ESL Activities
November 30, 2008 by mwalimu23
Over the past several days, I have perused multiple articles regarding teaching abroad and teaching ESL. While I can easily say that I’ve spent hours reading those articles, I must also admit that none of them appealed to me too much. I think it’s about time for a more upbeat read…and that’s why I’ve revisited Dave’s ESL Cafe to seek additional ideas to implement in ESL teaching.
One of the ideas I am a fan of is to have students create a cook book. Each of the students can write a recipe for a favorite home dish, making sure to list and describe the ingredients and procedures in English. The students can collaborate in small groups and share written versions of their recipes with each other. A writer can listen as the other group members go over the recipe and make sure that the English is understandable and accurate. Eventually, the recipes can be combined into a class cookbook. You could even host a potluck if possible!
Another fun idea I stumbled upon is to create an activit centered upon Asian culture. Students can make fortune cookies and make sure to write fortunes that are in the future tense. This sounds like a fun way to teach the future tense…and is perhaps more motivating for students than just filling out worksheeets! In addition to making fortune cookies, the students could also create fortune telling origamis (aka “cootie catchers”).
Another idea that caught my attention, because I have actually done something similar in my own educational experience, is the “How To” activity. Students give a brief speech to their classmates during which they explain how to complete/make/do something. I have done this a couple times in the past. In third grade, our teacher had every student in the class write an explanation for how to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Sure, this may seem like a simple task, but when the teacher reads your step by step instructions and ends up with slices of bread completely lathered in peanut butter–on all sides–the simple activiity quickly becomes an entertaining lesson. We learned that directions must be precise, and that we must choose our words carefully. This could be a fun idea to implement with ESL students too, depending on the class proficiency.
I think it’s safe to say that I could spend several hours searching through Dave’s ESL Cafe and sparking ideas to use for ESL lessons. And if you yourself are curious about anything ESL related, I recommend checking the site out!
Dave Sperling
2007
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I find the topic of ESL/EFL really interesting and especially when it comes to the activities. The idea of creating a cookbook is a great idea because it is something that the students are familiar with. Also, the group work will help students with their informal language and they will have the freedom to critique each other. I think the fortune cookie activity sounds like a lot of fun. I don’t think anyone would not want to do that, and the learning will just come naturally along with the activity. Also, thank you for the link to Dave’s ESL cafe; I will surely check it out.
[...] December 2, 2008 by griffin11 1. ESL Activities [...]
I really like some of the ideas. I, too, have done a few versions of the “How to” activity. I found that it was really interesting to see how much information we actually fill in as we are listening or explaining without explicitly stating so. We assume people know exactly what we are talking about, especially is we are speaking in our native language. We think that people understand all the small nuances that we have grown up with. However, there are those subtle aspects which we don’t bother explaining to English language learners since we think it is so obvious. Doing a “How to” activity will really highlight our assumptions. Hopefully it is an activity that will not only enrich the ELL students but it will also make the English speakers aware of some difficulties their peers are having.
I also really enjoy the idea of fortune cookie fortunes. The students have the ability to be outrageously creative and still learning about the English language.
[...] http://mwalimu23.edublogs.org/2008/11/30/esl-activities/#comment-25 [...]
I have been keeping a blog about ESL in the American/Michigan Classroom and was very intrigued by your post regarding “Dave’s ESL Cafe”. For one, it is a very catchy, name and two it invloved activities that ESL students can use in any classroom–in the U.S. or overseas. I have read about service projects and the cook book idea you refer to sounds like it is along the same lines. I think that in addition to teaching our students the langauge or English, it is importatant that they see themselves within that culture as themselves, not a new person. Moreover, if we allow students to not only maintain, but share their original culture and langauge it is a great merging tool amoung mainstream and ESL students to bridge the cultural and language barrier that is present betwen them. Grouping up with a mainstream classroom or school “project” to make a cook book for the whole community would also havve endless possibilities to fundraising and merging parents of ESL students as well as students and parents of other ethinicities. I can’t wait to check out “Dave’s ESL Cafe”! Thanks for the tip!