Catherine Walter "Learning Grammar and Pronunciation: what do we know, and what can we do about it?"

Catherine's talk started with the overview of popular grammar teaching approaches and their merits and drawbacks.  She pointed out that many of them neglect explicit grammar teaching (e.g. immersion). However, there are many definite advantages of this method: it is straightforward,  it helps to notice language features and gives negative feedback  (things that don't happen in the language ). There is also enough evidence to conclude that explicit grammar teaching does work (Norris&Ortega 2000; Gass&Selinker 2000).  The research found that it leads both to conscious and unconscious acquisition and has a lasting effect.
Some people think that the  best way to introduce grammar is when the need for it comes from a student. We can also create a situation for it artificially. On the other hand, in the  class setting it can be difficult to satisfy all the different needs different students have. It can also be challenging for the teacher to come up with the perfect explanation for a grammar point on the spot.
Catherine also shared her understanding of 3E system necessary for successful  explicit grammar teaching.

1. Explanation (or rules)  could be of different types. One - such as street signs and notices- are exposed by an authority. The other such as facts of nature are a result of observation of natural linguistic processes. The latter is the most desired one for teaching grammar. There are 6 criteria a teacher have to bear in mind while presenting a rule (both deductively and inductively). It should 
□be true
□demarcate (should clearly show the limits of the use of a given form).
□be clear
□ be simple
□be conceptually economical  (do not contain new and difficult concepts)
□ be relevant

2. EXAMPLES should be
☆prototypical
☆naturally sounding
☆ not contain irrelevant difficulties
☆there should be enough of them

3. EXERCISES give students opportunity to develop fluency

In the question of pronunciation, Katherine considers receptive skills to be more important than productive skills (for most learners). She also sees a strong link between grammar and pronunciation. Schwa is the most common sound in English language, it is often found in grammar words. So a teacher can incorporate pronunciation teaching (in form of decoding activities) into regular grammar lesson

Song Activity: The Lumineers "Ho Hey"

This nice song starts with the verse entirely in Present Perfect Continuous so I used it as an extension activity with my Intermediate students following the revision lesson on PPC.

1. Start with a song dictoglos activity. Tell the Ss that they are going to listen to the song and the first part consists of 5 sentences in PPC. Then play the verse a couple of times, allowing students to write and compare their results .(They are fairly easy to grasp since they have the same beginning). Do a whole-class check and write up the sentences on the board. Here you can focus on the language a little bit more and draw your Ss attention to the fact that there is no usual time indicator like for or since. Or ask them to listen to pronunciation changes that occur in fast speech (dropping of "v" sound).

2. Prediction. Now it's time to look at the meaning of the lines. Ask Ss to predict what's the song about based on the beginning. Depending on how much time you have the descriptions can be more or less detailed.

3. Listen to the song and check the predictions. If the Ss can't get much from listening you can elicit general idea: is it a happy or a sad story?

4. Listening more closely. Give out the lyrics of the song. Ask Ss to listen again and cross out an extra word in every line. Compare in pairs, then do a whole-class check.

5. Now it's time to look at some possibly new words and phrases. I found that the text of the song doesn't have many difficult or unknown words for Intermediate students. However, their combination can cause some problems. So we discussed some of the questions related to expressions in the text

When do people bleed? Can you bleed from non-physical causes?
If I bleed out for somebody how do I feel about the person? It's quite a tricky question, you can refer Ss to the urban dictionary definition that gives an insight into this line.
What can make a person think that he/she doesn't belong? Have you ever felt this way?
What can go wrong in the relationship?
China Town, Canal and Bowery are the places in the city. Can you guess which city it is? (answer: New York)

6. If you think your Ss understood the lyrics ask them to reconstruct the story of the couple working in pairs/groups.
What happened? Are they together or not? How do they feel? What was the reason for their break up? Why is he regretting about her not taking the bus? What would have happened if she had taken it? 
Hopefully, Ss got some ideas in the previous stage and can imagine the rest. If they are having a block, you can prompt them with more questions. Help with any vocabulary or grammar questions.

