Noticing-the-gap-activities

The teacher sets up the context for a speech event – e.g. two people fixing a date to meet or someone returning a faulty item to a shop.

1) Learners are paired off and attempt to perform a task, using the linguistic means they have.

2) Then they listen to the recording – or watch a video – or two experts performing the same task.

Recordings of skilled speakers performing the task are played

- Introduce the speakers on the cassette;

- Make sure the students realise the speakers are doing a similar task to the one they will do or have done;

- Make sure they know that you don’t expect them to understand everything. Tell them it might sound difficult to start with, but you will play several times.

Having listened to the task being performed learners should then have the chance of studying the transcript of the recording. They can be asked to note any features such as useful expressions that they would like to incorporate into their performance.

Variant of the notice-the-gap activity:

We allow the learner to perform the task in the L1 and then reformulate it in the target language allowing the student to see the difference.

Minuting the lesson

The learners can be asked to reflect on the lesson and recall anything that they consciously noted.

The students are asked to write down a personal note in the form of “something someone said that surprised me” or “a word or expression I particularly liked” tec.

Controlled practice

Drilling

The notion of practised control need not rule out the value of some mechanical and repetitive activities of the type traditionally associated with drilling.

Drilling – imitating and repeating words, phrases, and even whole utterances

After the students have listened to a taped dialogue they may be asked to repeat some isolated specific phrases or utterances. If all the dialogue were drilled the benefit would be lost!

Drilling may help in the storing and retrieving of the chunks and catchphrases etc.

Milling activities

They involve learners walking around, asking all the other learners questions with a view of completing a survey or finding a close match.

For example: Would you ever go hang-gliding? Would you ever eat a snake?

Ask your partner the following questions, take some notes and then report the information about him/her to the class.

1. When do you usually get up?

2. Do you do exercises in the morning? Do you go jogging?

3. Do you usually have a shower?

4. What do you have for breakfast?

5. When do you leave home?

6. How many lessons do you have every day?

7. Do you have a lot of homework?

8. When do you come back home?

9. When do you have dinner? What do you have for dinner?

10. What do you do in the evening?

11. Do you read a book or watch TV before you go to bed?

12. When do you go to bed?

Writing activities

Date: 2015-12-18; view: 1181