Today's lesson was a lot better than the last one. Actually I thought it was incredible how well the class participated in this lesson today...
My weekend was "something else" and so I got up very early this morning and meant to get the new question chunks ready to put them on the wall but they only made it to the blackboard and I forgot to take a picture. So this will by in the blog next Friday...
But I did make it a lot easier. I printed the list of auxiliary words (without the "do") on a yellow paper and the possible questions with auxiliary verbs on yellow paper too. The questions with "to do" are all on green paper.
WHY WITHOUT THE DO? Well even though "to do" might be an auxiliary verb, I don't ask a question like "Did you your homework?" like I ask questions with auxiliary verbs. I would say "Did you do your homework?" so I use "to do" just like a regular verb. That's why I took it from the list.
So at the beginning of the lesson, I asked the kids to discuss in pairs what the difference was between the yellow side and the green side. Each group had to give me an answer. In English of course and I just had to remind them once ;-) not all answers were correct but I accepted any English answer with a thumb up. As all groups were through I gave them the correct explanation which most of them found out anyway.
Then I handed out the vocabulary cards to each child and we played the game we played last week again. So I thought of a word from my list (bottle) and they had to guess. They were really excited and quiet eager to find the solution. With my second word I told them, that they could use their own vocabulary cards. So if they asked me "can you eat it?" and I said "no, I can't" than they could put aside all the food cards. This way the kids activate many different neuro-mechanisms (like Vera F. Birkenbihl calls them - this will all be part of my theory part of this bachelor thesis)
The kids categorise their vocabulary words.
They give them a meaning.
They ask questions.
They get an immediate feedback.
They are curious about the words I think about.
They play...
And probably even more. So this way of looking at the vocabulary is (according to Vera F. Birkenbihl) highly "brain-friendly". And it was fun too!!! The kids loved it.
This time I even managed to give all the kids a thumbs up when they said something in English and they could raise their flag a little higher.
Then I put them in groups of three. One of them should chose a word from the word cards and the other two should guess by asking those questions. Me and the head teacher walked around the classroom and listened to the questions and answers. Every time we heard a correct question or a correct answer like "yes, it is." or "no, I don't" the kids could go one up. I stressed this form of answering because I didn't want them to just to say "yes" or "no".
After about two minutes we both realises that pretty much all questions started with "is it ...?" So I interrupted them and asked them for more possible ways to ask like "can I drink it?", "do you have it in the kitchen" and so one. After having heard a bunch of different questions I let them go on.
I have to admit I was almost floating through the classroom. 17 kid sat there being very excited, speaking only English, asking mostly perfect questions, and getting excited as their flag reached the top of the pole. Some of them even took it down to -7 and wanted to go all the way up again :-)
About five minutes before the end of the lesson, I interrupted them and played the hangman game with them at the blackboard. So I drew as many lines as there were letters in the word I thought of and the kids had to guess the letters. First we went trough the alphabet together (I'll have to work on that too...) and then we played. They were allowed to look at the cards since I wanted them to think about their spelling.
So this really was a fun lesson and I'll definitely let them play these two games again.
Monday 16 November 2015
(Friday) 13th of November - not superstitious but...
OK... Today was definitely not my day... I'm not superstitious AT ALL but I really didn't have a good day. Nothing really came out the way I planned it. I'm not sure if the kids even realised but I did...
I will make this post as short as possible because it definitely wasn't my best lesson.
ACTIVE READING
First, I read the third part of the "Arctic Tern" text to them and they got it pretty fast, since they have already listened to the whole text passively for at least two hours.
QUESTIONS
Before the lesson, I put something on the wall that I thought would help them get the questions right BUT there is way too much on those papers... So this will definitely not stay at the wall!!!
And still, I gathered the class in front of the blackboard and went through those papers with them. I read possible questions to them and had them repeat them after me.
Then they went back to their desks and I told them, that I had a word in my mind and they had to find out what it was by asking questions I could answer with yes or now - so all sorts of questions without question words. First I thought of a kangaroo and then of a leaf. Actually I wanted to put them in groups of three and wanted them to do the same with the vocabulary of Unit 1 but I didn't get to cut them the card...
LISTENING COMPREHENSION
To end the lesson, I read another chapter of the "Wonder" to them. I put them in pairs to discuss what they had understood and we pretty much got the whole story together. It seems that they are really getting used to picking up the important information of a book, they don't know all the vocabulary. So I'll get another listening comprehension test ready for them soon.
