BTS Industriel -- Listening exercises & Discussion About Obligations

Last week's lesson went pretty well, so I thought I would give it a little share. Our subject of the day was obligation, so we focused mostly on the phrases, "you must + verb", "you have to" and "you mustn't" or "you can't".

My second-year BTS students here in France started out by listening to this text, between ESL-Lab's Randall and his daughter. I liked this text because it talks about possibility (can/can't) and obligation (you have to). I prepared this grid to help the students with the listening exercise:

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday

The students were asked to listen to the script and write the daughter's obligations and activities in the grid with times, if possible. What is confusing is that the daughter starts off by asking if she can go see the movie on Wednesday so students immediately start to write "Go to the movies" on Wednesday, only to find out that her father says no. As the dad and the daughter discuss what needs to be done and negotiate the daughter's freedom, have your students write as many possibilities as they can hear. Then discuss it as a group, writing down the different obligations and explaining the ones they missed (maybe even listening to the tricky parts again) to give them something to visualize. I also took a moment to point out that they are American, and we know this because they talk about "movies" and "soccer", and not "cinema" and "football". 

Next, we continued with the theme of obligation by looking at some warning signs. 

I started out by asking the class where they could see these kinds of signs. Then, I had the students volunteer to make sentences. For example, where it says, "Danger: no smoking", a student would say something like, "you mustn't smoke at school," or "it's forbidden to smoke in public places." We continued onward practicing the "you mustn't" and "you can't" structures until all signs had been discussed.

Next, the students listened to this short text  about which rules you have to follow when you visit a national park. The woman talks about 4 rules which I had the students write down, and she ends the audio by talking about the consequences. Once students had identified the four rules and the consequences, we moved on to our speaking exercise. 

In groups of three, I gave the students one of the following places: 

The City Zoo

A Textile Factory

A Pharmacy

The Public Hospital

ABC Construction Site

GoodFoods Supermarket

A Hair Salon

A Shopping Mall 

I asked the groups to prepare ten rules that either employees, customers or visitors (depending on the place) have to follow, and then to think of appropriate consequences. They had about 20 minutes to brainstorm and write their ideas while I walked around and answered questions, and once everybody had finished they presented group by group, sharing their rules and consequences. 

A First-Lesson Lesson Plan

My go-to first lessons typically involve introductions. It's a useful skill for just about everybody and it gives the teacher the opportunity to get a feel for the class from the very first day. 

With my professional students, we'll usually start with formal introductions and introducing a partner, practicing structures like, "this is so-and-so. He's responsible for..." using key verbs for business people. With my BTS students though, I wanted to do something differently.

With all of my BTS students, 1st and 2nd years alike, I have them write their name and stick it on their desk to help me learn their names. Every week they automatically get them out, and every week I learn a few more names! (I have about a hundred students...) 

Another classroom management tip is that I'll choose the first volunteer, and once they have given their answer (or whatever I have asked for), I'll let them choose who goes next. This way, it's as if they are "rewarded" for participating, and it motivates more students to volunteer from the get-go because they want to be able to "choose their destiny" in a sense -- they'd rather go first then randomly be picked during the mix. 

Here are my ideas for successful first lessons! 

For my 2nd year students:

A fun start: Two truths and a lie! 

I had each student write a short introduction (hi, my name is, I'm X years old, I live in...) and then end their introduction with two truths and a lie. Then, the class had to react -- "I think X is a lie." When the class finds the lie, the student sits down. This is a nice way to get to know some facts about the class. 

Just because it's the first day doesn't mean we can't get straight to work, so then we did a listening exercise taken from the BBC: Entrepreneurs: BBC English Express. 

Because the text is only a minute long, we could listen to it a number of times before discussing, and then listen again when nobody in the class could answer my general questions. 

I had each student take notes about the four speakers (one narrator and three people being interviewed). Their goal was to be able to summarize what each person said: what do they want to do, and why? 

Then, once everybody had the answers and an overall understanding of the text, I asked them to brainstorm and to write their own response to this question:

An investor agrees to give you 100k€ to start a business. What is your plan? (Think about the who/what/when/where/why/how). 

After 15-20 minutes of writing, I let the students present following the tip given above -- I chose the first one, and then after that they choose whoever they want to go next. For this exercise, I had them stand up in front of the class. Most students only spoke for about 30 seconds, but that is a great start! 

