sáng kiến kinh nghiệm loại a cấp tỉnh tích hợp các kĩ năng vào tiết trọng tâm ngôn ngữ theo mô hình vnen

đề tài giúp giáo viên hình dung rõ hơn tích hợp các kĩ năng vào các bước dạy trong tiết trọng tâm ngôn ngữ theo 5 bước dạy theo mô hình trường học mới. đề tài đã được sở giáo dục đào tạo hà nam chấm và công nhận

SỞ GIÁO DỤC VÀ ĐÀO TẠO HÀ NAM

TRƯỜNG THPT NGUYỄN KHUYẾN

SÁNG KIẾN KINH NGHIỆM

TÍCH HỢP CÁC HOẠT ĐỘNG VÀ KĨ NĂNG VÀO MÔ HÌNH VNEN TRONG TIẾT DẠY TRỌNG TÂM NGÔN NGỮ NHẰM

PHÁT HUY TÍNH TÍCH CỰC CỦA HỌC SINH

(Incorporating activities and skills into the Viet Nam Escuela Nueva (VNEN) template to stimulate students ‘participation in the language

focus lesson)

NĂM HỌC 2016 -2017

Cấp học: Trung học phổ thông Lĩnh vực: Chuyên môn

Môn: Tiếng Anh

Người thực hiện: NGUYỄN THỊ NƯƠNG Chức vụ: Giáo viên bộ môn

Có đính kèm các sản phẩm không thể hiện trong bản in

 Mô hình  Đĩa CD (DVD)  Phim ảnh  Hiện vật khác

SỞ GIÁO DỤC VÀ ĐÀO TẠO HÀ NAM

TRƯỜNG THPT NGUYỄN KHUYẾN

SÁNG KIẾN KINH NGHIỆM

TÍCH HỢP CÁC HOẠT ĐỘNG VÀ KĨ NĂNG VÀO MÔ HÌNH VNEN TRONG TIẾT DẠY TRỌNG TÂM NGÔN NGỮ NHẰM PHÁT HUY TÍNH TÍCH CỰC CỦA HỌC SINH

(Incorporating activities and skills into the Viet Nam Escuela Nueva (VNEN) template to stimulate students ‘participation in

the language focus lesson)

NĂM HỌC 2016 -2017

Cấp học: Trung học phổ thông Lĩnh vực: Chuyên môn

Môn: Tiếng Anh

Người thực hiện: NGUYỄN THỊ NƯƠNG Chức vụ: Giáo viên bộ môn

Có đính kèm các sản phẩm không thể hiện trong bản in

 Mô hình  Đĩa CD (DVD)  Phim ảnh  Hiện vật khác

Binh Luc, 10 -03-2017

I RATIONALE .

II CONTENTS

1 Review of the previous works

2 Practical basis

2.1 Teaching and Learning Conditions

2.2 The attitude of students

2.3 The method of teaching and learning

2.4 Training content

2.5 Test and assessment

3 The measures to solve the problem .

3.1 Step 1: Warm up (Create excitement for students)

3.2 Step 2 Organizations for student experience

3.3 Step 3 Analysis - Discover - Derive new knowledge

3.4 Step 4 Practice - Consolidation lesson

3.5 Step 5 Applications

4 The effectiveness of the application of initiative / theme into

practice .

III SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATION

1 Summary

2 Recommendations

1 2 2 3 3 4 4 4 4 5 6 8 11 13 17

33 35 35 35

I RATIONALE

Nowadays, English is spoken by most of the people through out theworld As a result, English has become one of effective means of internationalcommunication Everybody can share their culture, idea, knowledge…with eachother in English It is considered as a bridge linking people from different parts

of the world Moreover, because of its popularity, innumerable books, websites

in a lot of fields, particularly in science and technology, have been written inEnglish Therefore, if you master English, you can perceive much knowledgethrough English books or the internet On the other hand, English has been used

in all important meetings and conferences or in summit talks among leaders ofpowerful countries As the importance of English in our life, English is nowtaught as a compulsory subject in most of schools In other words, teaching andlearning English have become very necessary in most of countries

It is believed that the main purpose of learning foreign languages is notonly to communicate successfully with foreigners but also to pass the nationalhigh school exam However, it is difficult for people to be successful if they donot understand clearly and exactly its grammar According to Ur (1996),

