resursĂ educaŢionalĂ deschisĂ · why grammar must be approached by a functional perspective”,...
TRANSCRIPT
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RESURSĂ EDUCAŢIONALĂ DESCHISĂ
Denumire: Teaching Obligation and Modality
Autor: Delurințu Carmen Mihaela
Unitatea de învăţământ:
Colegiul Național Vocațional
„Nicolae Titulescu” Slatina
Disciplina: Limba engleza
Scopul materialului propus: de
documentare pentru cadrele didactice
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Aspects of teaching modals
1. Some issues and implications
The teaching of foreign languages in our schools is a complex
process. In comparison with the teaching of other subjects, in foreign
language teaching, the teacher is confronted with a large number of
problems, belonging to different scientific fields, such as linguistics,
psychology, pedagogics etc. each of them being distinguished by peculiar
features. On one hand, the teaching of a foreign language means the
transmission of a certain amount of knowledge strictly selected and graded,
as well as the formation of certain skills and habits in the practical use of the
language under study. On the other hand, these skills and habits must be
acquired under the peculiar conditions in which the student adopts a new way
of thinking and a new means of communication.
The methodology of foreign language teaching is a didactic subject.
It endeavours to establish an efficient system of methods and procedures and
it applies, develops and enriches with the help of its specific means, the
general rules of didactics in accordance with the characteristics of each
subject of study. We must emphasize the fact that although foreign language
methodology is based upon a number of general fundamental principles, the
teaching of each modern language has certain specific features. They are
determined, on one hand, by the peculiar characteristics of the foreign
language under study and, on the other hand, by the correlation between the
foreign language under study and the native language of the learners.
While teaching grammar, the teacher’s role in this process is very
important. He/ She can act as a source of information for the new grammar
pattern, organizer and manager of the activities and counsellor for error
correction.
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Teaching grammar is a three level process. The teacher first
introduces the grammar structure, then, the students practice the new
structure, and the last stage is the use of the new structure in activities.
When we ask students to concentrate on specific aspects of
language, teachers usually choose some way to explain the form and
meaning of hat language before asking the students to repeat, as a part of
controlled practice phase of the lesson. The explanation, repetition and
practice are all part of the study. Sometimes teachers spend a lot of time on
language focus and students are involved in quite a few minutes of repetition.
Once the students’ attention has been drawn to the language in question, they
may be able to move to a stage where they can be able to talk about their
lives. The teacher has to spend on every item of language as much time as
necessary depending on the students’ level and on the difficulty of the
language item.
Many people have contrasted two approaches, deductive and inductive for
introducing students to specific aspects of the language.
In a deductive approach, students are given explanations or
grammar rules based on these explanations on rules; they make phrases and
sentences using the new language. In an inductive approach, things happen
the other way round. Instead of going from rules to examples, students see
examples of language and try to work out the rules. Thus, after students have
read a text, the teacher might ask them to find examples of different modal
verbs and say how and why they are used. J. Harmer calls it the boomerang-
type lesson that means that all the elements occur in the sequence engage –
activate – study. The inductive approach and the discovery techniques are
closely connected. The latter asks students to do the work rather than having
everything handed to them by a teacher or a course book.
Discovery techniques suit some students very well because they
enjoy doing things on their own. It is sometimes considered that the
knowledge learnt by making some cognitive effort is sometimes more
powerful. Anyway, not all students feel comfortable learning this way. This
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category feels more confident if they are given the information. This thing
depends a lot on their level, as it is generally easier for advanced students to
use the discovery techniques than for the beginners. The boomerang type of
lesson is often more appropriate with the students that already have a certain
amount of language available to them for the first stage while discovery
activities are better suited to the students who are looking at the construction
of a certain language structure for the second time.
Explaining a language construction can be done in several ways. By
using modern technology, an overhead projector or an interactive whiteboard
can draw attention to grammar constructions by enlightening them or circling
them. Another way of demonstrating the grammar sequence is to write words
on individual cards, which can be moved around. For example, the teacher
can write on the cards the means of expressing obligation and necessity or
the uses of a certain modal verb (must, for example). Finally, it is sometimes
easiest for the teacher to explain the language construction. For example, if
we want students to understand the formal characteristics of the modal verbs,
the teacher can enumerate them and give examples for each of them. The
only thing the teacher should pay attention to is to explain the construction of
the language easy to do and to use the right language so that the students can
understand.
