Hi all,
As always, we had a fantastic day at the English UK 2020 conference. If you’d like the slides, you can find them here: Eng UK 2020 IELTS bridge.
Thanks,
Mark & David
Hi all,
As always, we had a fantastic day at the English UK 2020 conference. If you’d like the slides, you can find them here: Eng UK 2020 IELTS bridge.
Thanks,
Mark & David
This one is quite grammar heavy but there are a lot of skills in there as well. The biggest one is analysing grammar in context and this lesson draws heavily on Danny Norrington Davies’ idea of asking students “why” a particular language point has been chosen in this particular situation. We’ve really found that doing this little and often encourages our students to ask the same question of the language in the world around them.
Try it out and let us know how it goes.
Material:
This time for the material, I’ve gone with a presentation instead of a worksheet. I’ve tried to make the slides as intuitive as possible but let me know if you have any questions.
It’s been a while since we have put any new lessons up but for a very very good reason, which will become apparent in about March 2020.
I couldn’t resist putting up a Christmas lesson and what better to focus on around this period but memories. I know there are many who don’t celebrate Christmas so while this lesson focuses on a Christmas memory, the skills and language that will be learnt can be used for any regular public holiday or festival memory.
As with some of our other lessons on memories, this one focuses on how “used to” and “would” are used together but this one also adds in one-off memories as well.
If this one isn’t enough for you, you can find the previous “used to” lessons: here and here.
Materials:
Enjoy, and as always let us know what you think!!!
So, the origin of this lesson came when I was still teaching exams. I wanted a task that replicated the skills and language needed for Speaking part 3 in FCE / CAE / CPE, I wanted to show that the language for the task had genuine use outside the exam. I also wanted it to be a bit of fun. I decided to use some music as it would allow students to use high level vocab and in the feedback sessions I would have scope to add input and also to check comprehension. There are other examples of how to use songs in class on the site, for example: https://textploitationtefl.com/2018/03/04/the-cure-pictures-of-you-present-perfect-continuous/
or
https://textploitationtefl.com/2015/01/27/writing-lesson-based-on-a-song/
There are a lot more for you to explore.
Anyway, in this lesson, the songs are used for a slightly different reason.
So without delay, let’s get down to it.
Procedure:
Pre-listening: Select 5-7 songs that you intend to use. Try to ensure that the songs have a different feel and that they will evoke a different emotional response.
2. Task – the script outline
Ask the students to skim read the scenes. Ask them what type / genre of film they think it is.
Then, ask students to work in groups and complete the task on the worksheet. 10-15 minutes. There may be some language that the students are unsure of. Try to elicit meanings from them. Encourage them to think about context where possible.
Task: You have been asked to select music to match the scenes. The songs we played you earlier were the ones we have the rights to. We can probably just about afford to license one more song. So if you have a suggestion for one that would work, we can probably manage that.
Direct them to the suggested language on the worksheet (please add extra language to this that you would like them to practice). Encourage as you monitor and also take notes so you can do error correction after.
Give the students 5 minutes to prepare to present their ideas to the group. Try to encourage them to use reasons. This is a chance to recycle the lexis they used earlier and to practice summarising a group discussion.
Optional: Board the different ideas for how the film ends. The students can then vote on the best.
Post task reflection: Ask the students where they can use the language that they have been practising. The aim is that they recognise that this is language that could be used in the exam. If not exam students in business discussions, meetings etc.
Also encourage the students to offer each other feedback on the language they all used. Ask the students which of the phrases they did use, which they didn’t and why. It is about them making choices about the language they use and developing their own personal lexis.
Possible extension activities:
Materials:
Hi all,
Thanks to those of you who made it to our session at IATEFL on exploiting tiny texts in the classroom.
If you’re looking for the slides, you can find them here: Tiny Texts 2 Textploitation.
If you didn’t make it…shame on you…but you can still have our slides, because we’re lovely.
thanks,
Mark & David
We feel strongly that one of our jobs as teachers is to encourage discussion. For this reason, each year we write a lesson for international women’s day (9th March) in an effort to increase discussion on this topic specifically.
You can find our previous lessons here, here and even here. Or, you could try our latest one.
This lesson marks a bit of a departure from our norm as I will not actually be encouraging the use of the whole text and I will be encouraging you to allow your students to use their own phones to read the text…I know, I know. But the way I see it, people these days don’t tend to sit down with a broadsheet and read it cover to cover, they dip in and out of articles online and follow the trail wherever it takes them. I wanted to reflect this in class.
Note: I will include the text as an attachment for those whose students to not have access to the internet in class.
Material
Teachers’ Notes:
Discussion:
Introduction:
Reading:
Reading 2:
Useful phrases:
Engaging with the article:
Language Focus:
Independent Research
Reflection:
Further practice:
So, this lesson was a challenge. Literally, ‘Teaching Cat’ challenged us to make a lesson from this text so here we are.
The original text is one of those fun quirky texts aimed at people in the past that is now ridiculous, you know the type. So far, so not very promising. Except, how many of your students use strange bits of language that make them sound ancient. At EC London we have a 30+ group and this happens a lot, but also with younger students they have often picked up bits of quite bizarre English, outdated phrases, archaic words, or odd uses of more commonly used ones. This lesson aims to ask students to focus and reflect on register and appropriacy in their writing.
Enjoy and thanks Cat.
Objective: by the end of the lesson students will be more aware of appropriate register in their writing
Level: Upper intermediate & advanced
Time: 2-3 hours
Material:
Procedure:
Introduction:
Reading:
Discussion:
(N.B. at this point, I would ask sts to fold the sheet along the dashed line so they only have Discussion and Language Focus sections)
Language focus (register)
Language focus (analysis)
Writing task:
Reflection:
Ahoy hoy all, if you attended our workshop today at English UK London, you can download the accompanying slides here.
If you missed out, we were chatting about revisiting texts and using them to develop skills. Check out the slides and let us know if you have any questions.
cheers,
Mark & David
So you’ve got a text and it’s ridiculously interesting but it’s just that little bit too difficult for your students…
If you’ve ever been in that situation, you might want to try rewordify. A colleague of mine put me onto this website a few years ago and I thought it was time to pass it on.
The idea is simple: you put your text in and it dumbs it down with helpful synonyms and explanations. You may argue that this isn’t authentic and that it stops the flow of the text and you are probably right. But what I love about this website is it then lets you create worksheets for all of the trickier words.
Here are two ways I have used it in the past:
It’s a great little website. Check it out and let us know how you use it.
If you’d like to learn about more useful websites, check out this blog.
I should say that this is not a lesson but rather an idea to put into your reading lessons.
Recently at my school we were running some sessions on developing reading skills and I remembered a website I used to use quite a lot to help students read more quickly and to read in chunks instead of one word at a time.
The idea is simple:
For students who tend to read one word at a time instead of in chunks, it forces their hand a little.
There are just a few things to take into consideration though:
My favourite website to use is this one as it’s easy to use and soooooooooooooo free.
Check it out and let us know how you get on.