FCE Speaking and Listening Quick and Easy Minimal Pairs The aim of this activity is to incorporate short

spells of pronunciation practice into any other kind of lesson that you are teaching. Materials. Procedure !n the course of "hatever lesson you are teaching# listen for specific "ords "hich your students do not pronounce "ell. This is a phoneme$%ased activity# focusing on isolated sounds. &ou are listening for "ords such as C'()*T "hich may sound like C+'T. Make a note of them. T"o "ords are enough. &ou can save the activity for a convenient time in the lesson# %ut since this is a short activity you can deal "ith the pro%lem immediately and then return to the main lesson. ,rite the "ords on the %oard in num%ered columns. (se num%ers not letters. . one needed

C'()*T C+'T

Say "ord num%er - three times and point to it. Say "ord num%er . three times and point to it. Say %oth "ords three times and point to each one. The students listen. They don/t speak. Say one "ord and ask the students to shout out the num%er. Continue to do this randomly. !f the students are not getting it right# start again. !f the students are getting it right# you can stop there and return to the main lesson. *o"ever# there are t"o possi%le further stages. 'sk the students to do the same thing in pairs. +ne says a "ord and the other identifies the num%er. This adds a production stage to a mainly receptive activity. Monitor this. !t is possi%le to ask individual students to say one "ord at random "hile you# the teacher identifies it %y num%er. *o"ever# you should only do this if your monitoring of pair"ork suggests that it "ill %e successful.