“Grammar may be rough defined as the way a language manipulates andcombines words (or bits of words) in order to form longer unit of meaning” and

“There is a set of rules which govern how units of meaning may be constructed

in any language” In other words, understanding grammar is the basis of thesuccess in using foreign languages In fact, most students are incapable ofcommunicating fluently and their results in the exams are very low As a result,innovative methods of teaching and learning have been encouraged Moreover,schools have been encouraged to use the VNEN model, which is carried outnationwide by the Ministry of Education and Training of Vietnam Teachingand learning methodology in the VNEN schools is placing the student at thecenter of the classroom instead of the traditional custom where the teacher is atthe center This raises us the questions:

1 What activities and skills should be incorporated into the language focus lesson during each step according to VNEN model?

2 How could the teachers turn a commonly dry topic into an inspiring and juicy interaction during each step according to VNEN model?

To the best of my knowledge, the questions above have not been found inany works on learning and teaching English before This is the reason why theauthor decides to make a minor study on this topic with the hope that this would

give a small part to help students and teachers to get better results in teachingand learning English

Scope of the study

This study does focus on how to incorporate grammar into activities andcommunicative skills so that students are more involved in the language focuslesson

Methods of the study

Due to the main aims and objectives of the study, descriptive method andcontrastive method between the traditional method and the new learner-centeredteaching method would be mainly carried out throughout the process Inaddition, observation methods are also applied (observing students’ learning inthe lesson)

II CONTENTS

1 Review of the previous works

The debate about the effectiveness of traditional grammar instruction hasbeen ongoing for many decades A wide variety of topics were covered in theliterature over the general topic of grammar instruction

According to Weaver,Traditional Grammar Instruction throughoutcenturies of schooling, traditional grammar instruction seems to have had twomain goals: “(1) disciplining and training the mind (and sometimes the soul);and (2) teaching grammatical forms and word usages that were consideredcorrect or socially prestigious” (Teaching 3) Grammar was learned through the

“memorization and recitation of definitions, rules, paradigms, examples, andother grammatical features…once these were committed to memory,supposedly the student would then be able to apply them” (Teaching 5)

Traditional grammar instruction also involved “pages of skill and drillpractice” (Petruuzzella 69) The grammarians who taught in this way “gavelittle or no evidence of being concerned that students actually understand thegrammatical information they were required to memorize and recite” (Weaver,Teaching 5) In other words, students had to learn grammar for the sake ofmental discipline, not actual understanding of the English language or forimproving their own writing

Conversely, other researchers and teachers believe that students learngrammar best by situating grammar instruction in the context Many prominentteachers in the field of English have designed effective lesson plans that teach

grammar in this way Students will be more motivated to write and will becomebetter writers if grammar is taught in an incorporated setting.

In Teaching Grammar in Context, Weaver also offers some potentialguidelines for teaching grammar more effectively:

a Students should be heavily engaged with writing

b Students should be heavily immersed in good literature Good literature

is literature that is challenging syntactically or particularly interesting

c Thorough grammar study should only be for elective courses

d Use the context of students’ writing to teach relevant grammaticalconcepts

e Use the minimum amount of terminology possible

f “Emphasize (as appropriate to writers’ needs) those aspects of grammarthat are particularly useful in helping students revise sentences to make themmore effective” (145)

g “Also emphasize (as appropriate to writers’ needs) those aspects ofgrammar that are particularly useful in helping students edit sentences forconventional mechanics and appropriateness” (145)

h When students are ready to revise at the sentence level or edit a pieceoverall, then teach them needed skills, structures, and terms (141-145)

A grammar program following these guidelines is more likely to helpstudents improve their writing skills than a traditional grammar program

Finocchiaro and Brumfit (1983) describe the Communicative LanguageTeaching syllabus as follows:

a Meaning (function) is emphasised

b Contextualisation is important

c Language learning is learning to communicate

d Language is created through repeated trials and errors

e Fluency is primary whereas accuracy is secondary

In summary, each of methodology has its advantages and disadvantages.Therefore, the author would like to integrate the methods into different steps ofthe language focus lesson in order that English learning is more effective andthe results may be improved

2 Practical basis

2.1 Teaching and Learning Conditions

English language teaching and learning is taking place along with themethods of education innovation However, each class is crowded with more

than 40 students, which is difficult to apply the new model of learning andteaching, called the Viet Nam Escuela Nueva (VNEN).

