Hi,
I was wondering what people here thought about taking the students outside, and what kinds of activities you'd suggest. Sometimes I feel that a change in the classroom setting would be wonderful..especially for my Chinese students who are in the classroom, literally, from 7 a.m. until 9:15 p.m., with small breaks in between. The weather will be warm soon, and I want students to relax and also experience ENglish in a different setting. Any thoughts?
Taking Class Outside
Moderators: Dimitris, maneki neko2, Lorikeet, Enrico Palazzo, superpeach, cecil2, Mr. Kalgukshi2
Scavenger hunt, where they must find/photograph/collect various items written in English.
Give them an assignment to interview various people in English. Lots of variations here. Good for statistics, too.
Word hunt. What do they recognize in English as they pass by it? What additional words would they LIKE to learn after seeing it "live"?
Give them an assignment to interview various people in English. Lots of variations here. Good for statistics, too.
Word hunt. What do they recognize in English as they pass by it? What additional words would they LIKE to learn after seeing it "live"?
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coffeeandtea
- Posts: 10
- Joined: Tue Mar 02, 2004 9:56 am
- Location: China
thanks
thansk for your reply, you gave me some good ideas. 
Information Hunt –
This requires a lot of preparation on your part but it is worth it. And if you do it once, you can use it for other classes, adapting or updating it. My ‘Information Hunt’ contains tasks like this, for example:
• Go to Half Moon Street. In the window of the bank there is a poster showing apartments for sale. How much is the cheapest apartment? How many rooms does it have?
• What time does the last bus # 274 leave the main train station in the direction of the town hall?
• There is a plaque on the wall of the library. It is in honour of Christian Ernst. What did he do?
Students must answer the questions in English. I translate the names of streets and buildings where possible (a cause of much hilarity among students, needless to say.) Using the cut-n-paste options in word, I re-order the tasks, so each group follows a different route (otherwise they will all e.g. storm the library at the same time). Some students are clever enough to read everything at once and work out the route beforehand. Just don’t have a group that is too big, or else they split up among themselves and ten people go in ten different directions, finishing in ten minutes 
Breakfast Class
If you can cook or bake or have access to these facilities, it is nice to have a ‘breakfast picnic’ – I make typical Irish bread, for example, bring butter and jam to class. With a couple of big flasks of tea. (I cheat on the bread, by the way, I bring back ready-mix packs from Ireland – hey, I’m not that dedicated!) Perhaps students might bring something along that is ‘typical’ from their culture. You could design a class around ‘breakfast’- what do people eat for breakfast in the USA; Great Britain (English breakfast – fried bacon, fried sausages, fried eggs, fried ….). How important is breakfast? Who doesn’t eat breakfast? Stuff like that.
Town Tour
Here there are a couple of variations –
You hold the ‘tour’ but tell students that you are not sure your information is correct. Then invent the most outrageous lies and have students correct you on the spot or take note of the mistakes and correct them in the following class, e.g. standing in front of our horrible concrete town hall, I blithely announce “This is the town hall. As you can see it is a fine example of Baroque architecture….”
Students: “It’s not baroque!”
Me (looking bewildered) “It’s not? When was it built, then?”
(students guess or look for info in the foyer. We try to find an example of baroque architecture – the library is baroque. When was it built? Etc)
At a local brewery I say it’s a vineyard and wine is made here from grapes – more consternation and clarifications- it’s a brewery. They make beer here. What do they make it from? When was it founded? Where is the beer exported to? (I play The Stupid Foreigner and students translate for me.)
Or students give you a tour of the town – split the town into sections and have smaller groups hold ‘moving presentations’. Again, play The Stupid Foreigner, ask tons of questions, make students ask people to find out answers, take notes, follow up in class the next day…
This requires a lot of preparation on your part but it is worth it. And if you do it once, you can use it for other classes, adapting or updating it. My ‘Information Hunt’ contains tasks like this, for example:
• Go to Half Moon Street. In the window of the bank there is a poster showing apartments for sale. How much is the cheapest apartment? How many rooms does it have?
• What time does the last bus # 274 leave the main train station in the direction of the town hall?
• There is a plaque on the wall of the library. It is in honour of Christian Ernst. What did he do?
Students must answer the questions in English. I translate the names of streets and buildings where possible (a cause of much hilarity among students, needless to say.) Using the cut-n-paste options in word, I re-order the tasks, so each group follows a different route (otherwise they will all e.g. storm the library at the same time). Some students are clever enough to read everything at once and work out the route beforehand. Just don’t have a group that is too big, or else they split up among themselves and ten people go in ten different directions, finishing in ten minutes 
Breakfast Class
If you can cook or bake or have access to these facilities, it is nice to have a ‘breakfast picnic’ – I make typical Irish bread, for example, bring butter and jam to class. With a couple of big flasks of tea. (I cheat on the bread, by the way, I bring back ready-mix packs from Ireland – hey, I’m not that dedicated!) Perhaps students might bring something along that is ‘typical’ from their culture. You could design a class around ‘breakfast’- what do people eat for breakfast in the USA; Great Britain (English breakfast – fried bacon, fried sausages, fried eggs, fried ….). How important is breakfast? Who doesn’t eat breakfast? Stuff like that.
Town Tour
Here there are a couple of variations –
You hold the ‘tour’ but tell students that you are not sure your information is correct. Then invent the most outrageous lies and have students correct you on the spot or take note of the mistakes and correct them in the following class, e.g. standing in front of our horrible concrete town hall, I blithely announce “This is the town hall. As you can see it is a fine example of Baroque architecture….”
Students: “It’s not baroque!”
Me (looking bewildered) “It’s not? When was it built, then?”
(students guess or look for info in the foyer. We try to find an example of baroque architecture – the library is baroque. When was it built? Etc)
At a local brewery I say it’s a vineyard and wine is made here from grapes – more consternation and clarifications- it’s a brewery. They make beer here. What do they make it from? When was it founded? Where is the beer exported to? (I play The Stupid Foreigner and students translate for me.)
Or students give you a tour of the town – split the town into sections and have smaller groups hold ‘moving presentations’. Again, play The Stupid Foreigner, ask tons of questions, make students ask people to find out answers, take notes, follow up in class the next day…
story time
Hi
Another idea for your dilemma is to take the kids outside and read some poetry or a story in the sun, and afterwards discuss it.
p.s
Notify your students about it in advance, first because you don’t want them to miss this great lesson. Second, tell them to bring something comfortable to sit on, while you are doing this activity (you don’t want any scratching pupils because of the grass)
Hope I could help
Sharon
Another idea for your dilemma is to take the kids outside and read some poetry or a story in the sun, and afterwards discuss it.
p.s
Notify your students about it in advance, first because you don’t want them to miss this great lesson. Second, tell them to bring something comfortable to sit on, while you are doing this activity (you don’t want any scratching pupils because of the grass)
Hope I could help
Sharon