Mon Mar 23

Objectives:

- Exchange information about myths and urban legends, and listen for specific information

- Induce the use of past modals through listening to a mystery; then choose correct modals in a dialogue

- Follow a spoken song

The journal writing today was on "the most beautiful sunset you've ever seen. Where did you see it?" This was inspired by the amazing sunset I saw on the way to class. But interestingly enough, the song we listened to "Alice's Restaurant" also mentioned sunsets.

I gave back half of the oral production feedback sheets. Hopefully the rest will be ready by Wednesday. We went to p. 99 and in threes the sts discussed the beliefs and myths ("urban legends") and tried to identify which were true. We then listened to the answers. Like the earlier listening text, some sts doubted the veracity of some of the answers.

We then went to p. 100, discussed the vocabulary in the box and the sts tried to predict the story following the pictures. There were a few mistakes but some made good efforts at working it out. However, while listening to the story it became clear that there were elements no-one had actually thought about at all. They tried to produce possible explanations for the mystery, and then we listened to one that the "experts" consider the most probable. After doing the activity we looked at the language summary on p. 154. However as a number of sts hadn't come last Friday they didn't understand so well, not having done the groundwork with modals. Still, doing the "Spy Talk" handout of Oskar and Andrei, most of them seemed to work it out. This exercise also helped them to see that there are a number of possible answers and it often depends on the level of certainly one has for the situation as to which modal one will use.

We then went to the final activity of listening to Alice's Restaurant. It's a long song and I wanted the sts to listen and enjoy and understand the story without worrying about filling in the gaps; so they simply read along. Many of them laughed as well (especially Elvia!). We did some important vocabulary first (important because it helps them understand the story and the humour more).

The exercises (and homework for Friday) are to work out the meaning of words in bold according to the context; underline all the past and present modals they can find; and work out the meaning of various collocations which were in italics.

Fri Mar 20

Objectives:

- conceptualize and use modals of deduction and their level of probability

Rather than getting the sts to write today, I asked them to share some interesting but little-known facts. I started them off with "no-one can kiss their elbow" and "Mexico is the second most linguistically diverse country in the world, after India". A number of sts volunteered facts but some couldn't think of anything. I agree that at this time of night it's not so easy to think about things like this off the top of your head.

We discussed the movie trailers activity. They all enjoyed it and talked about what they relied on in order to understand: gestures, camera angles, facial expressions, repetition of words, sound effects etc.

I then wrote on the board the simple sentences: 

I am sick.

I might be sick.

I must be sick.

And asked them to infer the different meaning of each one. They had trouble defining "must be", considering it to be an obligation, so I explained the idea of deduction based on the evidence.

We turned to pages 98-99 and went through the exercises and the language summary, skipping the analysis. We practiced with exercises 1 and 2. The picture in ex. 1 appears to be from Mexico City. In the future I should exploit this more and consciously ask the sts to use "must", "could" etc. to talk about where they think this is.

Then I handed out some close-up pictures of everyday objects. The idea was that sts use modals of possibility to work out what they could be. Finally I showed them the complete picture. Unfortunately, again, I didn't make it so clear that the idea was to use modals, and I'm not sure I paid as much attention to it while monitoring as I could have. Still, I think the activity was a worthwhile one.

"Guess the picture" is from http://floorsix.blogspot.com

Wed Mar 18 - LAB

Objectives:

- Recognize and correct common Level 6 errors and identify which are the most problematic, in order to keep working on them and to avoid fossilization.

- Rely on either visual or auditive clues to make meaning of a text

- Relay this information to another

We didn't have journal writing today in order to have enough time to do all the activities.

First we went through the answers to the Stardust homework briefly. If I had had more time I would have asked them what they did in order to work out the answers to the vocabulary questions.

Then I gave them the handout of common errors and explained the concept of fossilization. I think the notion of this shocked them into doing their best on the error sheet! First they tried to answer the questions individually, then checked with a partner. There were some disagreements about spelling and the use of gerunds and infinitives, which allowed them to pay closer attention to the correct answer and discover that, perhaps, they didn't know that particular structure. I think it was very useful for them. Finally they put an asterisk next to the ones they got wrong, in order to work on them more.

