Last time I wrote about the listening from p.83 of Penny Ur's book (the one about the weather).
I thought I had put together a clever lesson about the weather, and I thought that weather forecast listening was pretty clever. So I tried it again with a slightly more advanced class. The vocabulary part went well again. The listening bombed again. I thought it would be fun, but I have two classes full of students who say it's a bad activity. I guess I won't be using that one anymore.
I got to thinking about why I was doing it anyway. First I had them listening to weather conditions. That's a real-life task and students didn't mind doing it. Then I read the incorrect version the book suggested and had students listen for the differences. As far as I know, Penny Ur and I are the only two people who like that activity (at least I guess she likes it; she put it in her book).
One of the problems with the task is that it has no real life equivalent. I was doing it with my students for fun, not because they needed that kind of listening practice. When it wasn't fun, it still didn't give them the type of practice they needed. It was a waste of time.
So I have a class of adult beginners. Most are high beginners, but a few are lower and a few are higher. The problem is that the higher ones have no confidence and say that everything is too hard. One activity was taken from Reason to Write and was just a few discussion questions about what types of people you admire and what makes a good hero. Everyone was able to answer the questions but they still complained it was too hard.
So next class was easier. We did some weather pictures, first matching the pic to the vocab and then saying what we liked to do in each kind of weather. Then I did the weather forecast listening exercise from p.83 of Teaching Listening Comprehension and everyone complained it was too hard - after they told me the right answers. First I'd asked them about the weather in the different parts of England. They got the answers right, but before I asked for answers, when I gave them time to talk it over with their partners, they just looked at each other like no one had heard anything. When I called for answers I got them... Then we did what was suggested in the book; I read an incorrect version and students listened for mistakes. They even heard all 7 mistakes but still told me it was too hard.
I was thinking about doing some easy things like decide which picture is being described or something, but somehow I get the feeling that's not what this group wants. I'm going to try some past simple/present perfect grammar dictations or maybe clozes next time. Then we're going to go out for dinner and drinks...
In semesters past, I would often tell students what we might do next class, but I don't remember ever being asked (unless the question was "Is there a test?"). However, this semester, just over three weeks old here in Korea, I've been asked a few times (in different classes) "What are we going to do next time?".
Either they're having more fun this semester and can hardly wait till next time and are already anticipating the next class, or I am coming across as disorganized. Or students are changing. Anyway, I'm left wondering what it all means (if anything).
In 2003 Penny Ur gave a speech about how our students need to learn World Standard English, an emerging dialect different from British English and American English (though more different from British English).
Since this variety is not clearly defined (I don't know of any grammars that describe WSE as there are for standard American English and what not), it seems to be up to EFL teachers, and certainly learners too, to define what is the new world standard.
English page claims to be creating an online grammar book with descriptions, lessons, etc. But they reject a perfectly good lesson that meets all the criteria they list for possibly rejecting a site. Instead, English page has put only their own sites in the future perfect chapter of the grammar book; lots of drills with no context. Why is online language learning stuck on decontextualized grammar drills? I think that englishpage is creating this grammar book not to help students, but to make money. Why else would they reject my perfectly good lesson but include their shabby drills?
Why not read the rejection letter and check my future perfect class out for yourself. Tell me what you think. Am I wrong?
We would like to thank you for submitting the link:
http://www.eslgo.com/classes/business/credibility.html
submitted on 20-Jan-2004. This link has been considered by our staff. If we
choose not to accept this particular link, it will be for one of the
following reasons:
1. Content is not a grammar description or lesson.
2. Duplicate URL
3. Errors in content
4. Errors in interactivity
5. Content cannot be evaluated because it is not in English.
Remember that we are trying to create an online grammar book. We are
looking for grammar lessons, grammar descriptions, grammar reference
materials, or online grammar tools. General ESL sites or non-grammar
content will not be accepted.
I knew I was in trouble when I read in Content-Based Instruction in Foreign Language Education about the "huge effort" invloved in planning a CBI course. This includes finding all sorts of authentic materials. For example I gave my first lecture on Urban Sociology last week. I studied sociology in college, but I still found myself scouring web pages trying to put everything together.
The work is intersting (luckily for me). The main goals of the two CBI courses are to teach EAP through CBI. So before I gave my lecture, we talked about lectures in the US vs. lectures in Korea and strategies for taking notes during lectures. I hope the students are getting as much out of it as I am. My former director once quoted someone as saying "The first time you teach something, you learn something. The second time you teach something, the students learn something. The third time you teach something, no one learns anything".
This is the first time I've taught Sociology or History (well I taught British History for a few weeks once) so it might be my turn and not the student's turn... I'll have to see what I can do about that.
I've decided not to do the kinds of questions I wrote about in my previous post with my EAP/CBI American History and Soci-Cultural Values class, mainly because there are 22 students in this one (as opposed to 8 in the other).
The first day I just told them a bit about myself and we played ask the teacher. It was only a 50 minute class. Now our second meeting is coming, two 50 minute classes back to back. It happens to come on March 8, International Women's Day. There were some good ideas in the JALT Global Issues newsletter, but none that seemed quite right for my class. Here are some International Women's Day ESL lessons I thought up (related to American History).
Lesson 1
Aims: To discuss famous American women and practice taking notes.
1. Students form 5 groups (the number of groups can be varied for larger and smaller classes). Each group reads about a famous American woman. I chose from http://www.greatwomen.org/, a site that has short, easy to read biographies of famous women.
2. Each student takes notes on the woman and then compares with the group. They discuss what's necessary and what's not (in the notes).
3. Repeat until each group has read about each woman.
4. Switch groups: no group members should be the same. Students compare notes on each woman. Each students' notes will be different so students can discuss the good points and bad points of each set of notes.
Lesson 2
Aims: To discuss suffrage by interpreting political cartoons
Students interpret and compare two political cartoons (with brief accompanying text). Here's a pro-sufferage cartoon and one from the anti-suffragists. This can lead into lots of things; in my class probably the fight for the right to vote for women in America.
I began teaching a new class this semester, an EAP content-based class called "Sociology of American Cities". Instead of a formal needs analysis, I asked these questions (it's only an 8 student class so we just made a circle and discussed the answers to my questions). Here are the questions. I hope they help you because I felt that things went very well. We got to know each other and break the ice a bit and I got my needs analysis. And in case you were wondering we all introduced ourselves before we did the questions.
Sociology
How much do you know about sociology? How many sociology courses have you taken? Have you studied urban sociology?
Have you been to America? Have you been to any American cities? What cities have you been to (in Korea and abroad)? What do you like and dislike about the cities you've been to?
What are some differences between rural life and city life? Which aspects of each do you like?
Academic English
Look at the goals on the syllabus and rate them in order of importance (1-8).
The midterm and final projects will be a presentation and an essay; what do you know about academic writing and making speeches? What do you need to know?
This course is based on learning English through studying the sociology of American cities; why do you want to learn English (be specific- for work, travel, the TOEFL, make friends, etc.)?
Considering why you want to learn English what do you want to study most? (grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation - speaking, listening, reading, writing).
Naturally, this course will present a lot of academic English like listening to lectures and reading academic papers. Have you listened to English lectures before? Have you read English papers before? How do you take notes? How do you make sure you understand the content? How do you help yourself understand the English?
This course will be conducted entirely in English. Does this make you nervous? How can you avoid speaking Korean in class?
Do you know each other? Are you comfortable speaking to each other in English? Are you comfortable speaking to me in English? What can we do to make speaking in English more comfortable?