Tag Archives: speaking
Life Begins at 70: a Future Perfect and Future Continuous Lesson
“To me, old age is always ten years older than I am” John Burroughs
In this engaging lesson, students will consolidate the use of future perfect and future perfect continuous through some engaging activities.
WARM UP
Show them a picture of how you see yourself when you are 70 and explain why you see yourself like that. (below you’ll see the picture I showed my students). After some laughs and a bit of explaining, ask students:
How do you see yourselves when you are 70? Do you look forward to getting old?
Ask them to talk in pairs for two or three minutes and get feedback.
THE POEM- WARMING by Jenny Joseph
This is a nice opportunity to introduce poetry in class.
Explain that the poem they are about to listen/read, written by Jenny Joseph, goes hand in hand with the picture of yourself shown above. After listening to the poem, ask students whether they think the author is looking forward to getting old and why.
It seems the poetess is rebellious, but she is only comfortable to ‘break the rules’ when she has the excuse of old age and senility. Ask students what they think about her attitude.
GALLERY WALK
- On the walls of the class display pictures of elderly people reflecting different attitudes towards life when they are old.
- Ask students to stand up, have a look at all of them, and decide which one will best represent their attitude to life. They now return to their desks.
- Ask them to write two sentences using the future perfect and two sentences using the future continuous, based on the picture they have chosen.
- Get students in threes now and ask them to explain their choice to their partners and use the 4 sentences they have written.
- For example and based on my picture
- I will have tried parachuting when I am 70
- I will have probably written a recipe book.
- I will probably be living in Bhutan
- I will be living life to the fullest
I have used these pictures to display on the walls.
SPEAKING
Students now work in small groups and answer the following questions about the future. Remind them that they need to elaborate on their answers, giving reasons and using different expressions to give opinions. All the questions contain either a future perfect or a future continuous form; encourage students to use these tenses in their answers.
You might find this handout useful
2 Fresh & Fun Activities to Practise Both, Neither and Either
If you think that teaching both, neither and either is a bit boring, I have good news for you. In fact, I dare say great news! It can also be fun!
It’s no secret on here that I love having fun in my classes but what people may not know is that although flexible when necessary, my classes are carefully planned and games are not played just to keep my students entertained; on the contrary, they are carefully designed and used to improve certain abilities and with a clear goal in mind. If at the same time we can have a nice time, that’s the icing on the cake.
1.SOULMATES
This is a team game and it aims at practising the structures
- Both/Neither of them
- Both… and / neither…nor
Materials:
- 2 white cards with YES written on one side and NO on the other
- Teacher’s here
PROCEDURE
- Divide the class into two or three teams.
- Ask the teams to select two people to play for them and take the “hot seats”. These two students will sit facing their team.
- Decide which team starts the game by tossing a coin. Let’s say Team A starts the game.
- Explain you’re going to give each of the two members of the team a white card with YES written on one side and NO on the other. Tell them you’re going to ask them 10 yes/no questions.
- Their team will score a point every time these two students show the same answer to the questions asked, and the team provides a correct sentence containing the target structure.
- Repeat procedure for Teams B and C and give a big applause to the winners.
Example 1.
- Teacher asks: Have you ever scored 10 out of 10 in an exam?
- Student A: YES Student B: YES
- Team: Both of them have scored 10 out of 10 in an exam / Both Mary and Peter have scored 10 out of 10 in an exam (1 point)
Example 2.
- Teacher asks: Have you ever scored 10 out of 10 in an exam?
- Student A: NO Student B: NO
- Team: Neither of them have/has scored 10 out of 10 in an exam / Neither Mary nor Peter has scored 10 out of 10 in an exam (1point)
Example 3
- Teacher: Have you ever scored 10 out of 10 in an exam?
- Student A: YES Student B: NO (0 points)
2. CHANGING SCHOOLS
This communicative activity has two parts.
In part 1, students will have a conversation where the aim is to agree with their partner using the structures:
- So do I- to agree with a positive statement
- Neither do I or I don’t either- to agree with a negative statement
In part 2, students will report back to the class using:
- Both/Neither of us…
- We both…
- Both … and … / Neither … nor…
PROCEDURE.
PDF teacher’s here
- Ask students to work in pairs and give them Handouts A and B.
- Ask them to complete the answers.
- Explain the context. You have just changed schools and you don’t know anybody in the class. You want to make new friends quickly and the best way, if not the most honest one, would be to agree with whatever the student sharing your desks says. So, five minutes before the next class starts you decide to strike a conversation with the student sitting next to you.
- Start by introducing yourself and then ask your classmate some questions.
- Your classmate will introduce himself and also ask some questions. Make sure you agree with everything he/she says using the structures.
