Day One: Breaking the Ice

The jitters I find myself experiencing on the first day of teaching a new class never fail to surprise me. I've been teaching for fourteen years now: what could possibly go wrong?  In any case, it could hardly be more of my disaster than my very first day on the job... (You can read about this teaching tragedy at: http://www.tes.co.uk/article.aspx?storycode=6006526).

I guess my nerves are rational enough. A lot is at stake here: this initial lesson sets the tone for the rest of the year, in terms of class dynamic and work ethic. I always aim to establish a positive group relationship in the first lesson while allowing myself the opportunity to gauge the needs and interests of individual learners within the class.

I thought I'd record the procedure I followed in last night's lesson and reflect a little on it here. Overall, I felt we had a good start back to the year, but I'm sure there's still room for improvement!

My New Class: A pre intermediate, mutli - lingual group of nine ESOL learners comprising Polish, Hungarian, Latvian, Thai, Moroccan and Spanish learners. Learners range in age from eighteen to around fifty.

Here is what we did:

Name Rattler
In my multi lingual class of pre-intermediate level learners, names were clearly going to be an issue. For me, establishing a solid group dynamic is absolutely crucial, and if it takes ten minutes of the first lesson for learners to get their tongues around each other's names then no matter: I feel it is time very well spent. Learners were clearly keen to get to grips with each other's names and I felt there was a positive atmosphere from the outset.

Name Rattler is as old as the hills. Introduce yourself, e.g.: My name is Genny.  The learner on your right then has to introduce himself and remember your name too: Her name is Genny and my name is Istvan. Rattle round the class until the last learner has to remember the entire class list of names. Then ask the last learner to give you another piece of information about herself, e.g.: I like banana sandwiches. The learner on her left then has to provide a similar bit of information along with the last learner's piece of information, e.g.: Loli likes banana sandwiches and I like beer. Rattle round the class the opposite way.

Name Rattler worked very well last night, and by the end of the activity the learners were visibly more relaxed. Most of them were making basic mistakes with the present simple tense: clearly we need to go back to the drawing board there!

Needs analysis

I sourced good needs analysis questions from Melissa Martin's first day back procedure on http://www.onestopenglish.com/support/methodology/teaching-approaches/approaching-a-first-class-with-a-new-group/155899.article. I gave learners time to answer the questions (some of them needed a bit of prompting)  and then we discussed the questions as a class. I did this because I wanted learners to be aware of the needs of the class as a whole. In particular we focused on the final question: "What can I do to improve my English outside the class?" as a surprisingly large amount of learners appear to labour under the misapprehension that they will learn the language by attending one English class a week and doing diddly squat else.

Rules and Regulations

I am not a fan of admin. Neither do I particularly like droning through pages of boring rules and regulations while my class gently slip into the land of Nod. We sped through the handbook, apart from one page which contained, to my mind, the most important rule of our institution: the rule which states that you must telephone or email your teacher if you cannot make it to class. Every September I remind learners of this rule, every year they nod earnestly, and every year most of them fail to notify me when they are going to be absent. I wondered if taking this rule from the handbook, typing it up, tacking it onto the wall in the corridor and turning it into a running dictation activity might help.

Well, it is too early in the year to say if this activity drove this particular rule home: I guess that time will tell. The activity did, however, give me a good insight into the writing and listening abilities of the learners in this class. It also generated movement and raised energy levels all round!


Holiday Lies

I wanted to see how my new class performed in a fluency activity, and so provided another tried and tested activity: the truth and lies game. Once I'd elicited the meaning of "truth" and "lie" I asked if there were any good liars in the class. A couple of folk said they were, and so I said I'd put them to the test.  I distributed post it notes marked with "Truth" and "Lie" and told the class that they had 3 minutes to mentally prepare a holiday anecdote which should be a truth or a lie, depending on the word they had received. I spun them a false holiday yarn of my own as an example. I then divided the class into two smaller groups, and asked them to listen to each others'  stories. This enabled me to see who worked well together, while noting significant errors (Most learners neglected to use the past tense in their anecdotes).

