Korean Job Discussion Forums

[turtlepi1]

[inthewild]

You were just asking them or playing some kind of game?

I was thinking of spending some time with the letters and trying to see who knew the most difficult word that starts with that letter. Then the class would vote on it and I would make the final choice as to who gets a point for coming up with the toughest word.

[turtlepi1]

[fondasoape]

The laminating machine is your friend. If your employer won't get one, get one yourself (they're not that expensive, and the sheets are cheap).

NB: Whiteboard markers and 'erasable overhead' markers (which come in zillions of colors and have fine points) are can be erased from laminated sheets. You can do all sorts of fun gap-fill or coloring etc, etc, and do it in every class, forever, without having to reproduce anything.




One other idea: make the kids run the class.

[inthewild]

Yeah I need something to teach them, they have ADD I think.

It's my first year so it's hard coming up with things to do.

Dunno what a laminating machine looks like nor where I would get one in my small city.

But I appreciate the ideas.

[ajuma]

You asked where to get ideas. Some of the "teacher's books" that are available with your series have pretty good ideas for extending and planning the lessons. Of course some of the teacher's books are REALLY awful. I saw one that started the plan "Smile at the children and say
"Hello". Wow! Really????

[fondasoape]

My teaching changed when I got a copy of
1000+ Pictures for Teachers to Copy (Andrew Wright)
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0201091321/qid=1102359842/sr=8-1/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i1_xgl14/103-9466294-4955868?v=glance&s=books&n=507846

I suggest you buy it at any price. I'm on my third copy, having given away the others


Here are some quotes from the Amazon.com reviews:

Reviewer: "nula1" (Nagoya city, Aichi-ken Japan)
This a veritable Bible for ESL/EFL teachers. Wright crams this excellent book with ideas that will help bring out the creative teacher and get everyone away from the often tedious textbook. The book is easy to use and can be browsed casually or worked through more systematically. I recommend the latter approach and suggest that ideas and activities can be used in all aspects of classroom work. A definite top 3 ELT books contender!

Reviewer: Darryl Nightingale (Chung Li City Taiwan)
This is not "Art"! The ideas and materials in this book are not designed to develop your students artistic vision!

The pictures and techniques in this book are designed, rather, to be quick and effective ways to define words and phrases, illustrate dialogue, provide settings and context, motivate students, and provide references to which the learner can make a personal response.

The book begins with a clear and concise section on basic techniques. You will learn, quickly and painlessly, how to draw stickpeople and boxpeople, types of facial expression, caricatures, animals and objects, scenes, and special effects.

The bulk opf the book follows, consisting of more than a thousand pictures to copy, based on the Council of Europe "Threshold Level" and the "Cambridge English Lexicon". Included are pictures of settings (eg restaurant), personal identification (eg professions), topics and notions (eg health), vocabulary and grammar, and pictures for composition (speculative pictures and story sequences).

This is followed by a brief but useful section outlining some basic ways of using pictures in listening, speaking, reading, and writing activities.

The book is rounded off with a complete alphabetical index to the illustrated words.

If you teach ESL or need to communicate visually for some other reason, and you think you can't draw, find youself drawing elaborate, time-consuming pictures, or your drawing efforts often result in mass blank looks of incomprehension, this book is for you. If you are looking for a book which will turn you into an artist, it isn't.

The best book I've seen of it's type in nearly five years of full-time ESL teaching. Highly recommended if you fall within it's intended target audience.



Reviewer: A reader
A complete artistic klutz, my classroom and handouts for my students have improved greatly since I discovered this great book. For language teachers and anyone who wants to learn some basic artwork, this book is a must-have.

Incredible book!!!, October 3, 1998

Reviewer: [email protected] (New York, New York) - See all my reviews
If you teach ESL, this book is essential. It puts every verb, noun, preposition, etc. in pictoral form, easy to draw and photocopy. It is good for upper levels all the way to special education. A special education professor at Columbia University told me she loved this book and would definitely use it.

[inthewild]

Ajumma, yeah some of my books aren't so hot. My K-coworkers have taken the books from me anyways. They want me to come up with my own things to do... which is tough when the job was advertised with low hours and no teaching exp. or teaching education needed.

So, yes, I admit. I am not a good teacher at the moment.

Fond, what are some things you do with this book? I can think of some simple games using the vocab words like Stop the Bus, Word Factory, and Hangman...

[fondasoape]

You'll have to see it to get some ideas -- mostly it helped me tell stories, or get the kids (in my case, usually adults) to tell stories, invent plays, etc (you can get them to do plays even if they can't read by going at it a little at a time: people memorized and passed down songs long before anybody started writing them down).

One game (I'm not sure if I invented it or not) is a guessing game based on drawing things from the 'wrong' perspective. for example, draw a cup on the board, but instead of drawing it in a side view, draw it from the top. Draw an elephant from underneath....

'what's this?'
is it a ___'?

Another good drawing game involves fold-ups -- draw a body part and pass it on. Then have the kids describe it. Do a few and have the kids tell a story involving their new characters.

My all-time favorite activity is more typically done with photos, but cuold be done with hand drawn pictures.

1. Put the people in pairs. 1 person draws, the other describes.
2. give the describer the picture. get him/her to explain the picture to the other person. (this is like an information gap activity, but more fun)
Make sure you choose pictures which are a little harder than the group can handle. Depending on the age/sophistication of the kids, try something like:







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