Could you please tell me if ... (indirect questions with a twist)

Good afternoon Everyone! 

I've already told you how much I love using games in teaching. I also mentioned my fascination with Black Stories , a spooky card game with mysterious riddles. In this short post I'd like to share with you how I exploit this game to practice asking indirect questions with my teenage and adult students. This game is appropriate for both lower and higher levels (A2-B2). 

After explaining the difference between direct and indirect questions ( feel free to use this worksheet  ), write the below riddle up on your board:

Thank You

A woman goes into a pub and orders a glass of water. The man behind the bar grabs a rifle and aims it right at the woman. She thanks him and leaves. 

Clarify any vocabulary items your students might not know. Their task is to ask you yes/no indirect qestions to solve the mystery. Some example questions might include:

1. May I know if the man and woman know each other?

2. I was wondering whether the man is crazy.

3. Could you please tell me if she was thirsty? 

You should limit your answers to yes and no only, without giving your students any clues (unless, of course, they get stuck). The solution to the story:

The woman had hiccups and wanted to get rid of them with the water. The man behind the bar understood straight away and wanted to help her by giving her a real scare. It worked!

*For those of you who don't know it yet, it's believed that getting a fright might stop hiccups. 

You can find more black stories here. 

These cards are my students' favourite game and I can definitely say it's one of my best purchases :) 

Are there any board/card games you really like using in the classroom? How do you exploit them?

Present Simple and Present Continuous Board Game

Aloha! 

Hope you're reading this post from a nice and sunny place sipping on something delicious :) It sure is sunny here but I'm hiding from the heat in a cosy cafe. Unfortunately, my internet connection hasn't been very stable since I changed flats over a month ago which made my lesson planning a bit tricky...but not being able to connect to the internet forces me to review and reuse my old materials which I have forgotten about. Looking for a way of practising the present simple and continuous tenses I came across a board game I created some time ago to practice these structures. I know how you guys love board games so I've decided to share this one with you :) Just click  here to download and/or print the game and you're ready to play! It's suitable for A2-B2 teenage and adult students who need to revise how to use the two present tenses. 

Hope you and your students like it and feel free to comment if you have any suggestions :) 

Humans of London: Rebecca's Story

After a long break (work, work, work), I'm back to share another activity that I created for my pre-intermediate/intermediate students to practice the past simple and the past continuous tenses.  The activity worked really well with my adult students but I'm sure your teens will enjoy it too.

Since my lesson inspired by Humans of New York has been quite popular (if you haven't checked it out yet, click here ), I decided to prepare something similar, but this time I looked for inspiration on Humans of London . 

To warm everybody up, ask your students if they know what Humans of New York/London/Amsterdam are. Have a quick discussion about the photoblogs and ask if there is any story your students would like to share if they were approached by a journalist working for any of these blogs. 

Tell your students they are going to read a story told by Rebecca- a middle-aged woman from London. Show them these two photos of Rebecca  and ask them to describe her appearance and think of some personality traits she might have (always elicit why). 

Now on the whiteboard write down these verbs: have, work, can, grow, cry, divorce, break up, run, lose, go, meet. Tell your students that all these verbs appear in Rebecca's story. Divide your students in pairs/small groups and ask them to write a story about Rebecca using the above verbs in the past simple and the past continuous forms.You might need to go over the forms with your students beforehand if their level is weaker. Give them enough time to complete the task and compare the stories they came up with. Correct where necessary. 

Then, give each student a copy of Rebecca's story which they have to complete with the right form of the verbs. Depending on their level, you might need to pre-teach some vocabulary. Give them enough time to do the task and check it together. Compare the real story to theirs and ask them what they think of it. 

Hope the lesson works for you as well as it did for me :) 

Be going to and will board game

The holidays are over, time to get back to work. 

Talking about New Year's resolutions is a great excuse to revise future structures, and since I know my students confuse the use of be going to and will when they talk about the future, I'm planning to concentrate on these two forms in my first lesson of 2018. 

