IN_winter_2016

IATEFL Slovenia Magazine Winter issue 2016, no. 69

Poland Conference 2016 Music in Learning Critical Thinking in the Classroom OUP Conference 2016

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TWin odlični izleti!

Turistična agencija TWIN se s kulturno-izobraževalnimi potovanji ukvarja že 20. leto. Ker v Veliko Britanijo potujemo pogosteje kot večina ostalih slovenskih organizatorjev potovanj, ponujamo odlično in preverjeno izvedbo.

Naše cene tudi že vključujejo javni prevoz in obvezne vstopnine. Cene so odvisne predvsem od termina odhoda in vaše fleksibilnosti pri odhodu.

Zemljemerska ulica 12 1000 Ljubljana Tel.: 01 280 28 20, 040 187 830 e-pošta: info@twintur.com www.twintur.com

Zakaj s Twin-om v London: 1 2

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Pogosti in redni, zagotovljeni odhodi v London. Twin organizira šolska potovanja v London že 20 let, v povprečju imamo na mesec vsaj 3 zagotovljene odhode v London.

Odlično vodstvo. Pri Twinu se zavedamo, da je odlično poznavanje običajev in turističnih znamenitosti Londončanov le prvi korak k odlični izvedbi. Naši vodniki imajo dolgoletne izkušnje pri vodenju šolske mladine, zato odlično poznajo vse sestavine programa, saj jih sami pripravljajo. Tudi zato je vodenje/izvedba toliko bolj fleksibilna glede na želje skupine.

Naj še omenimo, da boste v Sloveniji težko našli vodnike, ki v London vodijo tako pogosto kot Twinovi vodniki.

Nastanitev, ki presega običajno turistično kategorijo. Pri Twinu se zavedamo, da je dober spanec pomembna sestavina izleta. Vsi naši hoteli so hoteli s 3* in pri večini udeležencev presežejo njihova pričakovanja. Kot specialist za London lahko zagotovimo vsaj en bogat angleški zajtrk (običajnih zajtrki v Londonu so skromni kontinentalni).

Nikoli naknadno ne spreminjamo pogojev. Naša cena je vedno znana že ob prijavi in se nikoli ne spremeni zaradi spremembe cen dobaviteljev, goriva oz letalskega prevoznika.

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Vsaj 183 osnovnih in srednjih šol je že potovalo z nami. Z nami zelo malo šol potuje samo enkrat. Če želite neobvezujoče vzpostaviti stik z organizatorjem na eni od šol, ki je že potovala z nami, vam bomo z veseljem posredovali kontakt.

Ponujamo 3-dnevni program, kjer za izvedbo ni potrebno delovnika.

Več informacij na www.twintur.com ali na 040 187 830 ali v poslovalnici na Zemljemerski ulici 12 v Ljubjani.

Osmisliti učenje je osnovna naloga vsakega učitelja in ni boljšega načina, kako priljubiti angleščino, od tega, da učence popelješ po svetu. V današnjih časih to ni enostavno. Šole in učitelji se bojijo odgovornosti, mnogi starši pa ne zmorejo ali znajo otrok odpeljati sami. Ni bilo lahko pred 15 leti prvič sesti na avtobus in se podati z agencijo, o kateri nismo vedeli ničesar, na večdnevno potovanje v Veliko Britanijo. Bilo nas je strah pred odhodom, a takoj ko smo se podali na pot, smo vedeli, da je bila odločitev prava.

Po tistem, ko smo prvič potovali s TWinom, smo vedeli, da nas ne bo več strah. Lani smo že desetič odkrivali Evropo in vsakič smo se vrnili ne samo zadovoljni, ampak tudi hvaležni za TWinovo strokovnost, prijaznost, ustrežljivost ... Hvaležni smo celotni ekipi in nikoli ne bi izbrala druge agencije, saj sem prepričana, da niti cenovno niti strokovno potovanja ne bi mogla biti ugodneje in bolje izpeljana.

Vedno ponudimo kakšno dodatno storitev – brezplačno. S program zagotavljamo minimalni obseg storitev oz. ogledov, vendar nikoli ne izvedemo samo Ta ekskurzija je postala stalna praksa naše šole in učenci komaj minimalnega obsega – vedno, pri vsaki skupini dodamo čakajo, da bodo dovolj stari, da se je bodo lahko udeležili. Nam, nekaj posebnega, kar ni zapisano v programu. Prav tako v spremljevalcem, pa je v neizmerno veselje, ko jih opazujemo, kako naših programih nikoli ne zapišemo “če bo čas dopuščal”, kajti polni vtisov in lepih doživetij še dolgo pripovedujejo o potovanju. vse naše programe vedno v celoti izvedemo. In ker si London zelo pogosto ogledujemo, poznamo tudi optimalno 2 To be up-to-date with what is going on, visitKsenija our website: Tripkovič,www.iatefl.si OŠ Selnica ob Dravi zaporedje ogledov brez nepotrebnega hitenja.

IATEFL Slovenia Magazine Vol. 16, No 69, Winter issue 2016 Published by: IATEFL Slovenia, p. p. 1677, 1001 Ljubljana Email: info@iatefl.si, www.iatefl.si

Wishing you unlimited joy and infinite fun! Hope these If 2017 is going to be your year, holidays rejuvenate you, prove it, don‘t just say it. so that you return with full Spend the next 365 days believing in on energy and enthusiasm. yourself and chasing the dreams you wished

for last year that did not come true.

For each year of your life is a wonderful ride, yet the most hopeful time being when December turns the keys over to January.

I wish you a fantastic start Happy 2017! of the new year. Let it be full Janja

IATEFL Slovenia President: Dolores Malić IN editor: Dolores Malić Public relations: Gregor Pirš Primary school coordinator: Helena Žnidaršič Seme Secondary school coordinator: Nataša Meh Professional development coordinator: Tina Blatnik Language editor: Oliver Sims Printed by: Design Studio, d.o.o.

Graphic design: Petra Turk Articles, letters and other contributions should be addressed to IATEFL, p. p. 1677, 1001 Ljubljana Email: info@iatefl.si IATEFL Slovenia Board Members: Tina Blatnik Dolores Malić Nataša Meh Gregor Pirš Helena Žnidaršič Seme Cover-page photo and all photos on pages 8 -12: all-free-download.com

of friendy smiles and fizzy Peace and Joy for January to April, drinks. Fill it with joy and No troubles for May and June, don't be afraid to make a few No students for July and August, mistakes because they only Good start for September, prove that you are trying.

Happiness and Love I wish you for October to December.

12 months with no worries, Have a wonderful 2017!

52 weeks of happiness, Helena I‘d like to wish you health, 365 days without illness, courage, will and enough 8760 hours of good fun, (in) sanity to make it 525,600 minutes of memorable moments through the year. and 31,536,000 seconds of love.

Dragana Vesna Discover new joys, Fill up your days with laughter, Rejoice the simple pleasures of life, Spread happiness, Dream big, Aim higher.

Alenka

Simply: Let the new year be your year!