Listening and Writing

In the needs analyses many of the learners said that they needed to work on their listening. skills. This was the perfect opportunity for me to introduce my new favourite website: http://www.dictationsonline.com/
We used an elementary text, which worked well. I referred learners back to the final question in the needs analyses questionnaire and asked them to work on these online dictations for homework.  


And Finally:.

I couldn't resist trying out this little gem of an idea in the last few minutes of the lesson. I thought that it would really get learners talking and it did. The activity is by Camilla Mayhew and is called "Caravan or Cruiseliner" and with five minutes preparation you can adapt it to suit your own context and learners. It is a game I have often played with friends: you ask "The Beatles or the Rolling Stones?" or "Peanut Butter or Marmite?" or "Trotsky or Lenin"? You nominate your preferred choice and give reasons why. I used a good few of Camilla's suggestions but also added in a couple of examples with local significance. The learners quickly cottoned on and enjoyed discussing their choices: this provided a nice, upbeat close to the lesson.

You can find "Caravan or Cruiseliner" at:
http://www.onestopenglish.com/community/lesson-share/pdf-content/speaking/speaking-caravan-or-cruise-liner-lesson-plan/156839.article


Conclusion

Despite my worries, this first lesson went well. The class seemed to gel nicely, and I am delighted by the rich mix of nationalities. My initial diagnostic assessment shows that we have a lot of work to do - but with this group I think it will be a pleasure. Better get planning the next class!

Love Spider

A love spider.

I'm not sure how many of you will be winding up classes at summer school at the moment: if you are, let me share my all time favourite last lesson activity with you. If you are just embarking on a new term/session then this is well worth putting up your sleeve and keeping for the end of your course.

 I have road tested this lesson with EFL and ESL learners: with  levels ranging from pre-intermediate through to  upper-intermediate: it never fails to engage and delight. It's also a great way of revising grammar and lexis: particularly character adjectives. 


Resources:

• One A4 sheet of paper for everyone in the class (and yourself too)
• Pens/pencils for all
• Kind learners (or at least, no bad eggs...)
• Seats arranged  in a circle/horseshoe formation 
• Board and monopoly money (for the grammar auction stage)

 Procedure:

• Write your name in the middle of a blank A4 sheet of paper, and draw a circle around it. Draw eyes on top of the circle if you wish.  Encourage your learners to do the same. Tell your class they are going to make a spider. Not just any old spider though: we are talking about a lurve spider.
• Then pass your piece of paper to the person on your right, and ask class to do the same
• Draw a "leg" from the name in the middle of your piece if paper and tell learners that this is a spider's leg. At the end of the leg they are going to write something nice about the person whose name is in the middle of the piece of paper (Encourage them to make their language as interesting as possible!) This can be a compliment about the person's appearance, character, mention of a special talent this person has, an interesting fact you remember about this person or a positive prediction about their future.
• The learners keep passing their bits of paper round until it has come full circle. It is very important to allow the learners time to read the existing comments on the love spider they receive, as there should not be repetitive comments on any spider. 
• When everyone has written about everyone in the class, collect all the papers in.
• Hold a quick grammar auction. To do this, write a selection of 8 sentences from different love spiders on the board. Choose a mixture of grammatically correct and incorrect examples. Divide class into groups of four and distribute equal amounts of Monopoly money. Groups have to bid for correct sentences: the winning group is the one which has bought the highest number of correct sentences.
• Give the love spiders back to their owners and enjoy watching a roomful of faces beam with delight as they read the kind things their classmates have written about them.

New Year, Fresh Start...

The only thing I really like about January is sitting down and plotting a list of new year's resolutions (although I usually make far too many in the flush of excitement of a new year and fail to keep a good quarter of them.)

There are many more things to like about August: sunshine, festivals, and balmy light evenings... What's more, I always feel that this time of year offers us the possibility of starting afresh: as a teacher I have a whole new academic year stretching out ahead of me and my learners. I do believe it is time to look ahead and make some more new resolutions. Hopefully, declaring them publicly will be an added incentive to keep to them!

