Some suggestions for using language games effectively in teaching english to grade 10 students at high schools

It is all the reasons above that led me to the choice of the study “Some suggestions for using language games effectively in teaching English to grade 10 students at high schools” with t

PART A: INTRODUCTION

I Reasons for choosing the topic.

As we know, in traditional classroom, the teacher controls the class withauthority, there is no active role of students during teaching- learning process.Therefore, the introduction of a new English textbook at high school in the lastfew years has created some difficulties for teacher This innovation demands amove in the direction of a more learner- centered approach to teaching Themain objective of teaching English is to have communicative lesson However,

in fact, the teacher- student interaction is very limited in the classroom Manyteachers have troubles adapting their teaching and the new textbook to their ownstudents’ learning needs These difficulties include the use of language games

Throughout years’ time of teaching English in the period of generaleducation renovation, I have myself thought that it is necessary to reformmethods of organizing activities in teaching often to motivate students I have

positively realized that only by language Games can we interest students in English lessons These new language Games can be considered to be new

activities or techniques which are suitable for the students’ psychology Thenew language Games strongly do delight either learners or teachers when theyhave skillfully used old games Besides, they can raise the teaching quality Inthese Games, we can unexpectedly happen to realize students’ talents becausethey are equal to students, easy to play, suitable for the whole class even weakstudents Furthermore, the students who hardly prepare the lessons might havehigh scores in the games because quick-wittedness and intelligence are muchmore important than understanding about everything The sense of equality,atmosphere of excitement, feeling of the games in students’ reach, spirit ofsolidarity, the factors of which help students to ignore their shyness whichprevents them from speaking freely and actively This has a great influence onteaching results Moreover, they feel satisfied when they know they can do aswell as others All of the reasons are important factors to improve the teachingqualities and effects

Additionally, English is a language and it is a foreign language so it is toodifficult for students, especially rural students to learn although they have beenlearning for several years It would be too boring for teachers to teach and forstudents to learn English if teachers didn’t reform teaching methods to intereststudents I have been thinking of how to change the methods but whatever newmethods teachers may use, weak students will become bored, passive andinactive if teachers don’t interest them effectively

It is all the reasons above that led me to the choice of the study “Some suggestions for using language games effectively in teaching English to grade

10 students at high schools” with the hope of investigating into ways to

organize games more effectively in English classes, which make lessons moreinteresting and stimulating

Therefore, this study is intended to make a modest contribution to anincreased understanding of using games in teaching English at high schools.

II Aims of the study

With the reasons above in my mind, the specific aims of the study,accordingly are:

- To understand the theoretical background of classroom activities: games,advantages of games in improving students’ English skills

- To investigate the use of games in teaching English at high schools

- To supply systematic knowledge of using an running games in classrooms

- To provide lists of games that can be used in English in grade 10 Englishlessons in the most useful ways

- To help English teachers, especially teachers of English at high schools to addimplications for the teaching English through games, following a set of currenttextbooks: English 10 ( basic curriculum)

III Objects of the study

With the hope of improving the learning English through games, thestudy focuses on the following objects:

- Grade 10 students at high schools

- Teachers at between junior and senior high schools

- Undergraduates

- Advanced students

IV Methods of the study

To realize the aims of the study, a detailed study is used The theoreticalbackground of the study comes from many published books written by differentauthors on language teaching The data collected for the study came from twosources: the students and the English teachers at upper secondary schools bymaking personal observations through attending classes and drawing outexperiences

PART B : DEVELOPMENT

I Theoretical background

1 Games

1.1 What are language games?

Greenal (1984) defines language games as one kind of “activity which is used to consolidate language already taught or acquired And which occurs during the free stage of lesson or during occasions such as English club meeting…”

Image 1: Language games in English classes

In short, we can put it that language games are activities with the rules,goals, and element of fun carried out by the players/students’ cooperation orcompetition for the language practice

1.2 The relationship between games and language teaching

Games can be used to give practice in all the skills: reading, writing,listening and speaking, in all the stages of the teaching – learning sequence:presentation, repetition, recombination, and free use of language and for manytypes of communication, eg Encouraging, agreeing, guessing, explaining

By playing games, it will be easier for students to learn something, such

as new words, new structures… In addition, it would seem that what they havelearned will be with them for a long time This proves that language games play

a necessary part in students’acquisition in their learning Language games are

stimulating activities to introduce new materials, to practice recently learnt

language items, “to introduce or practice certain themes, or to relax or energize

a class” (Lewis and Bedson, 1999)