To warm everybody up I show them Friends New Year's Resolutions video or New Year's Resolutions comic by Incidental Comics and engage them in a discussion about New Year's resolutions- the choice of the prompt depends on the level of my students and their interests. Some of the questions I might ask to prompt discussion are:

1. Do you make New Year's resolutions?

2. What are some New Year's resolutions you have made in the past?

3. Are there any New Year's resolutions you have kept? 

4. Are there any tips how to keep one's New Year's resolutions?

5. Are there any New Year's resolutions you have broken? Why?

6. Do you think making New Year's resolutions is a good idea? Why?

I'm pretty sure my students will use be going to and will interchangeably so I'm planning to point out some basic differences between the two structures (i.e. be going to is used to talk about already made decisions, plans and intentions while will is used to talk about predictions, spontaneous decisions, and promises). After eliciting a few examples and making sure everybody understands the form and use of the structures, I'm going to move on to playing a game to practice! All my students love board games so I've made a  be going to or will board game in which students have to throw the dice and answer the questions from the squares they land on. They can only stay where they have landed if they answer the question using the correct future form. Remember to encourage your students to avoid giving short answers- the longer their answers, the better :) 

Modern Cinderella Christmas Story

Only 10 days till Christmas and I'm buzzing with excitement already! In the meantime, however, I'm trying to keep my students as thrilled about the festive season as I am. To this end, I've been playing a lot of Christmas music and my beloved Christmas adverts. One of my most-liked Christmas advertisements this season is #YouShall Find Your Fairytale Christmas  by Debenhams (a British department store). I love it because it retells one of my favourite childhood fairytales (Cinderella), and it's narrated by the greatest actor EVER, Ewan McGregor 💖 That's all I need to feel happy right now! 

This spot is a great material for a storytelling lesson where students practise narrating a story using a variety of past tenses and interesting vocabulary. It also gives a perfect opportunity to involve your students in a discussion about the importance of social media in our lives. 

Scroll down to have a look at my attempt to make a good use of this video.

First of all, show your students these  two photos  and introduce the people as the protagonists of a story. Have your students come up with information about the two characters. Encourage them to be creative and brainstorm both appearance and personality adjectives for each character. I even ask my students to invent names for the people as well as their likes, dislikes, hobbies, etc...the more your students get into the task, the better. 

When the profiles of the characters are ready, divide your students in pairs or small groups and give each of them a set of   picture story  . Tell your students the story they're looking at isn't complete so they need to think of an interesting ending of the story. If you want to spice the activity up, you can cut out the pictures, change their order, and ask your students to arrange the pictures into the logical order to create a coherent story. 

Before they roll up their sleeves and get their creative juices flowing, elicit a few features of a good story, i.e. interesting adjectives, past tenses, a range of connectors. Depending on the level of my students I spend some time on revising the aforementioned features or I just move on to the task and monitor the pair/group work. 

Once the stories are ready, have each pair/group share their version of the story with their own ending. Then, play the video and compare the stories. Write down any vocabulary that you think your students might find difficult. 

To follow up, you can involve your students in a discussion about social media and ask them some of the questions below:

• Do you think social network sites are good?
• What do you use social network sites for?
• How often do you connect to social media?
• How much information do you think is appropriate to put on social media?
• What are the advantages of social media?
• What are the disadvantages of social media?
•  Are social media good or bad for relationships? 

If you're looking for more festive season activities, check out  this post in which I shared some of my favourite xmas lesson ideas. 

Merry Christmas!

Tell me about the company you work for

After a very busy month of work and travels I'm back with a quick activity suitable for Business English learners at pre-intermediate-intermediate levels.

I have recently started teaching a business English course to a group of adults who need to become more confident at speaking English in order to communicate with their international partners and clients. Even though their receptive skills are very strong, they struggle to express themselves without getting stuck for words. I've been trying to expand their vocabulary and involve them in a lot of speaking activities in order to encourage them to start using the language they already understand so well.

This lesson, which involves reading and speaking exercises, enhances students' vocabulary and helps them talk about the company they work for. 

First of all, show your students the four logos from  handout 1 (page 1) and encourage them to share anything they know about the companies. Then, show them the four texts one page 2 (the texts are taken from Wikipedia) and ask them to read the texts quickly and decide which companies are described in each text. Next, students should read the texts more carefully and underline some phrases used to talk about companies (e.g. the company empowers people to experience the world). After quick feedback give your students the list of useful phrases (page 3) and go over the ones that haven't been mentioned yet. I always give and elicit examples to check whether my students really understand the phrases and are able to use them.

At this stage students should be familiar with vocabulary needed to describe a company. They should also know what kind of information they are expected to give when talking about an organisation.
Divide them in pairs and give each pair an envelope with a logo of a company and some facts they can use to talk about it ( handout 2) Together they should discuss the companies using the vocabulary from the previous activities. Monitor the task and help if necessary. After a few minutes ask each pair to tell their classmates about their company (encourage them to take turns in speaking so that everybody gets a chance to speak).

