1st year ESO

             

           1. WORD BY WORD

 

Image: Maria Novozhilova

          

           "TRAINERS", by Benita Gómez

1.      The students look at the word and they are given five minutes to work in pairs. They have to write as many words as they can with the letters of the word “trainers”.

Once they have done this exercise, the teacher writes on the blackboard all the words the students have found in the given time.

Accept all logical answers.

2.      Next, the teacher writes three columns in the black board.

Nouns, verbs and prepositions. Students  have to classify the words they have found previously.

-The students classify the words  in the right column.

NOUNS

Verbs        Past/ P.Partici

Prepositions

ears	Rise                  risen	in
tears	Sit                      sat	at
seat	Eat                    ate	near
ant	sent	inter
star	set                     set
sea	Rain
tea	Earn
air	Are
rain	Is
train
ten
rat
It (pronoun)
a/ an (articles)
trainer

3.      The students are given five minutes more and they have to write as many sentences as they can, using words from the table. They have to use the nouns , verbs, and prepositions found previously.

4.      The students are asked to read the sentences in groups of four.

Accept all logical answers.

The students were very enthusiastic with this activity and the participation was very good. Even the following day some of them wrote new words.

I think it has been a very good way to learn and practice vocabulary with students.  This activity was done with students in 1º and 2º de ESO.

2. VIDEO-ADVERTISEMENT, by Encarnación Hernández

LEVEL: 1º ESO

TIME: 50 minutes

ACTIVITIES:

To get students involved in the topic, I started by showing them the first shot of a current advert they are used to watch on TV every single day, IPHONE X-UNLOCK-APPLE. (you tube).

On this first shot of the ad, they could see just a blonde girl in jeans walking through a corridor, with a door at her back, and both sides of the corridor full of lockers.

Students were asked simply to describe the girl (physically, clothes, etc) trying to guess where she is, giving reasons why they thought so. (keyword: lockers)

Once they obviously knew where she is, a high school, and after having revised vocabulary related to physical appearance, clothes and the word “locker” ( new for many of them), they were given the following sheet to revise and learn school items.

They had to match all the words with the school items in pairs, in 8 minutes.

After the time provided, we checked the answers and continued to the following steps. (They did it quite well and quick).

The pairs then were going to be groups of four people who were given an ordinary school map. They had to recognize the different rooms and try to place in them at least 20 of the items they had revised on the previous sheet. They could draw the items, or just write the terms next to the different rooms (free to choose).

When this activity was finished, it was time to watch the whole advert (1:09) trying the same 4-people-groups to be able to recognize which of all of the school items they had been working with appeared in the advert, and try to identify new ones that were not on the first sheet.

The shots are so quick that we watched it twice.

The groups then shared aloud the new things they had been able to identify and we put everything in common. (They are so used to images that I was surprised the so many things they could see…)

Next, using the map given before, they were asked to tick on it the school rooms where the girl in the advert enters or passes by during the advert). (corridor, gym, basketball pitch, science lab….; we had to include in the map the arts class).

To finish with the exploitation of the advert, they were asked several questions about things that “maybe” have not noticed.

The groups had to answer the following questions:

-       
       Is it the beginning of the lessons or the end?

-        Are there any cheerleaders in the school?

-        What has the cleaner got in his hands?

-        Is there anyone in the lab?

-        What is the name of the basketball team?

-        How many animals can you see in the lab?

-        Is the music teacher still in school?

To my surprise, some of them could answer some of the questions. But we had to watch the advert again. To check the answers I stopped on each shot where the answers could be seen.

Answers:

-        It´s the end, since on the mobile phone the time is 5:03.

-        Yes, there are, since from one of the lockers one pom-pon falls down.

-        The cleaner has got a brush.

-        Yes, there is one teacher on a white lab coat working.

-        The name of the basketball team is Badgers, since the labels appear all through the gym.

-        Three animals are seen in the advert (a frog, a trout and fish in the aquarium).

-        Yes, he / she is, since when the girl abandons the school and all of the boots from the cars in the parking site open, several drums fall down from one car.

The reaction of the students were so nice, they were enthusiastic about discovering all of the details, co-operating in their groups and at the same time, competing among them.

My last activity was a simple question: IF YOU HAD THE POWER TO LOCK AND UNLOCK WITH YOUR EYES, WHAT THINGS OR WHAT PEOPLE YOU WOULD LOCK?

One of the answers was, as I imagined, teachers (well, some of them), but there were amazing answers such as DEATH, ILLNESS, TOXIC FRIENDS….). And talking about locking teachers, I finished the lesson showing them the following short video on you tube about a little girl in Dublin calling a Demolition Company to demolish her school.

Becky wants to demolish her school (full conversation given) (you tube).

They laughed so much. We had a very nice lesson..


3. can / need + sports photographs

Activity designed by Juan Luis Pérez

Type of activity

Speaking, vocabulary and  grammar

Aim

To practise the names of sports and equipment as well as the verbs “can” and “need”.

Task

To identify sports and equipment and consolidate the uses of basic questions and answers with “can” and “need”.

Procedure

1  1. Asking the students How many sports do you know?

2  2. Check answers in open class.

3  3. Give to each student a photocopy with some photos and names of the sports .Ask them to match the photos with the names of sports.

4   4.  In groups, they speak about the sports they have identified and correct themselves orally.