7. Ss write up their stories on the pieces on papers (I don't think they should be too long, 5-7 sentences should be enough) and display them around the room. Allow everyone to read each other's stories.

8. Within the same pair/ group Ss choose the story they liked the most (it shouldn't be theirs) and write up a dialogue between the main character and the girl based on the story. Ask them to imagine their meeting on the Canal a month later and come up with a short conversation.

9. Ss role-play the dialogues. For homework, they can write a letter to the main character from the point of view of a girl.

Reporting Verbs Dialogue Activity

I'm teaching reporting verbs this week and I have been looking for some interesting ways to practice them. After a quick search I noticed that most of the activities are based on the transformation of the sentences from direct speech. For example,
 "I'm sorry, I'm late" (apologise) --->
" She apologised for being late."
I decided to turn this activity upside down and come up with the following activity with minimal preparation.

1. Put target reporting verbs on the pieces if paper.

2. In class, revise the verbs and elicit example sentences
Apologise --->
I'm sorry I didn't do my homework.
Deny --->
I didn't do that!

3. Divide Ss in pair or mini-groups.

4. Distribute the papers (3-4 for a pair).

5. Explain that each pair needs to come up with the dialogue that exemplifies the verbs that they have got. They don't have to use the verbs themselves but they have to make the speech act clear. Moreover, it has to be a natural-sounding dialogue.
Example:
-Hi, Lisa!
-Hi, Chris! Would you like to go to the movie with me?
-No, sorry, I need to look after my younger brother. But next week, we'll go for sure!
-Oh, I hate it when you don't spend time with me!
Verbs used: invite, promise, complain

6. Ss work on their dialogues. Teacher monitors and helps if needed.

7. Ss present their dialogues. Meanwhile the rest of the group has to guess which verbs they are exemplifying and write down their ideas.
 Example:
-I think Lisa suggested going to the movie.
-No, but very close!
-Lisa invited Chris to go to the movie.
-Correct!

8. Ss guess. Teacher gives feedback.

If listening to the dialogues is not an option time-wise, Ss can exchange their written dialogues and guess the verbs that were used.

Past Tenses with Wallace and Gromit

My Pre-Intermediate coursebook introduces  Past Simple and Past Continuous Tenses through the story of Nick Park and the day when his warehouse was destroyed by fire. For those of you who may not know his name, it will be enough to look at the picture of these two buddies:

sourse

He is the genius behind the clay empire. Even if you didn't watch it, you probably know these crazy inventors. My students (13-14 year-olds) were also fascinated by them so I decided to act along the lines of conneced classroom philosophy (insert fancy term - check!) and devised a simple task. They have to watch Wallace and Gromit episode called "The wrong trousers" and complete the sentences with either Past Simple or Coninuous according to what happens in the animation.

Here are the sentences

1. 5.50 While Gromit was knitting, the door bell rang.
2. 9.00 When the penguin went outside, Gromit __________________________________
3. 9.33 As Gromit was having breakfast, Penguin _________________________________
4. 11.00 Gromit left home, when it_____________________________________________
5. 13.11 As Gromit was reading the ads, he ______________________________________
6. 13.50 Penguin was controlling the trousers, when Gromit_________________________
7. 17.14 When Penguin returned home, Wallace __________________________________
8. 22.20 Penguin was lifting up the diamond, when it _____________________________-
9. 25.15 As penguin was riding a train, Gromit ___________________________________
10. 27.50 As Gromit was reading newspaper, Wallace ______________________________

To avoid confusion, I inserted the precise time in the video when the action is happening.

Enjoy the video and the activity!

Kate Nash "The Nicest Thing": Song Lesson

Last week my class was revising  I wish constructions and I tried to find a new way to talk about it. I found the perfect song and this is how you can use it.

1. Ask Ss what people usually regret about. Elicit 4-5 categories such as appearance, money, family etc.

2. Ss work in pairs and tell each other the regrets they may have from this categories. They report back to the teacher on what they've found out from their partners.