To sum up, the application of games in language teaching is an excellentidea of teachers and educational specialists because games are means ofcommunication and they require the players to use their language correctly As

what Carrier (1985) assumes: “Games provide quite extensive language practice of opportunities for both general and specific language skills and so they should be seen as an integral part of teaching program.” (Carrier, 1985:6)

2 Advantages of using games in language teaching

2.1 Games create an enjoyable environment

In many games, students have the chance to work together or be involved

to score as many points as possible Most students have scoring points.Furthermore, to win a game or to solve the problem, students have to sharetheir knowledge, ideas that are contributed by each player The task of theteacher is to encourage all students to enjoy games fully That is to say, throughgames played in classroom, an enjoyable atmosphere has occurred withoutcontrolling

2.2 Games provide active learner – centered learning

Learners will manage and discuss until they achieve their objectivesthrough games By this way, learners have to speak or write in order to expresstheir own point of view or give information In addition, teachers no longercontrol what learners have to say He drops his role as director of games andbecomes more of a monitor and language informant In other words, games arepart of a general movement away from a teacher – dominated classroom andpromote active learner – centered learning

2.3 Games are highly motivating

In most of the games, an element of competition between individuallearners or teams is a strongly motivating factor, which stimulates students tojoin the game It is the most important reason to explain why all students areimmensely happy or absorbed in playing games Another point is that whenlearners are given a chance to play a game, they are encouraged to choose theirpartner This does not only create a friendly working atmosphere but alsomotivate them to help each other Consequently, all learners will feel happierand more motivated in taking part in games

2.4 Games promote co-operation and competition

Games require students to interact in role- playing, arguing usinglanguage in a variety of contexts depending on the type of games used Thisclearly increases student – student communication, which is the purpose ofTEFL ( Teaching English as a Foreign language) and promotes co-operation andcompetition, which are essential motivation in learning English

To win either for himself or on behalf of his team, players will try his best

to be the first person to find out the answer or to gain point for their team.Therefore, being involved in the competition, players pay less attention toforms, structures and thus communicate in a more natural way To compete thetask or requirement of games, players work together by sharing the informationthat each receives That is collaboration and cooperation between students inlanguage games

2.5 Games stimulate students’ creativeness

Being in a new foreign language situation, students will often happilyplay with friends, using gestures and new key words as a form ofcommunication The game itself provides the main content and form ofcommunication And through this communication, students can bring outreactive activities in the classroom, especially in the games like: drawing games,guessing games, creation with concepts (making a sentence with a concept) and

so on

2.6 Games provide immediate feedback and informal testing

Psychologically, whenever the teacher introduces a new idea, a new piece

of language, she wants to know how much students have understood and howmuch they have missed The popular way she often uses is checking by papertests or by oral However, this requires time With using games, the teacher cantest the language points students have learnt informally, without doing a seriouspaper test and without having to ask students to go to blackboard to do somedrills or marking a load of exercise sheets, which are tiring and unrelaxing All

of these checking forms can be performed by games This is especially effectiveand attractive to students

II Practical background

1 Background of the study

- There is a tendency of teacher- dominated lesson and students usuallyget bored with teacher- centered presentation

- Teachers at high schools are in the period of getting used to new Englishtextbook Language games didn’t use to be organized in class, so a lot of us –teachers of English at high school – get stuck in organizing language gameseffectively

- Some teachers haven’t been clearly aware of the roles of languagegames in teaching and learning a foreign language

- A few teachers reject the possibility of success of language games Theygive different reasons for their belief, some of the reasons are lack of resources,students use mother tongue during playing games, discipline problems due tonoise generated during game activities and so on

As a result, despite being an important part of collaborative teaching andlearning, language games generally neglected in teaching English at highschool

2 Difficulties

2.1 Large classes

This is a reality in Vietnamese schools Most of the classes at schools inViet Nam are very large.There are always forty or even fifty students in a classwith mixed abilities, motivation, and expectation of learning English Whilegames are designed for the whole class of 20–30 students For this reason,teachers often find difficult in controlling, managing and deciding to providegames for such large classes During the process of making games work, largeclasses have great negative effect One of the main reasons a teacher franklydoubts the efficiency and quality of using games in her English lessons is thelarge number of students she has to deal with at one time She is afraid that shecannot successfully communicate with students, and therefore they are likely tomake noise, to lose motivation and interest and not to take the English lessonsseriously Last but not least, this influences the study of next-door classes aswell