For my 1st year students:

I had them start pretty much the same way: introductions and two truths and a lie. Then, I had them play the game "find somebody who", where they had to ask the right question using "be" or "do" as an auxiliary. When they finished the exercise, we went over it as a class, correcting their sentence structure and learning things about each other. I also took advantage of this opportunity to ask the students (as a group) other questions: When is your birthday? Do you have any brothers or sisters? Where were you born? What other languages can you speak? 

Find someone in the class who:

 Has a birthday in December   ________________________________

Was born in the same month as you ___________________________

Likes pizza   ______________________________________________

Has a pet ________________________________________________

Was born outside this country   ______________________________

Likes listening to rock music   ________________________________

Wants to travel to Australia   _________________________________

Has a sister   _____________________________________________

Has no brothers or sisters ___________________________________

Doesn’t like tomatos   ______________________________________

Plays basketball   _________________________________________

Favorite color is green   ____________________________________

Loves English   ___________________________________________

Speaks another language ___________________________________

New Lessons: BTS Industriel here in France

It may have been a long time since I've posted anything in this blog, but that certainly does not mean that I have stopped planning lessons -- au contraire! 

At the beginning of September and despite previous promises to myself, I decided to accept a teaching position in a BTS (post-high school, 2-year technical degree) school, training students to become Opticians. They will have to take the BTS Industriel which I found a bit silly, but it makes more sense than taking a commercial BTS degree when only a part of their responsibilities will be commercial and the rest will be quite technical. 

To sum up the program, I'm teaching four kinds of classes: One group of 2nd year students who are apprentices, two groups of 2nd year students who are full-time students, one group of "prepa" students who weren't accepted into the first year but after a year of catch-up courses should be admitted next year, and two groups of first-year, full-time students. 

I only have an hour with my apprentices and my prep-class kids per week. Otherwise my lessons are an hour and a half long. 

I've decided to structure my lessons as follows: 

1. Corrections of the previous week's quiz (graded every week -- yes this sucks, but I think it will be truly beneficial for them in the long run to see their mistakes on the board and to participate in mistake correction as a group). 

2. A quiz: use last week's vocabulary words in a sentence or correct the mistakes, and this week I'm going to try a listening quiz with multiple choice questions. Again, the idea is to correct the mistakes as a class & continually assess their needs and my methods.

3. Listening practice: For the BTS exam, students will have to listen to a text and be able to sum it up in French (I think). My goal is to have them summarizing texts in English so that when they have to do it in French, it'll be a breeze. I always try to over-prepare my students so that when it comes time for the exam, they'll be more than ready. 

4. A grammar or a vocabulary point. We've already covered vocabulary about school (trainee, apprentice, a graduate, a diploma, etc.) and we've covered adverbs of frequency (1st years) and modal verbs (2nd years). Either I ask them to write or discuss a topic that I give them, and then we do a class brainstorm. 

5. Reading or writing: This is either an article or an excerpt of an article, either followed by a presentation or group work. Normally there is some kind of writing or speaking preparation involved and I try to switch it up every week.

and finally:

6. Presenting. This is where they either individually or in pairs/small groups present whatever they have prepared in the previous step (or 2). 

By the time we've made it through all the steps, they've done a little bit of everything -- listening and speaking, reading and writing, and hopefully assimilated a number of new vocabulary words. This method requires a lot of work outside the classroom on their end, but I feel like our time in class is pretty well spent. 

As the semester progresses, I'll share some of my lesson plans (beyond just my structure) and the links I've found to various listening exercises and articles. My goal as a teacher is to be able to construct well-prepared lesson plans every week and to consistently keep up with my grading in order to have corrections to give them. I also like to take the time to write corrections on their homework rather than just giving them a grade and handing it back. I want them to be able to read over it, think about it, and ask questions if necessary. 

Technology & Innovation: A follow-up

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?

Infographic lesson plan: Modals, futures & probability

On Sunday night as I was browsing for topics for this week's lessons with my professional adult ESL students here in France, I found the following infographic on the BBC website.


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.

Around the World -- Grammar game

Yesterday I posted the rules to my game called "Circle of Death" which is a variation on a drinking game, adapted to a classroom, for a more advanced/confident English speaker. Today I'll post the rules to a modified version that I created to accompany a group of pre-intermediate and intermediate adult ESL learners here in France.