The final activity of the night was Listeners and Watchers. Half the group were Listeners. They were sent out of the room with a list of vocabulary which was in the movie trailers. While they waited, they had to work out between them the meaning of these words. Meanwhile, the Watchers watched the four movie trailers without any sound. As they watched, they commented on what they saw and tried to deduce what the story was about. Then they went out and worked out between them the four storylines, while the Listeners came in and heard the trailers without seeing any images. Then when the Watchers came back in, they paired up, a listener and a watcher together, and they told each other what they had understood from the movie. Finally they watched and listened to the trailers and worked out the parts they had not understood. They agreed that it was more difficult to listen than to watch.

I liked this activity because it caused them to rely on visual or auditive clues to understand meaning, and the element of information-gap while discussing in pairs was very useful. Of course the trailers were in themselves attractive. The only thing I find disheartening is that I don't think I can use the same trailers each time, because if a st has seen the movie they won't be relying on what they see, rather on what they remember of the movie. So this activity will require researching new trailers each time I give this activity. Or, at the very most, finding little-heard-of movies and hoping that no movie buff in the class has already seen them.

Fri Mar 13

Interestingly enough, today was the second Friday the 13th of the year. And the topic of class ended up being quite macabre, although I hadn't actually planned it that way!!

Objectives:

- Correctly use vocabulary related to mysteries, problems and oddities

- Identify types of strange events with a related situation

- Explain different phenomena and listen for the correct explanation

We began with journal writing of "Have you ever experienced anything supernatural or mysterious? Or do you know of someone who has?" It seemed that almost everyone had no problem writing about this, and a number shared their experiences of ghost-like entities or visitations. I suspect it surprises people to know that they're not the only ones to have experienced something like this. I shared about the miracle of my friend Naomi who broke her neck and walked out of hospital two weeks later. I think next time I give this class, I'll share about Heidi as well!

We then listened to some remaining news articles by sts who hadn't come to the previous class. One st, I suspect, had taken her news article from a Spanish source. I'm not sure, but she had a lot of difficulty with vocabulary which, had it been in English, wouldn't have been a problem.

Then we turned to p. 96 of the book. Sts matched the words and phrases and as we went through the exercise I elicited examples of other similar experiences they may have had. It turns out that one st is an identical twin, and another can do card tricks!

Then we discussed the q's on p. 97 (ticklish, hiccups and sleepwalking were all explained by sts) and in pairs they came up with explanations about natural phenomena. We went through the box of vocabulary and then listened to the explanations. It seems that some of the "official" explanations may be slightly wrong, or at least only half-right. A number of sts, particularly medical sts, were keen to set the records straight.

We then finished with a song - Sympathy for the Devil, filling in gaps and making predictions about each era or period of time the Rolling stones were referring to. It's a very long song and there needs to be sufficient time set aside to listen to this, in future classes.

Wed Mar 11

Objectives:

- To verbally summarize a news article and give their opinion on it.

- To create humorous captions for comic pictures

- To identify captions correctly for each picture

The journal writing today was based on a semi-guided activity I've shown my Formación teacher trainees: to write the inner part of a paragraph with these sentences as the first and last:

- Last week my sister bought a lottery ticket.

- If only she still had her coat, she'd be a wealthy woman today.

Some sts read their "stories" out loud and two were very coherent but different in content; one was difficult to understand and didn't seem coherent. I wasn't sure what to do with that one, but thanked the st for sharing anyway (the sharing was voluntary).

Then the sts began sharing their articles. The "rules" were 2 minutes each; one minute to share the content of the article, and one to give your opinion about it. I had written on the board what criteria I would be using: Use language fluently and accurately; communicate with good grammatical control; express opinions with precision; and summarize an article. These were taken from the Oral grading sheet for level 6. But I let the sts know that I wasn't going to give them a grade as such; rather give them feedback on which areas they need to work on more. This settled them down a little!