Actually, this was it already... Seems like I didn't get to anything today...
PREPERATION FOR NEXT LESSON (VOCABULARY CARDS)
After the lesson I stayed behind and cut all the word cards that I had prepared. I made my own vocabulary list for this lesson because there is so much of "useless" vocabulary in the back of the Activity Book but rather useful vocabulary is missing. So I put the whole vocabulary, I want them to know, into the Quizlet and printed it out as small cards. But I found out that this will definitely be the one and only time I do this for the class. What I'll do next time is just to cut off the borders and down the middle column and let them cut those few lines themselves. But for this unit it's done.
I will make this post as short as possible because it definitely wasn't my best lesson.
ACTIVE READING
First, I read the third part of the "Arctic Tern" text to them and they got it pretty fast, since they have already listened to the whole text passively for at least two hours.
QUESTIONS
Before the lesson, I put something on the wall that I thought would help them get the questions right BUT there is way too much on those papers... So this will definitely not stay at the wall!!!
And still, I gathered the class in front of the blackboard and went through those papers with them. I read possible questions to them and had them repeat them after me.
Then they went back to their desks and I told them, that I had a word in my mind and they had to find out what it was by asking questions I could answer with yes or now - so all sorts of questions without question words. First I thought of a kangaroo and then of a leaf. Actually I wanted to put them in groups of three and wanted them to do the same with the vocabulary of Unit 1 but I didn't get to cut them the card...
LISTENING COMPREHENSION
To end the lesson, I read another chapter of the "Wonder" to them. I put them in pairs to discuss what they had understood and we pretty much got the whole story together. It seems that they are really getting used to picking up the important information of a book, they don't know all the vocabulary. So I'll get another listening comprehension test ready for them soon.
Actually, this was it already... Seems like I didn't get to anything today...
PREPERATION FOR NEXT LESSON (VOCABULARY CARDS)
After the lesson I stayed behind and cut all the word cards that I had prepared. I made my own vocabulary list for this lesson because there is so much of "useless" vocabulary in the back of the Activity Book but rather useful vocabulary is missing. So I put the whole vocabulary, I want them to know, into the Quizlet and printed it out as small cards. But I found out that this will definitely be the one and only time I do this for the class. What I'll do next time is just to cut off the borders and down the middle column and let them cut those few lines themselves. But for this unit it's done.
Wednesday 11 November 2015
9th of November 2015 - Our new speaking aim...
First thing in the morning, long time before the English lesson started, I asked the kids what flag they would like to have for their new flag pole. They could chose any English speaking country so I made many suggestions. 6 kids chose the USA, two chose Canada, 2 New Zealand, 1 Australia, 1 South Africa, 1 Ireland, 1 Great Britain, 1 Scotland, 1 England and 1 even chose Wales (I didn't even know how this flag looks but I thought that if I offer Scotland, which I just HAD TO offer, than I had to offer Wales and England as well, to be "politically correct")
So this is how those flags look now:
They all have a flagpole now with a range of numbers from -7 to 7 and the aim is to get the flag (which is glued to a peg) up as high as possible by speaking English and every time they say something in German, the flag goes down. I have to admit, that I have to get used to this first because it's not so easy to keep up with it and it made me realise how fast I get those few to answer me that always raise their hand. My personal aim with this flag is to see, who has not answered yet and to encourage them to do so...
Well the rest of this lesson is easily told.
FORMULATING QUESTIONS
We are still working on those question forms and I created a work sheet for them which we looked at together. I will mix the forms next time and I will hang a sheet of paper on the wall with all the auxiliary verbs because they need them for the negative forms as well... But right after having gone through those questions I was asked "Mrs. Kündig, do we must ... ?" from three different kids, so it's definitely not in their heads yet...
ACTIVE READING PART II
I read to them the second part of the "Arctic Tern" and as the kids where finished, they could go to and DIY...
More DIY Posts
For today, I decoded two songs they had on their wish list and had them ready on MP3 players. I also had all the Penguin Readers scanned in and a name list ready where they could write down, if they wanted me to print a book for them. And I had "Gossi the dragon" incl. MP3 players ready for the kids to look at.
It's a story by Karin Holenstein that has been decoded in German already and comes with the audio book as well. And I showed the class how to use the Ocean Treasures on my Lap Top.
