Ransom letter note

Word order is important and here is a fun activity to sensitize students to word order and sentence structure of the English language. 

1. Prepare banks with a large number of words. To make the activity more interesting and fun, you can type words with different fonts and sizes on different colour paper or cut them from magazines and newspapers.
2. Divide the students into groups and give each group a word bank, a sheet of paper and a glue stick.
3. The students work together and make sentences from the words in the bank and stick them to the sheet of paper so that it looks like a ransom letter note.
4. Stick the sheets on the wall.

For more information on word order, go to: http://linguapress.com/grammar/word-order.htm

Think green

     Raising environmental awareness is becoming more and more important and urgent each day. By incorporating environmental learning into education, teachers help students understand the natural world and their personal connection to it. In this way the young learners will be able to make informed decisions to protect the environment at school, at home and in the community.
     The good news is that a lot of materials have been prepared for the introduction of nature conservation into the school curriculum. Textbooks and teaching resources abound in texts, activities and practical advice on what people can do to help protect the environment thus establishing an attitude towards nature.

While browsing the net I came upon these surveys which I believe will help the students to find out what they can do to improve their environmental behaviour.

Think Earth Environmental Surveys

Another useful link, one of the oldest, and most unbiased sources of online environmental news on the web: http://www.enn.com/

 All the images shown here belong to respected owners and are shared here for appreciation purpose.

Language pyramids

         The following activity is suitable for elementary students of English as a foreign language, especially those who are slow, unmotivated, unfocused, immature or unapt. It will not only boost memory and practise stress variation in word linking, but will also sensitise learners to the mechanisms of word order and structure building.

How to do it?

1. Write a sentence pyramid on the board.

Example:                                      weather
                                                 the weather
                                              the weather can
                                            the weather can be
                                        the weather can be cold
                                   the weather can be pretty cold
                            In Scotland the weather can be pretty cold.
                     In northern Scotland the weather can be pretty cold.

2. Read each line out loud and ask the students to repeat in chorus.
3. If you have time you can ask individual students to repeat as well or read the pyramid by themselves.
4. The last task is the most challenging and creative - given a pilot word ( e.g. box, summer, bottle ..., etc.), the students build their own language pyramids.

How to use difficult English words in class to boost writing skills

       The English language abounds in difficult words, which you can use to make a fun activity in class and at the same time develop the students skills for writing clearly and accurately. 
       Choose several words ( there's a sample list below), write them on the board and ask the students to write definitions for all of them. They can work individually, in pairs or in groups. After the students have finished, they read the definitions and choose the one which is closest to the original meaning of the word.

Sample word list:
maconochie - n. army tinned stew 
demonolatry - n. worship of demons, and good and evil spirits 
hydropathy- n. medical treatment by baths and mineral waters 
novolescence - n. state of being new or up to date 
paucity - n. scarcity 
bucolic - adj. charmingly rural; rustic; country like 
chicanery -  n. trickery; deceitfulness; artifice, especially legal or political 
obfuscate - v. to darken, to confuse, to make confusing 
penchant - n. strong inclination, a liking
latibule - n. hiding place

For a detailed list of difficult English words go to 
http://www.english-for-students.com/Difficult-Words.html

Describing shapes

Here's another activity to eliminate boredom in the classroom and enhance speaking and listening comprehension.

1.Prepare a sheet of paper with different shapes on it (like the one shown above).
2. Make several copies ( the number will depend on the number of students in class - the students may work in groups or in pairs)
3. Cut the sheets of paper along the lines so you now have sets of shape cards.
4. Divide the students into groups or pairs and give each group/pair a set of shape cards, which they spread on the desks.
5. Ask a volunteer student to be the speaker and give him/her a sheet of paper with the original arrangement of the shapes.
6. The speaker then describes each shape so that all other students can arrange the shapes in their original order.
7. At the end of the activity the students compare their arrangements with the original one.

Using songs in the English classroom

An excellent way to make learning enjoyable and motivating is to use music in the classroom. Here are some of the benefits of songs - they:  

• increase motivation - there's hardly anyone who doesn't like music
• increase vocabulary and phonemic awareness - they are authentic material
• improve memory and concentration - students learn through repetition
• provide meaningful context to encourage fluency
• relax stress or change the mood

Here is a list of songs I have used and intend to use in class to make learning grammar fun:

Present simple - Celine Dion "I'm alive"
                                          Devotchka "Till the end of time"
Present continuous -  Keane "Everybody's changing"
                                   One Republic "Stop and Stare"
                                   The Arcade fire "My body is a cage"
                                   ABBA "One of us"
Present perfect simple - U2 "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For"
                                         Matchbox 20 "How far we've come" 
                                         Rod Steward "Have I told you lately"
Present perfect continuous  - Anastacia "Left outside alone"
Past Simple - The Beatles "Yellow Submarine"
                      A-ha "Did anyone approach you"
Past continuous - Aerosmith "Crying"
Future Simple - Zucchero "Diamante"
                           A-ha  "Crying in the ran"
Imperative; modal verbs (could) - A-ha "Foot of the mountain"
Subjunctive - Johnny Cash & June Carter Cash "If I Were A Carpenter"
Modals (could), Past Simple, too+adjective+to-infinitive, obligation in the past (should have stopped) - Snow Patrol "You could be happy" 
Modal verbs (must) - Queen "Show must go on"
1st Conditional - Simply Red "If you don't know me by now"
2nd Conditional - ABBA "Money, money, money"
                               Lisa Stansfield "Change"
3rd conditional - Taylor Swift "You're not sorry"
Wishes - Joni Mitchell "I wish I had a river  "
               The Arcade Fire " City with no children" 
               Blackmore's Night "Wish you were here"
Modals for the past - Adam Lambert "Better Than I Know Myself"
Used to - Gotye "Somebody that I used to know"
                The Arcade Fire "Used to wait"
Too+adjective+to-infinitive - OneRepublic "Apologize"
Make/Let+bare infinitive - Madonna "Love makes the world go round"
                                             The Beatles "Let it be"
Comparatives - Kaiser Chiefs "Every day I love you less and less"
Reported speech - The Killers "Somebody told me"
                                Nina Simone "If he changed my name"
                                 Holly Cole  "I Told Him That My Dog Wouldn't Run" 
Phrasal verbs  - James "Getting away with it"
                           Lily Allen "The Fear"
                           Devotchka "The last beat of my heart"