So do I- to agree with a positive statement
Neither do I or I don’t either- to agree with a negative statement
- Ask students to report back to the class using:
- Both/Neither of us..
- We both…
- Both … and … / Neither … nor…
Ex. Both of us have one brother/We both have one brother/ Both Peter and I have one brother.
Neither of us can speak Norwegian/ Neither Peter nor me can speak Norwegian
Example Handout Student A
You might also be interested in the following
Some Activities to Teach Gerunds and Infinitives
I always claim that English grammar is easy, especially when compared to the Spanish or French grammar, but it gets a bit messy when it comes to verbs followed by infinitive or gerund.
The easy thing to say is that
- some verbs are followed by infinitive (promise to go)
- some verbs are followed by gerund (can’t stand ironing).
But then we find that,
- some other verbs are followed by infinitive or gerund with no change of meaning (start to study/start studying)
- while some others are followed by infinitive and gerund with a change of meaning (stop to smoke/stop smoking)
And to add insult to injury,
- some verbs are followed by infinitive with to (offer to help)
- some others by infinitive without to ( make me study)
- some verbs are followed by gerund, but if there is an object pronoun in between the verb and the gerund, then the gerund becomes infinitive (recommended reading / recommended her to read) …
Amazing, isn’t it?
Well, I suppose there’s nothing we can do about it, so let’s get down to some serious studying.
- Level: Intermediate
- Time: 60 minutes
THE GRAMMAR.
Download the document here
THE PRACTICE:
Exercise 1. The Quiz
Exercise 2: The Rewriting Exercise
3. Speaking and/or Writing: Storytelling Competition
- Go to wheeldecide.com. Ask students to tell you verbs followed by gerund first, and then verbs followed by the “to” infinitive. Feed the wheel with these verbs.
- Explain that in this activity they will need to seat in a circle in groups of 4.
- Explain that you will write on the board the beginning of a story and then, in their groups, they will need to continue it.
- Write on the board the beginning of a story. You can use this Short Story Generator.
- Spin the wheel.
- To make sure students will use the verb in the correct way, ask them to tell you whether the verb displayed in the wheel is followed by infinitive or gerund.
- The oldest person in the group will start telling the story using the target verb in the wheel.
- Give the student one minute to continue the story and then spin the wheel again for the next student.
- If a student cannot come up with an idea to continue the story, he’s eliminated.
- Continue until there is only one student left. This student will be the winner if he manages to give the story in his group a suitable ending.
Here’s the wheel I have used with my students.
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Integrating Technology for Active Learning: An Activity Using Google Slides and Padlet.
There is no denying I use a lot of technology in my classes. It gives me great pleasure to discover a new tool and design an activity around it. I really think this is what keeps me motivated after so many years teaching. The challenge that mastering a tool brings and the possibility to use it in my classes to boost students’ motivation and spark their interest is certainly something that keeps my own motivation alive and kicking
Today, I would like to share with you an activity that I did with my intermediate students. I loved designing the activity and the way my students got involved activating their communicative and writing skills during the whole process.
Tools used:
- Google Slides
- Padlet
Aims:
- to develop students’ communicative skills
- to develop students’ writing skills
- to revise vocabulary related to “work”
- to integrate technology in the classroom
- to encourage collaborative work
Before the class.
I created a Google presentation using Google Slides and wrote the content for the first two slides. I also added three extra blank slides (see below)
I created three Padlets and called them: Work 1, Work 2, and Work 3
In each of these 3 blank slides I inserted a link to one of these Padlets.
During the class.
One. I asked students to form groups of 4. I have 12 students in this class, so I had three groups, one for each blank slide. If you have more students, you can easily add another slide to accommodate two more questions. I asked each group to write three or four questions related to “work”. I certainly encouraged them to come up with some juicy questions and avoid simple ones such as “Where do you work?”
Two. Once they have written their questions, the groups read them aloud and the class decides on the best two from each group to keep.
Three. At this point, there are two things you can do
- Assign each group one of the three slides and ask them to write their two questions, being careful not to delete the link to Padlet. Share the link for your Google Drive presentation making sure you share the link with editing permissions (read and write). I have shortened the link using Google shortener.
- If you think this step might be complicated for your students, you can always write them yourself. Have the groups dictate their two questions and move on to the next stage.
Four: Speaking. Ask students in their groups to discuss the questions in the three slides encouraging them to use work-related vocabulary. Get feedback.
Five: Set homework.
Show the presentation from the very beginning where they will see the instructions for their homework.
Explain that at home they will need to answer one of the two questions in each slide. They can do it by writing their answers or by recording them.
Remind them it is the same shortened link you shared with them in Three.
See one of the Padlet below