READING A CHAPTER OUT OF THE WONDER
Again I read a chapter out of our book to the class. But this time without any questions. I just want them to get used to more complex texts and I asked them at the end, what they had understood and they understood quiet a lot. One of the next times I'll let them take notes and ask them to write a short resume about what they have understood :-)
Incredible how fast a single lesson of English flies by after having had 3 double lessons...
So this is how those flags look now:
They all have a flagpole now with a range of numbers from -7 to 7 and the aim is to get the flag (which is glued to a peg) up as high as possible by speaking English and every time they say something in German, the flag goes down. I have to admit, that I have to get used to this first because it's not so easy to keep up with it and it made me realise how fast I get those few to answer me that always raise their hand. My personal aim with this flag is to see, who has not answered yet and to encourage them to do so...
Well the rest of this lesson is easily told.
FORMULATING QUESTIONS
We are still working on those question forms and I created a work sheet for them which we looked at together. I will mix the forms next time and I will hang a sheet of paper on the wall with all the auxiliary verbs because they need them for the negative forms as well... But right after having gone through those questions I was asked "Mrs. Kündig, do we must ... ?" from three different kids, so it's definitely not in their heads yet...
ACTIVE READING PART II
I read to them the second part of the "Arctic Tern" and as the kids where finished, they could go to and DIY...
More DIY Posts
For today, I decoded two songs they had on their wish list and had them ready on MP3 players. I also had all the Penguin Readers scanned in and a name list ready where they could write down, if they wanted me to print a book for them. And I had "Gossi the dragon" incl. MP3 players ready for the kids to look at.
It's a story by Karin Holenstein that has been decoded in German already and comes with the audio book as well. And I showed the class how to use the Ocean Treasures on my Lap Top.
READING A CHAPTER OUT OF THE WONDER
Again I read a chapter out of our book to the class. But this time without any questions. I just want them to get used to more complex texts and I asked them at the end, what they had understood and they understood quiet a lot. One of the next times I'll let them take notes and ask them to write a short resume about what they have understood :-)
Incredible how fast a single lesson of English flies by after having had 3 double lessons...
Friday 6 November 2015
Teach yourself Posten - Karin Holenstein
6th of November 2015 - MANY different things...
THE AIM OF SPEAKING ENGLISH IN CLASS
For today I wanted to think of a way of getting them to speak English instead of German in class because they are still so used to replying in German whenever I ask them something in English. So I asked them at the beginning of the lesson, if they liked their "speaking grade" so far and all of them said yes because they all did so well in the two Speaking tasks they had so far. I told them, that I would add an ongoing speaking task now which will also give them a grade. So if it's just a regular lesson I put my Australian flag on the front table and this means that we are in Australia and that we are not allowed to speak any other language than English. I divided their attendance or name table in two columns, one for negative and one for positive. So each time I hear something in German I would draw a line on the negative side and since I just did not want them to be quiet all the time I would draw a line on the positive side for every English answer or question. It was only allowed to use German words for vocabulary clarification like "How can I say _____ in English". Well they got the point and after I had drawn about 5 lines on the negative side they really started sticking to the English but there was no way I could draw all these positive lines anymore so I told them that today was like the final rehearsal and we would start this on Monday but with a different method. Well what I would really love is a little flag pole with a flag and if you press on the + the flag goes up and if you press on the - the flag goes down. That would help me pick the ones that haven't yet said a lot. Because I always see how far up they are... But I'm not sure if I can organise something like this till Monday. Maybe just a wooden stick and a peg with a flag stuck to. Well, I thought about coins but that way I won't be able to see how far they are... But it was amazing that they really stuck to English from then on. I should have done this "years ago".
FORMULATING QUESTIONS
I had three blackboards ready and handed out some paper to take notes. I made a statement like "it is snowing" and asked them to formulate a question. After several wrong tries and lots of hints we found out that the question was "Is it snowing?" - "You speak English" was turned into "Speak you English..." but they agreed that it sounded strange so we found out that it's "Do you speak English". I wrote all the questions with the "to do" on the right hand backboard and all the questions with an auxiliary verb on the left one. Then I asked them what the difference was but they just saw that one side started with "to do" and the other one didn't... So I wanted to start with the whole explanation about the sentence having an auxiliary verb or not but I saw it in their faces that they needed something different to "ventilate" their brains because this whole thing about finding the right questions was pretty difficult for them. And the bell was about to ring so I'll leave this for next Monday's lesson... I'll create a worksheet for them. An easier one this time ;-)
DIY (do it yourself)
For this lesson I prepared some DIY "posts" (I don't know if this is the right English word...)
