Conversation Questions About Halloween

 In case you’re planning a Halloween lesson for next week, I’d like to share a list of conversation questions to get your students chatting about the holiday. The questions are mainly in simple present and simple past tenses, so they can be used with high-beginner classes and up.

I’ve posted the questions, along with a printable handout, at my new site, ESL Airplane. You can find them right here: Conversation Questions About Halloween

 

On Teaching Beginners…

I love teaching complete beginners to speak English! For me, it fees like starting a project from scratch and then watching it develop.

I like teaching the basics and then seeing students connect the dots in their minds as they learn new things. (For example, if they learn “I don’t understand,” on day 1, they often have a lightbulb moment when I teach them to form negative sentences three weeks later.)

I like the feeling that if I train them well from the beginning, I can help them avoid the common basic mistakes that more advanced students make all the time (“go TO,” not “go IN!).

I love when a few weeks in, the occasional beginner student looks at me all bright-eyed, and says something like, “Wow! I understand everything we learn!” or “Wow! English is easy!” or “I can’t believe I like English!” And then they share a horror story about a nightmare teacher who told them they were bad with languages and would never learn English, or about getting stuck in a class where they didn’t understand anything. Beginners are really appreciative, and when I’m doing my job right, I know it.

Luckily for me, none of the other teachers at my school seem to share my enthusiasm for teaching low-level learners, so when they come along, I’m usually the one asked to teach them. A lot of teachers who I’ve spoken to seem to think that it’s harder to teach beginners than to teach intermediate and advanced students, but for me it’s the opposite. (Advanced students ask hard questions!)

This month, my goal is to put together of series of posts to help other teachers who need help with their beginner classes. If you’re one of those people, I’d love to hear from you:
-What questions do you have about teaching beginners?
-What are some problems you’ve had in the past?
-Do you have any beginner horror stories?

Or if you’re like me, and you do love beginner classes:
-What do you like about teaching beginners?
-What tips do you have for anyone who is struggling?

Please take a moment to answer a question or two in the Comment section.  🙂

1oo Things that Make me Happy

This lesson plan has been moved over to my new site: 1oo Things That Make Me Happy

 

 

 

Sell This Stuff!

Here’s a creative activity that should get students of all ages thinking outside of the box.

A while ago, I posted The Balloon Chair Prompt, in which students sell an unusual product to their classmates. Today I put a similar prompt onto a handful of different images so that you can use it with groups more easily.

The new prompt reads: You work in a shop that sells unusual, expensive items. A customer walks in and asks you about the object in the photo. Sell it to him/her.

Take a look, and then scroll down to the bottom of the page for some lesson plan ideas.

 

 

 

Lesson Plan Ideas

1. Start by modeling the activity. Show one of the pictures to the class, and ask: What do you see in the picture? Why do you think this object is so expensive? What else could it be used for? (A pile of stones? This isn’t just ANY pile of stones. These stones were found inside of an ancient Egyptian tomb lying next to a mummy. They are said to bring good luck to whoever possesses them.)
2.  Divide your class into several teams. (The pencil sharpening group, the pink drink group…)
3. Tell each team to imagine that they work for a secondhand shop or a curiosity shop. Their job is to sell the precious, expensive object in their picture. Instruct the groups to work together to make a list of reasons that a customer should buy their object. Encourage them to be creative and come up with a backstory for their object, or come up with unusual uses for their products. (I would recommend making sure that all students write the list down.)
4. Now rearrange the groups. Your new groups should have at least one member from each of the previous teams. (One stone person, one pencil sharpening person, etc.) Each group member should take turns playing salesperson and customer. The salesperson should tell the customers about their product, and try to convince them to buy it.
5. *Instead of dividing the teams up again in step 4, an alternative is to have your original groups give whole-class presentations about their products. After they finish, classmates can ask questions, and then decide which one item they’d like to buy.

Like it?

Would you use it again? Do you have any other ideas on how to use these prompts? I’ll be happy if you let me know! Take a moment and leave your ideas and suggestions in the comment box below. Thanks for reading.

 

Back again

Hi there!

These past few months have been pretty busy, but I think I’m back for real, this time. I’ve got a new table in my new apartment, and it’s set up near a sunshiny window overlooking my city street, and there are birds chirping in the background and everything. So… I’m totally motivated to sit down and get back to writing!