Besides, visual media in foreign language classes are too poor Themajority of the classrooms are not equipped with modern and necessaryfacilities It is hard to attract students to the native environment and bring reallife into the classroom

2.2 The attitude of students

Another issue is that some teachers may face students who are notinterested in or unwilling to learn how to communicate effectively They mayhave been taught how to learn in a way that makes it harder for teachers to tryand change negative habits They are used to what they have been taught andfind it easier or more comforting to continue to communicate in that way Thisphenomenon has limited students' participation in the lesson

2.3 The method of teaching and learning

Traditionally, teachers explain the structures by examples and studentsare passive to take notes Students heavily depend on the teacher Moreover,students learn and practise the structures for the exams without using in theirreal life

2.4 Training content

The content of the course depends entirely on textbooks, time spent oneach lesson is just enough to exploit new language and do exercises Practicetime is still very short Most students cannot communicate (See a video aboutEnglish proficiency survey of students)

Our curriculum requires us to teach stand-alone grammar lessons, and it’simportant to introduce various grammar points and topics Grammar probablyranked pretty high on your list of least favorite subjects as a student As ateacher, it can seem just as boring

2.5 Test and assessment

Testing methods have so far been inclined to test their knowledge ofgrammar and vocabulary The results are not good:

- Foreign Language scores of the final exam during school year 2015 –

2016 were low Candidates with 2.25 marks occupied the highest rate Thenumber of students with below mark 1 accounted for approximately 1% (52students) Candidates with 5 points or more only accounted for 8.8%

- The academic year 2015 - 2016, the marks of students at NguyenKhuyen High School were also very low

- The total mark of the entrance exam for Nguyen Khuyen High School(2016 – 2017) is 10.25marks, which is the lowest one in Ha Nam province.

In general, the results of learning English are not good Therefore, it isnecessary to find out the methods to improve the marks

3 The measures to solve the problem

Grammar involves a lot of rules and forms It is often associated with lists

of rules, countless abstract examples and lots of written practice However,there are ways to make teaching grammar fun Your goal in class is to enableyour students to carry out the grammar points that you are teaching forcommunicative purposes I truly believe that there are some very easy andpractical steps we can all take to make the presentation and practice of grammarmore tangible and fun!

The most important thing to remember when you are coming up withways to teach grammar creatively is that grammar doesn’t have to be dry andboring If you teach it in context and incorporate grammar into stories, games,and other fun activities, your students will pick up on grammar usage andstructure relatively painlessly – and they will probably even have a lot of fundoing it Additionally, their vocabulary has been improved a lot I believe thatthe best language instruction uses meaningful input and contexts to helpstudents develop their English skills, but also feel that teaching languagefeatures, in context, is necessary for students to develop proficiency Somesimple but interesting ways may help teacher to make this:

- Turning the ordinary objects into something extraordinary: I love usingeveryday objects when teaching grammar since I feel they add an element ofsurprise to the whole lesson Just by taking a look at your (or your students')pencil case can provide you with the inspiration you need Rulers can be used to

teach Adverbs of frequency (Language focus/ unit 1/English 10)

- Extend the classroom: Teacher may inspire your kids and spark theirimagination by creating words within your classroom's walls Tape a piece ofround black paper on the wall and you instantly have a black hole that leads toanother galaxy and therefore to an infinite number of sentences on SecondCondition and Wishes

- Use magic: Starting with a magic ball, you won't believe the difference

it will make in your class! Apart from ball games you can play, balls are great in

practising Tenses or Voice shifts (Language focus/ unit 10/ English 10, or Language focus/ unit 1/ English 12) Finally, you could use your school’s

noticeboard to assign special grammar missions for your class to go to Inormally give my students envelopes in class or assign them a riddle which theyhave to solve!

