material mastery by the students. When it comes to material mastery, the effectiveness of the teaching learning process comes to question. Emotional Memory should take part in the teaching and learning process because Emotional Memory does not only equip the students with the content but also the context the material has. For example, when the teachers teach their students how to say ‘thank you’, it is not just the content which is the list of expressions of saying ‘thank you’ but also the context which is the way to say it to make it culturally acceptable. If the teachers focus on birthing Emotional Memory from their students before engaging themselves in a role play, the role play will beget an expected outcome. To do so, a specific role play, as foreseen by the researchers, would overcome those problems which might occur on children learning English also and that special role play is role playing video game (RPG).

[1] (2009). Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority.

[2] Blatner, Adam. (2009). Role Play in Education.

[3] ibid

[4] Sawoski, Perviz. The Stanislavski System: Growth and Methodology. p.18

Diposting oleh Unknown 10.23 0 komentar

THE EFFECT OF GERMAN INVASION ON THE MAIN CHARACTER ANNEMARIE AS REFLECTED IN LOIS LOWRY’S NUMBER THE STARS

THE EFFECT OF GERMAN INVASION ON THE MAIN CHARACTER ANNEMARIE AS REFLECTED IN LOIS LOWRY’S NUMBER THE STARS

Fithriyah Nurul Hidayati

IAIN Surakarta

ABSTRACT

Number The Stars is the reflection of the real history of Denmark. The objective of the research is to describe the social condition in Denmark during the period of German invasion. The German invasion has caused many effects, namely: the deportation of the Jews, the lack of material, the racial discrimination and the rescue of the Jews. The writer is interested in choosing the novel Number The Stars in this thesis because of some reasons: firstly, this novel is interesting, this novel ever gets the Newbery Medal, National Jewish Book Award, and Sidney Taylor Award, and National Jewish Libraries in 1990 (http://www.loislowry.com/bio.html). Secondly, this novel consists of social problems so that the writer would like to dig up the fact in social study especially the rescue of the Danish Jews. Thirdly, the novel can increase the knowledge about the rescue of the Jews in Europe during the world war II. In analyzing the research the writer uses descriptive qualitative which contains data collecting and data analyzing method. The data are analyzed based on the mimetic and sociological approach. Some of the important research findings are stated as follows: firstly, the social condition in Denmark as result of German invasion are the deportation of the Jews, the racial discrimination, the lack of material, and the rescue of the Jews. Secondly, Number The Stars describes this amazing effort through the eyes of fictional ten year old Annemarie, who learns bravery, patriot, and friendship as she and her family shelter her friend Ellen and help the Rosens family escape.

German Invasion, Hero, Children

Diposting oleh admin 08.21 0 komentar

CONCLUSION

HELL is positively responded on all eight aspects except item tryout, management, and analysis. These lacks are due to the absence of current technologies for HELL. But, basically HELL is positively acceptable because it has fulfilled the basic elements of an e-language testing. By fixing the problems and heeding the inputs from the test takers, HELL would be redesigned.

There are other two interesting findings. First is the presence of add ons and additional tools which are positively accepted by the users. Add ons refer to the personalization of HELL based on what the users want and additional tools refer to patches provided by HELL creators to enrich the content of HELL. By having these two items, HELL can be redesigned like the personality of the users. Second is the finding dealing with the external technical problems which influence the responses from the users. By external problems mean problems which are not part of the application but part of the computers. Internet connection and the condition of the computer are the example.

Diposting oleh Unknown 12.30 0 komentar

When You Turn Off The Light

This is an activity I created with my students aged 11-12 all together during a class.

I wanted them to learn how to give directions. As it was very difficult for them because we needed a context, I picked one of them and blindfolded him using my jumper. That was really funny for them.

He was placed in the middle of the classroom and told to find a word on the blackboard following instructions given by the group.

It was nice and funny work!! Good luck!!

Contributed by: Maria Jose Gil Roma

Diposting oleh Unknown 11.30 0 komentar

What am I wearing?

Objective: identify clothes, styles, colours, shapes

Before class I draw a circle on the board with four air bubbles coming from it and in each write summer, winter, spring and autumn. When I enter the classroom I wear a hat, scarf, gloves, coat etc and we talk about the various garments. Explain garments, clothes, dress etc. In groups brainstorm different clothes for the seasons. Change groups around and new groups complete questionnaire about clothes, a pair of shoes, gloves, pajamas etc. Have a discussion about students' favorite clothes, fashions, can they wear what they like or what their parents choose, etc.

