Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Happy Bear]

I am trying to get more ideas on how to teach using a video.
Usually, I ask some questions beforehand about the subject, to see what my student think about a particular subject, add some vocabulary.

Then we watch it with the sound off to see what happens and to talk about what may be happening.

Then we watch it with the sound on listening for the vocabulary or grammar that I wanted them to listen for.

I am looking for other ways to do this to try and shake things up and keep them interesting.

[Clutch Cargo]

In kids esl classes back home I used vids for some classes and they are a great learning/teaching tool. Some of the things I did included:

- Pre-watch the vid yourself then make up a question and answer sheet which is in sync with the vid ie. the questions come up in sequence and provide some predictability for the students. I would keep the remote with me and when the next question's information was about to come up I'd hit pause and talk about the previous question and answer (also gives students time to finish their previous answer and discuss among themselves or as a group). Answers can be short or multiple choice etc.

-Use vids which are of a short documentary style (maybe 10- 20 minutes). I used some great ones on spiders, platypuses, echidnas, snakes (guess where I'm from yet?).

- I've heard from other teachers that Mr. Bean vids are good for esl students. Plenty of physical comedy and no real language involved, but plenty of opportunities for discussion about a range of topics, new vocabulary, Western idiosyncrasies (well British at least), and I reckon kids would relate to him pretty well.

- English language music vids are good because you can use the lyrics to prepare the students, then show the vid, then discuss the storyline (if there is one), the setting, the characters, the type of music, tense, 1st, 2nd, 3rd person, pronouns, etc.

- News presenters are a good way to cover a particular topic, linguistic routines ("Welcome to BBC news. I'm blah blah blah"; And now we cross to our Middle East blah blah blah"; "and now for the weather blah blah blah");and idioms. Good thing about this is the stories are current, they are compartmentalised and the students get a visual and verbal cue when the next story is coming. Once again, prepare the students first by watching the vid yourself and covering the vocab before screening. You could also leave any new vocab until after the vid and ask students what they think it means in the context of the news report.

- Weather reports (from t.v or just the radio) also make a fun and challenging listening and viewing activity. Pre watch (or listen to) the report and note all of the temps for different capital cities, then make up a sheet with the names of the cities and get them to write the temps for each. Alternatively you can make it a cloze activity where you leave out some city names and some temps so they have to watch, listen and fill in the gaps on their sheets. All in real time too, so they have to really focus.

Just adjust anything to the age or ability level as required. The great thing about using vids is that it provides much more context, and anything on a screen seems to keep their attention for a while anyway.
Good luck.

[shawner88]

Put on the video and sit in the back and read a book or the newspaper. 30 seconds before class finishes, turn off the video and say goodbye.

[Mr. Pink]

[shawner88]

I was joking. While I do sometimes (OK usually) sneak a peak at the paper while the kids are working, I never watch videos with the kids. I think I teach aprox. 4.1 minutes per class, sometimes more, usually less.

[Mr. Pink]

[Happy Bear]

Clutch Cargo, thanks a bunch.