- Personalize and use games: Instead of asking your students to work ontraditional gap-fills, you had better try to make exercises as personal/individual

as possible A questionnaire on how much they know about famous inventions

is better than an exercise on Passive Voice for example (Language focus/ unit 10/ English 10) And as I often say "If you can't make it personal, at least make

it fun!" There are tons of web tools you can use to create your own games such

as http://www.classtools.net/ or https://learningapps.org/

- Turn the students into teachers: Having mini-teachers when teachinggrammar is really helpful since it allows you to see things from your students’perspective The easiest way to go about "Mini Teachers" is to ask your students

to make a presentation on the grammar you've seen in class and prepare theirown exercises for their classmates

- Adapt or twist: When working on grammar exercises, teacher shouldgive students choice First, select those exercises you feel are most helpful; don'tassign all of them as homework Then, for each exercise decide on whichsentences you want to keep For the rest, tell your class they can change thesentences, so that they become more interesting or "twist" them which meansthey will have to write their own sentences If you feel this process could bequite challenging for them, try adding conjunctions like "and", "but" or

"because" at the end of the exercise's sentences and ask your students to expand

- Sometimes the teacher starts the game off by using a few questions andanswers from the textbook or from the guided oral practice section that I talkedabout in the last section Once students understand how the game works, you

can move start introducing different examples for the grammar point or have thestudents come up with their own examples.

Below the author will clearly and certainly present activities and skillswhich may be integrated into five steps according to the new model of learningand teaching- the Viet Nam Escuela Nueva (VNEN)

1.1 Step 1: Warm up (Create excitement for students)

The first activity aims to help students to mobilize their knowledge,skills and experience of yourself on matters related to the content of the newlesson.Teachers ask the provocative questions or request to make comments onmatters related to knowledge in the subject During this step, stories are also

amazing teaching tools For example, when the author taught the language focus lesson/Unit 9/ English10, the teacher asked students “Do you think that I

should change my appearance?” Students only answered "yes." Teacher continued asking “You think I should change what should I change?” Students said "Clothes" Teacher asked “Should I have my hair cut?" The teacher told students her own stories in her life Then, she asked her students for advice “If you were me what would you do?" This not only motivates students to find new

structures but practise speaking skill in real life

English songs are polularly used in this step One of the big problems weall face is maintaining learners’ interest throughout our lessons Consequently,

we often have to be very creative in the techniques we use Songs can be alively way to break up a lesson and students of all ages can find this motivating.What makes music such a great teaching tool is its universal appeal, connectingall cultures and languages This makes it one of the best and mostmotivating resources in the classroom, regardless of the age or background ofthe learner.The lyric of the song will be a wonderful story help to involvestudents in learning process Besides, It helps students to improve their Englishlistening skill There are a variety of songs containing grammatical points on theinternet However, the teachers need to plan carefully the use of songs in class,songs are useful for pronunciation and getting the rhythm of English Theyprovide vocabulary and useful expressions, as well as examples of everydaylanguage Combining physical movements with singing can make learning veryeffective for younger learners

The process of selecting a song is one of the most difficult aspects ofusing music in a lesson There are some things you probably need to think about

to ensure you get the right song For example, you need to think about the

language level of your class The language level of your class will determine notonly which songs you can use, but also what other activities – such as games orwritten exercises – you will use to develop the lesson

Playing a game is an excellent way to begin an lesson It makes thestudents energetic and brings enjoyment to the whole class It also gets thestudents involved in producing English by doing something fun Playing gamesalso helps to instill confidence in the students' ability to speak English Gamesare not supposed to be used just for the sake of it Games should help tointroduce or practice the topic or subject matter of the lesson Most games can

be easily adapted to introduce any language point or topic

A picture paints a thousand words Pictures are important for creatinginterest in the topic you are about to teach You can use photos, drawings,cartoons, paintings, symbols, flashcards, magazine ads, etc Today's world isvery visually-oriented and using pictures is a natural aid to learning Studentsalso learn in different ways Pictures help visual learners understand the subjectmatter being introduced Pictures allow students to be creative as they are open

to different interpretations You can use pictures to introduce vocabulary,predict a reading or listening activity, understand a main idea, etc Picturesprovide a talking point and help students give their opinions and ideas

For example, in the language focus/ Unit 5/ English 10, the teacher uses

the game and pictures to warm up The teacher gives 2 boxes and asks students

to guess what are in the boxes This activity may make students curious andactive to participate in the task

WARM-UP : Guessing GameTry to guess : what are in these boxes.