We listened to ten articles and on occasions I invited comments and questions from the rest of the group so that it wouldn't seem so boring for them. After the tenth article we took a break and read a silly poem (How to prepare a hippopotamus sandwich), just to get their minds thinking about something completely different. After the next ten articles we again did something completely different and fun in order to break the tension. It's my experience that even though sts are willing to share and talk in class, as soon as they have to do something remotely "formal" they become very tense and nervous. One st was visibly trembling throughout, and others forgot the words they had rehearsed saying. But to their credit, a number spoke very well and made few errors. I encouraged them with this as I had previously substitute taught a level 5 group which had numerous pronunciation and grammatical errors when speaking. All of them gave their opinion as well, which demonstrated good understanding of the task set before them.

So we looked at some Gary Larson pictures afterwards - actually got photos from a website that people had created to imitate the cartoons. First the sts had to guess punchlines for them. Of course some sts had difficulty due to the time of day and low level of creativity. But many came up with good punchlines. Then I gave them the punchlines on strips of paper and they had to match the punchline with the cartoon. Most successfully did this although there was some debate on a few concerning bears.

Mon Mar 9

Objectives:

- Writing: use of connectors in written texts

- Speaking: preparing a talk

The journal writing today was answering the questions "What's good about mobile phones? What's bad about mobile phones?" A number of good and bad things arose in a later discussion about them. The sts are quite happy to talk and share in class, even though many of them have had their first class at 7am in the morning and have been at the uni for the whole day.

I wrote some sentences on the board which were related but separate sentences, and asked the sts how they could make them into one sentence. Immediately they suggested by using connectors. So they gave a number of examples of connectors that could be used. We examined a little more closely the ones that were applied wrongly. Then I gave them a handout that has a lot of information about linking words taken from the website . I put gaps in the handout so they sts had to listen and volunteer possible answers and examples of linking words throughout. It was a lot of information, but more complete and easier to understand than the textbook. When they got to the exercise in the textbook (p. 92), they had very little problems with it, much less than previous classes have had. It paid off to do the extra work beforehand.

The rest of the class was devoted to preparing their talk for Wednesday's class. Most sts had brought their article and went through it. I answered vocab questions and checked understanding of the articles. Some who hadn't come on Friday had to use one from the textbook. One st, Jorge, seemed very unsettled and distracted and didn't work very well by himself. Mariela also was not willing to use any article from the textbook and so didn't have a lot to do. But before leaving I got sts to get into pairs and to practice their presentations, and their partner had to give them feedback and recommendations about their talk. This also gave the sts a chance to speak out loud and try to put their ideas into words. It's sometimes one thing to think "yes I'm going to talk about that article, it's about that lady" but actually getting the exact words out coherently is something quite different.

This exercise went well, even though it was close to finishing the class. Those sts who had not been distracted were able to get through both their presentation and their partner's as well, and make notes about how to improve their talk.

Fri Mar 6

Objectives:

- Review gerund and infinitives.

- Complete viewing of movie.

After last Wednesday's fiasco I feel a bit traumatised about having to show videos. Thankfully today the Play Station worked and the subtitles worked and the rest of the movie was shown without mishap.

The journal writing topic today was taken from Roberto's contribution to the blog: the quote "Remember that the only thing necessary for evil to triumph, is for good men to do nothing."

I asked the sts to write their thoughts and opinions about this quote. I asked a few to share what they had written afterwards, and a number didn't precisely agree with the quote, which made for interesting discussion.

We then checked the homework from the workbook and listened to the answers. I am happy to see that the majority do their homework and are eager to check their answers. Those who don't end up sitting uncomfortably during that period of time without much clue of what is going on, but I think it also makes them try harder to do their homework next time.

After completing the movie watching I gave the sts the details about the following task (a speaking one, based on p. 91). They had to choose either one of the articles from the textbook or else look for one on the internet (or The News), read the article carefully and take notes on it, create an oral summary of it and give their opinion about the information. This homework is due for next Wednesday's class. The sts seemed happy to do this. I let them go early (being Friday) but they'll have time in next Monday's class to prepare some more for this. Their homework was to bring in an article to Monday's class if they were going to use an external one.