Category: Middle School

Bringing reality into the classroom is so important.  Language is something we use in the real world and so it is incumbent that teachers link their lessons to actual use in the wider world.

One nice example is a – … Read More ....

Brainstorming is a great, open-ended activity that can be used for many teaching objectives.  Assessing student prior knowledge, consolidation, review or just language enjoyment and fun.

Give students an organizer or blank piece of paper and some short instructions / … Read More ....

A simple teaching recipe using the website – Storyline.

Students in teams open up the game and play. They must make a graph about the data set provided by the site. Ex. Percent of internet users over time.

Students discuss, … Read More ....

I used to do this with my classes (teacher training) and it always showed up on my teacher evaluations post-course as one of the highlights mentioned by trainees. You can do it too with students.

FREE HUGS.

Play the song … Read More ....

One of the problems with teaching is that there is never enough time and things almost always take more time than we’ve planned for in our lessons.

So what happens is that the real important stuff, the activities, the “giving … Read More ....

Commercials are high-quality materials to use in the language classroom. And they are copyright free!

Just play a commercial that doesn’t show the product until the end. Pause and have students guess what brand/product is being sold.

Here are a … Read More ....

This is helpful for learners with lower language levels who are struggling with the auxiliary verb system (be, do and have).

I give learners a piece of paper or mini-whiteboard with one word of a short sentence. They … Read More ....

This is a very easy technique for making a lesson.

Take any news story or any story. Assign and have students dissect the story and fill in the 5Ws .

Use this easy template – 5ws Graphic Organizer   Bingo!

Have … Read More ....

This is a real easy idea and especially good for the start of a school year or the beginning of any month or the year.

Provide students with this template and have them research all the important dates for the … Read More ....

This is very much like the famous quiz game, Golden Bell. Play until one student standing who can then challenge the teacher.

Students stand in a line. The first two in the line face off. The teacher shows a … Read More ....