Using Lexical Games in Class

Lexical games are a great way to get the students to work either as an activity or as a filler.
These games come in a variety of ways like:

• Category List
• Fictionary
• Word Seeds
• Word Dominoes
• Word Thieves
• I went into Town
• Word Jumbles
• Instant Crossword
• Don't finish a Word
• Biting your Tail

Choosing which game to play and when to play it depends on how well the teacher understands his class.
Some of the games mentioned above may not useful to some classes while other classes may find them really useful and entertaining.

In conclusion lexical games are very useful to students but a teacher has to know which games to use with their class, when and how to use them, and also the teacher has to make sure to make the instructions as clear as possible so that the students know what to do once the game starts.

Using Songs in Classes

Using songs in class is very useful for the students and also for the teacher, the only draw back I think that the teacher can have is that it takes a lot of work to prepare, but it is defiantly worth it.

Songs can be used in a number of different ways, for example:

• Listening comprehension
• Discuss the topic of the song
• Fill in blank spaces while listening to the song
• Sing along the song,etc.

Music and songs are very useful in class since they can be used to:

• Change the mood of the class
• Start a debate
• As background music
• As a way for students to relax or have a break
• As a filler activity, etc.

Songs can be very useful but when choosing one to play in class the teacher has to keep in mind that the song has to be simple enough for the students to understand it and if they are using a worksheet along with it it has to be at the student's level.

Is it Important to Test Students?

In my opinion testing is very important, because depending on the type of test the students take you can tell their level of English, ho much have they learned, etc.

Tests are usually made up of two types of questions:
 Discrete questions-Where the test focuses on a specific language point.
Integrative questions-Where different skills are tested at the same time.

There two ways to mark these types of questions:
Objectively-There is only one correct answer.
Subjectively-The answer depends on the person marking the exam.

Also on the other hand there are three criteria to make sure a test is well made:
The test has to be fair and appropriate to the students level.
The test will be easy to mark.
The test will give clear results to serve the purpose for which it was made.

Some students may become stressed if they know a test is coming, so some teacher like to test students without them even realizing they're being tested. For this teachers will run the activities as they usually do but pay special attention to a group of students and do the same thing for the next classes with different group until they have "tested" the whole class.
The teacher can then see if students surpass his expectations, meet his expectations, have problems meeting his expectations, or if students don't meet expectations at all.
Some activities teachers use to test students without them knowing are:
Gap-fills
Sentence Transformations
Sentence Construction and Deconstruction
Two-Option Answers
Matching

Here we have some examples of different types of tests:
Placement:Aims to sort new students into teaching groups of same level
Diagnostic: Aims to tell a student how well he/she has learned a particular course element.
Achievement: Aims to measure what has been learned over a long period of time.
Proficiency: Aims to see the student's ability to apply what they have learned.

In conclusion testing is very important for both students and teachers alike, students will know their mistakes and should focus on improving them and teachers will know where most of his students have problems.

Fun Pronuntiation Activity

It is important to make pronunciation activities fun for the students so that they will like them and look forward to them.

There are many ways to make a pronunciation activity fun.
For example the teacher could play a tape and the students read at the same time and then turn off the tape in the middle to see if the students are still at the same rhythm.
Another thing the teacher could do is have the students sing along to a song they like. That way even when they leave the classroom they'll still have the song in their heads and will continue to sing it even if they're not told to do so.
The teacher can also have the students read a poem or a chant, or even make one of their own. As with the song the students will probably keep on practicing even after class.
Also the teacher can write a little story and have the students act it out, the teacher must make sure the students like their characters so that they will really get into the acting of the story.
Those are just some ways to have students practice pronunciation activities, there are hundreds more

Grammar Games

This time we're to take a look at a couple of games that we can use in the classroom for practicing grammar

First we have a game where the teacher separates the board on different categories like clothes, animals, colors, etc...
On each the category the teacher puts pieces of paper with questions behind them and each is worth a determined number of points, the higher the number the more points its worth.
The teacher separates the classroom in two groups and the students have to pick a category, a number and then answer the question, if they their group gets the points, if they don't the other group gets a chance to answer the question and steal the points.
The game finishes when all the questions have been answered and the group with the most points wins.