Dolores

May you know when, what and who to treasure while you have it/them.

May you always make the right choices.

May you get the respect you deserve. but most of all May we meet (again) at the IATEFL Slovenia conference :)

Stay true to yourself, think outside the box, be kind to others, be honest, believe in the good in people and never forget that everything happens with a reason.

Jasna

ISSN 1855-6833

Across the Borders, Over the Boundaries 25th IATEFL Poland Conference by Alenka Tratnik .. ..............................

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The Power of Music in Learning by Danny Singh .. .....................................................................................

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Bringing the world into your classroom using critical thinking by Dragana Stegić ...............................................

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Zakaj je Iatefl konferenca najboljši dogodek za učitelje v Sloveniji? . . ...............................................................

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24th International IATEFL Slovenia Conference 2017 ................................................................................

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OUP Conference 2016 by Sandra Vida ..................................................................................................

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Across the Borders, Over the Boundaries 25th IATEFL Poland Conference

by Alenka Tratnik I love conferences. They’re informative, inspiring, interesting, engaging, stimulating…. They incite curiosity, energise the senses and build excitement. A conference is a place to learn, to explore, to enhance your teaching expertise, to develop both as a professional and a person. It’s a place where we, as teachers, are placed at the centre of the learning experience and given the opportunity to take our game to the next level, i.e. to apply new ideas in our teaching contexts.

 The most recent conference I’ve been to was the 25th Jubilee IATEFL Poland Conference, which took place in Szczecin. More than 800 English language teaching profes-

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sionals from near and far gathered in this border city in northwest Poland for the three-day event, the second biggest IATEFL conference in Europe, surpassed in terms of numbers only by the big IATEFL conference in the UK. The title of the conference, “Across the Borders – Over the Boundaries”, emphasised the fact that while we experience not only various obstacles on our career paths, but also face borders of time, space and material resources, we can come together with like-minded people to overcome these obstacles and to find novel ideas, share knowledge, make connections, form new relationships and strengthen existing ones.

Attending the 25th Jubilee IATEFL Poland Conference was a rewarding and satisfying experience both profession-

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ally and personally. When I arrived at the venue – the Faculty of Electrical Engineering of West Pomeranian University of Technology – for the pre-conference event, the place was brimming with people and lively discussions, oozing a cosy and friendly atmosphere. So immediately I felt right at home! And for the next three days, the extensive conference programme offered everything you could wish for: excellent talks, insightful research topics, innovative hands-on workshops, live sessions with learners of all ages, interviews, and the finale of a public speaking contest for lower secondary and secondary school students, in addition to a happy hour with publishers, a sightseeing tour of Szczecin, an early morning run and the 25th anniversary celebration.

And of course, there was also time for valuable hallway conversation and schmoozing.

Plenary sessions To pick a plenary session was a doddle, as there were only two sessions you could choose from every day – one in Polish, the other in English. Although I managed to somehow decipher the titles of the Polish ones, I decided to opt out! So here’s a short overview of the plenary sessions offered in English.

The first day of the conference kicked off with a jam-packed plenary led by freelance teacher-trainer Evan Frendo focusing on “impression management” – a topic I had no idea about before the conference but which I found absolutely fascinating. As the speaker put it, impression management is about how we seek to look and sound when we interact with other people. In his talk, Frendo argued that teaching impression-management skills is an important part of our role as language teachers. As a matter of fact, wanting to create a favourable impression on others is a basic part of human nature. It is therefore important to realise that we use specific language and conscious or preconscious (automatic) techniques – from self-promotion and ingratiation to supplication and intimidation – to facilitate others’ thinking positively of us. As an example, in meetings with parents, a teacher wants to project the feeling that he or she is a fully competent person, using self-promotional tactics in saying, for example, “Have I mentioned I also have a Master’s degree in teaching English”, which will probably create the right impression….

The second conference day started off with a plenary speech by David Nunan. It was a session I’d been waiting for in eager anticipation, as Professor Nunan is a globally acclaimed linguist and a distinguished English language educator. He’s a prolific writer, too, with more than 100 teacher-training textbooks and coursebooks to his name.

And can you believe that he’s sold over 4 billion copies worldwide? Wow! However, he didn’t choose to talk about teaching, about English language or about how to

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make a good lesson. Instead, he delivered a rather dry speech on a role for technology. He stressed that we need to move away from the question of whether we can learn a language through technology or not to rather ask ourselves which aspects of language we can teach. According to Nunan, there are four roles for technology: • As a carrier of content, technology gives learners access to authentic spoken and written texts.

• As an instructional practice tool, it provides opportunities for learners to practise the four skills and do a wide range of drills and exercises.

• As a learning-management tool, it enables the teacher and learners to organise their learning in various ways, to monitor progress and to keep records of achievement.

• As a communication device, it provides learners with opportunities for authentic spoken and written communication with other language users.

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students to translate back into English. Then let them see the original text and find L2 equivalents of the difficult/new bits of language.

3 Evaluate impact – Repeat tasks: Towards the end of a unit, get students to do one or two of the exercises that you used as your class openers. Encourage students to compare their scores at the beginning and at the end of the unit.

In a nutshell, we should think of technology as an enabler and carefully look into ways of how it can assist us in what we do as teachers.

Remember Jamie Keddie, the founder of Lessonstream? If you attended the IATEFL Slovenia conference in 2014, his name must ring a bell. Back then, he talked about “videotelling” and ways of bringing online video into the classroom. This time, however, he addressed the issue of negative perceptions of teacher talk, which is often perceived as counterproductive and should therefore be reduced to minimum. Yet Keddie pointed out that teacher talk is inevitable and that it’s therefore vital to change the image of teacher talk, which in fact is a dialogue rather than a monologue. It “involves one voice and two ears”, he said, wrapping up his speech by saying that we should embrace teacher talk and develop it.

I wasn’t planning on attending the talk by Grzegorz Śpiewak, a popular and frequent speaker at conferences in Poland, but I’m very glad I did. This very practically oriented keynote on how to make language teaching visible made a refreshing change from the aforementioned more academic talks. Śpiewak outlined three points: 1 Begin a class with more impact – Focus them instantly: As students enter the class, give them an opening question concerning today’s target language – on the board or on slips of paper.

2 Teach language with more impact: Translate a segment of input text into Slovene and give it to your

From workshops to talks and live lessons While selecting a plenary was a piece of cake, I was faced with a seemingly insurmountable challenge when it came to picking the “right” session to attend. The choice was overwhelming, with a slew of topics and speakers and up to 14 presentations going on at the same time. So, how to pick the right one and get the most out of the conference?

Well, some people go for a household name or an attractive title; some choose sessions based on what they want to learn. Still others have a more specific goal in their minds.

For example, Malgorzata, a newbie teacher from Poznan told me that she always opted for more practical, hands-on

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workshops, as she liked to get lots of useful ideas for her classroom, while a fellow teacher from Tunisia pointed out that she tended to opt for an academic talk.