3. Show 4 stills from the video. Ask: what does this person regret about? Elicit - relationships/love. Tell Ss you're going to listen to the song where the singer has a lot of regrets and wishes about her relationships. First of all, they have to look at the video stills and try to finish the phrases.

4. Ss report on their guesses.

5. Play the video while Ss check their prediction. Elicit the correct sentences.

Ask: What kind of song is it? How does the singer feel? Do you remember any other regrets she has?

6. Give Ss the gapped text of the song. Listen to it one more time and ask them to complete the gaps.

7. Check the answers and any unknown vocabulary.

8. Ask them to describe how the singer feels, what she means with the sentences like "I wish that you knew when I said two sugars I actually meant three".

9. In the next task ask your Ss to be creative and write an extra verse for this song that follows the patter "I wish ...". Remind them that they have to write it from the point of view of the singer. If your Ss are not on-the-spot-creative gave it to them  for homework as I did.

10. The last activity I took from Carissa Peck's blog. She describes it prettey well in her blog. It is fun and perfect for this lesson. At home prepare the papers with I wish sentences. For example I wish I had longer nose, I wish I had pizza for every meal etc. Give them to students on the lesson and ask them to make a doodle. Then they cover the sentences and pass the doodle around. Next person has to write a sentence with I wish that describes the doodle. The papers have to come the full cicrle. At the end, roll out the papers and check if anyone's sentence has been guessed. I guarantee you, it's loads of fun!

Using Pyramid Game to Practice Relative Clauses

I  like using popular game shows in my class. Here is one example that fit well in my class on relative clauses and the topic of entertainment - Pyramid. It is an American game show based on guessing words.
Level:
confident pre-intermediate, intermediate and above
What you need: 
video projector/ a laptop
cards with words
paper pyramid  (or whiteboard to draw it on)

Procedure:
1) Exposure. We followed Upbeat Intermediate book and they present the topic of relative clauses through the text about the entertainment. Ss had to read it at home. So we started off with the discussion of the text.
2) Presentation. I used part of the sentences from the text to draw attention to the structure of relative clauses. My students were quite familiar with the topic, so I let them talk and elicited as much as possible about the difference between defining and non-defining relative clauses. To introduce some new information I drew their attention to the cases where relative pronoun can be omitted
3) Practice. Do some controlled practice first. I had an exercise in the book fitting my aims perfectly, so Ss did it on their own and then compared in pairs. Do the whole class feedback.
4) For a less controlled practice I chose a simple definition game. The aim of the game is to define a word that you have on a card. I demonstrated the activity by giving them couple of riddles. Elicit the language we use to describe people, things, actions such as
It is a person who
It is what you do when
I used a worksheet from New English File Pre-Intermediate Teacher's book Unit 1D. Set the time, monitor the activity and help with difficult words if necessary.
5) Say that today you're going to play a more complicated and more exciting game. Show them the video from Friends and ask what  the rules of the game are.

or the longer one with worse quality

Questions to ask:
What  should you do?
How many people play this game?
How are you supposed to do it?
How much time do you have?

6) Watch again and ask Ss whether Joey is good at this game and why/why not.
7) Consolidate the rules of the game and write up do's and don'ts for the game
8) Now it's time to play Pyramid! Divide your class in pairs  or teams, if you have an uneven number of students one of them could be a facilitator.
9) Reveal (or draw) the Pyramid. You can choose to put the names of the categories inside the pyramid, or just put the numbers which adds an element of surprise. That's what I did and it looked like this

Here is the worksheet that I made. I glued  the questions to the cards to make it a little bit more official and easy to hand.

 

10) Ss chose the category/number, decide who is going to explain the word. Then you (or facilitator) set te time and the game begins!


The team with more points win. That's it! There could be additional variations and rounds if you feel like spending the whole lesson on it.

• The teams can drop out of the competition (think ahead about how to occupy them ) and the best ones should battle in the finale.
• Award more points for more difficult questions,
• Have "cat in a bag" category