When I was teaching in Japan, giving students individual attention was not really a problem as most people could study one to one or in small classes if they liked and therefore get as much individual attention as they wanted. Most of the students who were studying in large classes in Japan, e.g. college students, were too aware of the other students to want the teacher to even look their way, let alone give them individual attention during the class.
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Classroom Ideas
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Classroom IdeasA selection of practical ideas for teachers from classroom games and activities to discipline and teacher improvement. Feel free to submit your own ideas. You can browse ideas by topic on the left. Latest ideas are shown below. 16 January 2010 by Alex Case | Filed under Teaching | Leave a Comment »
1 January 2010 by Alex Case | Filed under Young Learners | Leave a Comment »
In a previous article I gave ideas on how to make reading the book more fun and useful for language development, but as the book is quite an easy one to use the ideas for what to do after reading the book are perhaps more important. 1 January 2010 by Alex Case | Filed under Young Learners | Leave a Comment »
Where’s Spot? by Eric Hill is one of the all time classic children’s book for both native and non-native English speaking children as it somehow manages to combine a simple repetitive formula with fun, realistic uses of things hidden behind flaps and a real storyline with a happy ending. It can be used at all levels and ages from two to eight or nine for names of animals, household vocabulary, colours and/ or prepositions, or just as an end of class treat. Below are some tips on how to make its use involving, fun and a great source of language learning. You can also find tips on what to do after reading the book here. 4 December 2009 by Alex Case | Filed under Games | Leave a Comment »
Garfield’s Scary Scavenger Hunt is a great game for practising the language of rooms and household objects, as well as prepositions of position and imperatives. Not only is it fun enough to be used as a “treat”, but you can make it test a variety of skills and there is another version of the game that you can use for revision or as a motivation for good work from the moment you play the first one. The game also ties in well with the topic of ghosts or Halloween. 4 December 2009 by Alex Case | Filed under Speaking | 3 Comments »
Using images such as memorable photos and famous paintings in class is a timeless idea that has recently become more popular and easier due to resources such as Google Images but could still be exploited much more by most teachers, hence the launch of two high profile books on the topic of using images last year- Images by Jamie Keddie from OUP and Working with Images by Ben Goldstein from CUP, both of which inspired some of the ideas below. 15 November 2009 by Alex Case | Filed under Young Learners | Leave a Comment »
Brown Bear Brown Bear is a classic picture book loved by generations of native and non-native speaking children and beautifully illustrated by Eric Carle. The ideas below should also work for other books, or at least help you come up with your own ideas on how you could use them. 18 October 2009 by Alex Case | Filed under Young Learners | Leave a Comment »
Like much of the multimedia content produced by publishers nowadays, Primary iDictionary from Cambridge University Press seems to have had a lot more thought, time and money put into producing a fine piece of technology than into thinking about how teachers can actually use it in class. That doesn’t mean there is any lack of ways, but it can take some thought and time to come up with them. Luckily for you, I had to look at this CD ROM in real detail and use it as often as I could in my classes so that I could write a review of it, so I’ve done all that hard work for you! I also hope this will serve as a guide to how you can use other 3 October 2009 by Alex Case | Filed under Games | 7 Comments »
1. Silly Perfect Mimes Give students a list of Present Perfect Simple and Continuous sentences which are silly or could be interpreted in a silly way, e.g. “He has been walking 20 dogs today” (which could mean all 20 at the same time), “He has been cooking Chinese, Italian and English food” (ditto), and “He has read Wikipedia” (which could mean he has read the whole thing). Also include the “correct” versions of these sentences (“He has walked 20 dogs today” etc). Ask students to draw or mime the 3 October 2009 by Alex Case | Filed under Grammar | 3 Comments »
Students can have real problems with the Present Perfect Continuous, partly due to the difficulty of forming a tense with two auxiliary verbs, but mainly because they have problems working out when to use this tense and when to use the Present Perfect Simple. It is introduced even in some Pre-Intermediate textbooks nowadays- a time when students tend to lack confidence and the language to understand complex grammar explanations, and are struggling with other aspects of the language and so can’t give all their attention to this tricky tense. What is needed then is some simplified explanations and then lots of fun controlled |