Team game. One student from each team goes to the board and the teacher describes a garment. The winner is the first student to write the correct word with correct spelling. Other students can call or in most cases yell out the word! A real fun game.

I then play another game. I collect about 12 garments or pieces of clothing (eg vest, pants, boxers, skirt, jersey, bra, scarf, gloves, beads, socks) and put them in a pillow case or similar. I play a music tape and students pass around the bag. When the music stops whoever is holding the bag has to pull out a garment (without looking inside) and put on whatever they pull out. This is hiliarious, shrieks of laughter. When all garments are on the students, we repeat the garment as they put it back in the bag.

Diposting oleh Unknown 11.29 0 komentar

Vocabulary Cards

I have a class activity that works quite well and I would like to share it.

I prepare index cards with sample sentences using the vocabulary of the course. Then I prepare (on the computer) envelopes with the individual vocabulary word on the front where the address would go.

I insert the card into the envelope.

Students are dealt envelopes like a deck of cards, at random, two or three at a time.

They have to write their own sentences using the vocabulary word on the outside of the envelope. They are only allowed to look inside after their own sentence is written, to check if they did it correctly.

The index card could also have the grammar rules, punctuation rules, spelling rules for irregular verbs, etc. Whatever was required by the lesson.

The nice thing about this method is that students all do not have to write sentences using the same words as the other students. When you have 40 students in a class, it is tedious to listen to all the same sentences. This breaks the vocabulary list up for everyone to learn.

I have done this with many variations, including just giving the students an index card with the word and they must use their dictionary to look up the word, write the part of speech and a sentence.

The variations are really limited by time and imagination.

Sometimes, when the students are all seated, I will fan out the cards like a regular playing deck, and they can choose their own from the pack!

As the work is completed, students return the cards, and envelopes, to me and I give out another set, so by the end of the class, the words have rotated around the room.

This also would work for math problems.

It is especially good for team work, where students have to solve real life problems and write paragraphs.

Diposting oleh Unknown 11.28 0 komentar

Typical Day

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Practises: speaking, present simple
A student describes a typical day. This can be his/her own day, or that of a filmstar, famous politian, friend etc.
Good for all levels, especially beginners.
Lots of present simple: "I get up at midday. My hairdresser arrives at 2pm."

Diposting oleh Unknown 11.28 0 komentar

The Noun Game

Divide a lined piece of paper into 4 columns like this:

etc

In the first column, insert random letters chosen by the students, like this:

F
B
M
etc

Now fold the edge of the paper over so that the students cannot see the letters. In the second column, insert the same amount of nouns, again chosen by the students, like this:

F	Animal
B	City
M	Country
etc

NB: make sure the students understand it is important that the nouns begin on the same line as the first letter.
The students now have to think of an answer for each noun, that begins with the adjacent letter, like this:

F	Animal	Fox
B	City	Bangkok
M	Country	Mexico
etc

The game finishes when the students have completed all the answers or as many as they can. In the event they cannot finish, a time limit must be imposed. Scoring is as follows:

• no answer: 0 points
• same answer as another student: 1 point
• an answer nobody else has: 2 points

Scores are written into the end column on the sheet, like this:

F	Animal	Fox	1
B	City	Bangkok	1
M	Country	Mexico	2
etc

The scores are then totalled up and the winner is the one with the most points. The length of the game can be extended or shortened by using more or less letters and nouns.

Contributed by: Anthony Dalton

Diposting oleh Unknown 11.27 0 komentar

Songs 4 All

1. Puzzles: these can be done in big construction paper pieces (whole class) or using small paper strips (pairwork/teamwork). You can scramble: stanzas, lines or words.

2. Fill in the blanks: you can select the words to hide at random or according to your teaching point, eg parts of speech (nouns, verbs).

3. Pictures: you can use flashcards as cues for filling in the blanks activities. Another option is to use pictures for story-telling/writing: give students a picture for each team and ask them to create a side story. Some tips for writing a story are: give the names, occupation and physical description of the characters; describe the place they live in; describe their relationship.

4. Context questions: after the song, you can ask students to answer true/false, comprehension or multiple choice questions to check for main ideas understanding. Your class can also discuss topics related to love songs, such as trust, love, faithfulness etc.

Contributed by: Tere Garcia

Diposting oleh Unknown 11.23 0 komentar