If you were looking closely you might have seen this little diver swimming around My English Images recently. I’ve just added this scuba diver to the sports page!
What’s your favorite WORKSHEET?
What’s your favorite . . .
This worksheet is aimed at intermediate students.
How to use the worksheet.
1. Give students a topic or conversation question to get started like their favorite movie etc. The more generic the better.
2. Read the sample conversations in pairs. Drill the sentence patterns.
3. Work through the replacement drills as noted below.
4. Students start new conversations with new partners using the language from the conversations you just drilled.
Note:
- The replacement conversations at the bottom of the page might be a bit tricky. Give the students a few minutes to work on them in pairs and then check their answers. Depending on the group you might have fun with students acting them out in skits. If they make a mistake, gently correct and everyone drills together. It’s rare that students are perfect so EVERYONE should get a chance to speak, drill and receive correction and they should do so without being made to feel bad about their mistakes.
Indirect Questions worksheet available now!
Indirect Questions
These can be a bit tricky for beginner students but I still tend to practice it with them. A lot of students who come to classes for the first time ask simple getting to know you questions like where are you from and I encourage the slightly more polite, “Can I ask where you are from?” This is done just as a drill to reinforce the simple pattern.
This worksheet is aimed more at intermediate students and focusses on the patters of information and yes / no questions.
How to use the worksheet.
1. Drill the patterns with the students.
TR: Where are you from?
CLASS: Where are you from?
TR: Can I ask . . .
CLASS: Can I ask where you are from?
It’s not likely everyone will get the pattern right away and if they do this focus may be too easy for them. While repeating the drill the teacher should be saying these things together with the class.
2. Drill the Can I ask and Do you know patterns.
3. Students form groups and move through conversations or role plays based on the conversations.
4. Drill the patterns again, students switch partners and go again.
Options:
- For larger classes you have the chance for lots of talking and for students to use the language with new people again and again.
- Give the worksheet as homework.
- Drill the first patterns with the students and do some conversation, then drill the Y/N patterns before moving into new conversations. Whatever you do, make sure students are talking a lot and getting correction and feedback.
Note:
- I’ve tried to keep this sheet as straight forward as possible but these patterns may still be confusing. Drill the patterns and get them on your whiteboard in clear boxes as I have laid out above as early in the class as possible.
Check out this sweet MOTORCYCLE
I’m really not into vehicles, as you may know. I don’t drive and I really don’t even like being inside automobiles. So drawing them is always a bit of a mystery. But I think I’m getting better at it, if this motorcycle is any indication.
You can get lots of other awesome vehicles like this on the vehicles page of My English Images.
Carl Sagan
We had a full solar eclipse the other day which I was lucky enough to see despite the terrible weather. So, continuing with all things cosmic, here are some great words by the late great Carl Sagan.
Get more great quotes and sayings like this here!
Like this:
Don’t be a BOOB
I think this card pretty much speaks for itself really.
boob
1 |bo͞ob| informal noun
1 a foolish or stupid person: why was that boob given a key investigation?
2 Brit.an embarrassing mistake.
ORIGIN
early 20th cent.: abbreviation of booby
boob 2 |bo͞ob|noun (usu. boobs) informal
a woman’s breast.ORIGIN 1950s (originally US): abbreviation of booby from dialect bubby, of uncertain origin; perhaps related to German dialect Bübbi ‘teat.’
Regular VS Irregular Verbs Worksheet
Use this one with a bit of caution.
Regular / Irregular Verbs
This worksheet, these worksheets rather, are for intermediate students who have a grasp of the language but need to brush up their accuracy when using certain verbs. I’ve used these with success in small groups of students where there was a lot of teacher student interaction.
How to use the worksheet.
1. Drill the patterns of a few words in full sentences.
I’m going to go to the beach tomorrow.
I went to the beach last weekend.
I have gone to the beach twice.
I haven’t gone for a long time.
2. Students fill in the first page of examples on their own. You can choose to drill these answers with them before they fill in the story but you should definitely drill them after.
3. Using the verbs they’ve just conjugated and drilled, students fill in the story.
4. Give students the topic of vacations and let them go to it. Make sure to monitor and offer correction where needed.
Using the rest of the sheets is a bit trickier. Here’s what I did.
1. Use one page each week. Those are the words you are going to focus on that week. A few of them might be new or used less frequently but it gives you a nice goal to work around.