So, in 2-3 weeks we'll be finished with our Unit 1 and so I'd like to get the kids ready for Unit 2. But this time I'll do it differently. The first text we read has 3 pages and I split it into 3 parts and do the active reading just as part of three lessons and not like last time as I read the whole text over and over again which took me over a whole lesson.
So I wrote the following procedure at the blackboard: (I wrote the key words and explained what I meant.)
For today I wanted to think of a way of getting them to speak English instead of German in class because they are still so used to replying in German whenever I ask them something in English. So I asked them at the beginning of the lesson, if they liked their "speaking grade" so far and all of them said yes because they all did so well in the two Speaking tasks they had so far. I told them, that I would add an ongoing speaking task now which will also give them a grade. So if it's just a regular lesson I put my Australian flag on the front table and this means that we are in Australia and that we are not allowed to speak any other language than English. I divided their attendance or name table in two columns, one for negative and one for positive. So each time I hear something in German I would draw a line on the negative side and since I just did not want them to be quiet all the time I would draw a line on the positive side for every English answer or question. It was only allowed to use German words for vocabulary clarification like "How can I say _____ in English". Well they got the point and after I had drawn about 5 lines on the negative side they really started sticking to the English but there was no way I could draw all these positive lines anymore so I told them that today was like the final rehearsal and we would start this on Monday but with a different method. Well what I would really love is a little flag pole with a flag and if you press on the + the flag goes up and if you press on the - the flag goes down. That would help me pick the ones that haven't yet said a lot. Because I always see how far up they are... But I'm not sure if I can organise something like this till Monday. Maybe just a wooden stick and a peg with a flag stuck to. Well, I thought about coins but that way I won't be able to see how far they are... But it was amazing that they really stuck to English from then on. I should have done this "years ago".
FORMULATING QUESTIONS
I had three blackboards ready and handed out some paper to take notes. I made a statement like "it is snowing" and asked them to formulate a question. After several wrong tries and lots of hints we found out that the question was "Is it snowing?" - "You speak English" was turned into "Speak you English..." but they agreed that it sounded strange so we found out that it's "Do you speak English". I wrote all the questions with the "to do" on the right hand backboard and all the questions with an auxiliary verb on the left one. Then I asked them what the difference was but they just saw that one side started with "to do" and the other one didn't... So I wanted to start with the whole explanation about the sentence having an auxiliary verb or not but I saw it in their faces that they needed something different to "ventilate" their brains because this whole thing about finding the right questions was pretty difficult for them. And the bell was about to ring so I'll leave this for next Monday's lesson... I'll create a worksheet for them. An easier one this time ;-)
DIY (do it yourself)
For this lesson I prepared some DIY "posts" (I don't know if this is the right English word...)
- READING BOOKS: I brought all the Level 1 and Level 2 Penguin Readers with me. I have 2 "level 1" books and 9 "level 2" books. I have a few level 3 books at home but I want them to try the level 2 first because they have the A2 level which the class is supposed to have after primary school (if they are good, and of course I want them to be good :-))
 |
| Level 1 books |
 |
| Level 2 books |
- WRITING LETTERS OR DIALOGUES: I had lots of writing paper ready so they could write letters in English to someone or if they wanted to work in pairs they could write down a dialogue... So just writing in stead of speaking.
- LISTENING TO SONGS: I will have decoded songs ready for them to listen to and learn the lyrics but I just didn't get to do this yet. I will start with about two or three songs to chose from but they will become more and more.
- READING "OCEAN TREASURES" ON THE LAP TOP: I put a Birkenbihl language course on my lap top they can use. But this one I'll have to explain first.
- WATCHING ENGLISH DVDS - I will get some DVDs they can watch in English with English subtitles so they can read along while they hear the words so they'll have the same effect...
So, in 2-3 weeks we'll be finished with our Unit 1 and so I'd like to get the kids ready for Unit 2. But this time I'll do it differently. The first text we read has 3 pages and I split it into 3 parts and do the active reading just as part of three lessons and not like last time as I read the whole text over and over again which took me over a whole lesson.
So I wrote the following procedure at the blackboard: (I wrote the key words and explained what I meant.)
- Read quietly and highlight the unknown words in German.
- (While I read it over and over again)
- 1. time - read the German part while I read the English part.