I call this version "Around the World" and it requires the exact same set up as "Circle of Death".
As always, it's a good idea to have plenty of print outs of the rules for the participants and a full deck of cards with jokers.

Around the World Grammar Game

Rules:

Sit in a circle, each player draws a card and completes the corresponding action one at a time.

Evens – Questions on the right

Odds – Questions on the left

Correct answer = +5 points

Incorrect answer = - 5 points

2's : Ask a question to the person on your right using a “do”

3's : Ask a question to the person on your left using “to be” .

4's : Ask a question to the person on your right using “did”.

5's : Ask a question to the person on your left using “was” or “were”.

6's : Ask a question to the person on your right using the future tense.

7's : Ask a question to the person on your left using “if”.

8's : Ask a question of your choice to the person of your choice.

(Now for some fun..)

9's : You are the rule master. You can make any rule for the table to follow. You get 10 points.

10's : Stand up and mime an animal. The first person to guess correctly gets 10 points.

Jacks : “Categories” – Choose a category and each player must say a word in the category. The first player who can't think of a word in the category loses 10 points.

Queens: “7's” : Going in a circle, each player must count by 7 (7..14..21..etc) and the first player to make a mistake loses 10 points.

Kings: “Truth?” Ask the player of your choice a truthful question. (+5 for asking correctly and +5 for answering correctly) 

Aces: The teacher makes a rule for all of the players to follow. (points vary depending on the rule)

Joker: You can choose to add ten points to your score or to subtract ten points from the player of your choice. 

Circle Of Death Grammar Game

A year ago I was brainstorming ideas that I could use with my professional students in our talk sessions. Sometimes it's not easy to get people talking, especially when it's the middle of the day and they are thinking about whatever needs to get done in the afternoon. I like to use as many games as possible as discussion topics are often monotonous and tiresome.

I took the idea for this exercise directly from a drinking game, I admit. I created two versions: the upper-intermediate/advanced version, and the pre-intermediate/intermediate version. The version I'm sharing in this post is my upper-intermediate/advanced version.

To play this game, you need a group (4+) and a traditional deck of 52 cards, jokers included.
The deck is passed from player to player and one at a time, they draw a card. Depending on what they draw, they must complete a task (see list below). They earn and lose points depending on how correct their answers are, and the game can be played indefinitely, as long as you can renew the deck and keep them talking. I use this game during a one-hour long talk session.

There are two types of tasks: grammar-related and amusing tasks. That keeps it light and fun. And as always, students of all ages love competition -- they will really enjoy giving and taking points from each other.

I recommend having enough print-outs of this game for every other student so that they can consult the list when they draw their card.

Without further ado, here are the rules for the Circle of Death Grammar Game for adult learners of ESL, upper-intermediate/advanced level:

Circle of Death Grammar Game

Rules:

Sit in a circle, each player draws a card and completes the corresponding action.

Evens – Questions on the right

Odds – Questions on the left

Correct answer = +5 points

Incorrect answer = - 5 points

2's : Ask a question to the person on your right using a superlative.

3's : Ask a question to the person on your left using “ever” .

4's : Ask a question to the person on your right using a regular past tense verb of your choice.

5's : Ask a question to the person on your left using an irregular past tense verb of your choice.

6's : Ask a question to the person on your right using the future tense.

7's : Ask a question to the person on your left using “would”.

8's : Ask a question of your choice to the person of your choice.

(Now for some fun..)

9's : You become the rule master. You can make any rule for the table to follow. Failure to follow the rule results in the loss of 10 points. 

10's : Stand up and mime an animal. The first person to guess correctly gets 10 points.

Jacks : “Categories” – Choose a category and each player must say a word in the category. The first player who can't think of a word in the category loses 10 points.

Queens: “7's” : Going in a circle, each player must count by 7 (7..14..21..etc) and the first player to make a mistake loses 10 points.

Kings: “Truth?” Ask the player of your choice a truthful question. +5 for asking and +5 for answering.

Aces: The teacher makes a rule for all of the players to follow. Failure to follow the rule results in the loss of 10 points. 

Joker: You can choose to add ten points to your score or to subtract ten points from the player of your choice.