LIKES AND DISLIKESPAIRWORK

Exercise 3: Likes and dislikesPairwork : Ask what your friend likes and dislikesFind out which chores he/she likes or dislikes the most- Things the teacher did before, during and after the activity.Before: Teacher says “All right. Exercise3. Work in pairs; ask and answerthe questions”During: Teacher sits at one place and says nothing.After: Teacher says “Everyone finished? Good. Now look at exercise 4 ….” - Some question for us: Do you think the activity was successful?What do you think might have gone wrong?What could she do to make it more successful?*Discuss why the activity was not successful, and what the teacher could do tomake it more successful:- She could prepape for the pairwork by establishing what the questionsand answers should be. She could also demonstrate the pairwork by askingquestions round the class, or by getting one pair of students to ask and answer infront of the class. Then students would know exactly what to do.- She could be more active in starting the pairwork. Instead of just saying‘work in pairs’, she could show students who to work with, check that everyonehad started working in pairs. This would be very important if the class were notused to pairwork.- During the activity, she could move quickly round the class to check thatstudents were talking and to see when they finished.- Instead of waiting for everyone finished, she could stop the activity.Then there would be no chance for students to get bored and start talking aboutother things.- After the pairwork, she could ask some pairs what they said, or ask afew pairs to repeat their conversation in front of the class.Example 2:Teacher presented “used to /didn’t use to + inf (Unit 4, part E – languagefocus) and then used the following exercise for free practice in pairs.Exercise: Work in pairs, ask what your friends used to do and didn’t useto do (Ask about food, sport, music, school, subject ……. ).A possible procedure:* Introduce the exercises and show what questions and answers studentscan give:Teacher: Now you are going to talk about things you used to do and things youdidn’t use to do. Look at the exercise. What question can you ask? What about food?Student A: What food did you use to eat when you were small?Student B: I used to eat ice – cream. (And so on)*Write the basic question on the board:What (food) did you use to eat?*Ask a few questions round the class to show the kind of conversationstudents might have:Teacher: What kind of music did you use to listen, Huong?Student: I used to listen to pop music.Teacher: Pop music? When did you use to listen to it? (And so on)If teacher likes, ask two students to have similar conversations, while theothers listen.* Divide the class into pairs:Teacher: Now. You’re going to work in pairs (Indicate by pointing. If there aresingle students left without a partner, make groups of three). Ready? Ask andanswer the questions. First, one person asks all the questions then change round.Start now.* Students work in pair. Teacher moves quickly round the class, checkingthat everyone is talking (but do not try to correct mistakes, as this willinterrupt the activity)* When most pairs have finished, stop the activity. Ask a few students whattheir partners said:Teacher: Now, stop talking. Mai, tell me about Huong. What did she used to do?Student: She says she used to eat ice cream, listen to pop music and swim in theafternoon, she liked meat but she didn’t use to eat it. She was afraid of beingoverweight* Give feedback- Well done.- Pay attention to….(And so on)3.2. Example of group work.Task 3 (Unit 3 – Speaking - English 10)This is a free activity and aims to develop fluency in speaking. The proceduremay be:Divide students into groups of four or five.Read through the instrutions and make sure that each group understandswhat to do. Choose one “secretary” in each group to write the list but emphasisthat everyone in the groups should agree on what to write.While the activity is going on, move from groups, but do not interruptmore than is necessary.When some groups have finished their discussion, stop the activity, askone person from each group to report on what they decidedGive feedback: - Content - Popular mistakes3.3. Example of dividing the class:First, draw a plan of your own class of 50 students. Show how you woulddivide the class for a pair work or a group work activity and what instructionsyou would give:Here are two rows of a class of 50 students. The desks are fixed and thestudents sit on chairs.1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13For pair work: Most students could work with the person next to them.Student 6 could turn round and work with student 3 and students 7, 8, and 9work as three together. Or student 3 could move to work with student 4 and thesecond row could be divided into two pairs and one three.For group work: Students could work in threes and fours along eachrow. This would be easy to organize but would make it difficult for students towork well as a group, as they would be in a straight line. Or Students in the firstrow could turn round and form groups with those behind.The first few times that you try pair or group work, you need to givecareful instructions and know exactly how you will divide the class. Pair workand group work can become a routine. Once students are used to it and haveregular working partners, it can be organized quickly and easily.4. Suggestions for some popular kinds of practicePairwork and groupwork are not “teaching methods”, but ways oforganizing the class. They can be used for many different kinds of activity, andare naturally more suitable for some activities than for others. Before decidingwhat kind of activity will be used teacher should answer the followingquestions:- Could you use pairwork or groupwork for part of the activity?- If so, exactly what would students do in pairs or groups?- What would you need to do before the pair /group stage?- Is there anything you would do after it?Here are suggestions for some popular kinds of practice:*Pattern practice : This can be done in pairs in the same way as practicing structure with“used to” mentioned in part 2 - Demonstration. Any controlled oral practice canbe done first with the whole class, and then in pairs.* Practising short dialogues:Acting out short dialogues can very easily be done in pairs, with littlechance of making mistakes. It can be done first with pairs of students in front ofthe class and then with all students working in pairs at the same time.* Reading a text and answering questions:Students can disscuss questions in pairs or groups and then read the textor they can read the text silently and then ask and answer questions in pairs orgroups. This is a good way of involving the whole class in answering questions.* Short-writing exercises: Student can sit in groups and decide together what to write. One studentacts as “secretary”. This can be difficult to organise but in a large class it has theadvantages that students correct each others’mistakes and the teacher only has afew papers to mark at the end.Pair work can be used for correcting written work (eg: homework)-students sit in pairs and correct what their partner has written.* Discussions:With more advanced class, discussions can be conducted in group. It isimportant to define the discussion clearly and to ask each group to report theirconclusions afterwards.* Grammar exercises: Student can do grammar exercises orally in pairs; the teacher goesthrought the answers afterwards with the whole class and students write theexercises for homework. This is more interesting and productive than studentsdoing exercises alone, in silence.III. APPLYING THE RESEARCH IN TEACHING