Another kind of game we can play to have the students separated into groups, then the teacher gives a word and one student from each group has to run to the board and write a complete sentence (using the target language the teacher has been teaching) with the word the teacher gives.
When the first student finishes he/she runs back and the next one from the group runs to the board and writes a sentence the starts with the last word from the previous sentence.
The game finishes when all of the students from one group have written their sentence and the teacher checks to see if they are correct. I they are that groups wins, if their not the other group can finish while the first group tires to correct their sentences.

These are just a couple of games we can play with the students to help them understand the grammar. There are hundreds of different more games and also different ways to play the same game and still make interesting and competitive.

12 Grammar Tenses

There are 12 grammar tenses used for different situations in English and here we're going to see a little bit of them:

For the present, past and future forms we use only the main verb, in the past form we make it a past tense and in the future form we add the "will".
For the  present, past and future perfect forms we use the main verb in its past form and add "have" for present, "had" for past and "will have" for future.
For the present, past and future progressive we add the different forms of the verb "be" (depending on the subject) and add "-ing" to the main verb.
For the perfect progressive forms we add "-ing" to the main verb and in front of that "have or has been" for present, "had been" for past and "will have been for future".

1. Present: Main verb: I cook diner.
2. Past: Main verb in past tense: I cooked diner.
3. Future: Main verb + will: I will cook diner.
4. Present Perfect: Have or has + past participle of main verb: I have cooked diner.
5. Past Perfect: Had + past participle of main verb: I had cooked diner.
6. Future Perfect: Will + have + past participle of main verb: I will have cooked diner.
7. Present Progressive: Form of "be" verb + -ing of main verb: I am cooking diner.
8. Past Progressive: Past tense of "be" verb + -ing of main verb: I was cooking diner.
9. Future Progressive: Will + be + -ing of main verb: I will be cooking diner.
10. Present Perfect Progressive: Have or has + been + -ing of main verb: I have been cooking diner.
11. Past Perfect Progressive:\ Had + been + -ing of main verb: I had been cooking diner.
12. Future Perfect Progressive: Will + have + been + -ing of main verb: I will have been cooking diner.

How to Promote Extensive Readig

Today we'll be talking about different ways to promote extensive reading. But first what is extensive reading?

Extensive reading is simply reading for the sheer pleasure of it, doing it because you want to and not because someone told you to, reading a book, newspaper, magazine, etc. at the bus, school, your house or whenever you have some free time are examples of extensive reading.

Teachers want to encourage students to do extensive reading because this way the students learn without realizing it, and this increases their confidence with the language.

So some of the things teachers do to encourage extensive reading is to give the students a library of magazine, newspapers, books, etc. Also teachers often teach the students how to select which material to read based on their level and giving the students some classroom time to read.

Some other activities the teachers can do is to make the students do a book report or to have them answer some questions once they finish the book, but without making it an assignment, this can be an optional activity.

Also students should be allowed to chose their own reading material so that they choose something they find interesting, and its also important to encourage the students to share what they learned from reading the book, magazine, newspaper, etc.

Interesting and Fun Writing Activities

Writing activities can be boring sometimes, so what the teachers need to do is find a way to make them more interesting or fun.

For example a way of making this activities more interesting could be to first read an interesting newspaper article and write a summary of it, or it can be something other than a newspaper article, maybe something form a magazine or something the student saw on T.V. anything that the student would want to write about.

Teachers can also make this activities into competitions to make it more fun.

For example have the students listen to a recording and as soon as its over have them write down some of the specific things they've just heard (a supermarket list, list of chores, activities for the day, etc.) and the winner could even get a reward if the teachers thinks its a good idea.

Teachers can also make it so that the students realize how they can use writing in the real world.

For example the teacher can have the students do a role-play activity where they are writing a letter to a friend that lives far away. For this the teacher can have some questions on the board and the students make their letter by answering those questions with their own information. For example:

What is your friend's name?
His name is Jose
Where did you meet?
We met at school
etc...
Hi Jose I still remember when we met at school..............

There are a lot of more ways a teacher can make a writing activity fun and interesting and those were just some ideas.

How to Teach Listening Activities

For listening activities there really isn't a whole lot to teach, its more about getting the students to understand what they're hearing, there is a lot of different activities you can do to accomplish this.

When teaching a listening activity you have to keep in mind what you want the students to learn.
For example if the teacher is playing a recording, during the first time they listen to the tape the teacher wants the students to get a general idea of whats going on (skimming). Then after making sure the students understand what's the situations the teacher would play the recording a second time, this time asking the students to listen for specific details (scanning).

