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Adding Sparkle to your Classroom

Rob Dean, Macedonia 2011

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Sparkle n C,UA quality that makes someone or something seem interesting and full of life

Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English 5th Edition

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1. Young Teenagers – what are they like?

2. Implications for the classroom

3. A Recipe for Sparkle: Approaches and activities

Agenda

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Young Teenagers of

Today

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..

Source: Daily Mail Online

£655

44,129MKD

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General Implications…

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Get to know their world and exploit it

in class

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Detailed Implications…

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Approaches and Activities

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Sport and leisure

Music and films

Food and drink; likes and dislikes

Technology

What do the

pictures have in

common?

Fashion

Challenges

Challenges

Discover EnglishSky

Discover English

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Teen-Friendly Topics

• Language is clearly related to context.

• Contexts must be directly relevant to the students’ experiences and interests for the language to be meaningful to them.

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Traditional Grammar?

The present perfect is a very difficult

concept that does not exist in every language. We use it to link the past to the present in some way – for example when we can see the present result of something that happened in the past. We don’t usually include a time expression with the present perfect (except when we use for and since). We make the present perfect simple affirmative by following the subject with the appropriate present tense form of the auxiliary ‘have’ then the past participle or third form of the main verb. The closed interrogative form is made by simple inversion of the auxiliary and the main verb.

‘Do you understand?’

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Student

InformationKnowledge

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Traditional Grammar?

• Helga is ____ because the drinks machine was empty.

• Manfred is _____ because the train from Hamburg did not arrive on time.

• Hans is ____ because he’s standing under a waterfall.

So what else is there?

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Oxy

mo

ron

?

Fun Grammar

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A Fun Approach to Grammar

A Recipe for Sparkle

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What you tell me, I…

forget

What I work out for myself I…

remember

‘The art of teaching is the art of assisting discovery’

Mark Van Doren, American Poet

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A minimum of metalanguage

Discover English

Sky

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The Most Important Person…

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I’ve worn glasses since I was two years old

I’ve met the Prime Minister of Malaysia

I’ve visited twenty two countries so far this year

I’ve driven a Rolls Royce car

I’ve worked as a waiter

Four True; One false

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How did I do?

Challenges

Sky

Discover English

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1. A Fun Approach to Grammar

2. Multiple Senses

A Recipe for Sparkle

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Multi Sensory Teaching

• Involves the child as a whole on a visual, auditory and physical level.

• Many children will not successfully learn language just through completing written exercises.

• Language has a greater chance of being understood and retained if the children can experience language through the whole body.

27Discover English

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Language development: VocabularyLanguage development: Vocabulary

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Language development: VocabularyLanguage development: Vocabulary

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1. A Fun Approach to Grammar

2. Multiple Senses

3. Cross Curricular

A Recipe for Sparkle

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Cross Curricular

• Learning about other things in English helps students to learn English.

• We could integrate aspects of other subjects: eg geography, maths, history, art, etc.

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Number Activity

1. Think of a number from 1 to 10. 2. Multiply it by 9. 3. Add the two numbers together (i.e. 72 = 7+2 = 9) 4. Take that number and subtract 5. 5. Take that and find corresponding letter of the

alphabet.6. Think of a country beginning with that letter. 7. Think of an animal that begins with the second

letter of the country name.

How many people are thinking of elephants in Denmark?

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Are there any elephants in Denmark?

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1.2. 3.

4.5. 6.

7. 8.

+

-

x

÷

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History

Linguistics

Discover English

Sky

Across the Curriculum

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Cultures

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1. A Fun Approach to Grammar

2. Multiple Senses

3. Cross Curricular

4. Stories

A Recipe for Sparkle

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Stories

Why stories?

•Binary elements: eg: good / bad, happy / sad

•Structure: Beginning, middle, end

•Language learned and practised in a story is memorable

•Students listen to, read (and watch!) stories in their own language

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Tara Danny A.J.

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The power of imagination

and the story form…

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The power of imagination

and the story form…

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The power of imagination

and the story form…

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The power of imagination

and the story form…

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The power of imagination

and the story form…

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The power of imagination

and the story form…

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1. A Fun Approach to Grammar

2. Multiple Senses

3. Cross Curricular

4. Stories

5. Task Based

A Recipe for Sparkle

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Task Based

• For most teenagers, language is not intrinsically interesting.

• We communicate with language to find out more, share information and feelings or to achieve something.

• This type of learning helps students perform real world activities.

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Task Activities

• Ranking

• Problem-solving

• Adopt / reject

• Commonality

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Date, Marry or Throw out of Aeroplane?

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1. Tea, coffee, hot chocolate2. Books, TV, cinema3. Mobile Phone, Skype, Facebook4. Pizza, burger, chips5. Soap Operas, The News, Sit Coms

Favourite =

Quite like =

Least favourite =

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Discover English

Sky

More Tasks

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Challenges

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It’s time to ensure that the way students learn with technology agrees with

the way they live with technology.

Teenagers and

Technology

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1. A Fun Approach to Grammar

2. Multiple Senses

3. Cross Curricular

4. Stories

5. Task Based

6. Technology

A Recipe for Sparkle

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My whole world is with me in my pocket…music, phone, camera… (Indian girl)

It would be as horrible as falling off the end of the world if my

mobile phone and games vanished.

(Chinese boy)

Why does going to school feel like going back in time?

(Saudi Arabian boy)

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Po

ck

ets

1

The Materials

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1. A Fun Approach to Grammar

2. Multiple Senses

3. Cross Curricular

4. Stories

5. Task Based

6. Technology

7. Songs

A Recipe for Sparkle

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Songs and Music

• Music is an international language

• Music engages the emotions

• Language learned through songs is memorable

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Love – hold heart

Me – point at self

Disappointment – look sad

Face – circle face

Believer – wave hands

Mind – point at brain

Leave – turn around

Gave – mime giving

Pain – tense body

Rain – show with fingers

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f u n g r a mma r

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mu l t i p l e s e n s e s

f u n g r a mma r

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mu l t i p l e s e n s e s

f u n g r a mma r

c r o s s c u r r i c u l a r

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mu l t i p l e s e n s e s

f u n g r a mma r

c r o s s c u r r i c u l a r

s t o r i e s

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mu l t i p l e s e n s e s

f u n g r a mma r

c r o s s c u r r i c u l a r

t a s k b a s e d

s t o r i e s

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mu l t i p l e s e n s e s

f u n g r a mma r

c r o s s c u r r i c u l a r

t a s k b a s e d

t e c h n o l o g y

s t o r i e s

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s o n g s

mu l t i p l e s e n s e s

f u n g r a mma r

c r o s s c u r r i c u l a r

t a s k b a s e d

t e c h n o l o g y

s t o r i e s

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s o n g s

mu l t i p l e s e n s e s

f u n g r a mma r

c r o s s c u r r i c u l a r

t a s k b a s e d

t e c h n o l o g y

s t o r i e s

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Thank You

robert.dean@pearson.com