2. Drill the terms with the students. Make it fun, use full sentences, lots of energy and a big smile.
3. Have the students use the terms in their writing, in stories or in reading passages. If you can find a story, a blog post, or news article that uses some of the words, have the students read it and find the terms in the story. Along the way there is a lot more they can pick up too!
Note:
This is actually the sort of worksheet that I DON’T usually like. It’s just a lot of lists of words. This is a case where making it work, making it effective is really up to the teacher. Time to roll up those sleeves and get to work on this one!
Why don’t I usually like these kinds of sheets? Because giving students a list of verbs to conjugate takes the words totally out of context and makes it harder, not easier, to remember.
Find Out About SPORTS New Worksheet available this week
This is a great new update to a much older worksheet that lets students talk about some famous sports stars and then their own. Click here to get the PDF.
Find Out About: Sports
There is this category of activities called “find out about” where you get students in a group to find out something about other people. Find out they birthdays, favorite foods, and hometowns of three people in your group or class. It’s sort of an old standard. This worksheet is a variation on that.
How to use the worksheet.
1. Drill the questions and answers with one of the students as a volunteer.
TR: Where are you from?
CLASS: Where are you from?
ST: I’m from.
2. Drill it again with he/she
3. Split the class up into four groups: Jordan, Koji, Kournikoa, Schwarzenegger. Each group gets their corresponding worksheet. For example, the Jordan group gets the page with Jordan’s information. Only the last sheet has all the information, that is for the teacher.
4. Students circulate the room asking questions to find out about the other sports stars. They can not look at one another’s sheets and have to talk to someone from each of the other groups to complete the task.
5. When done, check the students’ answers.
6. Now ask, who is your favorite sport star? (Not someone on the sheet we hope.) Students break into pairs or groups and talk about their favorite sports stars.
Note:
- This activity requires careful modeling, time management and clear introduction. In the conversation at the end it’s important for students to be producing the language they just practiced without mistakes. Otherwise they haven’t learned. To ensure that you need to give them correction, monitor what they are doing and help them where they need it.
VISITING A DOCTOR new worksheet now available!
Basic Patient Report
This is one of the least “fancy” worksheets I have made and there is a reason for it.
About Hesperian:
Hesperian Health Guides develops and distributes health materials that provide knowledge for action, and inspire action for health. Our guides are designed in partnership with and for community health workers and others in poor and marginalized communities around the world to prevent and cure disease, and to challenge the social injustices that cause poor health.
Beginning with the development of the classic Where There Is No Doctor in the mountains of Mexico in the early 1970s, we have collaborated with partners to produce health materials now available in over 80 languages. Hesperian’s expanding digital resource center is open to people around the world to help them customize, translate, and download materials.
How to use the worksheet.
By the time you get to use this sheet in class you should already have taught some vocabulary or done some simple drills and practice to reinforce understanding.
1. Set up and explain the role play. Student swill play nurses at clinics and patients coming in to describe their symptoms and seek help.
2. Show the students how to fill in the form and drill the questions. This is your last chance before they start talking to reinforce any vocabulary or questions your students might have.
3. Give students role play cards to use. (I’ve provided eight, four related to injury, four related to sickness. I recommend making your own based on the needs of your students.)
4. Students role play the situation and the teacher or instructors monitor and guide. Point out where some questions might be unnecessary or where they might be used simply to calm the patient. In the case of a person with a cut, the injury is obvious but the questions help focus the patient and give the nurse time to observe the patient. In the case of the male – female section at the top of the page, nurses should just fill that in without asking.
Note:
I used and developed this simplified worksheet for students of mine who were going to be traveling to Africa and southeast Asia to live and work for two years. A handful of them were nurses but all of them needed to be well informed about local diseases and sickness. In using this sheet I found it more realistic, more helpful, and more focussed than any of the other materials that are out there. Patient speaking is kept to a minimum as would be the case in a real clinic. The nurses and doctor’s language is also kept as simple as possible.
The Milkman cometh
The milkman is sort of an old fashioned job in the US. In fact I don’t think there have been milkmen around for quite a while. Yet the image and the idea have stuck in our popular culture. I’ve included this image in the JOBS section of My English Images for you to check out. If you are a U.S. visitor it might not be the most common job your students are thinking of but then where are your students from? Are there milkmen in their home countries? I remember visiting some friends in Ireland when I was a kid and their father was a milkman. My dad went out with him on the milk run and tried to convince everyone that he was the new milkman.