My selection, on the other hand, is often made on an ad hoc basis. I might have even selected one session but then have a change of heart at the last minute! But it was a different story this time. Unlike other conferences I have been to over the last two, three years, here were numerous sessions from talks, workshops, and a live session on ESP and business English which suited my professional interests to a T. Just to name a few attention-catching titles: “You know when you get to my age”, “The key to successful business English training”, “Business English: Make it interesting”, “Motivational techniques for everyday BE lessons” and “Focusing on increasing creativity in business English”, but the list went on! I collected some wonderful resources and walked away with a handful of new ideas to implement in my teaching practice.

I rounded off my last day at the conference by taking part in “The great British quiz”, organised by IATEFL Poland’s e-bulletin and journals editor Peter Whiley. I was hoping this was going to be a bit of fun, but the quizmaster dropped mind-shreddingly difficult questions on us. In fact I didn’t know the answer to a single question, and the only thing which prevented me from feeling like a complete failure was the reassuring fact that neither did any of my British fellow participants on the team! That said, it’s the taking part that counts, isn’t it?

 On a final note, about a week prior to my going to Poland, I bumped into a fellow English teacher I hadn’t seen for a quite a while. While chatting, I proudly announced I was

going to attend another conference in a few days’ time, in Poland. She inquired why on Earth I needed to attend a conference on teaching English, and anyway what was there to talk about for three days?! “You can already teach, can’t you?” she added with a smirk. I was astounded.

Of course, it should go without saying that every teacher is responsible for his or her own professional development. So to extend and enhance our teaching practice, to further develop our knowledge, to refine our teaching skills, to keep updated with the latest teaching methodology, to continually push for improvement, in short to keep learning, we read books, take courses and indeed attend conferences – and this is a commitment we all have to make to ourselves as teachers!

My favourite quotes from the conference • “Computers are creating a world that places a premium on innovation and creative thinking.”

(David Nunan) • “As teachers, we constantly put up performances.”

(Evan Frendo) • “Being a teacher is reassuringly difficult.”

(Jamie Keddie) • “Learning a language is about confronting your fears.” (Ewa Grzelak) • “The most important thing in communication is to hear what isn’t being said.” (Alicja Gałązka) • “In the teaching–learning context, praise is too general, overused, distributed unfairly and manipulative.” (Wioletta Szóstak) • “Don’t treat other people the way you want to be treated. Treat other people the way they want to be treated.” (Mike Hogan) Further reading • Learner-Centered English Language Education

by D. Nunan • Inspiring Active Learning: A Complete Handbook for Today’s Teachers by Merrill Harmin and Melanie Toth • Impression Management in the Workplace: Research, Theory and Practice by Andrew J. DuBrin • In the Classroom: Suggestions & Ideas for Beginning Teachers by Richard M. Trimble • Visible Learning for Teachers: Maximizing Impact on Learning by John Hattie • Visible Learning and the Science of How We Learn

by John Hattie and Greg Yates

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The Power of Music in Learning

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by Danny Singh Danny Singh, born and raised in London, but now based in Rome, gives creative English language lessons and teacher training courses all over Italy and abroad. He also offers stimulating monthly presentations on language related issues at Rome’s biggest international bookshop and is visible on web TV www.inmagicartwebtv.eu with a series of interactive English video lessons. He is author of two books, “I was a happy man...then one day I came across Laughter Yoga” and “Learning English through the mind and the body”.

He regularly attends Pilgrims TT summer courses as a Guest Speaker.

Website: www.laughnlearn.net e-mail: singh_danny@hotmail.com Music is one of the most popular forms of communication.

It is intrinsic to all cultures and transcends barriers of religion, race, nationality and even language. In addition, music is one of the few activities that involves using the whole brain.

Reading music and playing an instrument focuses more on the left-side of the brain, while composing or interpreting a piece of music concentrates more on the right-side. It is not coincidental that musicians are usually good at mathematics.

Music is an excellent form of therapy and helps to reduce stress and tension. During a typical summer school language course in the UK, students start by doing an entry test to

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identify their level, before being put into a group. This test is quite short, but extremely stressful for the students, as a bad test result could mean spending the whole course in a group with a lower-level, than the one to which they feel they are entitled to be in. To help the students understand how much time remains during this test, we teachers might write 2 minutes or 30 seconds on the board at various intervals. However, during the summer of 2014, I tried a new system, very simple, but with pleasing results. When there was less a minute left, I began playing the song, The final countdown by Europe. The musical introduction is enough to help them understand and most of them smile, start giggling or burst into short fits of laughter, which helps to break the tension.

The most important reason for using music in learning is that it facilitates memory, unlike almost no other activity. Even when we dislike a song or piece of music, if we hear it enough times, we can’t get it out of our mind, just because it stimulates memory. A university lecturer who simply talks for an hour or so, with little interaction or feedback expected from the students, may well ask why music could be beneficial in this case. Concentrating on a speaker, however interesting, humorous and stimulating he/she might be, is quite difficult to maintain for anything more than 15 minutes. However, let’s say our lecturer switches on the first 45 seconds of Smoke in the water by Deep Purple, with those famous guitar chords, after about 15 minutes of his lecture. I am pretty certain that it would help break the tension, the boredom and keep students awake. Our lecturer then continues for another 15 minutes or so, then does it again. If the lecture lasts for an hour, the musical introduction to the song will

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have been played three times and possibly four, if the lecturer plays it at the end. Aside from acting as a clock, this piece of music has far more beneficial results for our students. Just trying to recall the song will help the students to remember parts of the demanding lecture that they have been through.

Ideally, the lecturer should play a short piece of music to indicate a change of subject. If a different piece of piece of music is played each time, the student will link each piece of music to certain information given at the lecture. I would invite all university lecturers who have never used music before in their lessons, even if perhaps sceptical, to try this technique, then send me your results and feedback.

When we learned as kids, we used an array of music and songs to help us learn the alphabet, the times table, numbers, the days of the week, as well as short stories. I’m sure readers can think of their own additional examples. The kids of today have even more access to music as a learning aid, thanks to the internet and various other tools which can create or download music in an instant.

There is of course a procedure to go through. A five year old child does not simply begin singing a song in perfect English, just because it’s being played on the teacher’s CD player. At first, the child will begin moving and feeling the music rhythmically, then start humming the sound. The child will pick up on a few key words that he/she has managed to understand so far. Then, as he/she really gets into it, the child may well start singing the whole song, not with the correct words necessarily, but more likely with some similar sounds. That’s all part of the fun.

Music works on our emotions. When we hear a song or piece of music, our body temperature changes, goose pimples appear on our arms, we can feel a tingle moving up our spine.

Like our best and worst emotional experiences, we remember all the finite details. We all remember where we were on our best birthday celebration, not just the exciting bits, but even information which is normally discarded; what we were wear-

ing, who was present, what we ate and drank, the temperature of the location, a phone call which took place during the evening, a humorous and maybe unexpected event. Similarly, we all remember where we were when the Twin Towers collapsed, or when a famous statesman was either assassinated or died in strange circumstances.

If you find a song emotionally uplifting, each time you hear it, you will remember information linked to when you heard it.