2.2 Money and time consuming

Most games require the teacher to use game cards (picture or word ormap cards); 50 – 60 cards for a class do not cost a little sum of money.Newspapers and magazines, especially foreign ones is rather expensive in VietNam Therefore, with her own rather “meager” salary, a teacher finds it difficult

to spend some money for game materials In fact, the help from her school forthis problem could not afford to pay for suitable materials Another problem isthe time To set up a game, the teacher has to spend much time and effort

2.3 Limit of a severe syllabus

The educational situation in Viet Nam can be considered “overloaded”for students In recent years, there are many educational conferences addressingreduction in the present educational syllabus, But up to now, although thisproblem has been commented much on newspapers and in public, nothing hasbeen changed This means that teachers of English are forced to spend muchtime to teach English through games, which require more time than a traditionalmethod What needs to be taken into account is that some managers at Schoolshave no knowledge of the difference between English and other subject Forthem, finishing the syllabus is the most important without thinking of theoutcome of students’ study

III Solutions and methods for implementation

1 Solutions

1.1 Why to use games in language teaching

Games have long been advocated for assisting language learning Here aresome of the reasons why:

- Games add interest to what students might not find very interesting Sustaininginterest can mean sustaining effort After all, learning a language involves long-term effort

- Games provide a context for meaningful communication Even if the gameinvolves discrete language items, such as a spelling game, meaningful

communication takes place as students seek to understand how to play the gameand as they communicate about the game: before, during, and after the game

- Games can involve all the basic language skills, i.e., listening, speaking,reading, and writing, and a number of skills are often involved in the samegame

- Games are student-centered in that students are active in playing the games,and games can often be organized such that students have the leading roles, withteachers as facilitators

- Many games can be played in small groups, thereby providing a venue forstudents to develop their skills in working with others, such as the skill ofdisagreeing politely and the skill of asking for help

To achieve the above-mentioned benefits some thought needs to be given

to when and how to use games and not to use games That is the focus of thenext section of this paper

1.2 Some tips when to use games in the classroom

On the other hand, there is number of situations, in which using a game or

a fun activity may be of a great help in both developing good conditions forlanguage acquisition itself, as well as helping to improve or create learningenvironment and overall positive atmosphere in the class Some of suchsituations are described hereby:

- Vocabulary: it is usually difficult to learn and live the new words, which the

on-going process of studying process requires It is then useful to introducegames as an opportunity to re-use the desired vocabulary During a game,repetition of the target words can be executed repeatedly The students getpersonally involved, therefore, in addition to avoiding boredom as it oftenhappens when repeating words; it is also more likely the vocabulary will getinternalized

- Lack of interest: this is a common situation in teen-age classes, where the

students are often not motivated enough to take the learning process seriously

In such cases, it can help to employ games and fun activities, where they needthe target language in order to succeed The games can be a springboard for theserious language work, or vice versa, the language work can become aprecondition to a success in the following game

- Tiredness: it is a matter of fact that students do not always come into the

language class in their best condition They may have just had a demanding PEclass, have just written an exhausting exam, have difficulties at home, or it issimply ‘one of the days’ In such cases, it is very difficult for anyone to performtheir best, including language students The teacher should be aware of that.Games may be used as a tool to overcome the crisis and yet bring an educationalbenefit, too

- The students do not co-operate: there may be classes where the students are

not very close to each other, do not feel comfortable when asked to co-operate

on an activity A game has a great potential bringing the students together The

reason is that such activity is not viewed as extremely serious; the students canrelax and find a way to communicate better This skill is then also transferred toother activities too, and, needless to say, other subjects may also benefit fromthe newly learned communication skill, especially if the students are required towork on projects or otherwise as teams.

