Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Darkness]

I need some serious help on how to teach my free speaking class on how to make a proper sentence. I am horrible with english grammar and I need to explain to them when and why you use these words in a sentence.

I need some sort of an exercise for them to practice everyday.

Thanks!

[Darkness]

forgot to *TAG* the thread...

[lulu144]

by the looks of it everyone here is horrible at grammar.... I don't really teach it....
I just focus on the way things are said and base a lesson on it..

like

he is a doctor
she is a teacher

you are on the chair
he is on the chair

the flower is under the basket
you are under the light....

etc etc...I'm sure this won't help.... but I felt like posting....

[Darkness]

anything is helpful at this point. I cant get these kids to talk for the life of me, so unless I just sit there and ramble on for 45mins every day to them, I need to figure out some sort of a lesson plan.

But I have no idea how to teach this shit....I dont even really understand it myself.....

[spyro25]

as, it, to, from, the???

these are all different word classes! there is no way you can just teach where to put them in all one lesson. take one at a time. articles such as 'the' take a LONG time to teach correct use, at least 6 months or so, and even then there are tons of opportunities for error even amongst advanced students!

for basic sentence structure just remember subject / verb / object! if you don't even know what that is then i'm sorry but i don't know why you deserve to be teaching those kids!

if all else fails - take some korean vocabulary in the class with you! go the korean route. for difficult concepts for beginner students such as 'as' or 'to', your english 'explanation' with much hand waving and crappy pictures on the board isnt going to make much sense.

it wouldn't take you 5 seconds to ask a korean coworker what this word meant in korean (as long as it is something they have in korean, so no 'the'!) , write the word in korean on little brackets next to the word in english on the board, then practice making sentences with that!

you'll save so much frustration and student's patience doing it that way (if you must), and you can start to focus on the bigger picture - getting the students to make conversation.

[Darkness]

Thank you!

I probablydont really deserve to be teaching english, but I think most start out that way, so go easy on me. I will admit I'm not the most advanced teacher, but I am trying.

Ok, I will start with start with "to" or something, get them to build sentences then each class I will add words.

After some google'ing I found I am trying to teach them prepositions

[endofthewor1d]

[endofthewor1d]

by the way... are you teaching from a book? or were you just thrown in a classroom and expected to pull lessons out of your ass?

[Darkness]

expected to pull lessons from my ass.....only thing I found was an old stuffed animal

[spyro25]

[Darkness]

I will look into getting a book. I found tons of stuff on the internet but I dont have a printer. Tons of activities and stuff I could print off to get them to fill in the blanks....

[some waygug-in]

Get some picture cards..

The Let's go cards are OK....but too costly.

But you can get the kids saying some useful vocabulary with them.

If you can find them, the cards for the "Finding Out" series can be useful.
With the level 4 cards, you can get them saying whole sentences.

It's a strong alien. It's a sad panda. etc.

This is the basic drill:

Divide the class into teams, hold up a card, ask, "what's this?" and the first team to come up with a correct response gets a point.

It can get a bit boring if you don't have enough cards to keep it interesting, but it does get them saying English words at least, and understanding at least on a surface level what those words mean.

It's not something I would do every day, it depends how often you see the class, maybe once a week or every other week is plenty.

If nothing else, you can get a set of Crazy 8 cards and start with them.

They are cheap and usually easy to find. You can also find some cheap animal card pictures or something similar and figure out ways to use them. One guy I met blew up pictures out of whatever textbook the kids had and made cards out of them. A lot of work, if you ask me. I made my own last year, but I found it way too much work if you are changing schools every year. Far better to find some bright colored pictures to catch the kids' eyes.

The Crazy 8 cards have vocabulary divided according to 6 categories, bugs, transportation, sports, animals, flowers, fruit so it's varied enough to keep it interesting. Cover the word so they can't read it (assuming they are advanced enough for that). If they don't know it, slowly reveal the word one letter at a time. This generally gets them curious and trying to guess what it is.

After you've done that, you can use the same cards to play pictionary.


If you want some more variety, get the student cards for Let's go. A bit costly, but very useful. It's not as useful as having the big teacher cards, but it's better than nothing and a lot cheaper.

I've found level 2 and level 4 to be the most useful, but some things in the level 1 (classroom commands) are essential. I've used these to play things like "go fish" or "sorry" with some of the matching cards in each set. You'll have to pick and choose because you won't want to use all the cards at once. I've also used these to make worksheets. I copy10 -15 pictures, white out the words, write the words in a box at the bottom and the students have to match the words to the correct picture.
You can also do things like, make a copy of several cards, cut them in half and then mix them up. Make a copy of the mixed halves and the students have to try and match them up.

If your classroom is large enough for movement games, you could do something like this: place several cards at the front of the class standing up. The kids divide into teams and form 2 lines near the back.
At regular intervals, you call out a picture and they race to touch it first. Have them rotate positions in the lines so that each student gets a chance. This game only works if you have the space, if you are in a small hagwan classroom, you won't be able to do this. Be careful to make sure that the area is free of obstructions like desks and things that the kids could hurt themselves on. The last thing you want is to have a kid crash into a desk and end up bleeding.

In a small room, you can play a similar game but throwing a ball intsead of running. Less fun, but a bit safer. You can also do it with paper airplanes....kids like that.


Anyway, I'm sure I've bored you to tears with all this. I don't know how useful it will be in your situation. It all depends on things like classroom size, age, level and the number of students per class etc.

I know this post is a bit disorganized, sorry about that....that's kind of the way I teach I guess.

I hope you can glean something helpful from this.

Good Luck

[poet13]

I wouldn't start with TO. That word has many meanings, and the implications are enormous. I went TO the store. I talked TO my mother. Put it next TO the book. Wow.
I would start with the stuffed toy, and the word ON.
Put it in different places. Make the kids laugh. If it's not too smelly, put in ON a students head. Cuddle it, talk to it, listen to it talk back, pretend to eat it, offer it food. Kick it across the room and shout GOOOOAAAAALLLL while kissing you finger and then pointing a the sky like that Korean soccer player dude does. You can have a blast with just the rabbit.
When they have the concept of on, then you can add a word. Maybe beside, or under. Those are simple words with not too many connotations.
Go back to on. Dont let them lose that starting word. You can get around to off eventually. Flip the lights off and on....over and over and over. Kids get a kick out of that, cause they shouldn't do it. But start with ONE WORD. Two and you lose them.
Have fun with it. Hope that helps.
Let us know how it turns out.

[ajuma]

Buy one or the other of these books: Collins CoBuild English Usage or Grammar in Use (beginning, I'd imagine). Study the grammar yourself, THEN come up with some games/ideas to teach the grammar.

I've been teaching for 10 years now and do great with the "usual" grammar questions, but I was looking through a textbook that I'll be using (advanced class) and it has "past passive" (or maybe "passive past"...can't remember)!!! I'm going to have to study up on this one!!

Teaching is a learning process!!!

[Darkness]

I am finding out that teaching is a learning process. That's why I keep asking questions on here to try to better my teaching for my students, and myself.....