The same is true even if it makes you cry. I remember Nessun dorma by Pavarotti being played by the BBC as Donadoni struck his penalty over the bar in the 1990 World Cup, meaning that Italy were eliminated on penalties and Argentina went through in their place. That image haunted me every time I heard the piece of music, until almost twenty years later, when it was played in another deeply emotional situation, during a Spanish film, in which a paraplegic man was flying in his bed.

Music can affect our mood and emotions as mentioned previously. It is not by chance that each store or shopping centre you enter has a particular song or piece of music being played at that moment. It is usually studied beforehand in detail. Shops want you to spend money and to feel happy while you’re doing it, so the music is carefully selected to help obtain those results. At train stations meanwhile, the objective is to ensure the passenger feels as relaxed as possible and doesn’t notice that he/she may be waiting 20 minutes for a train which normally passes every five.

When you phone a company to complain about something, what happens? They often put you on hold and you are forced to listen to a piece of music, usually relaxing, which you hear so many times, that when you do eventually get through to someone, you are no longer angry and you may even be humming the very music that’s been playing. In the Harrow town bus station (a London suburb), a location notorious for crime, an experiment was tried, where classical music was played day and night over a period of time. The result was that the crime rate dropped dramatically.

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In learning situations, mood is often underestimated. If students are feeling too excited, hyperactive, sleepy, or bored, they will not be at their best for learning. A good teacher can anticipate the mood of the students, especially if he/she knows them. But music should be used to set the tone. If you want your students to jump up and move around, play some good rock. I often have to use this with adults, who expect to sit down and relax for the best part of a lesson. If you want your students to relax, meditate and concentrate, try playing something which reflects this. Any Mozart or relaxing classical music will do. When I want my students to think creatively, I might play some jazz or a mix of classical and jazz.

Ensuring your students are in their best learning mode by applying the appropriate music is fundamental.

It is well known that the image is far more powerful than the word. Our mind remembers the image and consequently the words related to it far more than a group of sentences making up a paragraph. However, if music is then added to the image, this stimulates the memory even more. I’m sure you can all think of some examples of short videos, where the music is more than just a useful tool to help you memorise the information contained in the video. Classical and rock are the best forms of music for aiding memory in this context.

With the diffusion of facebook and other forms of social network, images are now freely available. It is quite easy to obtain images demonstrating more or less anything you want.

Try creating a PowerPoint presentation with some of them and adding music. That will make the information stick even more. Nowhere is the link between music and images greater than in the world of cinema. When we think of the Hitchcock classic, Psycho, we don’t actually see a woman being stabbed in the shower. We see a knife approaching a shower curtain, but what hits us is that sharp music. That music is what makes the image more powerful. How many films can you think of where the music plays a fundamental role in making the images memorable?

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As we have already seen, music has tremendous benefits for language learning, improving memory and focusing attention, but also for physical coordination and development. Learning through physical movement has been an important part of my methodology for many years, however, it was only in May 2014, that I discovered some conclusive results. I was invited to a seminar in Catania (Sicily) on the subject of students with the problem of dyslexia and short attention span in learning. I believed that I had little experience in this subject and indeed wondered why the organiser had insisted on my presence.

In the morning, I was sent to a high school, where I was given two classes and asked to demonstrate some of my activities that I normally use with my students. We did some breathing exercises, laughter yoga exercises, making words with the body, verbs through the body and combined with gentle back massage, yoga combined with total physical response and some other activities. I was shocked to discover that several students in the two groups had either dyslexia or other learning deficiencies. I hadn’t the slightest inkling of this during the lesson. Each student had participated in a more or less confident manner.

After a solid Sicilian lunch, I was taken to the seminar and asked to speak about my methodology. While talking, one of the Professors who had been present during my morning lessons operated a video showing some clips from the lessons.

The amazing thing was that everything I said was demonstrated by a video clip! The point is that students with learning difficulties benefit enormously from activities with movement, rather than being told to sit still, which is totally unnatural, group activities where they can collaborate, rather than be singled out and stared at!

Of all the activities I did, probably the most interesting in this debate was making words with the body. There are essentially two ways that students can do this exercise. One is by using the body to form the shapes of the letters. The other is by creating an image which represents the word. For a dyslex-

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ic student, this one is interesting. Which technique would they choose? Probably the image of course. However, considering that the shape of the words is created with the body and not with pen and paper, there is no reason why many dyslexics couldn’t choose this form.

The physical coordination and movement can be seen even more when we move on to music combined with dancing.

Dancing which ironically is the same as the shortened version of my name DanSingh, used to be my greatest fear. As all readers should know, the best way to overcome your fear is to face it. I was forced to face mine, when through no fault of my own, I was selected to participate in a Bernardo Bertolucci short film at a wedding scene. I was quite happy to play the role of a guest who was slumped in a chair, having overeaten, however, despite my protestations, I was forced to dance with a tall elegant lady. When the day finished and a large banknote was placed into my hand, I realised that I had been paid to dance, therefore, my conclusion was that however ridiculous I might seem, I had nothing more to be ashamed of. This led to me trying different kinds of dance and eventually finding dances that I actually enjoyed; circle dancing, folk dancing, Scottish dancing. I inserted some of these into my lessons.

What often makes these dances easy is not just that the movements are fairly simple, but that the music is highly amusing!

Music reduces muscle tension and improves body movement and coordination.

I have applied dance into my lessons in other ways. Humour and laughter is an essential part of my approach to teaching, so I look for song videos which have funny dance routines, get my students to watch them and then together we imitate the dance routine. Doing this all together as a group means that no one student feels vulnerable about his/her lack of coordination, or what his/her peers might say, but most of all it is fun and increases self-confidence. Critics might ask what language learning is actually taking place. Well, as we are dancing to songs which contain words, these lyrics are ab-

sorbed far more easily than simply sitting down and listening to them. Students link the words with the images of the video and can reproduce them quite easily. Some of the songs with these hilarious dance routines are Lonely boy by Black Keys, The Locomotion by Little Eva, Where the hell is Matt (any version), although my favourite is the 2008 version, as I love the music. Another song that I often use is These boots are made for walking. There are two versions, the modern one by Planet Funk, which is deliberately humorous and the original version by Nancy Sinatra, which is funny because of the dances used in that period.

Using different versions of the same song is another technique that I enjoy, especially if the versions are significantly different. The two versions of These boots are made for walking mentioned above differ enormously, as do the two versions of Losing my Religion by REM and Lacuna Coil, Save a Prayer by Duran Duran and Super Angels and Dancing in the street by Martha and the Vandellas and Jagger and Bowie.

It’s amazing how many students initially claim they can’t dance, but then turn out to be ballerinas of the highest level after a few lessons dancing to these songs. Teachers can obviously choose their own favourite songs to use with their groups.