This week I’ve been working on coming up for lots of new ideas for speaking prompts, classroom activities and more. If that’s what you’re looking for, check back soon. (And feel free to say hello in the comment section to let me know you’re reading and keep me on my toes.) 🙂

New Apartment Moving Checklist – A vocabulary-building lesson plan idea

Hi everyone! It’s been a while since I last posted, and I was planning on posting a quick update to let you all know that I haven’t disappeared. I am in the process of moving, and my brain has been taken over by sofas and comforters and window blinds and drain stops.

Somehow, in the process of posting this update, I came up with a new vocabulary-building prompt, and a few ideas to help you plan your lesson:

Lesson Plan Procedures:

• Warm-up: Introduce the following scenario:

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You have just moved into your first new apartment. The apartment is unfurnished except for a refrigerator, an oven, a shower, a toilet, sinks, closets and cabinets. You have a sofa, a bed and a mattress. You will need to buy everything else. With your group, make a list of 20 things that you need to buy.

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• Let your students know that this is a vocabulary-building exercise. Encourage them to think about the little things that they use on a regular basis that they couldn’t live without, and to focus on words that they don’t know how to say in English.
• As groups are working, you might want to jot down useful words that they come up with on the board.
• After they finish, you might ask groups to read their lists aloud to the class. Tell the other groups to check off words on their lists that the other groups mentioned, so that they don’t end up repeating them.

Other Ideas:

• Here are a couple of first apartment checklists to have on hand for your reference. (You might want to print one out for your students after you’ve finished the activity):

  Checklist from My First Apartment
  Checklist from Bed Bath and Beyond

• With lower-level students, you might begin by teaching vocabulary for the rooms of a house.
• Once they have learned the relevant vocabulary, ask your students to draw a picture of their house (or of their imaginary dream home). Make sure to remind them that they aren’t being judged on their artistic ability. 🙂 After they finish drawing, pair your students up, and have them describe their houses to a partner. I was a little uncertain about how this would work out the first time I tried it, but my students always seem to love it. It works especially well when you have visual learners in your class.
• Another possibility is to have students draw a picture of their favorite room in their house, furniture and all. They can then tell a partner about what they already have in the room, and what they would like to buy.

Comments?:

As always, I’d love to hear from you.
Please let me know how it works out for you if you try it out.
And please share any other related ideas that you have!

The Best Pet: Would you rather have a fluffy cow or a plant with eyes?

The world is full of big, important issues that your students could be debating, but I don’t have an example of one for you today. Instead, I have this prompt:

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Which is the best pet? : A horse? A bear? A fluffy cow thing? A plant with eyes? List 10 reasons why.

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This is a prompt for those days when your class just needs a silly, lighthearted debate. It’s a good way to help nervous language learners stop taking themselves so seriously and start brainstorming.

Here’s a little handful of ideas on using this prompt:

• Divide your class into four groups, and assign each group to a different one of the pets. (I would recommend assigning the pets randomly. It’s more fun and more challenging when students have to defend an idea that they don’t actually believe.) Encourage them to (a) compare their pet to the other pets, and (b) Think of specific examples of activities that they could do with their pet.
• After your students are finished writing down their ideas, it’s time to debate! My debates are usually somewhat informal. I give each group the chance to state one of their ideas at a time, and then I allow the other groups to argue against it. (If anyone has any ideas for a better organized debate, though, I’d love to hear them.)
• This prompt works well after teaching comparative and superlative adjectives. (A bear is stronger than a horse, but a plant with eyes is cuter and less dangerous than a bear.)
• Here is a simple, printable organizer that I created to help your students outline their ideas: Best Pet Organizer

Thoughts and Ideas:

How else could you use this prompt in your classes? Please share your ideas in the comment box!

How long does it take to learn a language? Spoiler alert: I have no idea

Before I started teaching, sometime in between college and grad school, I was living abroad and taking language classes. I thought that I would become fluent in the language pretty quickly because I had started learning it as a child and was already pretty confident with the basics. It turned out that language learning was a lot harder than I had anticipated.

My teacher was an older woman in her mid-seventies who had been teaching forever. She was nice but usually really blunt with her opinions. (On the last day of class, for example, she went around the room and gave us all individual, informal critiques in front of the whole class. She told me something like, “You’re an amazing friend, but you’re just an average student.” Um..?)

Anyway, near the end of the course, buried in flashcards and still not fluent, I approached my teacher feeling kinda overwhelmed.
“How long does it take to learn a language?” I asked. “How much longer until I’m completely fluent and don’t have to carry a dictionary around with me everywhere?”

