Job Discussion Forums

[FreakingTea]

I'm starting at a university in September, and I'll be teaching speaking, writing, and something called audio-visual. It sounds like just showing movies and then talking about them, giving necessary vocabulary beforehand. I'm pretty sure this is an excuse for students to take a nap, if that's what this is.

Has anyone taught one of these? What was it like? Do you have any tips for keeping things interesting? I searched for threads on it, but all I could find was topics about what kinds of movies to show on off-days.

Thanks!

[dean_a_jones]

You sure it's not just a fancy way of saying "listening class"? If so, it should be a bit more intense and structured that what you described--not sure if you are just guessing, or have been given a description of the actual course content. Most listening classes tend to use recordings or videos in conjunction with workbooks, hand-outs and discussion activities and testing materials etc.

[doogsville]

I taught a class called 'advanced audio visual speaking and listening' this year. The uni provided a textbook, but it was not very good, so I tended to make up the lessons myself. To be honest it was a tough class to teach. Well, it was a tough class to teach if I wanted it to be more than a 'lets watch a film at school' class, which I did. The preparation could take hours and hours. I tried a lot of different things, some of which worked better than others. I Googled it too, but as you say, there is very little useful information. Here's some of what I tried.

I would choose a film, and download/edit a five minute preview of to show in class. The students would then watch the film in their own time, and in the next class we would discuss the theme, the story etc., and I would also edit a few clips looking at specific pieces of language to teach them about. I didn't do that all the time though, because I'm not much of a film buff, and I found it hard to watch films all the way through to figure out if they were useful for teaching.

Mostly I focused on TV shows, because they're shorter, and there's more of them, and I feel they are better for teaching about culture in different western countries, which was something the uni put in the syllabus for the course. For instance, one week I used 'The Office, and showed the first five minutes of both the original British pilot show and the American one. We then talked about the differences in the accents, language, style of the shows etc. I've done the same with a couple of other TV shows like Hells Kitchen.

Then you can choose a theme, like fairy tales, or cooking, or soap operas, and again, show a few different clips in the class and have the students discuss them. I've also used longer clips as listening exercises, in which they have to fill in the missing words, or answer questions about the action etc.

Another useful little exercise is show a 2 to five minute clip with no sound. Have the students pair up, and have one of the pair turn their back to the screen. You then show the clip and the student facing the screen has to describe, in English, what is going on. I've also used short clips from movies, the Pink Panther was one, with no sound, and had the students make up a dialogue for it and then some of them had to present it to the class.

It was tough though, and I don't think I will be teaching it next semester, which is something of a relief. Speaking of which, the university you are going to teach this course at wouldn't happen to be in Zhuhai would it?

[FreakingTea]

dean_a_jones, I was pretty much just guessing. I think I'll ask my FAO for a class description. Now I'm hoping it's mostly just listening, because editing clips sounds like a lot of work.

doogsville, it's at Western Chongqing University. That sounds like what I would expect it to be, though I might not be teaching advanced students. Using shows is a good idea. Maybe I can also use a VPN to download videos from youtube, since there are all kinds of short clips on there.

Thanks for the responses!

[doogsville]

Yeah Youtube is a great source of short clips. There's a lot of good ESL/EFL stuff on there too, which I've used before. You can also use Youkou, but I find it harder to use, and a lot of the stuff on there won't download so you would have to trust it to work in a browser in the class.

Oh, and if you do have to edit clips, which is a lot of work and quite hard to do, I found Videopad to be the best editor, or at least the only one I could make sense of and get to work.

[FreakingTea]

I got a response about the class:

Audio-visual class is a subject which is a combination of all the basic English practical skills which maily includes listening and speaking and often is hold in aduio-visual classrooms in which each student has a computer.

Now I really don't know how to prepare for this class! Hopefully it's all software or something and I'm just there to answer questions.

[choudoufu]

how hard can it be? it's your basic engrish class, but you get to use
audible-visible aids.

so get yourself a book like new concept synchronized listening.
http://detail.tmall.com/item.htm?spm=a230r.1.14.1.tAPOiY&id=16380817977

it's got 29 chapters, each chapter has 3 short dialogs and 2 longer texts.
do some gisting, some transcription, some discussion. each chapter will take one 2-hour class.

then you head over to youtube, and download a mess o'short clips (1-2 mins).
introduce your lesson goals.......grammar, vocab, whatever. the clips will
support. hint: they like jack benny.

[dean_a_jones]

Yeah Chou has probably hit the mao on the head. If they don't give you some materials (or perhaps even if they do) get a decent workbook and treat it like a general English class with a much larger emphasis on using the A/V equipment. This will take a bit more prep on your part, but actually will pay off in the long run, especially once you get into the swing of things. The students generally tend to like the A/V element if it is worked in well, and it really gives you something bounce ideas off of compared to a speaking class that doesn't have this component.

Also, if you have not been here before, be prepared for them to like stuff that seems a bit immature compared to what you would normally expect for a western uni student--stuff that might appeal a bit more to those around 16 back home.