2.2 Step 2 Organizations for student experience

In this first stage you need a meaningful context in which you will showhow this grammar is used You can do this in many different ways; you candraw pictures on the board with speech bubbles explaining what is happening;you can use a short video clip or photographs; you can even mime a short scene

if you feel confident in your acting ability!

Here’s an example of how you might present the second conditionalsentences:

out of his head In these bubbles stick pictures of money, a sports car, a yachtand a big house

sentence from a song such as "If I had a million dollar”

grammar: ‘Do I have a lot of money now?’

I usually appreciate opportunities that let students question, doubt andrethink what they have already known That's how I've come to love using

"slashed" activities in order to encourage my student's grammar work Such

activities can be great for refreshing some already known material, as well asfor encouraging students to think about some new / old but challenginggrammar points, plus, you can do it in a very personalized way! They don't taketoo long to prepare, but, as I've already seen many times, they bring a lot ofhelp, fresh perspective and a good impulse to make the students really thinkabout the grammar For example, I use such activities very often when it comes

to question forms (unit12/language focus /grade 10) A nice way to start a

class is to ask students to recreate the questions based on their "slashed"versions, and then to answer these questions

How/your vacation?

/you/speak Engish?

/you/ understand people around?

what/the best and worst experience?

what/the weather/ like?

etc

I recently used the same technique for revising gerunds and infinitives (unit 2/language focus /grade 10) , too:

Is there anything you'd suggest/ do to improve life in your city?

Is there anything you couldn't afford/ do 10 years ago but can afford/ donow?

What do you think there is no point/ do after the new regulations wereintroduced?

What do you wish you stopped/ do but cannot?

What do you want your colleagues/ do this week?

do you mind/ talk about personal issues with your business partners?

What do you regret/ not do last weekend?

Besides, I also let students play a game "Pelmanism" For example,students have learnt reported speech in Grade 8 or Grade 9 So, they haveknown it when they are in Grade 10, 11 or 12 Therefore, teacher may use thiskind of game to help students rethink These are two slides of this game forreviewing reported speech:

these must

now may here will

might then

would there had to those

these must

now may here will

might then

would there had to those

One of the successful ways to teach grammar in an incorporated setting,

is through the news Students are aware of current events in their school, theirlocal community, and throughout the world and can be very interested andengaged in some of these topics Another way in which you can use your

students’ interest in certain celebrities For example, in the language focus/ unit 16/ English 10, teacher may start to teach comparatives and superlatives by

recommend stocking up on a big pile of photos to use in a variety of activities):

“My Tam is taller than Dam Vinh Hung.”; “Thu Hien is more talented than the other singers.” ; and it works great with comparative adverbs: “Thu Hien sings more beautifully than Thu Thuy, too.” Some students make the correct

comparisons; some students have some wrong statements This doesn't matterbecause they will discover or form the structures in the next step This activitymakes students apply what they have been learning outside of the classroom(when they are encountering texts on their own), and also makes them morepersonally invested in the material If teachers do not connect language study toreal life, students will not learn it as well

Each teacher uses different ways to stimulate students learn new thingswhich students need to work out their communicative tasks or exercises for theirtest However, I emphasize that teachers should use the meaningful contexts ormini games to guide students review or stimulate their curiosity to discover newstructures

2.3 Step 3 Analysis - Discover - Derive new knowledge

At this stage it’s quite important that the activity is controlled so that thefocus is almost entirely on the new grammar structure

A good way to do this is to put learners in groups or pairs to work on theactivity while you monitor and give feedback After this, teacher may do asimilar activity on the board so that all of the class is involved The teachercould make this into a game or a speaking activity, which makes it morecommunicative but still very controlled Once they’ve seen the grammar incontext, take a few moments to clarify and point out the structure and usage Make sure everyone understands, knows what it’s called, and can identify andgive examples of this particular sentence structure

When students see grammar in context first – through a game, a story, anactivity, or just frequently hearing it used – it lets their brains work a little bit tointuit the meaning before you formally explain it That’s how we naturallylearn a language: by being exposed to it and picking up on the meaning It’sbetter engaged into context, and it also develops their critical thinking andcomprehension skills In other words, students are also able to develop theirspeaking and reading comprehension

