Job Discussion Forums

ls650 · Joined: 10 May 2003 Posts: 3484 Location: British Columbia

I'm curious to hear how others use videos in the classroom.
As an example, I will sometimes show students a DVD in English, usually with the sub-titles on. I'll often then ask the students to write a review, or to describe some of the events in the video using a grammar point we've studied in class.
Do you use videos in your classes? If so, how?

PlayadelSoul · Joined: 29 Jun 2005 Posts: 346 Location: Playa del Carmen

We use videos for many different activities, depending on the level of the students. These include identifying actions, describing and comparing characters, reporting scenes, predicting outcomes, and adding dialog.

Videos can be very productive, if used correctly. If it is a situation where one pops in the DVD and hits play, then they are pretty useless, IMHO.

M@tt · Joined: 16 Jan 2003 Posts: 473 Location: here and there

if you can get transcripts online, sometimes that opens up new possibilities. i have many of them for The Simpsons and Friends, if you're interested. of course, if you don't have these DVDs, it's pretty pointless.

lozwich · Joined: 25 May 2003 Posts: 1536

I've done the watch and review idea, but I've also used videos with more advanced classes to lead into speaking topics. For example, once I had a class where we had been talking about various aspects of money for the last week or so. I showed the beginning of Pride and Prejudice where they're talking about needing to marry well, and used it to kick off a discussion about how money affects your relationships, and the kinds of people you meet according to your social status.

Also, there's Mr Bean just for fun last-day classes and also a great Wallace and Gromit video and questions book that I've used that can be grammar point practice as well.