Tag Archives: exam

Fixed+Movable Page: Challenging Students to Speak Better

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Yes, it’s this time of the year. My students’ second term has already finished. Time to start a new one. The last one. It’s when every single year, I have serious doubts about whether I should be doing something else to help them improve. It’s like the yin and yang. The selfish side of my brain tells me I am giving them my best, staying up late preparing  classes, creating new material students seem to swallow in 5 minutes …etc-  and here 🙂  I cannot but remember my grandmother when she complained about how quickly we ate everything it took her all morning to cook- ; while the other side of me keeps reminding me of all the times I had to rush through a specific point or how on a particular day we didn’t have time enough to discuss a given issue in detail…etc.
But the truth is that although I should say that I honestly think I am doing my part, sadly the truth is that some students, unfortunately more than I wish, don’t seem to be able to understand that

                                                       Studying+Practising= Improving

The main difficulty my students need to overcome is their insecurities. They feel safe using a limited number of structures and they are afraid to use the new ones. New structures, new vocabulary is like a challenge to them and it is my intention to help them rise to this challenge; so this is what I’ll be trying next time we focus on Speaking.

1. FIXED PAGE
I am going to ask my students to write at the back of their notebooks some structures we have learnt this year; structures they instinctively know would show they have acquired the necessary level, like for example:

• It is not worth+gerund
• Get/be used to +gerund
• There is no point ….
• Want/ would like someone to do something
• It’s easy/difficult /nice + to infinitive

Students should be aware that this is their own personal list, to which they will be adding new structures or expressions they want to use as we move on towards the end of the course.

2. MOVABLE PAGE.

Most of the activities we do in class are topic centred, so we talk food, health or technology. Lessons in textbooks are also normally topic – based, and they provide students with the necessary vocabulary, phrasal verbs, readings …etc.

Before we start speaking about a given topic I am going to ask them to write on separate piece of paper all the vocabulary, expressions, idioms they can remember related to the topic. This should take like about two minutes and will give them an idea of how much they already know and how much they still need to study and then I am going to ask them to compare it with their partners to give them the opportunity to add any new ones they might have forgotten.

FIXED +MOVABLE PAGES. Once the speaking task is set, students will need to try to use as much vocabulary written on their movable page and as many expressions as they have at the back of their books. My experience is that most students tend to rush and just speak without caring about the structures or vocabulary they use, so I’m pretty sure that if I want this experiment to be successful I’ll need to use lot of persuasion and monitoring, but I think it’s worth a try. What do you think?

A Cue Prompter to Help Students Give their Speeches

freeware, Speaking, Tutorial, , ,

This year is slightly different for me since I don’t have as much time as the previous years to update my blog. This year I have found myself with a job to go to , a rural house to run and with no domestic help. I wasn’t sure I ‘d be able to post, if I’d have time or if I’d feel up to it and heck, I am still wondering where I find the time to do everything. But the thing is that here I am, still pumped to post.Today I want to share with you a little tool you might find useful .
This little tool is a cueprompter. My students need to, in two weeks’ time, give a speech of two minutes maximum and I find this little tool can help them a lot monitor the time it takes them to give their speech as it has adjustable speed feautures.
How to use it
♥Copy/paste the text into the prompter text window
♥You can set screen size, font size and colour
♥Start the prompter and adjust the speed
♥ Use the Space Bar to stop/start the cueprompter

Tutorial here

Picture Description .Intermediate Level.

Lesson Plan: Intermediate, Picture Description, Speaking, , , ,

Yes, yes I know classes have finished. So what? If you haven’t taken your speaking test, this post might still be useful .

I just couldn’t let it pass. I saw it and I immediately thought about you,  struggling at home, getting  no help at all and feeling utterly miserable without my wise guidance 🙂 ha,ha,ha

Well, let’s stop rambling and get to the point. What you’ll find below are two pictures and someone comparing the two pictures.

Well, they are clearly both connected to the topic of science… but in two quite different contexts. In the first one, there are two people- they’re probably lab technicians from the coats they are wearing- or I guess they could be research students or something like that. Anyway, they seem to be watching some kind of monitor but I am not quite sure why. The guy in the foreground seems to be holding something which might affect what they can see on the monitor. … it’s not all that clear.

In contrast, the second picture is of four schoolchildren, probably in a science class. They’re all wearing plastic yellow glasses of some sort… probably to protect their eyes from chemicals or something. They are sitting at the same desk. the one on the right, .. he is holding what looks like a plastic bottle.. which must have liquid in it.  There’s some kind of tube-like thing and plastic containers on the desk.

Picture Description: Holidays in the City or on the Beach

Lesson Plan: Elementary, Picture Description, Speaking, Students' Corner, , , , ,

I wouldn’t like to finish the course without publising another example of picture description. This  time for the Elementary Speaking exam and kindly sent by Noelia Fernández.

Holidays in the city or on the beach


In both photos we can see two very different holiday destinations: a big city and a solitary paradise beach.
The picture on the right was taken at the famous street of New York Times Square. This street is always crowded with tourists, and in this photo I think there are too many. They are carrying photo cameras, video cameras or taking photos with their mobile phones. They are wearing summer clothes because it might be July.
In the other photo, there is a beach with clean sand and clear calm water without waves. In the foreground we see five sunbeds and palms.
In my opinion, the perfect vacation is a mixture of both destinations, a few days in the city to visit museums and emblematic buildings, to see a musical or a theater, to do some sightseeing and to make all the activities that you can, and then, other days at a resort to relax and enjoy the sun, the beach, sleep and enjoy the food.
If you’re looking forward to going to New York ,you need to save money because it is the most expensive city in which I have been, but it seems as if you are in a movie with all the famous places and you think ” I know this and that”.