Even though it’s useful to have a quick lesson where you explain theformal name of the grammar pattern and go over its structure and usage, theteacher had better not over explain The less you can possiblytalk about grammar and the more you can actually use and practice thatgrammar, the better it is

For example, in the language focus lesson/ unit 14/ English 10, the

teacher use "Cards of the Future" This enjoyable card game is useful for

teaching students how to distinguish between the three future forms: will, going

to and the present continuous The students are divided into small groups.The groups are given a set of future form cards and question cards The groupmembers take it in turns to pick up a question card and decide which futureform card (will, going to, present continuous) would be the most suitable matchfor the question (e.g a prediction, a decision, a future arrangement, an intention,etc.) The student then asks a question using the phrase on the question card andthe correct future form to the other students in the group When all the questioncards have been used, each group writes three new questions for each futureform and gives the nine questions to another group to answer

Another example in this step, the teacher introduces the reported speech

in the language focus/unit 8/ grade 10 You may choose to have students stay

in their groups or return to their desks for the introduction You can try to elicit

the target structure by asking a question such as “What did Lan say?” Try to use

a sentence that is written on the board Most likely students will search for the

name Lan and then read the sentence exactly as you have written it but you can then say “You’re right! She said she was very tired Good job!” You have now introduced the target structure Write the sentence He said he was very tired on the board next to Lan's original sentence I am very tired Use a few more

sentences from the warm up as examples and encourage students to makereported speech sentences

When the teacher would like students to focus on comparisons in the language focus/ Unit 16, she lets students compare the people in your

classroom Put students in groups of four and then set a time limit of about fiveminutes On your signal, each group should write as many comparative andsuperlative statements about the people in the room as they can At the end ofthe time period, have one group share their sentences If another group has thesame sentence as the first group, both groups should cross that statement offtheir list Continue until all groups have read all of their statements and anyduplicates are eliminated The group with the most statements remaining wins

In the language focus/ Unit 9/ English 11, the teacher may use the game

"Relative Clause Bingo" to guide students to discover the relative clauses Here

is a captivating game to help students practice defining relative clauses In theactivity, students play a game of Bingo by describing words using definingrelative clauses The class is divided into groups of four Each student is given aBingo card and each group is given a set of word cards The word cards areplaced face down in a pile The first player takes the top word card and gives adefinition of the person, place, or thing on the card using a defining relativeclause, e.g A person who , A place where , or Something that/which Theother players in the group try to guess the word When the group has guessedthe word correctly, those players who have the word on their Bingo card cross itout The second player then takes the next word card and gives a definition, and

so on The first player to cross out all his or her words wins the game

To sum up, in this step teacher guides students to form their newknowledge through teacher' s explanation or games

2.4 Step 4 Practice - Consolidation lesson

During this step, the teacher usually organizes the controlled practice andoral practice activities in control

Controlled exercises for structure practice: Repetition (this is more

effective when the examples are carefully prepared to illustrate the meaning ofthe structure.), substitution exercises, fill in the blank (with prompt or withoutprompt), reordering sentences, combining sentences (simple sentences can becombined together to make more complex ones This is especially good forteaching conjunction and relative clauses Moreover, this kind of exercise will

be included in the final paper test) Besides, "listen and respond" exercises arealso good techniques This is similar to a tightly controlled total physicalResponse activity The teacher can ask a series of questions and have thestudents respond by speaking, drawing, moving or writing This helps sts notonly to understand language in context but to improve their speaking, listeningand writing skills

However, there’s nothing wrong with mechanical exercises – gap-filling,sentence transformation and so forth These can help learners to grasp the form

of a complex structure at the outset without having to think too much about themeaning But it's important to move on to activities where the structure is used

in more interesting and realistic ways I like structure-oriented problem-solvingactivities and quizzes, games, picture-based work, text-based work, role-play,exercises that get students using the structure to talk about themselves and theirideas, exercises that combine grammar practice with vocabulary learning, andinternet-exploration activities, to name just a few approaches To involvestudents in the lesson, the teacher should adapt the exercises into the interestingactivity such as picture dictation This is another fairly well- known game,where one student describes a picture they have drawn or have been given bythe teacher to another student, who tries to draw what they hear When thepicture is finished, it can then be compared with the original This activity is avery natural place for the use of articles, especially the generalisation that weuse “a” the first time we talk about something and “the” the next time It ispossible to elicit even more use of these forms with pictures where “An ape is

on the table” (making sure there is more than one ape in the picture) and “Theape (who is on the table) is smiling”