Music is a form of art, but can be linked with other forms such as paintings. The obvious example is Starry starry night

by Don McLean which was influenced by the famous Van Gogh painting. We can discuss the links between the two, the preferences of the students for the song or the painting and analyse the plethora of vocabulary that comes out of it. An example of a song that is influenced by a book is Resistance

by Muse. In reality, a whole album was influenced by the book 1984 by George Orwell, however, that is perhaps the most well-known song from the album. Students who may find the idea of reading the book or indeed any book a tedious chore, could be encouraged to listen to the whole Muse album before proceeding with the book.

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Music and songs are not only beneficial for language learning, but can be used as an aid to teach almost any subject.

There is a site, where “bored history teachers” have created parodies of a huge number of hit songs, changing the lyrics and making reference to important historical events. I doubt many students would say that history was a trivial and meaningless subject after listening to these songs!

Songs and music can also be used to teach social and political issues. One song that is very powerful is the Gandhi rap. A student may wonder why they should bother reading about a famous, yet defunct character, however, after listening to the Ghandi rap, it is quite likely that they will want to find out the information themselves, starting with the lyrics, then deepening their knowledge of the subject.

Many people assume that a subject such as Business English should be taught in an extremely serious way, with little time for fun and entertainment. However, one great business teacher that I had the good fortune to meet, told me that she used to teach primary school kids before she became a business teacher, after which, she continued to use the same methods, while adapting the language. There is a wide range of songs that can be used in Business English, touching all kinds of subjects related to money, accounts, interest, deposits and debt.

When using music and songs in the classroom, never overestimate the quality of technology. The internet has crashed, the computer expert has a virus and is absent today, the CD player has gone missing, are all factors which can make the life of a teacher more difficult. In numerous situations, I’ve had to abandon my idea of using music in the classroom, or use a different song to the one which would have been more appropriate.

In the summer of 2014 however, I had an excellent internet system, while I was teaching high school kids at a summer

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school, based at Reading University in the UK. This allowed me to use streaming and show some ready-made interactive video lessons that are visible on a WebTV channel. I was given a free reign by the school to literally do whatever I wanted and I did!

I started breathing and laughter exercises at the beginning of the lesson, followed by a series of creative team building exercises, then some verb exercises, done by a mix of stretching movements and gentle massage. After the first break, we continued with some neuro-linguistic programming techniques, exploiting the use of the senses, before some work on physical pronunciation and yoga combined with total physical response.

However, the real revolution was the use of music in the lessons. As the students walked into the room, I would have a lively song playing to wake them up. Between each activity, just as I suggested earlier for the University lecturers, I would play a song to separate one activity from another. The songs were carefully selected according to the group and modified if necessary, according to the group reaction or mood. In a four hour lesson, at least ten different songs were played.

Most of the students appreciated the music, a few wondered and indeed, asked me why we had so many different songs playing, as they were obviously not used to hearing so many songs in the classroom, while those that would complain about anything and everything, did precisely that! I allowed each group to choose one song themselves. This ensured that the group had to work together, as they were only permitted one song, so that they made a serious and well thought out choice. In addition, it enabled me to discover some new artists (for better or for worse) that I had no previous knowledge of, but most importantly, I could observe them as they sang their favourite songs, with a high quality pronunciation, yes, even the lower-level ones who had difficulty uttering a simple sentence using the present simple, would produce a decent sound. That’s the power of music in learning.

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Bringing the world into your classroom using critical thinking

by Dragana Stegić There are many ways in which English teachers can continue their professional development, and there have been quite a few articles published here on the matter. As a relatively inexperienced teacher, I quickly noticed that holding on to a routine can delay or even stop both personal and professional growth, not to mention the amount of boredom sticking to a traditional way of teaching (i.e. the 4 skills) can create within the classroom. Doing a bit of research and talking to colleagues in the field of TD is in direct relation to acquiring new information and trying out approaches many teachers never had the chance (or sometimes even courage) to try in the classroom. The choice depends on the teachers’ preferences: it can be a completely different course book, using IWB, joining an online community or simply trying out a new method of teaching, a fresh approach.

During my studying years, I became familiar with the concept of critical thinking (CT), and as chance would have it, after I graduated I had the opportunity to join a six months online course organised by the University of Oregon on the topic of integrating CT into the classroom. The more I learned about the complex concept of CT, the more I became fascinated with the idea of making it a part of my teaching practice Personally, the simplest way I can explain CT in just one word would be “curiosity”. Imagine yourself as a small child, just beginning to discover the world, wondering about anything and everything. Well, the first natural thing to do is to approach your parents and start asking questions. That is basically the essence of critical thinking – asking questions and asking lots of them.

Those wanting a more precise definition may be interested in the following quote: “Critical Thinking is the process of using reasoning to discern what is true, and what is false, in the phrases and ‘sound bites’ we hear every day. Part of it involves being familiar with logic and logical fallacies – those bits of false reasoning that are used to manipulate and mislead us.

Part involves being able to separate facts from opinions. Part involves being fair and open-minded, not dismissing any-

thing without examination, and not accepting anything without examination. Part involves asking questions, of yourself and of others, because that is how we uncover the truth, and the motivations behind the arguments.

Part involves self-regulation: the ongoing process of making sure that you have not fallen into any of the logical fallacies or rationalisations yourself. Ideal critical thinkers are open-minded, ready and eager to explore all ideas and all points of view, including those alien or opposed to their own.

They are not threatened by opposing views, because they are looking for the truth; they know that if they have it already, it will stand any scrutiny. And if they don’t have it, they are willing to drop the falsehoods they have and embrace it.

Critical thinkers question everything, using their tools to ferret out the truth, wherever it may hide. The tools they use are Logic, Research and Experience.

Critical thinking not only can make you manipulation -proof, but can open new vistas for you, as things previously hidden become clear.”1 Reading this rather long explanation may seem intimidating, but I can assure you that using it in practice is much simpler, and I’m sure many people have used CT in everyday life without even being aware of it.

It takes some getting used to the practice, however, which is why it is recommended you start using this technique at the beginning of a school year. Do not expect to master it overnight, and certainly do not expect your students to do so either. My approach to teaching is somehow always connected to my own experience in life and work. Therefore the topics I choose usually reflect my personal points of view, though I also always try and step out of my comfort zone and address topics I don’t necessarily agree with. The simplest exercise you can do with your students is to pick out news stories you find together online and then together try and separate fact from fiction. The news can be about anything, from politics to global warming to a report on a football match,

1

http://www.robinwood.com/Democracy/GeneralEssays/CriticalThinking.pdf

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and can be local or international. Visit various websites and compare the language used, the layouts, where the focus of their reporting lies and so on.

Help yourselves with the six critical questions on the next page and see where it takes you. I am sure this kind of approach will give your students a point of view they have never considered before.

But whatever you decide to do, just make sure you don’t just turn up and say, ”Right, here is the concept, here are the rules, let’s do it!” My favourite prop, for example, is a poster with a big question mark and the enigmatic title “question everything”. I think this is a nice reminder for students that we are not in this world to simply gobble the information served to us daily and that it is our responsibility to learn how to process it. I work together with my students on discussing topics of that day or week, debunking fake news and learning how to distinguish fact from fiction. Even if you have no experience with CT, just go online and type “question everything” and you will find an abundance of websites which are sure to help anyone learn how to form one’s own opinion rather than blindly following the opinions of the masses.

