Last week's lesson (okay, two weeks ago... last week I was off enjoying a ski vacation in fancy-pants Megeve) focused on using the futures and language of probability using a cool infographic grace à the BBC.
This week I was at a loss for what to do to follow up with this previous lesson, and then I got it. My professional adult ESL students here in France have been requesting the use of more articles and current events in our lessons, and on the front page of Yahoo! there was an article speculating on what Apple's next product would be. Because the article uses a lot of useful adjectives and appears to pitch the concept of a wearable computer to mass market, I thought it would be appropriate to use it not only to continue last week's discussion about the future and what is or isn't possible, but also to go back to our lessons about pitches. Which idea convinced you? Which feature do you think is most useful? Do you agree/disagree? What is your opinion? A lot of interesting and thought-provoking conversation followed, pulling out a number of useful vocabulary words.
Then, to practice comparing and contrasting, we watched the Google glasses project video on Youtube. We compared the two ideas and practiced talking about which product we preferred, what the similarities and differences were, the risks and the danger, and our overall opinions about the future of smartphone technology.
Overall, I have to say that this lesson was the perfect transition after the previous lesson's infographic. I'm really happy with the participation I had and with the fluency of my students. These were pre-intermediate and intermediate level students but I plan on doing the exact same lesson with my upper-intermediate and advanced students in the days to come.
When I'm lesson planning, I always think about what I want my end result to be and what I want my students to be able to "do". I think about my lesson plans in segments of "can-do", ending with a skill that is immediately applicable to the needs of the learner. My next challenge for myself is "what to do next?"
Any ideas? How would you follow up these two lessons integrating current events, infographics, and videos?
Monday, February 18, 2013
Tuesday, February 5, 2013
Infographic lesson plan: Modals, futures & probability
Original can be found here
I absolutely love infographics. I love them even more when they present a topic that I can cover in English class. There are so many possibilities for using the one I've posted here but I'll share my lesson plan with you which reviews modals & futures for talking about probability, likelihood and chance.
I did a 30-second review of modal verbs and the near future/distant future with my groups because these are topics we previously covered. Then I handed out the infographic and a "cheat sheet" introducing some expressions that I wanted them to try to use during the lesson including degree of probability and chance when giving their opinion.
After a few seconds, my adults started laughing a little bit to themselves. After everybody had showed some sign of comprehension, I started asking questions.
"What do you find funnny?"
"What do you find scary?"
"Does anything seem possible/impossible?"
"Do you agree/disagree with ...?"
And then the discussion started.
My advantage here that others might not have is that my students are western, and we work at a web agency. These topics are right up their alleys -- a bit sci-fi, a bit nerdy, some inspiring a dream or provoking an emotional reaction -- it was very easy to get them talking about these subjects. If your students work in a different field, you might try a generic Google search for infographics and try to see if something could fit their interests and needs. This one is just a perfect mix of grammar revision, discussion, and new vocabulary -- I was so pleased to find it!
Here's the "cheat sheet" I handed out to help facilitate the conversation:
Expressions
for talking about likelihood and probability:
In general:
It could
happen/ It might happen
If it
happens, then…
It’s
possible that…
There’s a
chance…
Most likely
(use of adverbs):
It’s
extremely likely that…
It’s very
possible that…
Least
likely (use of adverbs):
It is
highly unlikely that…
It’s nearly
impossible that…
It will
never happen
It could
never happen
It should
never happen
Future
tenses:
1. The near future : Planned &
programmed (Present continuous or “going to”)
a. I’m going to dance class tomorrow
night.
b. I’m pitching a proposal to a client
on Thursday afternoon.
2. The distant future: Uncertain,
unplanned (Will)
a. Maybe I will go to Spain on vacation
this summer, or maybe I won’t.
3. A snap decision: no time to think
(will)
a. The phone is ringing! Can you help
me? – I’ll get it.
b. I’m going to drop these boxes. Can
you give me a hand? – I’ll help you.
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