Focus on Pronunciation and Listening

As I said in my last post, I  spent much of the summer exploring the link between listening and pronunciation, and bemoaning the approach that so many course books take to teaching the listening skill. This year I wish to focus on listening and pronunciation in my classes. I will look at ways of incorporating some of the listening material on websites mentioned in my last post, and explore ways of exploiting this material to its best advantage. I will also keep a diary of listening activities we do in class, experiment with different approaches and look at ways of measuring learners' success (in a supportive, non-testing way.)

Persevere with my own language learning

For the past couple of years I have dabbled in learning a few different languages, only to bale out when the going got tough. I wish to emulate the dedication and perseverance of my learners and so have decided to choose a language and stick with it!  I have chosen Italian, and am learning it at home with Michel Thomas. His method fascinates me, and I am interested to see how far I can get with it. Perhaps I will reward myself with a jaunt to Italy in the summer - better get saving.

Spend Less Time Reading About ELT

Yes, I am an ELT junkie. I admit that I can spend hours leafing through books on methodology, lexis and grammar. On discovering Twitter earlier this year my level of addiction reached an all time high as I basked in the rush of seemingly unlimited links to further reading and ELT related chat. However, this summer I've had a break from it all, and this has made me feel rejuvenated and freshly creative. Reading outwith ELT has furnished me with fresh ideas for discussions and activities that I can take with me into the classroom with me. Roll on  September!

Five Things I Learned at Summer School This Year

Lucky for some...(photo courtesy of Photo Pin)

 Summer school is over, and I am back in Shetland.  Before all my experiences get lost in the rush of getting ready for a new term, here are some important lessons I have learned these past few weeks.

1. The horse shoe isn’t always best

I have always loved the horse shoe. After all, what’s not to love? It is open and friendly. I can see all my learners’ lovely faces and they can see mine without cricking their necks.  It makes whole class discussion easy, yet with a bit of chair shifting learners can work in groups too. So, on arriving in my new classroom on the first day of teaching you can imagine how I felt when I found my classroom organised into cliquey groups of four. Oh, horror! I set about rearranging desks in a mad frenzy, so that the good old horseshoe would be in place to welcome my new arrivals. 

Yet, when my course director popped into my class on the second day, she asked me, afterwards, if I had considered rearranging the seating. I assured her that I already had, a little defensive at any implied criticism of my dear old horse shoe. 

However, later on in the week I arrived in class with minutes to spare and an activity still to set up and realised too late, that some rotter had yet again, broken up my horseshoe into small islands. With no time to rearrange things I decided to let it stand…for one lesson. But, do you know what?  I didn’t ever change them back. My Japanese learners (who made up around forty per cent of the class) were visibly more vocal in group discussions. They clearly felt a lot more comfortable a little removed from the spotlight of the horseshoe and a lot less “put on the spot”. I just hope their necks didn’t get cricked.

So will I be rearranging the tables and chairs in Shetland? Probably not. My (predominantly European) learners are confident and sufficiently vocal for me to leave things as they are. But I am now convinced of the value of a flexible approach to seating in different teaching contexts.

2. Listening and Pronunciation are inextricably linked…

Yes, I  know you may well have heard this before. However,  it was a fact that I had never before been so aware of in practice. My multilingual class were studying at upper intermediate level, yet appeared to struggle a great deal with listening comprehension. And their pronunciation needed a lot of work. It was clear that they had difficulty understanding each other and native speaker English, even when lexis and sentence structures were familiar to them. However…

3. Learners don’t always see the value of pronunciation focus

In initial needs analysis, not one of the learners mentioned pronunciation as an area on which they wanted to focus. Not one. The trick then, was a wholly integrated approach.

4. Many course book listening activities are not actually very good at all…

I do believe I’ve said this before, but I’ll say it again now, as my teaching experiences over the summer rammed the point home once and for all. The course book listening activities  focused almost exclusively on comprehension. They tested listening, rather than teaching it.  Unfortunately, it was a test that only two out of my twelve learners ever passed. And unfortunately, the school  required us to stick to the course book. My only option then was to stick with the course book texts and change the approach. I typed out the listening transcripts and made them into gap fills, focusing on weak forms, word and sentence stress and connected speech. And seethed inwardly. 

