PRONUNCIATION TIC TAC TOE - long schwa

Not to beat around the bush, straight to the rules:

1. Choose a sound you want to practice, e.g.          ɜː;
2. write its phonetic form on the whiteboard;
3. choose 9 words with that sound, e.g.
    word, work, bird, thirty, turn, journey, early, heard, service,

    (you can point out that 

       * it's possible for a single sound to have many different written forms - and that's what makes English pronunciation hard to master,

       * this sound usually includes "r" in the written form);

4. practice how to say the words;
5. draw a table ... like this:

6. divide the class into groups (you can have more than two groups)

7. assign each group a symbol, e.g. o - x - Δ ;

8. decide which group starts the game; 

9. a group wins the square if each member of the group pronounces the word correctly.

That's basically it. 

Enjoy!

THE ELLEN, HUGH LAURIE & SLANG

Here comes the video,
quite catchy with teenagers;
they watch "The Ellen Show" and know Dr House very well.
Last but not least - it's dangerous: you may end up laughing out loud while watching!

Just ask your students to draw a table like this:

or like this:

then enjoy the show while your students write the words and / or the definitions!


... oh - I've almost forgotten ... the video ;)

THE COCONUT SONG

This is what you end up with when you say to your students:

"That's all for today. 5 minutes left. What do you want to sing?"

PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTION TOOL

A new tool at your disposal!

Recently, I wanted to find something new and out of the ordinary for my teenage brainiacs.
"Transcription!" I thought  and I wound up with that link:

⏩http://www.photransedit.com/Online/Text2Phonetics.aspx⏪

- The ways to use it?
- Plenty. E.g.:

* matching words / sentences with their phonetic transriptions;
* matching pictures with words written with phonetic symbols;
* a fragment of a text from a coursebook read previously during the lesson transcribed phonetically >> handed out to students to untranscribe;
* sentences to untranscribe as an extra task / homework;
* lyrics / fragments of lyrics / of popular songs for students to untranscribe;
* _ _ _ your _ _ _ _ _ _ ideas _ _ _ _ _  (to share with us ;)."

GRAMMAR PRACTICE with CHINESE WHISPERS

A very simple but bringing lots of fun way to consolidate any grammar structure.

Afer all ado about form and use
(if you have that habit)
you can serve your
smart alecs a
game of
...
CHINESE WHISPERS.

Just prepare slips with sentences containing the grammar on the classroom menu ;)
and to make everything straight,
you can write a number next to a sentence on the slip
and the translation of the sentence with the corresponding number on your whiteboard.

Then, off you go with the whole lotta fun!

You can prepare sets of the same sentences for each team and make it a competition  
OR
just choose a sentence for the whole group and wait for the final version of the original sentences
OR
( ... space for your invention ... ).

When it comes to the choice of the sentences, choose the most useful / common ones
OR
use the ones that appeared in the coursebook or worksheets during the lesson.
Help them recycle the material as much as possible.
To give you the idea...
for the verb TO BE, the sentences may be:

1. I'm terribly sorry.
2. Don't be mad at me.
3. How are things?
4. Are you alright?
5. She's from Olsztyn.


Enjoy engo-lingo!

MEMO GAME CREATOR

Hiya!

I found an awesome tool for creating a memory game online and I feel the need to share it with you!

It's great because it's an online tool and you just need to save the link to your game to use / reuse it / overuse it!

It's also great because you can customise it to the full: the number of tiles, the words, the pics, and what not ;)

You can also make any changes if you're not satisfied with your current version - you just need to register for free to get that chance (but it's not necessary if you're a perfectionist ;).

Last but not least, you don't have to prepare the game yourself - you can always give your students the opportunity to be creative, learn a new skill and revise/consolidate the material! ... and later to share it with their classmates!

Here comes the link:

⏩MEMORY GAME CREATOR⏪