Higher or Lower

A super simple game I use in class is Higher or Lower. It takes no time to prepare, gets students really engaged in an activity and can be used to practice a wide range of skill sets.
To start with numbers. The is a myriad of numbers you can practice all. Prices, times, dates, weight, height, number of people at a place. The list is endless. If it has a number you can use it.
You can also use it to practice modals of deduction and some simple language chunks that will be useful both in life and when the students goes in for their dreaded Cambridge exam.
I tend to arm my students with the chunks of language they are going to need at the start of the game.

I think it could be....
I don't reckon it's more than....
I can't be sure but....
I'm guessing it's about.....
Well, it's obviously more than.....
You said Claudio was close so it must be around...
It's clearly between ..... and .... so my guess is....
Ok, so the number must be....

Then I draw a simple grid on the board. 2 columns and two rows.

In the title row I put the comparatives necessary for the activity. If I were doing the price of a car one side would read:

More expensive than....   and the other.              Cheaper than....


I'd put a picture of the car up (google images) and I'd get the students to start guessing. Asking each students in turn to provide me with a number.

I'm not sure how your students are with numbers and the different ways in which we use numbers in English but after just 5 classes which have included the height of a mountain, the price of a car, the time of my alarm on my phone, the age of a painting and the number of tourists to visit The Alcazar in Sevilla. I've seen 90% of my students being able to use "Big" numbers with almost consummate ease. It's a fun way of drilling numbers and it gives everyone in class a chance to practice.

Right then. That's it for today. Coming soon some fun musical ideas and post-it notes galore.

Til the next time.

Game of Tones

Good morning all,

After another glorious TESOL event I thought I'd throw out one of the more amusing activities from the land of STRIP I bring you. "You Had Me at Hello" This is a wonderfully quick activity which helps students understand the difference tone makes. With a great number of languages tone i absolutely vital so this concept is usually be very easily transmitted.

I start by asking the Ss what difference tone can make. I then arm them with two words. Hello and Really.  I  make sure they are aware the power these two words can wield and then I let them unleash that power on their partners.

For the first half of the activity I ask students to use one of the situations on the powerpoint (paper, boards) and speak to their partner in the tone of voice one would imagine a person in that situation would use. Their partner then has to guess which one they are trying to convey. If they get it wrong and feel their partner has misunderstood the phrase then they can show them how it should be done.

It always helps to model the first two or three situations just to get students up to speed with the task. Especially those who aren't as quick as your star students.

When the students get to the Really section, I get them to translate or simply share with the class what each phrase means. Then they get 5 minutes to practice with a partner and finally they are called upon at random to do the same action as before, however, this time to the whole class. He, (or she) who guesses correctly gets to choose who speaks next.

The funnier you make the situations the more fun the students will have doing mock, over the top tones of voice.

As always you can find the slide for this within the STRIP presentation just there ------>
in A even more materials.

I hope your students enjoy this task as much as mine.

hasta la proxima.

H

Looking forward to next class

've often found myself wondering, whilst plannig my next class, what do the students already know. we are all well aware that before we start a class we should really take into account and think about any assumed knowledge the class have on the subject we're about to embark upon.

You'll read it in every book, you'll hear it at every training session but how often do you actually check what students know before you start teaching it?

What I like to do is check at the end of the previous class what they might know. I always review what we have done in that lesson (I check again in the next) and then using a spidergram or something of that ilk on the board I just get students to come up and write any words or phrases relating to that subject of the next class.It's a simple way to get the mind going and into gear. If unit's a grammar point simply asking a student to explain it rather than a boring diagram up on the board. All it ever sounds like to me is
 Subject +blah + bla-ing and I'm teaching it.

So for vocab. Preview known vocab with a spidergram and then in the following class open with a quick round of Categories on mini whiteboards or in Ss notebooks. Starting the class with a game is always great and students have almost always thought of a new word or two since the previous class as you've left that idea there in their heads.

I have been know on the odd occasion to tell eams it's their turn to look for new vocab on the topic and start the next class by explaining it to the other students.

These ideas are hardly revolutionary. I don't claim to have any ownership whatsoever over them. They just make classes flow a lot easier and take the subject matter from the hands of the teacher and puts it into the hands of the students.

These ideas take a a little bit of forethought. Just flick to the next page in the book before the class finishes and see what's coming up, if you're a class to class planner, like me. If you're even more organised and you plan a few classes at a time then you're already set. These ideas have helped me an awful lot and have saved time in lengthy explanations and most importantly got the students thinking about what they've learnt and what they're going to learn.

It's very rare that a class will have no idea at all about the subject matter so give them some credit and relinquish your power........ to an extent.


That's all you're getting for this week.

Enjoy your weekend.

The Fix is in.

I'm not sure how many of your students love lists, but I have a whole bunch of them who absolutely love lists. I think it might have something to do with the Spanish exam mentality that makes them enjoy pouring over list after list of phrasal verbs and dependent propositions. for some of them, it obviously works.
It's for that reason that I decided to spend far too many hours of my time making this list of prefixes and suffixes. It's just a list. No extra exercises, just a big long list.
The downloadable worksheet is available from the link right up there ^ it's called Just a few materials.

Anyway, there is a little taster below but for the whole docume t you'll need to click above.