5   5.    In turns, revise all the spots drawn on the pictures.

6   6.  Ask them the question “Can you .....  football ?,Can you ….. judo ?,Can you …cycling ?  Which verbs  do you use with can ? .

7   7.     They answer I can play, do , go + the name of the sport.

8   8.    Write on the blackboard the sports which go with “play “, “do “ and “go “

9   9.    Ask the students to walk around, asking their partners  Can you ……?  wait for the answer Yes, no  I can / can´t  and write the name of the student and his /her answer.

1

    10. Circulate as students are asking and answering their questions, monitoring the activity and helping with any queries.

11. Ask them how many of these sports are water, team, winter, extreme sports?

12.Check answers in open class.

13.Ask them What equipment do you need to play,to do, to go +the name of the sport ? e.x What equipment do you need you go cycling ? Answer ,I need a helmet, a bike, googles etc….

14 Give them a photocopy with photos of different equipment you need for sports.

15 In pairs, match the name of the sport with the name of the equipment.

16.Check the answers in open class.

17.Divide the students into groups of three.Tell them to draw in each group a diagram for the rest of the groups can answer the question : What is the sport and what category do the cicles represent?

Categories : 1^st equipment, 2^nd Type of sport ( water, team, winter, extreme)

                                 3^rd Verb used ( do, play,go )

The students must only write 1 name in each circle of each category. ex helmet, winter, go. ANSWER  SKIING .DON´T WRITE THE SPORT

18. Swap diagrams. In turns each group tries to know which is the sport with one word of each category written on each circle. The group write the sport and pass round the diagram. At the end each group tell the rest of the class the reasons why they have written one sport instead of others using expressions with “can “ and “need “e.i It is basketball because it is a “team “sport, you can”play” basketball and you need a ball .If it is not the answer, the group can anwer “ yes, you can play this sport, you need a ball but it is not a team sport , etc.

MY FEEDBACK OF THIS ACTIVITY

I prepared this activity after studying with my students of “low level” the topic of sports. I thought how to join the idea of teaching them some vocabulary with some pieces of grammar and all together speaking as much as possible taking into account that my students are not used to speaking English at all.

I never stop them when they are speaking, students learn more effectively if they are guided in such a way that they eventually correct themselves rather than if they are given the correct version of something straight away. I prepared this activity focused more on fluency rather than accuracy. I tried to monitor the activity moving round the class and listening to the students giving feedback on the errors with the class after the activity.

4. FOOD

 by M. Camino Martínez

In groups of four my pupils worked together. 

I used a POSTER with different food. They talked about the food shown in the poster and then they had to think about a menu with all the items. They could add two more to create a special one.

All of them were very excited talking about what to create. Ideas and opinions everywhere! . They wrote down their own menu and they used their laptops to do a POWERPOINT to present the ideas.

It was fantastic!! Different menus and great jobs!! Everyone was involved in the activity: they worked together, collaborated, gave reasons and opinions and had a great time.

With this activity I achieved these aims:

·       Picking curiosity

·       Getting my students to think and discuss

·       Collaborating

·       Working in groups

·       Practicing oral skills

5. When two vowels go walking, by M. José Sánchez

I played the video “When two vowels go walking” from Youtube for my beginner adult students to watch it and they liked it, as the tune is very catchy, and they can now understand that when there is a dipthong in a word the first vowel has the main stress and is pronounced as in the alphabet.

This also brought a discussion about exceptions in basic words they have already learnt like soup, book…etc.

There are always exceptions to a rule.


6. THE WEATHER: SPEAKING REVISION ACTIVITY, by María Rodríguez

After the explanation of the climate and weather unit, I checked if my students had understood  the contents correctly.

The aim of this activity was to revise the last unit, to practice oral skills and for them to make full sentences.

a)      To do so, during one class, I wrote some words about climate and weather on the blackboard:

The climate is conditioned by four elements. We usually study these elements, the tools used to measure them and the units of measurement.

PRECIPITATION; TEMPERATURE; WIND; ATMOSPHERIC PRESSURE; WEATHER VANE; ANEMOMETER; RAIN GAUGE; THERMOMETER; BAROMETER; MILLIBARS; DEGREES CENTIGRADES OR CELSIUS (Cº); MILLIMETERS (mm); LITRES PER SQUARE METRE (l/m); KILOMETRES PER HOUR (Km/h); METRES PER SECOND (m/s).

The activity consisted of matching these words trying to find the connection amongst them.

b)     For the second part of the activity, I took my students to the courtyard and asked them to look up and to make the forecast for that evening or for the next day by taking into account the above mentioned vocabulary.

c)      Before starting the third part of the activity we went back to class.

Once inside, I quickly reminded my students about the three factors that condition  temperature: ALTITUDE, LATITUDE AND DISTANCE FROM THE SEA.

The objective was to explain how these factors can determine the temperature and to do so, my students had to use not just the specific vocabulary, but also some comparatives and climatic related verbs.

Examples:

-        About the altitude: The higher the altitude is, the lower the temperature (because for every 100m higher, the temperature drops 0.6ºC).

-        About the distance from the sea: Sea takes longer (than inland) to cool down in winter; This is why temperature is not very cold in winter and takes longer  (than inland) to warm up in summer; This is why temperature is not so hot during summer.