Choral r:There are three things important to remember for choral repetition: 1.
clearly Tasks to be performed while reading / listening: gap-filling exercises; true / false
indicate when the students should start the chorus;2.clearly indicate the stress during the
chorus;3.stay silent during the chorus so that you can hear how well the students are
performing. Individual r: is conducted in three stages:1.the teacher nominates a student;
2.the student responds;3.the teacher gives feedback (positive or negative). || Problems
with pronunciation:When we speak about English pronunciation, we should pay
attention to: the phonemes that do not exist in Romanian: /æ/, /ð/, /θ/, /ŋ/; the existence of
two phonemes for a sound that seems to be a single one: the long and short vowels; semi-
vowels that are spelt as vowels but are actually consonants and behave as such. Most UK-
published textbooks offer CDs with Received Pronunciation (RP). The problem with RP,
however, is that it is a minority accent, being used by only 3 - 4% of the British
population.|| I think that students should be encoursged to make phonetic transcriptions
and their pronunciation should be checked. Phonetic transcription should be introduced
from the very beginning, otherwise the students will tend to invent their own
symbols.First, teach them to recognize the symbols, then to use them. Teachers should
demonstrate tongue and lip position for the production of sounds in isolation and in
context.|| Knowing a word might be difficult because it means knowing: how it is
pronounced and spelt; what it means;the situations and contexts in which it is used. There
are also other things we can know about it:its metaphorical meanings, its connotations,the
number of syllables it contains, its synonyms,its homonyms, its antonyms,its lexical
family.|| Vocabulary teaching can be organized:a)in lexical sets:clothes, food(the words
are easy to remember);b) by dictionary work(more appropriate with intermediate or
advanced students);c) in reading/ listening texts(the learner can see samples of language
in use);d) at early levels, in relation to grammar and functions: the lexical set of
adjectives of physical appearance can be related to the verb ‘to be’.|| In teaching
vocabulary, ‘visual aids’ can be used in the pre-teaching activities(e.g. match the word
with the pictures/definitions).The presentation of the new words can be made
though:visual aids-pictures, objects, drawings.|| The techniques of explaining new
vocabulary are: demonstration (gestures,mime,facial expressions); visual aids: pictures,
objects, drawings; verbal explanation: by means of definition, analysis (derivatives),
context, translation, synonyms, antonyms.||
Translation is recommended only in the following cases:if it is easier to translate than to
explain or define:oak-tree – stejar; in the case of false friends or partial cognates: library=
bibliotecă; button=buton, nasture;in the case of idiomatic expressions.We should vary the
way we explain the meaning of new words.|| The vocabulary to be taught is selected
according to the following criteria: familiarity(we teach first the names of the objects we
use very often); usefulness(we select vocabulary to be taught according to the students’
needs);frequency; rang (polysemantic words),content words(nouns, full
verbs,adjectives,adverbs);function words(articles,prepositions,conjunctions, auxiliary and
modal verbs) || The ways of keeping the vocabulary learnt are: 1. mechanical drills:
simple substitution drills;multiple substitution drills; direct practice; expansion drills. 2.
meaningful drills and exercises: multiple choice exercises:synonyms;definitions;
matching drills;sentence completion. 3. communi-cative drills or exercises: adaptation or
variation of a dialogue; eliciting a summary of the story; paraphrasing a story, retelling a
story from a different point of view. || The inductive approach, the students see
examples of language and then work out the rules. The deductive approach starts from
theory and goes to examples. I prefer the inductive approach, because as teacher i can use
a text that several examples of the structure and asks the students to read it. Then, I help
the students induce the form, meaning, usage of the structure. The inductive approach is
favoured, as it is considered to ensure a more effective learning because it requires
students to make some cognitive effort. || Many teachers do not use drills(considering
them old-fashioned)and not very creative.But drills should be used because they build
automatisms and help us come to use certain structures without thinking about them.
