Tag Archives: video

Video Lessons: TedEd-Lessons Worth Sharing

Audio, Lesson Plan: Intermediate, Listening, , ,

I’ve known about TED (Ideas Worth Spreading) for quite a long time but although I found their videos very interesting I thought they were too long or too difficult for my classes. Now TED has launched a  new  site, called TedEd,  with  a collection of educational video lessons you can choose by subject and view in class or assign as homework. Every video is accompanied by a lesson with Quick Multiple Choice questions that check your general comprehension. If you have one wrong, you can always check with the video hint and you can also have Think questions that further explore the topic.

For teachers , one of the most powerful features is the FLIP THE LESSON where you can customize the lesson by editing the title, giving your own instructions, select  or deselect any multiple choice questions…etc.

This is a lesson I have flipped for my students. I used the video Questions No One Knows the Answer To to give my students some practice using Reported Speech Questions. You can see my lessonhere

 

Teaching with Songs: Opposites

Listening, Music, ,

There is something I have to tell you. When I am alone in my car I sing at the top of my voice and I enjoy it so much that sometimes I even dance while driving! But it even gets worse  because  while I am listening  to music, very often, I focus on the grammar or the lyrics and if I am teaching something specific and I feel like my students need a break, then  I make a point of  not giving up till I find the right song. So much for concentration on the road!

This happened last week with my first and second years. I decided they needed a break from some boring stuff we had been dealing with. We were about to learn Antonyms  and then, all of a sudden,  Katy Perry was on the radio singing her world famous Hot n Cold. Great for opposites in elementary levels!

I was planning on grabbing the lyrics from Internet and racking my brains to create  some good tasks  when I decided to try ISL Collective and there it was. Ready to take! Thank you very much Missk for your wonderful job. It was a real timesaver!

(to download this activity you’ll need to register on this site : ISL COLLECTIVE (I talked about this page here).

Now, why don’t you try this activity? It’s a lot of fun.

Video : Travelling to Antarctica

Listening, ,

Antarctica is earth’s southernmost continent, encompassing the South Pole. The name Antarctica is the Romanised version of the Greek word Antarktik, meaning “opposite to the north” . It is the coldest, driest and windiest continent and is considered a desert. Only cold-adapted plants and animals survive there, including penguins, seals, mosses, lichen and many types of algae.

Some interesting facts about this continent are:

♥ There are no native people or permanent residents

♥ There are no shops, hotels, billboards or cafes.

♥ It doesn’t belong to any country

Unbelievable as it seems, if you have an adventurous spirit and enough money, you can actually visit this continent. In fact, its popularity as a tourist destination is growing. Now, if you get itchy feet and decide to travel to this continent, watch this video first and try to answer the questions below.

Level: intermediate. (tapescript: here)

Now, answer the following questions about what you’ve heard.

1. How big is Antarctica?

2. Does it rain a lot? Justify your answer

3. What’s the average temperature in winter?

4. Why do tours often take place in summer?

5. What are some of the animals you can see in this continent?

6.What are some of the things you can do in Antarctica?

Reading or listening to a biography?

Audio, Listening, Resources, , , , ,

Nobody can deny the pleasure one gets from reading a good book. I always boast  that I’ll never be bored as long as I have a good book by my side.

Reading certainly helps  students learn and biographies are definetely something quite light to read . Today I want to show a website I came across just by chance when I was looking for information about Whitney Houston (rest in peace). The site is called biography.com and here you can watch exclusive biographies about famous people like Christian Dior, Bob Dylan, Sarah Palin or Michael Jordan to name just a few. What I especially liked about this site is that you can choose between watching a minibio (2-4 minutes) or watching the full bio. What’s your choice? Don’t tell me  I think I can guess .

Now, watch this minibio about Pablo Picasso and tell me what you think about this site.

Lesson Plan: New Year Resolutions

Lesson Plan: Advanced, , , ,

Happy New Year to everyone  and good luck with your New Year Resolutions. I have a dozen  resolutions myself  but I no longer believe I am going to keep them. The title of this post is not what one might think it means though it’s true that I have had the same New Year Resolutions for quite a number of years. But I want to be positive, start off on the right foot and mentally prepare myself for, this time, keeping them. Time will tell!

Why the title, then?  There is a very funny lesson that I prepared two years ago called Bridget Jones’s Diary that has to do with Resolutions. A few days  I got a comment to a post in this blog where I introduced this  lesson (here) and so I thought I might show it again .