Students get used to saying or writing a certain construction by
practicing the language they are studying. While doing this, the teacher may
correct them if they make mistakes. The practice helps the students to move
the newly acquired information from short-term memory to long- term
memory. Once-only study session is not enough. The teacher needs to ensure
that students see phrases and grammar repeatedly. Repetition work but this
does not mean that repetition takes place as controlled practice when students
first meet the language. It needs to be brought back over time and at spaced
intervals so it gradually becomes part of our students’ long-term memories.
Free practice and controlled practice are both means of activating students’
pervious knowledge of language forms.
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Sometimes the teacher may decide that students need free practice.
Free practice is concerned with the passage from language study to activation
that means the correctness of the language constructions and the use of
language. This is often the case of the advanced level where students have
understood the explanations of meaning and language constructions. In such
situations, the teacher might just say something like: Let’s talk about the
things you can and you can’t do! This is a way to personalize practice and
thus, the teacher can find many mistakes so that she/he might return to the
explanations of meaning and constructions.
Controlled practice deals with repetition, which can be either choral
or individual. For choral repetition to be effective, it is important to keep the
rhythm and keep the chorus clear. If the students got enough choral
repetition, the teacher may ask individual repetition nominating the students
in a random order. Another type of controlled practice is a quick cue-
response session. For example, after teaching means of expressing obligation
and necessity, the teacher shows the students cards with different signs that
they would expect to find in the airports, restaurants, offices, libraries and
they are asked to write for each sign a sentence about the rules expressed by
the signs. Cue-response drills are an efficient way of getting the students o
say the new language in a way that can be invigorating and challenging.
The practice stage must be followed by various communicative
activities, in which students are made to use the new structure in an
interactive way, to exchange information and negotiate meaning. To
encourage students and involve them in a task, the activities must be
imaginative and enjoyable and exploit the students’ personal experience.
For example, the teacher may use a series of pictures to set up a
story and then asks the students questions that oblige the students to use them
in their own answers. The students are asked to continue the story according
to their imagination, using the new structure in at least five sentences.
Conversational exchanges contribute to even further to turning the new
structure into a habitual and functional item in learners’ language.
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Here is an activity designed for teaching the modal verbs. One way
of teaching grammar is to use, plain and practice procedure. For example, if
we want to teach the polisemy of the basic modal verbs to intermediate and
advanced students, especially older ones, we can use a comparative
presentation. It can be the most straightforward way to the students’ mind.
For example:
• May – permission and possibility
• Must - obligation and probability
• Can – ability, possibility
The teacher explains that the same modal verb to express different kinds of
modality.
e.g. May he borrow he book?
(Poate el sa imprumute cartea?)
MAY – permission
e.g. He may be at home.
(el poate fi acasa.)
MAY - posibilitate
e.g. He must read the book.
(El trebuie sa citeasca cartea.)
MUST – obligation
e.g. He must be at home.
(El trebuie sa fie acasa.)
MUST – high probability
e.g. He can/can’t read the book.
(El poate sa citeasca cartea.)
CAN - ability
e.g. He can’t be at home.
(Precis ca nu e acasa.)
CAN – low possibility
As understanding an issue is far from knowing it the teacher asks
the students to translate simple sentences based on modal verbs. Students
usually have difficulties to identify the correct answer. That is why the
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teacher must show them a logical path. Then, the teacher asks the students to
practice the newly acquired knowledge. They have to do a multiple-choice
task or a fill in exercise.
When the students have learned to distinguish among the different
meanings and uses of the modal verbs, the teacher must proceed with other
types of activities that should allow the students to practice and use the new
structures until they can deal with modality in actual linguistic situations.
e.g. 1. All children....... learn the history of their ancestors.
