Professional Documents
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T Methodology # 4 (part 1)
Practice activities are those which fall somewhere between the two
extremes of the communication continuum:
1. Oral drills
2. Information gap activities
3. Games
4. Personalisation and Localisation
5. Oral interactions
I. Oral drills
Cue-response drills
A: Is John British?
B: No, he isn’t.
A: Where’s he from, then?
B: He’s American.
In this particular example, the teacher will elicit the following questions:
- What’s his/her name?
- Where’s he/ she from?
- What’s his/her job?
- What does he/she do?
- How old is he/she?
Chain drills
This is a way of practicing a particular structure over and over again
in the context of either a game and/or a personal element.
The teacher chooses the structure and says e.g. “I am going to watch TV
tonight.”
The nominated student has to say:
“He is going to watch TV tonight. I am going to read a book tonight”
The next student has to remember the first two speakers’ plans and then
add his or her own. Lots of structures can be used for this kind of drill, for
example like DOING, I’ve always wanted to DO, I’ve never DONE, at seven
thirty last night I was DOING etc. Chain drills are an amusing way of
getting quick and involving practice of a particular structure, and if the
memory element is added they can be made into a game.
information.
By sharing this information they can complete a task. Information gap may
words, this kind of activities are also drills, but because they have a
slightly communicative element built into them they are more involving
and motivating than a lot of question and answer practice. For example,
context.
The class is divided into two teams; one represents noughts (0) and the
other crosses (X). The teacher puts the grid on the board:
The team selects the square it wishes to play for, and a member of the
team has to say a sentence using the word on the square. If the sentence
is correct the square is filled with a nought or a cross, depending on the
team the player comes from.
To be continued...
Bibliography:
Harmer, J. The practice of English Language Teaching, Longman