- Time left: short games or fun activities may serve as time fillers, for instance at

the end of a lesson, when all planned work has been finished This way the timeremaining is not ‘wasted’, it is used for the language practice too Regular use

of short games at the end of lessons also motivates the students to work harderand have their work finished earlier, in order to save time for an enjoyableactivity

1.3 When not to use games

Although it was advised in this study many times to use games and fun activity as they are of a great help to the whole teaching/learning process, there may be also situations, where a game may not answer its purpose and the

teacher’s educational aim Some of such situations are outlined hereby:

- Students have not built the bases of vocabulary needed for the particular game

- if the students lack the knowledge which the game requires It then becomes stressful even though the game would otherwise be an enjoyable activity

- Too little time available - a game should be planned carefully time-wise as well as content-wise It is of help if the teacher dedicates more time to the game than seems to be necessary It creates anxious feeling if the game must be endedbefore finishing the tasks because the time runs out

- Students are overexcited and misbehaving - they need to calm down, a kinetic game may not be the right answer

- Students do not co-operate with the teacher during the lesson - in such case, it

is advised to stop using the enjoyable activities, as a restoration of discipline tool

1.4 How to set up games effectively

To organize games effectively, teachers should follow some importantprinciples as below:

- Demonstrations of how the game is played The teacher can demonstrate with

a group of students or a group can demonstrate for the class

- A kind of script of what people said as they played or a list of useful phrases.Similarly, key vocabulary and concepts may need to be explained

- Clear directions Demonstrations can accompany directions, and directions can

be given when needed, rather than explaining all the steps and rules in one go.Also, some student-initiated modifications can be accepted

- Games already known to students

- Games used to revise and recycle previously studied content, rather thaninvolving new content

- Groups are heterogeneous in terms of current language proficiency, so that themore proficient members can help others.

- Resources, online or print, such as dictionaries and textbooks

2 Methods for implementation

- Games should be regarded as supplementary activities The whole syllabus

should not be based on Games only - even for young learners

- When choosing a Game, the teacher should be careful to find an appropriate

one for the class in terms of language and type of participation

- Once the Game has begun, the teacher should not interrupt to correct mistakes

in language use

- The teacher should not compel an individual to participate Some learners may

not want to participate due to personal reasons Forcing students to participateusually does not have successful results

- A Game which looks wonderful on the paper may not work in the actual

classroom setting If it is tiring or boring, it should be stopped

- Clear instructions should be given Unless the learners know what he is

expected to do and how to do it, the aim cannot be achieved, and the Gamecannot be played

- When giving instructions to beginners, a few words in the mother tongue

would be the quickest way to make everything clear More English exposure isneeded at a later stage

- Games are best set up by demonstration rather than by lengthy explanation.

- When using Games, teachers should be good at controlling the class and

careful with chaos and noise

- It is very important not to play a game for too long

- Teacher should prepare the materials in sufficient quantities

- Teacher should "check" answers at the end of an activity

- Making sure everyone participates It is best to stop a game at its peak (5 – 7

minutes)

2.2 Some games suggested in the lessons of the current syllabus of English

10 ( basic curriculum).

In this section, I try to put forward some personal suggestions on games

in the lessons of the current syllabus of English My choice of games in eachlesson is based on these points below:

- The aim of each lesson

- The language contents of each lesson

- The need of revision of what were learnt or what have just been learnt

- Students’ level

- Games suitable for the stages of the teaching process: presentation, practice and free practice (production)

2.2.1.Using Games in Warm-up stage to check, revise vocabulary or grammatical structures or lead students to the new lessons :

Game: Number matching

Unit 7: The mass media - Language focus - Exercise 3- page 81 -Aims: To lead students to the new lesson in pre-teaching Grammar stage: Uses of Phrases “Because of” and “ In spite of” -Time allowed: 7 minutes -Material preparation: I prepare a table of phrases and clauses (exercise 3) in advance and stick it on the board -Steps: +I divide the class into 2 teams: Team A and Team B and ask each team to choose 5 couples (for 5 sentences) +I ask couples in the 2 teams to come to the board and stand on 2 sides +I number each member of 2 teams: Team A: 1-a,2-b,3-c,4-d,5-e Team B: 1-a,2-b,3-c,4-d,5-e Students in Numbers Students in Letters 1 Because of the cold weather

In spite of the cold weather

2 Because of his illness

In spite of his illness

3 Because of the large crowds

In spite of the large crowds

4 Because of the meat shortage

In spite of the meat shortage

5 Because of the bad condition of the house

In spite of the bad condition of the house

a We could not see what was going on

b He had to cancel the appointment

c We kept the fire burning all day

d He managed to come to school

e There were enough seats for everyone

f We all wore shorts

g They enjoyed living there

h Everyone is living on beans

i The council demolished it

j We have managed to get some beef

+I show couples in the 2 teams the pairs of phrases and clauses:

+I ask couples to find and match each other in their own team

+The couple who have the perfect match will score one point for their team +I translate the meaning of the words, phrases or clauses each couple matched