Here are two activities you might want to try out.

What makes you happy?

This CT lesson helps students to consider what makes them happy in their lives. The students share the information with their classmates and examine their findings by looking at reasons for happiness and studying the most popular categories for happiness. Students begin the lesson by writing down ten things that make them happy.

They then work in pairs and share their information, going on to talk about why those things make them happy. The students are then put into groups of four.

They discuss and find out the most popular categories for happiness, e.g. health, education, money, etc. They then give feedback about their findings to the whole class and create a poster about happiness in order to ed-

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ucate other students about choosing the right things to make them happy.

Island adventure In this creative teaching activity, students use their CT and problem-solving skills to survive being stranded on a desert island. The students are told that their boat is sinking and that there is a desert island nearby. In groups of three, students choose four items from a worksheet to help them survive on the island. The students write about their choice of items and their reasons for choosing them.

Each group then explains their choices to the class. Then the groups find out what particular challenge they’ll face on the island by picking a card. Each group picks a card and makes a plan of what they’ll do to survive on the island and how the four items they brought will help them. The groups then present their plans to the class.

The teacher assesses each group‘s chances of survival according to their plan and how risky their ideas are.

Each group is awarded a score between zero and three. After each group has presented, they roll a dice and the awarded points are combined with the number on the dice. Groups need to score four or more to survive, and more than six to thrive, on the island.

Most important, with the rising number of conflicts and hate speech across the globe – and speaking here as someone who has seen first-hand how toxic hatred can be if not cut at its root –, it is our responsibility to discuss with our students such topics we personally (dis)agree with.

Making CT an integral part of your work and your life takes time, so treat it as a process, not a task. Do not expect to master it overnight and certainly do not expect your students to do so either. The most important thing to remember is not to give up, as worn out a cliché as this may sound. It won’t be long before you notice the benefits of incorporating CT into your teaching, and your students’ understanding of the world around them will become much clearer as a result.

To be up-to-date with what is going on, visit our website: www.iatefl.si

Zakaj je Iatefl konferenca najboljši dogodek za učitelje v Sloveniji? jo ravlja p i r p a Ker g i učitelji. sk sloven

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Pač, ker je. Ker je najdaljši, največji, najbolj strokoven dogodek.

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Conference24t hInternat ional 24 Iat eflSlovenia ConferenceCon I teach, therefore I learn th

International IATEFL Slovenia Conference 2017 9th - 12th March 2017 - Terme Topolšica

THURSDAY, 9th MARCH 2017 14.00 - 19.00 16.00 - 17.00 17.00 - 17.30 18.00 - 19.00 19.00 - 20.00 20.00 - 22.00 22.00 - 24.00 FRIDAY, 10th MARCH 2017 7.00 - 7.30 8.30 - 8.50 9.00 - 10.00 10.15 - 11.00 11.00 - 11.30 11.30 - 12.15 12.30 - 13.00 Lunch break 14.15 - 16.00 16.00 - 16.30 16.30 - 18.15 18.15 - 19.15 Dinner 20.30 - 23.00 SATURDAY, 11th MARCH 2017 7.00 - 7.30 8.30 - 8.50 9.00 - 10.00 10.15 - 12.15 12.30 - 13.30 Lunch break 14.30 - 16.15 16.45 - 17.45 18.00 - 18.45 Dinner 20.30 - 23.00 SUNDAY, 12th MARCH 2017 9.00 - 9.45 10.00 - 11.00 11.00 - 11.30

Registration of the participants Surprise plenary Official opening of the conference Workshops Dinner International evening Mingling in the swimming pool Morning gymnastics in the pool Workshops OPENING PLENARY Workshops Coffee break Workshops Workshops Workshops Coffee break sponsored by OUP Workshops PLENARY

Thom Jones

Social evening Yoga session Workshops MORNING PLENARY Workshops AGM Annual general meeting

Mark Almond, Pilgrims

Workshops PLENARY Workshops

Peter Medgyes

Social evening Workshops CLOSING PLENARY Steven Lever Announcement of the winners of POETRY COMPETITION, closing of the conference

Time for reflection 16

Huw Jarvis

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nf

OUP Conference 2016

by Sandra Vida As always, December is the time of year for the OUP conference. Almost 500 English language teachers gather every year, some looking forward to interesting lectures, some to meeting old friends and some just to get the free lunch! And the line-up this year promised a lot, as all three speakers have attended our conferences before and we know all three to be superb, each in their own field of expertise. For me, this was the ultimate reason to attend. And they did not disappoint!

Jamie Keddie reminded us of the importance of stories and personal anecdotes not only in our lives but also in our classrooms. It does not really matter if these are spontaneous or prepared in advance; what does help, though, is the idea of using good comprehension/support activities before, during and after the storytelling. Jamie shared three great stories and gave them to us to use as we please.

Such sharing, he believes, is a very human way of using them. And I have to agree with him that this gets to the essence of teaching as well as being the bottom line of all interpersonal interactions. Being human – so social beings – means we thrive from listening to and telling and retelling stories, be they true or fictional.

So what can you do with stories? Well frankly a lot!

For example, put your students in pairs and have them speculate about and predict what might happen in the story. You can provide key vocabulary beforehand and have students come up with the story from there and then compare theirs with the original. Or have students guess key moments/facts from the story, but be sure to use every idea you get from them – don‘t just let their ideas drop if they are not strictly “correct”.

Edmund Dudley talked about managing mixed abilities in our classrooms. I know from experience that there cannot be one clear solution to this, and it was good to hear a confirmation of my own thoughts reflected in Edmund’s lecture.

As Jim Scrivener says, “Every learner has an individual range of levels. Every class is a mixed level class.” (1994) And teachers know that students differ in terms of their abilities, knowledge, learning style and attitude.

If I imagine one typical class I teach, I can see that the variety extends to a lot more than the above four aspects

(if you are interested in more, there is an extensive list of factors in the book by Penny Ur cited at the end of this article (p. 304)). But the bottom line is that it is not only about the students: also we as teachers have mixed abilities, and the range of levels we display also depends on the time of day, on the day itself, on the weather and on a million other factors.

What we need to remember for our own practice is to stress the things we believe in, those we value most, and make time for them in our classes. So if you value writing, you should make space for it in your classes! Very often students hate writing, feeling that it is something of a punishment task for them, something we make them do at home, eating up their precious free time. What’s not to hate?

The most important thing for teachers is to really get to know their students. You can do this in many different ways, but perhaps one of the easiest is to have them write a letter or email to you. If you need to, you can scaffold this task by including prompts, depending on the level of your students.

We also need to work harder on focusing on the good sides of our students and avoid negative labelling. By all means make predictions about your students, but also actively try to avoid negative labelling and make positive predictions. Then wait and see if your predictions were correct!