Verb-forming Suffixes	Meanings	Examples
-ate / -en / -fy -ise / -ize	make / become render (as) / treat (as)	Activate / Shorten / Purify Minimize / Crystallize / Idolize

Adverb-forming Suffixes	Meanings	Examples
-ally / -ly	in the manner of / with respect to	Emphatically / Musically / Nicely / Alternately

Speaking Part 1. Phrasal Verb Battle Ships

Below I've posted a quick outline of one of my most popular ever games. While at first it seems quite complex and does contain an awful lot of detail. It can be used as a reference and I almost always get my students to whip it out in class as a quick filler.

It's just a new take on battle ships. The Hasbro classic board game and of course multi million dollar box office flop starring Rhianna.

The full worksheet can be found here https://sites.google.com/site/sirhofthebomb84/other-materials. It contains the game board, a definition of each phrasal verb, an example sentence and a space for students to put their own example.

The game itself is then pretty easy. Students can use the board in class and when they're at home revise the 36 phrasal verbs. I also tend to get them to come in and tell me any other meanings they've found for any of the phrasal verbs and also whether they're seperable or inseperable.

While I realise this is by no means the ultimate list of PV's it is a useful tool to learn them and it also adds the bonus of practicing some of the popular part one questions from the Cambridge.

I hope your students enjoy it as much as mine did.

Take it easy, and if you're in Spain, enjoy the long weekend. 

Rules:

1) Draw your ships on anywhere your Grid.

2) Say a sentence using a phrasal verb to select a question.

3) If you HIT a ship Answer the Question if you MISS all ships it’s your partner’s turn to guess.

4) Win by sinking all your partner’s ships. 

 

	Get	Set	Turn	Take	Check	Call
In
Out
Up
On
Off
Back

	Get	Set	Turn	Take	Check	Call
In	Where are you from?	What do you like about living here?	Where was the last place you went on holiday? Did you enjoy it?	Would you rather eat in or eat out? Why?	Do you have much contact with your cousins?	Can you remember your first English lessons? What were they like?
Out	Do you normally go out with family or friends?	What’s your surname? Can you spell it?	How did you get here today?	How important is the Internet to you?	What is your fondest childhood memory?	How do you like to spend your evenings?
Up	Do you like using public transport?	Do you want to do the same job as your parents?	Why are you studying English?	Where do you plan to go for your next holiday?	What’s the longest journey you’ve ever been on?	If you could go anywhere in the world where would it be? Why?
On	What don’t you like doing while you’re on holiday?	How much time do you spend on the internet?	Is it easy to meet new people where you live?	How long have you been studying English?	How often do you watch TV?	How expensive is it to go out in the evening where you live?
Off	What is the most popular sport in your country?	When was the last time you went to the cinema? What did you see?	What sports do you enjoy watching on TV?	Tell me about your favourite celebrity?	Do you think English is important for your future?	What did you do for your last birthday?
Back	Are you happier doing mental or physical work?	How do you find out what’s happening in the world?	What’s the difference between watching the news on TV and reading it in the newspaper?	Do you play any sports?	Which part of the day do you enjoy most? Why?	What do you do on an average weekend?

 

Where exactly is the cat sitting?

I must admit my most commonly used sentence over the past seven years is probably; "The Cat Sat on the Mat." I use it when helping students develop their imagination and write a story that is less one dimensional and I use it to show what a difference stress can make to a sentence.

Today I'm going to talk about the latter. Next time I shall delve deeper into the former.
This is just one of three activities I use throughout the year as a quick reminder to my studets that stress can change everything.

I write this simple sentence out on the board. Next I underline one of the words in the sentence and get the students to stress said word. Almost immediately stdents pick up on the difference the stres can make. 

For example. The CAT sat on the mat. The stress on the word cat shows us it was a feline creature and not any other beast. 

The cat SAT on the mat. With the stress lying on the verb it shows us that the cat wasn't dancing, nor was she singing and was in fact just having a nice little sit. 

I continue with the other words in the sentence then I get students to write there own sentences and choose a word to stress. Other students have to decipher the meaning and share with the class what the stressed word indicates. 

And that my friends is about that. 

If you want regular updates you can follow me on twitter @EFLuencyfella

Reported Speech and Sporcle a match made in movie heaven.

Here is the return of an old favourite from my old blog. It's a fantastic way to work reported speech and movie trivia into th classroom

There are a myriad of games to allow your students to practice their new found skill of reporting. One I was introduced to a couple of days ago tests your students movie knowledge, their ability to transalte from the language they first saw the movie and then how to convert some of the most famous quotes in movie history into reported speech.

Your students level will, obviously, dictate the difficulty of the task, the reporting verbs they use and whether they chuck a few adverbs in there as well.

The first step is to get onto the fantastic  http://www.sporcle.com/games/happy101/best-movie-quotes-imageshttp://www.sporcle.com/games/happy101/best-movie-quotes-images then run through each of the images to identify which movies the quotes come from.

Step two, hit the timer and get the students to take turns in giving you a quote to one of the movies on the screen. 

Seven minutes later the time will have run out and all the missing quotes will be revealed and the students will have a chance to take the famous quotes and report them to their classmates.  

This works as a wonderful cooler after going through the "rules" of reported speech or as a warmer in the next class to make sure they still have it down.. My students really enjoyed it.

 A big thanks to my colleague Neil for pointing me towards the quiz and sharing his idea with me. 

I hope your students find it as useful as mine did. 

Right that's all for today.  Have a great holiday whereever you may be. If you don't have a holiday just go ahead and have a great weekend.

For regular updates why not follow me on twitter @EFluencyfella