Job Discussion Forums

[basiltherat]

hi all
does anyone have any ideas for a good exercise (oral) to cement usage of modals of deduction ie must/can't/might/may/could be __ing, be, have been/done etc.
my guys are still struggling with it. i've done several exercises and practiced several times but they still seem to be floundering. i dont feel that they've grasped enough at this time. clearly, it will be touched on again later in their course but still ....
hoping that someone out there has something good. tried a web search but all that comes up are gap fills which i'd prefer to avoid. i need something oral based.
thanks tons
regards
basil

[dyak]

I find this one quite engaging, but you need absent students (for once).

Select a student that is absent that day. Elicit from the class where they are/might be/could be/should be etc...

No matter what target language you use, someone will say, 'He/She's in bed/sleeping'. You can say, 'How do you know?' and, 'Are you sure?' to work in the modals.

You can then choose someone who was absent the day before and repeat the whole thing to elicit the past modals.

As a follow-up, pictures that evoke 'What has happened to this person?' or 'What does this person do?' can reinforce the concept.

I often wonder if students speculating about each other's private lives is the only context I'll ever need...

[moonraven]

For visual learners, I have effectively used Before and After drawings or photos--they can deduce what must have happened, could have happened, etc.

For a less artificial exercise, put some headlines from the US elections....

[Sheep-Goats]

Groups of four. One student is the prisoner. Two is his advisor. Three is a representative of the government that imprisons him. Four is a representative of the police.

Set the context of the discussion to provide the most variety for discussion and options for various speakers to use modals as possible (will vary depending on SS interestets and levels). Optionally, list enough contexts on note cards for the whole class to practice different ones at once, and rotate these periodically during practice.

Younger learners will do better by setting the four roles to Principal, parent, student, friend. There are numerous other modifications, such as telling the "student" that he is to be as dishonest as possible...

Have one group you know will do well model the activity first. If you're not sure which group this would be start taking more notes on student performane and/or interrupt the activity once it gets going with a demonstration from a leading group.

During the activity you'll need to get your ear in where you can hear and make good corrections -- you may need to go over common mistakes in writing on the board either as a summary or as an interruption.

[Sheep-Goats]

[foss]

You can use this way to practise to modals of deduction in their simplest form:

Get the class into pairs and tell them to draw their partner. Collect all the sheets and shuffle them. Show one of the pictures to the class and ask them: "Who's this? It might be Jo, it could be Ana, but it can't be John because he's a boy." Go through the rest of the pictures, getting the class to make similar sentences.

Works for me and lightens up the frostier types.

[shmooj]

find some disaster pics or pics where something's just happened - the slightly obscure the better. Encourage students to look for evidence in the pics to base their assumptions on.