In the language focus/ unit 11/ English 10, students work in pairs and

play the game “Guess my Sentence" This activity not only helps them practicethe third conditional sentences but improve their reading and speaking skills

Here is a fun guessing game for students who are learning the third conditional.The class is divided into pairs and each student is given the corresponding part

of the worksheet Both students have the same conditional sentences, but wherethey have words in bold, their partner has gaps and vice versa The students take

it in turns to guess the missing endings of the third conditional sentences If astudent says the exact words that their partner has in bold on their worksheet,the students can move on to the next sentence If not, the student must continueguessing until they say the exact words The pair continues like this until all thesentences are complete Next, the teacher may adapt the exercises into the game

"It's Regrettable" In this group activity, students play a game where they try to

identify problems from third conditional sentences expressing regret Thestudents are divided into groups of three and each group is given a set of cards.The students shuffle the cards and place them face down in a pile Each studenttakes a card and reads the problem without telling anyone The students thinkabout what caused the problem on their card The students then plan how to talkabout it using the third conditional, without saying the information on their card.When they are ready, the students take it in turns to talk about their regrets forthe problem on their card The other students listen and try to identify what theproblem is The first student to guess correctly wins the card If no one guessescorrectly, the student expressing the regrets keeps the card Afterwards, thestudents take a new card each and repeat the activity This continues until all thecards have been completed The student with the most cards at the end of thegame is the winner

Another example, during the language focus lesson/ Unit 10/ English

11, I explained how to replace relative clauses by a participle or an infinitive to

my students and they were all bored with listening As a result, a lot of them gotconfused Then, I distributed the handouts I prepared for them to do exercisesand asked them to rewrite the sentences While doing the exercises they werebored and they couldn’t get the idea Then the following day I played a gamewith them and they were more confident in the end I wrote sentences on slips

of papers and put them in an envelope I divided my class into two teams andtold them how to play the game They had to choose a box from the grid alltogether as a team and one by one in turns, they had to take a slip of paper fromthe envelope and replace the relative clause by a participle or an infinitive Iallowed them to look at their notes while waiting for their turn and in the endthe victory was for all of us

Now you are ready to move on to guided oral practice I like to do this byhanding out a simple question and answer that the class completes together as aclass.

It is worth getting your students to speak using the grammar that you areattempting to teach, in sentences that relate to themselves They will have toprocess the knowledge you have given them in a way that is relevant to them,and in doing so they will forge a clearer understanding of the context and amemory of how to use the grammar you have taught in the future You shouldalso encourage your students to write down the important sentences andgrammatical concepts that you teach them, so that they have something torefer back to if they need to, but also because writing something out improvescontextual memory This not only helps students learn grammar andvocabulary but also improve their speaking and writing skills

For example, the teacher may use the Storyboard Game to

Practice English Past Tenses in the language focus/ unit 3/ English 10 or in the language focus/ unit 2/ English 11 The teacher will need to prepare the

story in advance Draw or find pictures that create a logical (or illogical!) story

pictures in order to tell a story, but they can only do it by telling you whathappened before and after

For example, imagine that there are four pictures in this story (your storyfor class should have about ten but, for the sake of the example, we’ll start withfour) The pictures are on the blackboard in the following order

1 A man standing outside his house in a bathrobe

2 A newspaper boy throwing the newspaper onto the porch

3 A man drinking coffee

4 A door slamming

A student must talk about the first picture in relation to the others, so that

you put them in the right order: “The man was outside in his bathrobe because

he saw the newspaper boy throw the newspaper onto the porch.” When you

hear this sentence — and ask fellow students to correct, as needed, for grammarand order — you’d put picture 2 first and then follow it with picture 1 Another

student would then have to add picture 3 to the story: “The man had drunk coffee before he saw the newspaper boy throw the newspaper onto the porch.” You would then put picture 3 before picture 2 Another student: “The door slammed and locked the man outside The man was standing outside after the

door had slammed “Once the students understand the game, you can select a

volunteer to take your place putting the pictures in order Encourage fellow

students to correct any mistakes you may hear by asking, “Is that correct?”