Defining relative clauses - Olivia Newton-John and John Travolta "You're The One That I Want "

                        
There are numerous ideas of how to use songs in the classroom. Here are some: http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/activities/using-songs-classroom

 If you feel that I should add other songs to this list, feel free to share.

Graffiti in the classroom?

The following activity, called Graffiti in the Classroom, is an excellent way to get the students thinking about a topic prior to reading. It is not actually connected with painting, but with writing and involves all students. Being an independent activity in which students can think and put down their ideas freely, it provides a way for shy students to get involved in the discussions.

Steps:
1. Prepare several sheets of paper with a topic to discuss written in the middle.
2. Stick them on the walls so that it is easy for students to write on them,
3. Give the students coloured pencils and tell them to go round the room and put down their ideas on each topic. They can also agree or disagree with what their classmates have written.
4. While doing the activity, the students must keep silent.

The following pictures are some of the Graffiti that my 11th grade students produced on some of the topics discussed in class:

Some of the ideas can be used while discussing the topics later during the lesson.

Jazz chants

I was a young teacher when I attended a seminar on methodology, and a teacher trainer from England presented us with Jazz chants. I found them really enjoyable and motivating and so did my students.

A Jazz chant is a poem that uses jazz rhythms to illustrate the natural stress and intonation patterns of conversational English. It provides an exciting way to improve your student's speaking and listening comprehension skills while reinforcing the language structures of everyday situation.

Here's an example:

I'm sorry, but you've got to do better than this.

I'm doing the best I can.

I'm sorry, but you've got to walk faster than this.

I'm walking as fast as I can.

I'm sorry, but you've got to work harder than this.

I'm working as hard as I can.

It's not good enough

It's not good enough

It's not good enough

It's not good enough

I'm doing my best.

Try a little harder.

I'm doing my best.

Try a little harder.

I'm doing my best.

Try a little harder.

I can't, I can't.

Don't say can't.

I won't, I won't but I'm doing my best.

Do a little better.

I'm doing my best.

Do a little better.

I'm doing my best.

Try a little harder.

I'll try, I'll try.

Try a little harder.

I'll try, I'll try

How to do this activity in class:

1. Write down the poem on the blackboard. Ask the students who they think is taking part in the conversation ( teacher and student; parent and child, etc.)

2. Divide the class into two groups.

3. Read the poem to the class, using proper intonation/melody. ( Of course the rhythm may be changed to something more modern like rap if the students are not into jazz).

4. Read the poem again, making the students repeat, but in groups - the first group is the teacher and the second is the student.

5. The students do it without your help.
6. As a follow-up you can ask the students to write their own Jazz chants.

For more information on Jazz chants: 

http://carolread.wordpress.com/2010/04/26/j-is-for-jazz-chants/

http://www.scribd.com/doc/23248564/Jazz-Chants-text

Short activities to eliminate boredom in the classroom

Here are two activities to do with your students when they are getting bored, inattentive or noisy in class:

1. Give each student a small sheet of paper and make them write down what worries them or what they are afraid of. When they are all ready, ask them to tear the sheets of paper into very small pieces and then throw them into the recycle bin. Now they have all got rid of their fears and worries. (there's no need to make them read or share what's written down)

2. We all like hearing good things about ourselves. In this activity you will make the students say good things to their classmates. On the blackboard write down the following: "One thing I like about you, ......, is that you ..... ." Then take a ball and throw it to one of the students, saying: "One thing I like about you, Emma, is that you are very active in class. " Then Emma throws the ball to a classmate and says something good to him/her. The activity continues until everybody has taken part.

These activities work with all students. No matter what their level of English is, no matter if they are slow or fast learners, they are all willing to participate. And the results of these feel-good activities are obvious - they encourage cooperation, show a fun way of looking at life, build self-esteem, and lift their spirit.

One perfect rose

1. Cut this poem into lines.
2. Give each student a line, ask them to memorize their lines, collect the pieces of paper back.
3. The students have to arrange the lines into a poem by walking around and telling one another their lines.
4. The students stand in a line and say the poem.

A single flower he sent me, since we met.

All tenderly his messenger he chose;

Deep-hearted, pure, with scented dew still wet-

One perfect rose.

I knew the language of the floweret,

“My fragile leaves,” it said, “his heart enclose.”

Love long has taken for his amulet

One perfect rose.

Why is it no one ever sent me yet

One perfect limousine, do you suppose?

Ah no, it’s always just my luck to get

One perfect rose.

Dorothy Parker