In: Advanced| Elementary| High School| Intermediate| Middle School| Recipe| University
14 Sep 2009
This is a wonderfully simple communicative activity.
Get a pile of nice magazine pictures. Next, tear or cut them into twos. Enough halves for the number of students in your classroom.
Then, give each student half a picture. They have to walk around the class describing their picture and finding their torn "match". Once they find their match, they can sit down.
Make sure to make…
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In: Advanced| All Ages & Levels| Elementary| False Beginner| High School| Intermediate| Middle School| Recipe| University
4 Sep 2009There are many ways to teach writing but one way that I really think provides enough structure for beginning and developing writers is guided writing.
Give students a text with words missing (usually nouns). In groups or pairs they can complete the text together, guessing the words to be filled in. Better yet, if the story has some context or theme.
If the students are…
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An Activity with a Cell Phone
This activity was done in a workshop for teachers of English working at the DGEP (Direccion General de Escuelas Preparatorias), high school teachers of English.
The activity was to show a simple but…
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In: Advanced| Business| High School| Intermediate| Middle School| Recipe| University
1 Sep 2009
I really think it great when a teacher gets the students interested in the world and what's happening there.
You can use the newspaper in many ways but one easy way is to ask a student each day to begin class by reporting 3 things from the news. A new student each day. Ask questions afterwards and have the student write the 3 main…
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21 Aug 2009
This discussion activity really ceaches students to listen to each other.
Start the activity by making statements for the class but "coughing / mumbling or saying "blablabla". Ex. I went to the &&)))*** last night. Students ask for clarification using the prompt on the board.
Low: Excuse me, what did you say?
High: Excuse me but who/what/where/when/ ..........?
The teacher then repeats the statement but finishing it…
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In: Advanced| False Beginner| High School| Intermediate| Middle School| Recipe| University
19 Aug 2009
This is a nice way to get students to know each other.
Make a quick organizer for writing. Have the students fold an A4 "hamburger" like, 4 times. They will have 8 lines for writing when they unfold it.
They must write 8 sentences about themselves, all beginning with "I am....". Teacher monitors.
Next, go around the class with students reading their poem in total or…
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15 Aug 2009
Cellphones are the imbilical cord of today's youth. Instead of fighting against them, let's use this interest to get them learning English!
Transl8it.com allows the teacher to enter English text and then get the "text message" equivalent. Simply copy this and handout to students. The students look at the text messaging and "decode" this into proper English. After they are done, ask…
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12 Aug 2009Mr. Bean works well with this technique.
Backdoor is a technique where in pairs students sit back to back. One student watches the screen and describes the action. The teacher can write vocab. on the board to prompt student talk. Continue for a few minutes then pause the video and the pairs switch positions.
Continue and then watch the end of the video together, describing without the sound.
This works well with 3-7…
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In: Advanced| Elementary| False Beginner| High School| Intermediate| Middle School| Recipe| University
12 Aug 2009
This generates a lot of talk and students are always very interested in each other's lives.
Write down on the board some of your own (the teacher) family names. Underneath write;
A. Who is .......................?
B. ........ is ...........'s ................
A. .................................?
Students ask the teacher about the family members on the board. The teacher replies, using "B" and writing more information on the board. The student then… What's a teaching recipe? It's a step by step guide or general description of the ideas you use to keep your classes exciting and educational. It can be a lesson plan, a numbered list of steps, a game idea, or whatever you like! We invite you to share your teaching recipes, and browse the ones other teachers have shared.