I don’t remember her answer, but I do remember that the next day she brought in a little story for our class to read. It went something like this:

There was once a young man who was walking to the beach through an unfamiliar town. He walked and walked until he saw an old man sitting near a hill. 
“Excuse me,” he asked the old man. “How long does it take to get to the beach.”
“Go on, go on, keep walking!” The old man grumbled.
The young man walked away confused, wondering if he had said anything offensive. When he reached the top of the hill, the old man called after him, “About twenty minutes.”
“Uh…Thanks, but why didn’t you tell me that before?” The young man asked. “I thought you were mad at me.”
“Mad? No!” The old man said. “I just had to see how quickly you walk.”

And the moral of that story, my teacher said, was that she has no idea how long it would take us to learn the language. Everyone learns at a different pace, everyone has a different language-learning background, and everyone puts in a different amount of effort. It’s hard for a teacher to predict how long it will take each individual student to learn.

It was thoughtful of my teacher to bring in a whole story to answer my simple question, and I appreciated that, but at the same time, that wasn’t then answer I wanted. Now that I’m an ESL teacher myself, though, I totally know what she means. Students often ask me how long it will take them to speak perfect English. Sometimes they’re impatient and disappointed in themselves for not jumping from pre-intermediate to super-advanced in two months. All I can really say for sure is that it’ll take a lot longer than two months.

I’ve heard from others that if you start from scratch and live in a country where the language is spoken, it should take about two years. But not many of my students are complete beginners when they arrive, and most don’t live in the U.S. They go home after a few weeks or a few months. Some will continue to take language classes a couple of times a week. Some will watch English movies and listen to English music. Some won’t.

So, unfortunately, it’s hard to give students the concrete answer they’re looking for. I can relate… I know what it’s like to be learning a language and worried that you’ll be learning forever. I can assure you that if you really work at it and you keep on walking, it won’t take forever. But I don’t know how long it will take.

What do you think?

How do you answer, “How long will it take?” And have you succeeded in learning a second language fluently? How long did it take you?

Please leave your comments in the box at the bottom of the page. Thank you!

New Food – A Personal Story Prompt

Here’s a prompt that will help your students tell a past tense story about a personal experience. I would recommend using this toward the end a unit on food. It’s a good way to let students practice some of the food-related vocabulary they have learned.

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In case you can’t see the image above, it reads:

Describe a time when you tried a new food. Think about these questions:

• How did you feel before?

• Who were you with?

• Why did you try it?

• What did it look like?

• How did it taste?

• How did you feel after?

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Here are a few teaching ideas to get you started on your lesson plan:

• Warm your students up by asking them to make a list of a few foods that they remember trying for the first time. Tell them that it might be an unusual food (insects, horse meat, etc.), a grown-up food (coffee, beer…), or new cuisine (Thai food, American food…) or just something that they remember trying for the first time (sushi, cupcakes, broccoli, hot peppers…). You might want to list a few of their ideas on the board.
• Tell your students that they should choose one of their ideas to tell a story about.
• Display the slide above (or write the questions on the board). Tell your students that they should use these questions as a guideline to help them write their story. Remind them to focus on using correct past tense verbs.
• If you’d like to focus on speaking instead of writing, you could ask students to prepare index cards and make a presentation rather than writing out the entire story.
• After they finish, students can present either in small groups, or to the whole class.

Want more?

If you’re looking for more food-related activities, here’s another post you might like: Design a Restaurant Task

Comments

As always, please feel free to share your thoughts and ideas in the comment box at the bottom of the page.

Throw a party – Create-It #4

Yay! A Party!

I like to use this speaking activity at the end of units on special occasions or holidays around the world. It’s also a good way to practice using present continuous, going to, planning to, and other future grammar structures. It’s one of those simple, fun activities that require very little prep, but really get students engaged.

Here’s what I do:

1. Display the slide above on the projector, or write the questions on the board. You might also want to use this Party Planning Worksheet to help your students organize their ideas on paper.
2. Divide the class into groups. Explain that they are going to work together to come up with an idea for a party. After they finish, they will need to present their ideas to the class,and invite their classmates. 
3. Read through the questions to make sure that everyone understands them.
4. Let your students get to work. (I suggest giving them a specific amount of time to plan).
5. Groups make their presentations.
6. (Optional) Do a class vote: Who had the most creative party idea? Whose party would you most like to attend?

I made you a worksheet! 

Here is a worksheet that you can print out to help your students organize their ideas: Party Planning Worksheet

Like It?

Please take a moment to say hi and leave comments in the box at the bottom of the page.