They also give students the opportunity for safe practice. Drills should not necessarily be
easy and they should not be used for too long or too frequently.We should praise our
students only if they indeed did a good job. || The principle of integrating skills means
that the focus on one skill should lead to practice in another (e.g. writing on the basis of
listening/ discussion/ reading). || The process of understanding the text is the process of
seeing how its content matches their predictions. As they receive more information from
the text, their predictions will change. The following activities may be used for
prediction:minidiscussion on the topic;discussion of a headline / title; discussion of the
first line / paragraph; brainstorming related to the topic; the cloze can also be used as a
prediction activity. This stage should have a degree of informality and should be carefully
prepared because prediction activities bring about a “heightened degree of attentiveness”;
they can be done in pairs or in small groups, even in the students’ native language,
though the foreign language should be used as much as possible.If you want to avoid the
chaos in any communicative activity you can tolerate of a minor intrusion of the native
language if it is helping the activity along.||
statements;note-taking; asking the students to guess the title;asking them to answer a
series of questions.|| Technical equipment:We can use video material.In this case we
should be careful because students may pay more attention to what they see than to what
they hear.We can try: playing the video without sound and having the students try to
guess what the characters are saying; freezing frame and having the students predict what
will follow;playing the audio without the picture and having the students try to imagine
the speakers.|| The 5 characteristics of communicative activities are:desire to
communicate; communicative purpose; attention focused on content, not form; variety of
language; no teacher intervention.|| Information gap: A “gap” of information between
two people appears when one person knows something that another person does not. By
creating such gaps we give the students a reason for communication, which is motivating
and useful.|| Oral communicative activities: Reaching a Consensus: the students have to
agree with each other after discussions. The task is not complete until they reach an
agreement. Simulation and role play. Talking about Yourself: What we have in common -
students are put in pairs at random and told to discover 5 things that they have in
common. Problem Solving: the students are given a complex situation and are told to find
a solution. E.g. The Desert Dilemma: Your plane has crashed in the desert. The pilot and
co-pilot are dead. The plane has no radio. There is a small camp 100 kilometers north of
the plane and you decide to go there. Which 7 objects will you take from the plane? (give
them a list). Communication Games: based on the principle of the information gap.
Students have to use any or all the language they know to complete a game-like task. E.g.
Find the Differences: the students are divided in pairs; one student in each pair is given a
picture, the other another picture; they are supposed to find the differences between the
two pictures without showing them to each other.||Teachers in comm activity: During
the communicative activity, the teacher should not devote much time to correcting errors.
Just showing the students that a mistake has been made is enough. The teacher might
employ scaffolding in the following ways: by unobtrusively saying the correct form; by
showing interest and agreeing (nodding, saying “yes”, etc.); by asking brief questions that
encourage the speaker to extend the story (“and then) ||
The teacher should conduct feedback after the communicative activity. This can be of
two types: content feedback and form feedback. While offering content feedback, the
teacher should insist on evaluation rather than criticism.This stage may be as important as
the main activity because it will also offer an opportunity for authentic and spontaneous
communication. After this discussion the teacher can concentrate on the form feedback,
discussing with the students the errors noticed while they were performing the task.||
Spoken VS written English:We should be aware of the fact that speech is not spoken
writing. We should not speak like a book, but in a true-to-life, natural and spontaneous
manner. The sentences made in speech are different from the way they appear in print:
they are shorter and differently arranged, being less complex and sometimes even
incomplete.||Class management during comm Act: If you want to avoid the chaos
during...you can: to avoid its getting louder and louder, the teacher can circulate among
the students and even tell them from time to time to be more quiet;keep the activity short
until students get used to it;make sure the activity can be used with a different number of
students;do not use an activity that is too difficult or too emotionally loaded until the
students are used to this activity;tolerate of a minor intrusion of the native language if it is
helping the activity along;set a strict time limit and stick to it. There are people who have
a lot of knowledge about language, but who cannot use it to express what they want.
They may be helped by being placed in “safe” situations of communication in class.
Students develop their fluency and confidence by speaking as much as possible. ||
Accuracy is not important in the case of a communicative activity.We should teach
students to choose their vocabulary and style accorning to the situational context.Students
develop their fluency and confidence by speaking as much as possible.Role play is one of
a series of communicative activities that develop fluency. || Written comm activities:
note-taking(similar to dictation, but the students put down only the essential information,
not the entire text); summari-zing(develops our ability to present the information clearly
and succinctly); instant writing: Complete the sentence: I will never forget the time I.. ||
Teaching spelling: copying wors, sentences,meaningful units; dictation; exercises where
only one element is new and the rest repeats the items found in the exercise: fill-in,
combination of units in a sentence.