Teachers' Questions
TEACHING
The questions asked by the teachers and the solutions worked out are shared here. Feel free to share your own solutions. Send your solutions to us and we will share them with the teachers.
Here are some of the questions raised by the Sahay ESL Advanced Curriculum Facilitators. These questions have been discussed during the workshop but are included here for further discussion. You can share your own solutions for these issues.
Classroom Activities & HW To Suit All Types Of Learners
In the lesson plans, demo classes and the discussions after the demo we discussed a number of activities and actually watched how all the students are kept engaged.
Unless the students get something that suits their level, interest and style of learning, they will not participate actively in class. The students at this ESL curriculum are studying at different class levels and they are working at different levels of competencies within one class too.
The very first step is to watch the DVD and look at the workbook activities keeping in mind this diversity. You watched 9 demos wherein each class was easily managed and kept engaged for 2 hours on a variety of activities.
For example, in one of the classes, we paused the DVD where a story was being narrated with pictures. We did not show the end of the story to the students. We asked the advanced students to complete the story in their own way. One group completed it as a horror story and another group completed it as a funny story. A third group which was working at a lower level completed a given set of sentences with their own ideas. All these were shared in class and marks were given for this group work activity.
In another class the lower level students gave a few ideas while the advanced ones gave more ideas. Simply by increasing the amount of production we catered to different levels of learners. We start asking the lower level students to first share their ideas and then prod the higher level ones to think of other ideas that have not been given by anybody else.
In yet another class the students were in heterogeneous groups. The higher level ones prepared a skit and gave such roles to the lower level ones that they can easily manage. The group activity helped them learn from each other.
Please do not force the shy learners to produce language before they are ready to share their ideas. Telling them something like, "You have never spoken in class. Come on, now tell me your ideas" is a terrible thing to do. This will only make them worse.
Put the shy learners in groups with such students who like to help others. Get the whole group to come to the front of the class instead of asking one shy student to come and stand there alone. Give them an opportunity to practice within a small group before they face the whole class.
Backward lesson planning wherein you provide the input, provide opportunities for practice in a private setting before a public performance will help such learners come out and share their ideas. Whatever little they say, accept it, expand the idea and convey it to the whole class in such a way that everybody appreciates it. This will make the shy learners have more confidence in the value of their ideas as well as provide them a good exposure of how to translate their ideas into words.
The naughty learners are quick in grasping your ideas and are able to think creatively. If you keep them engaged with challenging activities they will spend their energy in solving the task rather than in disturbing the class.
It is absolutely essential to have a variety of activities at different levels for different types of learners. In some classes at least you can try 'blended learning' wherein each group is doing a different activity, simultaneously, and some are working on technology based tasks, at their own level. The class can be divided into various stations and students can move from one station to another to learn at their own pace what they need to learn through activities that they like to participate in.