• Can
• May
• Must
2. He must......... have worked in sales all his life.
• Must
• Can
• May
3. The child ..... play in the garden. The grandparents allowed them to.
• Must
• May
• Can
As far as grammar is concerned, there are a couple of ways of
teaching it. With the communicative focus on meaning and interaction, the
structure itself becomes less important than the meaning it carries. “that is
why grammar must be approached by a functional perspective”, Adriana
Vizental in her Strategies of Teaching and Testing English as a Foreign
Language. She also explains that the notion of functional grammar goes
back to Saussure’s model who considered linguistic communication as a
three level process: form – structure - meaning. The three levels correspond
to the three branches of linguistics: phonology, grammar and semantics and
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grammar is further broken down in morphology and syntax. While the
traditional linguistics views language as a system of forms to which
meanings is attached and consequently, the study of language goes from
form to meaning, the modern linguists’ approach (the Functional Sentence
Perspective – Halliday (1985/1994) – An Introduction to Functional
Grammar) is upside down, from meaning to form. Instead of asking him
what a meaning a certain item carries, the functional linguists tries to assess
how the speaker puts his ideas into forms.
As far as the meaning is concerned, modality is a sector that offers
the speaker a wide choice of forms. There is a variety of functions that can,
may, must can express. CAN(’T) can be used to express (in)ability or
(im)possibility., MAY – can express permission or possibility, MUST – can
express obligation or probability. On the contrary, various forms can express
each function. Take for example probability. The speaker can show that he
views a situation, event, action as probable by using:
• Must, ought, should, will
e.g. He must be at school.
You ought to have done it.
They should be the guilty ones.
He will be the winner of the competition.
• Be sure/ certain /positive
e.g. I’m sure he is telling the truth.
I’m certain he has finished it by now.
I’m positive they have already left.
• Obviously, apparently, certainly
e.g. Obviously, they are lying.
Apparently, they are out of town.
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They have certainly did it.
• Be likely
e.g. It is likely to happen sooner than we expected.
Obviously, the choice of a certain form instead of another is
constrained by the context in which the form is used. In other words, there
are two types of constraints: accuracy - the choice of one grammatical
category instead of another and appropriacy - the choice of register.
In what concerns the form, it is important to show how the structure
and voice can be manipulated to convey different meanings.
The speaker begins the sentence with what is considered to be the
most important element while the rest of the sentence comes on the second
plan.
e.g. Children must obey their parents.
Children mustn’t cross the street on the red light.
In the first case, the accent falls on the idea of obligation while in
the second one, the stress is on the idea of forbiddance .In this case, the
intonation plays a very important role. The speaker can modulate the
intonation to convey the meaning if the sentence.
Obviously, the speaker is not always aware of the way he/she uses
the voice and that is why teachers should warn students of the dangers of
uncontrolled voice and they can help them understand how to use intonation
to convey a favourable attitude. This can be done especially by practicing
communicative interactions.
In case of writing, form is equally important because each type of
disourse has its own layout, which the learner should respect when the tasks
require.
Here are some activities focussed on meaning and on form:
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Activity 1 – focussed on meaning – Where is Bill?
Language: the meaning of the modal verbs
Age: teenagers
Level: intermediate
One of the main uses of the modal verbs is to make guesses about
present or past states. If the teaches gives the students a paradigm, he / she
can further ask students to make sentences using the pattern.
e.g. Pattern: Someone is vawing to me.
Weak inference - That could/ might be John.
Stronger inference – That may be John.
Strong inference – That should be John.
Very strong inference – That must be John.
Situations:
• She is not at work today. (ill)
• The baby is crying. (tired)
• The student is absent minded. (in love)
Activity 2 – focussed on form and meaning – Can vs. will be able
Language: Can vs. will be able
Age: young learners
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Level: intermediate
In this example, the students have read a text in which the new
language occurs and they have done comprehension work on text. They now
look at a grammar issue that arises in the text.
e.g. Study the examples:
Why is it necessary to use will be able rather than can in wo o them?
• My Spanish is very poor but the teacher tells me that after
a couple of years of study I’ll be able to speak nd write
very well.
• She is at work today but perhaps she can see you
tomorrow.
• This newspaper says that we’ll be able to travel to he moon
very soon.
• You’re young and healthy and you can find a job if you
want to. You really can!
The teacher wants to know if students can make a difference
between something that hasn’t happened but which the speaker can already
do and an ability purely in the future - that needs something else to happen
first.
Exercise:
In which of these sentences is it possible to use can? In which of
these sentences is it possible to use will be able to?
• He lost a leg in the accident but with a new artificial one
he ..............to walk again.
• If we go to the theatre tomorrow, we ........ see the new
play.