Another example, in the language lesson/ unit 6/ English 10, the

teacher asks students to make a plan called "A Week in my Country" In thisproductive activity, students use the future form 'will' to make decisions anddiscuss a holiday itinerary and 'going to' to talk about their plans Students work

in small groups The students imagine they have invited some English-speakingfriends to spend a week in their country They discuss and decide on a holidayitinerary for themselves and their English-speaking friends using 'will' Thestudents then complete a plan for the whole week, including where they will go,what they will do and see, what they will eat, etc When they have finished, thestudents present their plans to the class using 'going to'

In the language focus lesson/ Unit 8/ English 10, reported speech is a

great opportunity for students to interview their classmates, teachers or familymembers so this activity may be best as a homework assignment If studentshave never had the opportunity to conduct interviews before, it would be good

to provide them with several questions to ask It may also be helpful to providethe translations of these questions for the interviewees

In the language focus/ unit 9/ English 10, students create a political

party They decide on their party's policies by answering ten questions about theenvironment, education, health, politics, crime and punishment When eachgroup has completed their ideas, they tell the other groups what they would do

if they were elected using the second conditional As the students are listening

to a policy from another group, they comment on the negative consequences ofthe policy They continue like this until one group has won each argument.Finally, the class votes to see which party they would like to elect

In the language focus/ unit 10/ English 10, the teacher may place the

passive voice in a real life context by discussion The teacher asks students tobrainstorm the types of things that the government does for the population Thegovernment repairs streets, cleans monuments, builds schools and hospitals,etc Make sure students see that sometimes when we talk about actions, we’renot interested in the actor, either because we know who it is (in this discussion

we are clearly talking about the government), or because I would like toemphasize the results, in other words what was accomplished Students shoulddiscuss what things were done in the last year by the local government.The

teacher encourages students to use the passive voice (Streets were repaired A new hospital was opened The park benches were painted Trees were planted Etc…)

All things considered, teacher may adapt exercises in the text book intogame shows such as "Who is millionaire", " The magical cone", "Luckynumber"," Ring the golden bell", " the big wheel" and then, organize studentsdiscuss in groups about an interesting but close topic in their life Of couse,students must use the target structure in discussion

2.5 Step 5 Applications

During this step, teacher should ask students to apply the structures tosolve communicative tasks in their life The teacher may ask their students touse the structure to talk one outstanding feature of any students in their class.Grammar games are particularly useful in this step to make sure that grammarpoints are being absorbed by students While a student can usually successfullyreproduce a grammar point on paper once he or she has learned it, it’s moredifficult to reproduce a rule like this in a freer setting, such as a game Students

games are properly explained and the rules are well-thought-out and established

by the teacher, they can be a great way to reinforce grammar points that havealready been introduced in class Besides, how will the target structure theyhave learnt be used to work out the examination questions? (readingcomprehension, gap filling in the text, sentence combination, sentencetransformation) This kind of exercises should be engaged into the games such

as "Who is millionaire", " Magical cone" "Lucky number", " Ring the goldenbell" Moreover, it is really useful to integrate other subjects into thelanguage lesson in this stage when the teacher would like to use the game “Ringthe golden bell" The teacher may use design the questions about geography,history, physical education However, the game in this stage should contain alltarget language items of the lesson You can find numerous games or soft wares

to design games on the internet which are really interesting and useful Besides,

if teachers are not good at information technology Teachers may integrate theirown questions into the available games so that the lessons may be moreattractive

These are some PowerPoint slides in the language focus/ Unit 2/ English 11 The exercise which contains the sentences about verbs in the past in

the paper tests is adapted into a game "who is a millionaire?" It is not onlyinteresting but it helps students be aware of the role of the past tenses during

their tests

1 The boat was sailing north when

a terrible storm (ĐH D - 2015)

A broke B Was breaking

C Had broken D Would break

L

A broke

F 50:50

2 When I last Jane, she to find a joB (CD 2007)

B saw / was trying

3 The captain as well as all the

passengers very frightened by the strange noise (ĐH 2011)

4 The captain as well as all the

passengers very frightened by

the strange noise (ĐH 2011)