Recently, I started lessons with Athena and Vicky who who didn't have the chance to learn much English at school. English will be their third language and third alphabet as they already know Russian and Greek. I'm trying to use many of the new ideas that I've picked up from the internet in our lessons and they seem to be working.
One thing I do insist on is that they record themselves speaking. I cannot stress strongly enough the benefits of getting students to do this. In our lessons that means using the listening exercises from the Headway book we're doing. After every short such exercise I ask them to practice saying them on their own (thankfully, the book has transcripts at the back), recording their performance and, if necessary, redoing it. As most newer mobile phones have audio recording capability no special equipment is needed.
4 comments:
I couldn't agree more about getting the students to speak as part of their homework. I have noticed a huge increase in their speaking ability after assigning actual speaking homework.
I use an online voiceboard (www.ishout.net,but it is in Korean)and assingn weekly speaking assignments. With the young learners,I have them read their storybooks outloud. The beauty of the online service is that it is very easy to check, and you can set it so other students in the class can listen. Because others are listening, they practice more. I can leave a comment right on the webpage.
Have you tried giving them audio books along with the print version? That seems to work well with more advanced students.
Also vlogging might be another way to encourage them to speak.
Excellent idea. It works well when you have a computer room. I use audacity (you can download it for free), students record themselves and then they can save their recording and take them home in their pendrives.
Nice blog. Good luck.
Carmen Gloria Sáez
cgsaez@gmail.com
Great idea. The only problem is my school doesn't have PCs so it's not really an option for me. However, most of the students have cell phones which can record voice or video so they can do the same job
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