Reflect on other things that happen, too. This helps us avoid being prejudiced against certain students and also helps support peer collaboration. For example, try out this simple activity to get everybody in the right learning mode: show students a photo of a city, preferably not a really well known one, and ask them which city they think it is. Observe how the discussion evolves. The important thing here is not to know the answer, and it’s precisely this that sets us in the right mood for learning. It gets us speaking, and when the students see that no one knows the answer, they get more confident about sharing their ideas. Making guesses is the focus here, not getting the correct answer.

The best students don’t necessarily have the best or the most original ideas. Give the opportunity to shine to everyone. One thing you can do in terms of differentia-

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tion within a lesson is to focus either on input, process or output. It may be impossible to create three levels of the same lesson, but depending on your needs, you can, with the same text, for example, focus on one of the three. For example, at input level you could have three groups each answering comprehension questions, but these being differentiated (choose the correct answer, find the correct answer or produce the correct answer).

During process, a possibility for differentiation is to give the same questions to the students and have them get to the same answer but with differentiated process (e.g. read the text, an information gap task in pairs, guessing, or research and compare in groups).

A good resource to use is Simple English in Wikipedia.

On a Wikipedia page, on the left you usually have a choice of languages for the same article. One of them may be simple English, and this might be just the right difficulty level for your students.

During output phase, the teacher provides options and allows students to choose the level of difficulty. Edmund Dudley suggests a simple 30-second task that allows everybody to participate without pointing out who are (and thus exposing) the weaker students: write down as many words for fruit as you can in 30 seconds (here it was obvious even in the group of teachers that the number of items on somebody’s list is not dependent just on the knowledge of the person, but also on a variety of other factors. It is important for the teacher to never confuse that with ability!). When we want to hear the results, we first ask those who have the fewest items on their lists to call them out. The others then cross out the items if they have them on their lists and later only report on those that have not yet been mentioned.

You might also differentiate the same task by giving students the following assignment: Go to a shop and choose one of the following tasks: • Make a list of all the different fruit sold there; • Make the list divided into categories; or • Interview the person selling the fruit.

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• Post-it notes – find someone who has the same colour (this can be engineered or random); • Grab the end of the string and pair up with the person who grabbed the other end; or • Line up (according to shoe size, birthday, height, etc.)

For a more long-term grouping strategy, you might start an autograph book – students write their autograph on the back page of their book; when they work with somebody else, they collect their autograph at the end of the book and try to collect as many autographs as possible in a given time span. This encourages students to want to change their partners! :) There’s also a very easy way to get learners involved in decision-making: for each task, one of them throws a dice to see whether or how it’s going to be done. The criteria on how to become the “dice master” depends on the teacher, of course!

A good idea here is to reward things which are not usually rewarded (for example, make Martin, who helped a classmate by lending him a pen, the dice master for the next lesson), and make sure to avoid only talking to certain students (usually those you know can answer the questions!), which you can do with lollipop sticks in a jar on your desk with the names of the students on them – you just pull one out when you want an answer, so the students never know when they might be called upon and for the teacher it eliminates the bias towards certain students.

When you need feedback on how well students have understood something, you might introduce traffic light cups and ask your students to show you with their cup how clear the explanation was for them. You can upgrade this by asking students with the red cups to go and find somebody who has a green or an amber cup and see if they can help them (of course there are many alternatives to this – coloured cards instead of cups, for example).

(It does not matter whether any students actually choose option 3, but it is important that the option was there.)

Teachers need to be able to see the classroom as a “mini world” where you need to promote social skills and life skills. Knowledge is not the only thing you have to offer to help your students in the real world. This is why we need to also teach turn-taking, teamwork, fair play and other similar skills.

It is the teacher’s task to create a positive learning environment and think about things like “How do we make groups?” (by level, mixed level, by choice of topic, randomly, etc.).There is no single right answer, of course, but it is good to try to avoid fossilization of groups/pairs (where people always communicate with the same people). There are a lot of easy ideas to use here, such as:

If you know some of your students don’t have a very good command of English, you might adapt a dialogue so that, for example, student A, the waiter, only speaks English, student B (the one whose level of English is lower), the customer, none (and then vice versa), while student C translates. In this way, you can avoid exposing a particular student while giving another a more challenging task.

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Sinead Laffan talked on a topic very close to my heart: continuous professional development (CPD). She started with a story about a busy teacher. Like every teacher, she is often physically and emotionally exhausted. But in a way, she likes being in this state, and this is one of the reasons she doesn’t take steps to remedy it. She feels it makes her important that she has no time to do anything more, being so very busy. “There is no time” is a major reason why she doesn’t get round to CPD, but on the other hand she is also quite intimidated by it. This is not something she should be doing, she thinks, rather something that academics do. She is physically and emotionally exhausted. She gives all the time. The feeling she has is that she is moving all the time, but in the end she is not really sure what she is doing. She is also incredibly lonely.

Especially professionally.

will feel more supported and less isolated. And by investing some quality time doing it, you will feel better about yourself and your job, clearer about what you do in the classroom, calmer. In short, you can find your better teacher self!

I know so many teachers like this personally. In fact our staff room is full of them. So what can she do to help herself? What can YOU do to help yourself?

At the OUP conference, we offered the chance to win the conference fee to two participants. All you had to do was answer three simple questions:

The fact is that nobody can develop for you – you have to develop yourself. Teacher development is a bottom-up process, an individual process. It is reflective, leads to better teaching and learning, and is best done in a group.

Why is the IATEFL Slovenia conference special?

What is the title of our conference?

Who do you know who has already been to one of our conferences?

Unfortunately, we tend to be rather good at faking teacher development, because it is individual and specific. This is why it’s best done with others. It’s not about fixing it for other people, but for being there for each other, for support. It depends on trust and honesty, and on flexibility, and it needs to involve a reflective element. Sinead said that if you walked away from here without reflecting on what you’ve experienced and how it might reflect on your classroom, you haven’t done enough!

We were pleasantly surprised by your answers. Sadly (and slightly surprisingly as the next conference will be our 24th!), it seems not all teachers in Slovenia have heard about our conferences or even know somebody who has attended one! But those who have heard about them or who have been to one gave an interesting palette of answers, which summarise perfectly what our conference is all about. We hope you can feel the love and energy we put into organising them and that you will join us in March. The title “I teach therefore I learn” was chosen in the same spirit as Sinead Laffan recently explained at the OUP conference: we need to decide to want to develop, to explore possibilities, and to take action and then reflect on it. Many of us do so on a regular basis, and so can you!

She also mentioned three phases to development every teacher should go through: Exploring – What do I want to work on and how do I do that?

Doing – Time for action!

Reflecting – What have I learned?

As I write this, I’m naturally also reflecting on my own practice and when/how I will be able to carry out my own teacher development. Personally, I’m really lucky in this regard to have so many opportunities and so many great teacher friends. They all have their own special qualities, of course, and I’ve learnt so much from them already and am looking forward to learning still more. The next opportunity for this will in fact be very soon, at our annual IATEFL Slovenia conference, and I can hardly wait to meet you all again!. See you there!

