Tag Archives: vocabulary

Lesson Plan: Talking about Your Hometown .

American Cultural aspects, freeware, Lesson Plan: Elementary, Speaking, Vocabulary, , , , , ,

This is a lesson for Elementary students.

Step 1. Reading and Listening

Mind mapping is a very important  learning tool for visual learners. This mind map has been created with Exam Time, which is very easy to use and  embeddable, a feature I always appreciate.

There are some steps previous to this mind mapping  we wrote on the board, essentially reading and listening about this issue. Form these listenings and readings we gathered and sorted vocabulary that was, then, written on the board.

Step 2. Mind Mapping

What you see below is a nice way of displaying what was written on the board of the classroom  with the help of my students.

por cristina.cabal
Step 3. Speaking

For this activity, instead of the typical photocopy with the list of questions to talk about, I have put students in groups of three or four and given each group a set of cards, which they had to place face down on the table. Students in turns pick up a card and talk for as much as they can about the given question. At this point I give my students the usual talk about how important it is now, to “show off.”

This is a snapshot of the cards. Click here if you want to print them.

Reading Comprehension: Pre-Teaching Vocabulary

General, Reading, Vocabulary, Vocabulary Games, , ,

All my lessons last 90 minutes and even though I like to think that students don’t normally get tired or bored, changing gears several times during the 90 minutes is quite important to maintain their level of attention. In this sense, fortunately, teaching a language is not the same as teaching some other subjects where the range of activities you can do is a bit more restricted.
When it comes to Reading Comprehension there are some activities I have tried over the years that seem to have worked pretty well. This week I am planning to use a different activity with my intermediate groups to pre -teach the vocabulary in the Reading Activity, which I would like to share with you. It will require that they leave their seats and walk around the class, talking to their classmates. I’m sure they will appreciate the opportunity to move their legs.
Steps.
Step 1. Decide the vocabulary you want to teach (that goes without saying, doesn’t it?)
Step 2. Prepare two sets of cards. One card contains the word and part of speech you want to teach and the other card contains the definition.
Step 3. Students stand up and find their partner ( I have large groups so it’s going to take a while).
Step 4. Students sit down with their partner and write a sentence containing their word.
Step 5. Students read their sentences and explain the meaning of the word /expression being studied.
Note: I have very large groups, like  thirty students  per class but I never know how many  will be attending on a particular day. For this kind of activities I need to make sure I have cards for all the students. So, if I run out of words to pre-teach, I’ll prepare some cards containing the phonetics for the targeted words.

Thanks for reading!

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Word of the Day: Sick vs Ill ♦Toothache vs A Toothache ♦ Ache vs Hurt

Speaking, Word of the Day, , ,

Every time time I need to write something related to Medicine I cannot but think my father is smiling at me from up above. He wanted me to be a doctor  but  even though I might have done  it, just to please him, the truth is that I would have made an awful physician as  , unfortunately, my knees still go weak whenever I see blood or someone happens to mention the gory details of an accident or operation. Well, that’s me!, the proud daughter of the best doctor ever, who cannot even stand the sight of a needle!

So, daddy, here it is, another post in your memory!!

Sick vs Ill

♥Ill is often used to mean ‘unwell‘ in British English. In American English ill is unusual except in a formal style. Note that we use ill after a verb.

She is ill.
♥In Attributive position (before a noun), many British people prefer to use sick. Sick is also the normal informal American word for unwell.

The President is sick.
♥Be sick can mean ‘vomit‘.

I was ___ three times during the night

sick

[collapse]
The problems faced by mentally ___people need to be dealt with

ill

[collapse]
She is never sea-__

sick

[collapse]
His mother is seriously ___ in hospital

ill

[collapse]

 

Toothache vs  A Toothache

♥ Illnesses are usually uncountable in English, including those ending in -s : measles, flu…

But some more common minor ailments such as: a cold, a headache, a sore throat, a nose bleed, a cough, a rash… are countable, ie, they take the indefinite article (a,an)

♥While in British English, toothache, earache, stomach-ache and backache are uncountable. ( I have earache) in American English , they are generally countable if they refer to particular attacks of pain.

Compare:

I have toothache (BrE)  //  I have a toothache (Am E)

(Source Practical English Usage – Micheal Swan)

Ache vs Hurt

♥ What ‘s the difference between My leg hurts and My leg aches?

If your leg aches you have a continuous, dull (not intense) pain.

If your leg hurts, it is often stronger and sudden. Ex. Ouch! My leg hurts!

♥On the other hand, ache is used both as a noun and as a verb whereas hurt is only used as a noun.

I have a(n) ___ in my stomach

ache

[collapse]
The pain in the small of his back was worse and there was a dull __ in his arms

ache

[collapse]
I ___my hand on that broken glass

hurt

[collapse]
He ___ my feelings by ignoring me

hurt

[collapse]

 

And, now that we are on the subject, how do you fancy answering some questions about this issue? If you need to revise the vocabulary , click here

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Word of the Day: To Fall Back

Word of the Day, ,

Yeah! Once again it’s this time of the year when it finally dawns on me that winter is coming. There is no way I can keep on pretending this hot weather is going to last. On Sunday 27th October , our clocks will fall back, and we’ll gain??? one extra hour

This practice, called Daylight Saving Time (DST) is done as a way of making better use of the daylight by setting the clocks forward one hour during the summer, and back again in the autumn. But, in Spain, some people are beginning to ask the government to end this time change practice and keep daylight saving time all year.
A bit of history is due: In Spain Daylight Saving Time was first introduced in 1918 but it was introduced and abolished several times throughout the years. But since 1974 , after the 1973 oil crisis, daily saving time has been observed every year. What do you think? Should we end this practice or keep it?

Anyway, don’t forget to fall back this Sunday! Saturday night will be one hour longer!

WordHippo: an Online Dictionary and Much More

Dictionaries, ,

Word Hippo is a very useful online dictionary for students and for teachers. I absolutely adore the pink hippo but this is just something to add up to the list of reasons why I like this site. Word Hippo is very simple to use and everything is on the same site.

Do you need to find a synonym to avoid repeating one word (for example, I’m really tired of my students saying and writing  I think that all the time), here you’ll find not only synonyms of the word you are looking up ,but also its antonyms. You will also find the meaning of the word and its translation, words that rhyme with it and you can even get its plural/singular, if it is a noun, or its past/present if it is a verb. Amazing , isn’t it? But more is coming…. You can have your word pronounced and if you type a name , say Christina for example, it gives you its meaning (follower of Christ) and its origin, among other things. But what I like best about this dictionary  is that you can get Example Sentences where your word will be used in context, and this is something I really appreciate as I’m not a morning person and sometimes when I need to prepare a lesson in the morning I spend an awful lot of time, time I don’t have , looking for the right sentence to exemplify meaning.

So, definitely, WordHippo will be among my favourite dictionaries this year.