A thing most teachers do is known as the task-feedback circle which starts with a lead-in then the teacher would do some pre-task work if he thinks its necessary, after that the teacher sets the task and then plays the tape for the first time, then the teacher gives the students some time to discuss what they heard in pairs, if they can't do it the teacher plays the tape again, if they can the teacher moves on to the next activity.

In general most teachers want students to focus first on the general idea of the conversation, then on the specific details they ask for (name, address, phone number, etc.) and last the language focus.

Some tips that the teachers should remember are:

• To keep the recordings short.
• Play the recordings the times they need to, but not to many.
• Let the students discuss their answers.
• Play little parts of the tape if necessary.
• Help the students if they are stuck.
• Don't change the instructions half-way.

The teachers should also consider how he wants the class to go, if top-down then he would go from a general idea to details but if he wants to do bottom-up he would start with the specifics and then work to a general idea.

Lesson Plan

Lesson Plan

Planning a lesson its one of the most important and difficult things a teacher has to do. The teacher has to considers many things when planning a class like the level of the students, what they need to achieve, what is going to be more difficult for the students, what materials the teacher will need, what sitting arrangement to use, etc.

Formal Lesson Plan:

For a formal lesson plan the teacher has to make a chart for the background information of the class and another for the actual lesson plan.

For the background information the teacher needs to include:

• Teacher's name
• Class name
• Room
• Date
• Lesson start time
• Length of lesson
• Teaching point (what language items/skills you'll be working on)
• Target language items
• Main lesson aims (what the students need to achieve)
• Evidence (how to know the main lesson aim has been achieve)
• Personal goals ( what you wish to improve)
• Class profile
• Timetable fit (how the lesson fits with what the students have been doing and what they will do)
• Assumptions (what the students should know)
• Predicted problems
• Context
• Materials used

For the actual lesson plan the teacher will need to include:

• Stage
• Procedure (what the teacher will do)
• Tasks (what the students will do)
• Interaction
• Aims
• Time

There are also some more experienced teachers that choose not to do a formal lesson plan and do an alternative. Some of these include:

• A brief 'running order'- Basically a 'running order' of the activities you plan on doing.
• Flow Chart- Helps to take different routes if what you planned didn't work out.
• Dream through the lesson- Think of different scenarios for the class.
• Focus on the 'critical learning moments'- Decide what its the most important thing that the students need to learn and make sure it makes an impact.
• Half-plan- Work on language issues in class as they come.
• Where's the meat?- Focus on the challenge of the activities.
• Plan the 'critical teaching moments'- The parts of the lesson that will be a 'critical moment'.
• Lesson images- Draw pictures at key moments.
• The jungle path- Don't plan anything, just go with the flow.

In conclusion, as I said before planing a lesson is one of the most important things a teacher has to do, specially a new teacher, some more experienced teacher choose to use one of the alternatives but it is not recommended for new teachers, they should make a formal lesson plan.

Giving Instructions

Giving Instructions

Some of the activities in class are very hard to explain to the students, especially when they're still at early levels so the teacher must learn to give clear and good instructions.

Teachers should practice the way they give instructions before the class so that when they come in they know what they're going to do.

Here are some steps to give better instructions:

1. The teacher has to know how well he or she gives instructions, he/she should get feedback from a friend who watches them give instructions.
2. Plan ahead: Look at the instructions before class and include only the important parts using simple, clear language. Use short sentences and don't state the obvious or unnecessary things.
3. Make sure the students are listening before start giving the instructions, make eye contact with them, use a good voice projection, use gestures to help clarify the instruction. 
4. If possible demonstrate rather than explain.
5.  Check comprehension: Make sure the students know what they are supposed to do, getting students to tell you is a simple way of achieving this.

A very important part of giving instructions is making the students listen to what you're saying, after that you can worry about if the students understood or not. Some useful tips for this are:

• Make eye contact with as many students as possible.
• Use gestures to let the students know you're going to speak.
•  Wait until the students settle down.
• Don't get impatient, keep looking from person to person patently.
• If the students are taking too long to settle down get their attention with a single word.

In conclusion, you need to use a voice of authority and speak clearly. Make sure the students are listening and that the instructions are simple enough for the them to understand.