Become a more confident language teacher.
One common question that I was asked in my sessions at iFLT ’14 was, “I thought that our goal is to provide students with comprehensible input…so why do so many of these activities contain output?” Great question! Is output bad? No comprehension based teacher thinks that output is bad. Output is a good thing and one of the end…
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I am a very bossy person by nature, and unfortunately I didn’t realize it until right after I graduated from high school. By the grace of God, I’ve learned how to tame my nasty natural instincts…although it’s not always easy! Being married helps 🙂 I think that this is why the game that I’m about…
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I used this activity for the first time as an icebreaker at our MOPS group, and it was so fun! I love using it in class, because it is a great way to give everyone an opportunity to speak without eliminating teacher-guided discussion. So here’s what you do: Decide how many groups you want to…
Read MoreI just stumbled across this activity that I used to use on the first day back from break in Spanish 2. The activity and discussion that it sparked easily filled the first 55 minute period after break. It’s a simple form for a communicative activity in which students interview each other about their Christmas vacations. After they get…
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I’ve been working on compiling some ideas for creative book reports/story re-tell props/presentations. One idea that I came across are tissue box book reports (see Joy in the Journey for an example). I also stumbled upon some awesome pictures of tissue box monsters and other fun tissue box creations, but I didn’t see anyone that…
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Fan ‘n’ pick is one of my favorite Kagan structures, but it is also one of the most complicated ones for my students to learn. After several years of painful trial-and-error structure intros to six or seven groups of students, I think that I have finally developed a system that works. The key? Use forms.…
Read MoreI have my very first ever student teacher!! (Well, I guess they are called ‘interns’ around here, but you know what I mean.) Her name is Julia, and she is super fabulous. She just spent…a long time (a semester maybe?) with an awesome French/Spanish TPRS teacher at a high school in our city, so she…
Read MoreI made a new version of my embedded storyboard today (the idea originally came from Michele Whaley). With the old one, which was meant to include the most general/basic information at the top and then add more details moving down the columns, it was difficult to explain the problem and give the basic plot outline…
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We all have those classes that just won’t stop talking…and we all have those classes that just won’t start talking! Such is the case with one of my second-year classes (level 1B). It’s a great group of kids, and they are very good students, but getting them to participate in discussions or speak up in general is worse than…
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