5. There are some amazing websites out there!  Here are a few I enjoyed using...

Grammar
 http://www.englishpage.com/verbpage/verbtenseintro.html
 http://www.englishpage.com/verbpage/verbs29practicetest.htm

Listening
http://www.dictationsonline.com/
http://www.shortstoryradio.com/ 

http://www.shiporsheep.com

http://eolf.univ-fcomte.fr/index.php?page=tv-commercials-listening-exercises

A Fish Out of Water

Earlier in the year I made the decision to step out of my comfort zone for a few weeks and try my hand teaching different learners in a new location. So here I am, working with EFL learners from all over the world in an Edinburgh summer school. In this school, learners study English in three week blocks: the courses are structured and serious and quite emphatically not "summer fun" courses. My learners come from Japan, Taiwan, Thailand, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Italy, Russia and the Netherlands: an eclectic mix of backgrounds, ages, needs and expectations.

I was a little nervous about leaving the safety and comfort of Adult Learning, Lerwick behind. me. During the interview, my future employer seemed at pains to stress the difference between what he perceived as the cosy, relaxed world of ESOL with the fast paced, competitive demands of work in the EFL sector. As my start date drew nearer I started to panic: would I be able to handle the many and varied demands of fee paying groups from such diverse cultural backgrounds?

Well, to be honest, I have found the change challenging. (Hence the break in blogging!) However, it has also given me plenty of  food for thought. Over the next few days I plan to keep a brief record of some of the activities I have been doing in class, accompanied with reflections which I can follow up on my return home. 


An Effective Listening Activity

Although my morning class are studying at Upper Intermediate Level, they experience great difficulties in decoding connected speech. Even simple listening texts containing a high proportion of familiar words result in confused stares, particularly from my Japanese and Thai learners. The following website contains graded dictation activities: http://www.dictationsonline.com/. The texts are short (I chose one which lasted only 19 seconds) and learners have the opportunity to listen several times, guided by the instructions on the website. I asked learners to compare their answers in small groups (thereby minimising anxiety among less confident listeners) and finally learners compared their texts with the correct version. This enabled us to focus on the most problematic areas of the text. Finally, learners read out lines from the text, providing further opportunity to focus on word and sentence stress and features of connected speech.

Over the next few days I will continue to focus on ways in which I can help my learners to  improve their listening skills. As many of them will be returning home at the weekend, I also need to make sure that they are equipped to carry on this work in  their own countries. 

Pork and the Final Parsnip

Photo Courtesy of Photo Pin

Our final parsnip comes with a generous helping of pork. How you serve it up depends entirely on you and your teaching context.

Food Inc

I recently watched Food Inc and haven't quite regained my appetite yet. This documentary film examines America's food industry and, with pretty gruesome footage of slaughterhouses, it is not for the faint hearted. However, a short and judiciously chosen extract could provide some meaty classroom fodder for the question: Where does our food come from?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6E-VmEWOug

What I, personally, took away from this film was the resolve to read food labels more carefully. In an ESOL class this would be a useful and empowering exercise for learners. Too many of us are consuming way more sugar and salt than we should be, and we are often duped by the cunning wiles of companies which sell us healthy looking fruit juice and yoghurt loaded with sinister ingredients. ESOL learners are more vulnerable to the food industry's cunning ploys than most, and therefore benefit from a little input in deciphering labels.

There is an excellent lesson on the ESOL Nexus website which looks at "traffic light" labels on food packaging. Find it at: http://esol.britishcouncil.org/lesson-plans/eating-healthily


A Great Bacon Sandwich

Does all this sound too depressing for you? If you teach a class of pork eating carnivores, digest this recipe for the perfect bacon sandwich. I have yet to encounter a meat eater who does not have a fixed opinion on the best method and ingredients required to achieve this culinary delight, and cultural variations should provide an interesting discussion here.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2012/jul/15/how-to-make-bacon-sandwich?INTCMP=SRCH

Porky and Beautiful

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BeuekMbXCIw

This post would not have felt complete without a mention of my very favourite pig. Here's a lovely little clip to lift the mood mid lesson.

The Last Parsnip

Thanks to all of you who have read and commented on these posts here and on Twitter: I've had fun writing them.  Do let me know if you have any Parsnip successes in your own classes: I'd love to hear from you.