Wrap up the lesson by asking your students to tell you about the company they work for. No excuses now- they have been given enough practice to be able to do that task without any problems :)

Witches' brew

Days are getting shorter and colder and supermarkets offer special deals on sweets. I don't even have to look at the calendar to know Halloween is just around the corner. All Saints' Eve is my younger students' favourite celebration so I always digress a bit from our programme and try to make something special a few days before 31 October.

In this fun activity, students learn vocabulary related to cooking and revise the imperative form by writing their own recipe for a magic potion made of horrid ingredients of their own choice.

I usually start this lesson with a general discussion about cooking. I ask my students if they like preparing food and I encourage them to tell me about the dishes they can prepare.

Then I hand out a few recipes and together we make a list of verbs and other words which they might find useful in writing their own recipe (I make sure to write everything up on the whiteboard as they will have to use that vocabulary later).
At this stage I also elicit that the imperative form is used when writing a recipe. Depending on my students' level I decide whether it's necessary to explain the imperative form in detail or a quick revision is enough. There are a number of recipes you can use here: you can choose a more elaborate recipe for your more advanced students or a simple one for your less proficient pupils. Click here to have a look at my favourite Halloween recipes.

OK. so students are now familiar with the structure of a typical recipe and know a lot of cooking words. They have seen a few examples and are ready to create their own recipe...BUT there are a few things they need to do before they roll up their sleeves and get down to hard work.

First of all, I show them this short video and elicit answers to two questions:

1. What is White Queen making? A magic potion.
2. What does the potion do? It makes Alice shorter. 

Now I tell students they're going to make a special recipe for their own magic brew. In order to do that, they need to think of three things:

a) What will your magic potion do?
b) What ingredients will you need?
c) A step by step, detailed instruction how to make your portion.

It's important to point out that a good magic potion doesn't include "typical" ingredients...I always help pupils come up with yucky, hair-raising ingredients and let their imagination run wild. Some of the ingredients might include eye balls, finger/toe nails, witch's tooth, drops/millilitres/litres of tears/sweat/saliva/snot, nose hair, tongue, fingers, toes, earwax, eyelashes...The more imaginative and detailed the list of ingredients is , the more interesting the outcome, so I make sure to help everybody with gruesome vocab.

I never forget to play some spine-chilling Halloween music to get everyone's creative juices flowing. You might find this  Halloween Music Playlist handy.

SPOOOOOKY  BREWING EVERYONE!

P.S. If you're looking for more teaching ideas for Halloween, have a look at these websites:

https://onthesamepageelt.wordpress.com/2016/10/22/using-context-clues-ten-halloween-songs/

https://www.fluentu.com/blog/educator-english/esl-halloween-activities/

http://busyteacher.org/17448-10-fun-halloween-games-english-practice.html

https://oupeltglobalblog.com/2014/10/23/efl-classroom-activities-and-resources-for-halloween/

https://www.eslkidstuff.com/HalloweenGames.htm

https://www.esolcourses.com/links/halloween-resources.html

http://bogglesworldesl.com/halloween_worksheets.htm

https://www.facebook.com/onthesamepage.elt/posts/2057350524282458:0

http://consiliumeducation.com/itm/2017/10/19/halloween-for-early-years/

https://speakinggames.files.wordpress.com/2016/01/delta-downloads-2-e28093-halloween-riddle-maze.pdf

http://www.mes-english.com/flashcards/halloween.php

https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/halloween

https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/halloween-2

https://tekhnologic.wordpress.com/2015/10/04/trick-or-treat-the-game/

Now and then

This is just a quick post to say hi and share this PowerPoint presentation which I created for my students with whom I want to revise some past and present structures, and vocabulary related to people's physical appearance.

It's a simple prompt but it might do the trick and encourage learners to describe both present and past states and habits using a variety of structures such as comparatives, the present simple, past simple, used to/would + infinitive.

It can be used as a time-filler activity or an additional activity to supplement your coursebook. 

I'm sure the presentation will interest students of various ages and levels.


P.S. If you're looking for more activities to revise the structure used to + infinitive, these songs and gap fills might be just perfect for you:

Gotye "Somebody I used to know" + the song

Johnny Cash "She used to love me a lot" + the song


I'll be happy to hear from you if you have any ideas how to use these photos in teaching. Feel free to share :)