Tag Archives: Grammar

Using an iPhone to make a PSA

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The fact that everyone these days has a smartphone means that every classroom has multiple cameras.  This is a tremendous opportunity for teachers since acting out a role-play on camera is usually more exciting for students than acting one out in the classroom.

I’ve always found public service announcements to be a great place to start when making movies in class.  You can really fit any type of topic into a PSA.

When making a PSA in class, there are a few things to keep in mind:

– Editing is usually not possible.  This means students have to get creative and think about how they can shoot a PSA in one take.

– Phones have different formats.  Make sure you know how you’ll get the videos on the OHP.  I find youtube the best source for this.  Having everyone upload their videos to youtube averts any need to download.

– Examples!  Youtube has a ton of PSAs.  Explain that you can go for shock value, humor, seriousness, etc.  Again, the idea is to be creative and have fun.

Here’s an example from my students.  It’s pretty good considering they did it in 45mins.  We were working with tag questions this week so they developed an script based on this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4o6kQ9bNMyg&feature=youtu.be

History in Post-It Note Format

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Students are divided into groups of three.  Each student is given three post-it notes each.

The teacher instructs the students to write an important event in their life along with the month and year it happened on each post-it.  Once everyone has completed writing their events, the groups are told to arrange the events in a line according to when they happened.

Using a small trinket as a marker and a six-sided die or coin to move (heads = one move; tails = two), each group member takes turn rolling and moving their token.  Whichever post-it the token lands on, the person who wrote that event must explain it to the group.

After all of the events have been explained, the group can then practice explaining the events using a target grammar structure.  For example, if there is an event such as “moved to France (08/2002)” and “bought my first car (05/2005)” the group can say or write, “Matt moved to France three years before Joan bought her first car.”

Reassembling an Essay

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The goal is to take apart an essay then have the students put it back together using their knowledge of transitions, main ideas, etc.

The first step to setting up this activity is to take a sample TOEFL essay from any online source and import it into MS Word.  As you read through the essay, break it apart into fragments based on the use of signpost words or idea groups.  Don’t break it up so much that it’s difficult to spot the logical transition between ideas.

Once you’ve got the essay broken down, print out as many copies as you need.  I usually have students work in groups of three.  Cut up the essays one-by-one and mix the strips together.

In class, distribute the cut up essays and explain the task to students.  The goal is for them to visualize the logic and structure of a TOEFL essay.

Hot Seat: Present Perfect

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First arrange all of the chairs in a circle, there should be one less chair than there are students.  One student then stands in the center of the circle while all of the others are sitting around him or her.

The goal for the student standing in the center is to free up a seat so he or she can sit.  In order to do this, he or she makes a sentence using never + the present perfect (“I have never smoked a cigarette.”)  Any student that has done this action must stand up and explain how many times or for how long they have done it (“I have smoke cigarettes for many years.”)

Ideally, multiple people will stand up.  After the last person has stated how long or how many times they have done something, everyone must take a new seat (you cannot sit in your original seat).  The student left without a seat then makes their own sentence and the process is repeated.

Jigsaw Reading

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For this activity, two texts about the same subject are required.  After the topic of the texts has been introduced, one half of the class gets one of the two texts while the other half gets the other text.

Each group of students is instructed to read their text for main ideas and important details.  After the students have finished reading, the groups get together and verify the information they found.  Once both groups are comfortable with their text, they are then paired with a student from the other group.  The two students exchange the information they read.

I personally conclude this activity with a short group quiz about the texts in which students who didn’t read the particular article are the only ones who can answer (if I read text A, I cannot answer questions about this text.  Only my partner can).