 

Parsnips Part Six: Isms

Photo courtesy of Photo Pin

We use the handy little ism suffix to denote general principles or doctrines, and also to form the names of certain schools of thoughts and theories. The fact that -isms generally come trailing heavy ideological baggage in their wake explains their absence in ELT course books: a pity, because like our other parsnip friends they are rich sources of classroom activity just waiting to be tapped!

So which ism to choose? The very best ism lessons generate an exchange of ideas, in which everyone (both learners and teacher) leaves the classroom having had the chance to question their own deeply held beliefs. In this post, I will discuss feminism. I choose this particular ism not only because it is a movement close to my own heart. Feminism generates discussion which can be as light hearted or serious as you and your learners wish.  Many of my learners come from cultures where gender roles and expectations are quite different from those in the UK: as an ESOL teacher I feel it is important that learners have the opportunity to explore these differences in an open and non judgemental environment.


Warmer: Gender Roles

The following warmer provides handy revision of character adjectives, although you may need to referee a few arguments!

Make a list of about fifteen character adjectives geared towards the level of your learners ( e.g.: brave, thoughtful, intuitive, sentimental, reliable, practical, logical, emotional , confrontational etc. ) Ask learners to work through the list in pairs, marking each adjective with M (male) or F (female) or B (both), depending on who is most likely to possess this quality. Come together to discuss answers and the areas in which people agree/disagree. Encourage learners to back up their ideas with examples and illustrations.

You might wish to show your class this amusing little animation on gender roles.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIwWS2atEmc
Ask learners to report back on what they have seen. This activity provides the opportunity to practice comparative forms (e.g.: women are more talkative) With more advanced learners you could use it as a vehicle to work on the language of making generalisations, e.g.: women tend to enjoy shopping more, men usually like to get out of the supermarket as quickly as possible. Encourage the learners to challenge and question these generalisations.


Changes Through Time

A look at the changing roles of women in society is important in any serious discussion of this topic.

The following clips provide a useful insight into the history of the women's movement: highlighting how far womens' lives have changed in the last few decades.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/learningzone/clips/equality-for-women/3516.html

This short clip describes the anit-discrimination laws passed in the 1970s and contrasts these laws with the sexist way in which women continued to be portrayed in advertising. You could use this clip to generate discussion on how life has changed for women in the past thirty years, focusing on past/present tenses and used to. As a follow up, you could select a handful of television commercials from recent years and ask learners to comment on what they tell us about gender roles in UK society.

You could personalise this discussion by asking learners to compare their own lives as men/women with those of their mothers and fathers. What has changed? Do they feel these changes are positive?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=reCX3_OAkv8

This footage of the 1970's Miss World competition shows presenter Bob Hope being attacked by angry feminists in the middle of his (outrageously sexist and disparaging) commentary. You could show the learners the footage and ask them discuss what they think it might be about. Follow this up by providing a little more background and asking them if they sympathise with the protestors. What do they think about such beauty pageants? Are such competitions still as popular today?

A Spot of Market Research
Divide your class into two groups and allocate a three minute time limit. One half of the class lists as many "boys' toys" as they can think of, while the rest of the class lists "girls' toys". Collect and board the lists, providing linguistic input where necessary. Then discuss the items on the list. Why are some toys seen as being for girls, and others for boys?
If your learners seem interested in this discussion, you can follow up by taking a look at the "pink stinks" website. This is a campaign which is aimed at the gender stereotyping of toys; particularly at the marketing of make up and beauty products to the parents of female toddlers.

http://www.pinkstinks.org.uk/

Learners could follow this up by doing a little research in their own communities. Is there a toy shop in your town? You could ask learners to visit and look at its layout. Does the layout of the shop perpetrate the gender divide? How does it do this?

Other Isms
Ask your learners to list all the -isms they can think of. (This provides a useful exercise in word formation too.) Are there any -isms they would care to discuss in future lessons?

Further Reading

Barnyard, K. The Equality Illusion (Faber and Faber: 2010)
Greer, G. The Whole Woman (First Anchor Books: 2000)
Power, N. One Dimensional Woman (Zero Books: 2009)