SPEAKING: LINKS AND RESOURCES

Hi everyone,

Here is a brief list of some articles and resources you may want to have a look in relation to the Speaking session.

Speaking: Links and Resources

Hope to see you all soon!

SPEAKING: PRESENTATION

Hi again,

I've been having problems uploading the presentation, but it look like I've found a way at last...so here it is!

Slideshows, Podcasts etc...

A couple of links:
Firstly,
http://www.brainshark.com/mybrainshark
 Here you can do a few things, for example:
- upload a Powerpoint presentation and add voice to it
- create a posdcast

Here is my example, which you saw last Wednesday in our brief Bulgarian session!

Secondly, you can create quite fun presentations (flicks) with your photos at:
www.picturetrail.com
There are many special effects, wallpapers, backgrounds to use...
Here is mine:

Two activities

Hello everybody!

First of all I would like to congratulate Neda for the course. I'm going to write about two activities which I like because they have been very useful in my class and my students have liked enjoyed them.

Picture dictation

I describe a photograph and my students have to draw what I'm describing. It can be done in a low level class just to practice easy vocabulary and prepositions of place or in a higher level class using more complicated vocabulary and expressions like "in the background", "in the foreground", "at the top", "at the bottom", "on the left side", .... At the end I show the picture to the students and they compare it with their drawing. Then one or two (or more) students describe other pictures, so they can practice listening and speaking.

Dictation (true/false)

The teacher dictates twelve sentences. Six sentences are true and the other six are false. Students have to write the sentences and try to guess if they are true or false. When they have finished, they correct the sentences on the blackboard and the teacher says if they are true or false. You can to do it to practice different grammatical points, for example I usually do it with present perfect, but you can use present simple, past simple .... . Students always like to know about their teacher's life, so they really like this activity.

Example of sentences:

I have never been fined for speeding.

I have written a novel.

I have been to China. 

When we finish the activity we do a pair activity: They have to dictate four sentences to their partners about themselves, two of them are true and the other two are false. They have to write them and guess if they are true or false. Students practise listening, writing and speaking

Mª José Ramos
 

Talking twin babies

When Neda was telling us in yesterday´s session about acquisiton of a language versus learning and made reference to the quotation “Babies only hours old are able to differentiate between sounds from their native language and a foreign language, scientists have discovered. The study indicates that babies begin absorbing language while still in the womb, earlier than previously thought", I remembered having watched a video in youtube that you have probably watched too. 

I have just found it and it is really interesting to see how these two twin brothers "talk". It is only a word what they are using all the time but it is surprising how they give it entonation as it was a real conversation.

Watch it:



There has been someone who has translated their conversation:
Part 1
Part 2

I've used voxopop for speaking activities such as interviews, telling holidays, etc but a funny thing is guessing something. The teacher gives clues about an object and they ask questions about it (where it is, if it's big, if you can eat it...etc).

They can also write or find a tongue twister and record it.

Talkgroup » English Workshopn (VOXOPOP)

Talkgroup » English Workshop

Hi everyone,

Have you used voxopop in your classes? Let us know your experiences here or on Thursday if you have!

Tongue-twister

Hello everyone,

I want to share with you another activity for third and fourth years. I propose a tongue-twister, a good way to improve pronunciation. Firstly, students will try to say some parts of the tongue-twister separately, in order to pronounce them correctly. In the end, they will try to say the tongue-twister as fast as possible, but also pronouncing it correctly, linking the words.

Another way to work with these tongue-twisters is separating the class in groups and make each group say one part of the tongue-twister.

Below I write you some examples of tongue-twisters:

-"I can skateboard with a black hat and eight bags"

-"I'm happy when it's hot and I'm on holiday"

-"The spider and the grasshopper are under the flower"

-"Five fish eat ice cream with a knife"

-"The green witch is wearing punk jeans"

-"The rich prince likes chicken and English"

-"The snake and the spider eat spaghetti"

This idea was taken in a formation course by Enma Thomas.