The very best idea here is to find a professional soulmate – to forge a personal relationship with someone you can trust, be honest with and be flexible about. Anyone you can ask “please tell me only the positive things in what you hear me saying” or “just ask me questions and then tell me what you’ve heard”, for example.

Teacher development doesn’t have to take up a lot of time or be complicated; in fact, many teachers find it gives them more energy, puts them in a better mood and helps them to work more efficiently, so they actually gain time.

So really it’s not extra work at all! Through support, you

References • •

Scrivener, J. (1994). Learning Teaching. A Guidebook for English Language Teachers. Oxford: The Bath Press.

Ur, P. (1996). A Course in Language Teaching. Practice and Theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

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Planning Planning lessons lessons and and courses courses 1: 2:

Describing assumptions and potential problems Selecting resources

By Katherine Bilsborough

By Kevin Thomson This series of articles explores twelve professional practices This of articles twelve professional practices that series are important forexplores the development of English language that are important for the development of English language teachers. teachers.

Development in these practices moves through a series of Development in these through a series of key stages, from beingpractices aware of moves the practice to being able key stages, from being to aware of the These practice to being to help other teachers progress. articles will able help to other teachers to progress. These articles will helpin youhelp to develop your understanding, skills and confidence you to develop your understanding, skills and confidence in these areas. these areas. appropriate brochure assumption realia potential problem resources solution stage role play

Appropriate materials are at the right level and A brochure a small booklet containing are suitableisfor the students. information.

An assumption is something you believe to be In thebut world of English teaching we use the true, which might not be. word ‘realia’ to speak about real objects we A potential problem is a problem that might bring to class to bring life to our lessons. happen.

Resources are things such as lesson plans, A solutionand is an answer to that a problem. activities worksheets can be used in your lessons.

A period of time in a lesson which forms a part of the complete lesson. example, first A role play is when your For students are the given stage of acharacters lesson is often a warmer. different to play (for example, a waiter) and they act out a scene.

Planning is an important part of a teacher’s job. Above all, you need Planning is an important partneeds of a teacher’s need plan to think about the students’ and whatjob. youYou want yourtostudents your lessons in end advance sometimes toneed plan whole Many to learn by the of theand lesson.

You also to plancourses. each stage, teachersappropriate use a coursebook so it’s necessary to plan the whole choose materials andnot have these ready before the lesson course this is important already contained in the coursebook. you begins. as Another part of planning is to have aHowever, Plan B with should know the needs your learners before you lessons plan your lessons to alternative materials andofactivities.

This is because rarely ‘go to make sure that your lessons are successful. There may be some parts plan’. of the course that you can leave out or that you need to add to meet the needs of the students.

When we are planning lessons, it is important to think about assumptions. It’s also important to think about potential problems The andthese resources you use in class are very important and and materials solutions for problems. it is a good idea to use materials which reflect real life. Your lessons will be more memorable for your students like: if you use realia instead of Assumptions can be answers to questions pictures. For example, if you are presenting the vocabulary of food to 1.

Whatthey do I will thinkremember my students already a class a real onionknow? much better than a picture of one as they feel andcan smell 2. What do I can thinktouch, my students do?the real thing. A train timetable, a magazine, a tourist brochure or an item of clothing are all examples of real-life objects thataffect can be brought class.

These assumptions the way weinto plan our lessons. If the

next grammar point is ‘the past simple’ but we think our students Useful classroom already know how to usephrases it, we might choose to do a quick review of the However, it’s important to be aware that these are For language. the teacher assumptions. We might need to change our lesson plan if it becomes • Here are some things I have brought from my house. clear that our assumptions were incorrect.

• For the next lesson, I’d like you to bring four things from your house to show your classmates.

Activity: Potential problems

©Mat Wright ©Mat Wright

Activity: Ways of using real things Match solutions A–D with potential problems Can you think of some different activities that 1–4 you above. could do with your students using the following?

A Always have in anEnglish extra activity planned for ‘fast finishers’.

• Train timetables • ABtourist brochuretofor a city in your country in English Ask students work in pairs, sharing a book.

• Cups and plates (plastic ones will do) C Read the audio script aloud or use it as a reading text.

• Small plastic animals D Move an activity from your lesson plan to homework or to the Keynext points to remember lesson.

• Plan your lessons in advance, thinking about your students’

Activity: Think about your next class. learning needs.

• Think about these things: • Bring real-life objects to class.

• the students (age, likes and dislikes) language level / classroom • Ask your students to bring real-life /objects to class. (size, / materials (coursebook, materials) • Usedesign) these real-life objects to design other activities for your students.

• What assumptions are you making about your students?

• Whattopotential Over you problems can you see?

• Can you think of some solutions to these problems?

With a colleague, look at a coursebook you are using at the moment.

Look for a lesson you will do soon and think of any real-life objects points remember youKey could bring to in to help make the lesson more memorable for your students.

• There are lots of different ways we need to plan our lessons.

• We need to think carefully about our learners’ needs.

• It’s important to think about the assumptions we are making about what our students know, don’t know and need to know.

• It’s important to think about potential problems during the lesson and solutions for these.

Small plastic animals Your students could use these to make a zoo and practise prepositions of place. For example: Student A: ‘Where is the tiger?’

Student B: ‘The tiger is next to the elephant.’

Useful vocabulary Useful vocabulary

Over to you

Discuss these problems with a colleague. Suggest possible solutions.

Potential problems can be things like:

• There isn’t enough time to do everything in the coursebook.

1. I planned to do a listening activity but the audio player or • Select a number things which you have in your house or in your computer isn’tofworking. purse or wallet like a photo, a postcard, a cinema ticket, a used train 2. My students finished an activity much more quickly than I ticket, a shopping list, etc. expected.

• Stick these items onto a large piece of cardboard.

3. My students are taking much longer to do an activity than I • Takeexpected. the piece of cardboard with you to class.

• Show thehalf piece of cardboard withgot thetheir things on it to your students 4. Only of my students have textbook. and tell them that they must ask questions about the items. For example, ‘Do you go to the cinema often?’ or ‘Where did you buy the things on the shopping list?’

• Some students are slow readers and others finish reading quickly.

*odd numbers: 1, 3, 5, 7, etc.; even numbers: 2, 4, 6, 8, etc.

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Suggested answers Answers

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• You want to do pair work but you have an odd* number of students in your class.

Ways of using real things Potential problems AA2; train B4;timetable C1; D3 in English Your students could do a role play where they ask and answer questions about train information. For example, ‘Can you tell me what time the next train for Glasgow leaves?’

• Your students can ask about each other’s items in pairs or small groups.

• Your class always finishes late because students want to ask questions at the end.

A tourist brochure for a city in your country in English Your students could create a role play where one student is an English-speaking visitor and the other a local person. The visitor asks questions about the city or place.

• Ask your students to make a similar piece of cardboard with items stuck to it for homework and bring it to class.

Cups and plates (plastic ones will do) Your students could act out a role play in a café where one is a waiter and one is a customer asking questions like ‘Can I have a cup of tea, please?’

Activity: Practising asking questions with real-life objects

© British Council 2015 © British Council 2015