- 2. time - read the English part except for the highlighted German words (so all words you don't understand yet.)
- next times - Read more and more in English and just the words you don't understand German
- When you think you understood it all - Turn over your paper and just listen one more time.
- > Understood it all? - if YES get up quietly and DIY, if NOT then read along a few more times until you really understood it all, then turn over your paper again...
- and so on...
Thursday 5 November 2015
2nd of November 2015 - first listening comprehension
Well these two lessons were a complete mix of many different things. Most of them I have already written lots about and so I will just mention them...
I created a worksheet but I don't think it's all that good afterwards. I wanted to give them the idea of an English question with the "how much is there" in it, so I gave them one example, and then less and less help the further they got. But it looks a little complicated...
I explained it and told them to write those things they found outside, inside these gaps. Well they did this with very little trouble and by the end, everyone of them could formulate a correct question including the answer. But I realised that there were so many more questions and just with this one "is/are there" formulation, they still didn't initialise how to formulate questions (with the help of "to do") so I'll try to have an exercise ready for next lesson.
Then I did something rather unexpected. In German I'm reading a wonderful book called "Wunder" to the class and we discuss about those characters a lot. I have the same book in English as well so the night before I created a listening comprehension test for them for the next chapter.
First I handed out the questions and clarified the vocabulary to make sure they know what they have to listen for. Then I read these three pages to them: Page1, Page2, Page3
I formulated possible answers always with words that appeared in the text somewhere close and I guess I read it a bit fast and since it was their first try I graded them pretty gently. All 6 correct = 6 / 5 correct = 5.5 / 4 correct = 5 / 3 correct = 4.5 / 2 correct = 4... I will try to do this more often to get them used to listening very carefully.
Well the next lesson, when I gave back the test, I went through the questions with them again and one by one and then I read and asked them to say stop whenever they heard the correct answer so we could discuss it. As I read, I always stressed those words that were in the wrong answers so they could hear why they couldn't be correct. Now after hearing it for the second time it seamed a lot clearer for them and I remembered the Oxford YLPT where they heard all the texts twice. So maybe I'll read it to them twice next time. We found all the answers together and at the end I read the chapter in German to them. I think that there were some light bulb moments for them after finally understanding every word ;-)
- We sang one of our songs and the "vida la vida" with the gestures.
- I read the "shopping for a school camp" again but only when they needed me. So for example I said: "Betty, Tom and..." and then they went on with "Oliver are going camping with their class... and so on" In the whole text I needed to help about 6 times and they just spoke the rest of it all by themselves.
- I asked them to explain me something about many and much and just let them talk so I got:
- countable / uncountable
- plural forms / singular forms
- and many things out of the text that these expressions were used with like "how many tomatoes", "how much spaghetti" and many more.
I created a worksheet but I don't think it's all that good afterwards. I wanted to give them the idea of an English question with the "how much is there" in it, so I gave them one example, and then less and less help the further they got. But it looks a little complicated...
I explained it and told them to write those things they found outside, inside these gaps. Well they did this with very little trouble and by the end, everyone of them could formulate a correct question including the answer. But I realised that there were so many more questions and just with this one "is/are there" formulation, they still didn't initialise how to formulate questions (with the help of "to do") so I'll try to have an exercise ready for next lesson.
Then I did something rather unexpected. In German I'm reading a wonderful book called "Wunder" to the class and we discuss about those characters a lot. I have the same book in English as well so the night before I created a listening comprehension test for them for the next chapter.
First I handed out the questions and clarified the vocabulary to make sure they know what they have to listen for. Then I read these three pages to them: Page1, Page2, Page3
I formulated possible answers always with words that appeared in the text somewhere close and I guess I read it a bit fast and since it was their first try I graded them pretty gently. All 6 correct = 6 / 5 correct = 5.5 / 4 correct = 5 / 3 correct = 4.5 / 2 correct = 4... I will try to do this more often to get them used to listening very carefully.
Well the next lesson, when I gave back the test, I went through the questions with them again and one by one and then I read and asked them to say stop whenever they heard the correct answer so we could discuss it. As I read, I always stressed those words that were in the wrong answers so they could hear why they couldn't be correct. Now after hearing it for the second time it seamed a lot clearer for them and I remembered the Oxford YLPT where they heard all the texts twice. So maybe I'll read it to them twice next time. We found all the answers together and at the end I read the chapter in German to them. I think that there were some light bulb moments for them after finally understanding every word ;-)
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