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• Do you think that someday people ............ live and work
on the other planets?
• After a few more lessons, I think you ..... skate very well.
The teacher can ask the students to work in pairs on exercise 1
before checking it with the class. The focus is entirely on the meaning and
form of the language. The teacher asks the students for their conclusions
before letting them do exercise 2. If necessary, the teacher can spend some
time on an explanation stage and even conduct an accurate reproduction
stage using can and be able to.
Activity 3 – focussed form – Find someone who.....
Language: the production of modal verbs in questions
Age: young learners
Level: elementary
This communication activity can be used for practice in the
production of modal verbs in questions. Each sentence should use a modal
verb.
e.g. Find someone who can run very fast.
Find someone who might spend the holiday abroad.
Find someone who must write two exercises.
Find someone who thinks that I should speak louder.
Each student has a worksheet with a list like the above and moves
around the classroom asking questions to their classmates. When he finds the
person who fits the description, he writes the name down.
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In this example, the language to be studied is presented students in a
text.
Activity: Can I make the right choice?
Language: can, could – ability and possibility modals
Age: teenagers
Level: elementary
The sequence starts when the teacher asks the students what they
would like to become after graduating secondary school. The students
discuss in large groups about their future careers and after that, they report it
back to the class.
The students now look at the first paragraph of the text and try to
decide what the text is about. When they have done this, the teacher checks
their answers. The students now read the whole text and say if they agree
with the author choice.
“Where can people learn new things? Each person can have a
different way to choose their major. Some people can decide their career
instantly, and on the other hand, others can discover their interests in
college. It can be easier to find one’s field when people can try different
subjects. Educational institution is an environment where students can
develop their life-skills. I believe that people can learn by themselves if they
like to learn. Education and a major can be a part of their goal for some
people, but for other people, their career is more important.
I had this similar problem when I was deciding my major in
sophomore year. I could major in voice, but I couldn’t think of a job I can get
because there are many very talented singers in Japan who can’t get a job.
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So, I ended up studying business but never liked it. Therefore, my grades
were not very pleasant even though I could get A in all voice classes.”
The students now match questions, such as:
• How can some people decide their career?
• What can educational institutions develop?
• Could the author decide what to do?
• What can’t talented people do in Japan?
• What couldn’t the author think of?
Then, their attention is drawn to the modal verbs can and could and their
uses. The teacher explains to the students that could is the past form of can
and introduced the formal characteristics of the modal verbs. Then, the
teacher asks the students to underline each modal verb and discusses with the
students about their meaning. She shows them that they can both express
ability and possibility.
e.g. can - affirmative form, interrogative, that means the
inversion with the subject; it expresses present possibility.
The students are asked to fill in the following grammar chart using examples
from the text:
Modal verb Ability Possibility
Can
Could
Some people „pick up” second languages without going to classes.
Others go to language classes and study the language they wish to learn. The
former category refers to the ability of acquiring language naturally and
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subconsciously. The latter refers to the students’ organising their learning
and applying their learned knowledge to their task. As the American linguist
Stephen Krashen underline, the difference between acquired language and
learnt language reflects on the quality of used language. The spontaneous
language, learnt probably by exposure to a target-language community with
no attention to language study, is the language that we use in conversations
because it is anxiety free, but is it not always grammatically correct. On the
other hand, the learnt language, the one studied as grammar and vocabulary,
may lack the spontaneous communication as they are monitoring their
sayings. No matter what the means of getting to master the English language
may be, students always have problems in expressing modality.
In these respects, this work is meant to be as an answer given to all
those learning English, confronting with difficulties of understanding, and
consequently using, modal verbs. It is a more detailed approach of modal
verbs expressing necessity and obligation, both on account of their form and
meaning, in order to find ways of dealing with modality.
In order to become competent users of English, students need to
know the auxiliary verbs and their uses so that they can form correct and
complex language structure. They need to know the characteristics of the
modal auxiliaries, the relationship of the modal auxiliaries to each other and
their meaning. To avoid students’ making mistakes, teachers tend to
introduce grammar gradually, starting with the structures that can be
presented and understood easily. Some of the auxiliaries are essential so they
are taught at the first level.
There are a number of ways that teachers can help their students
master the complexities of modality. First, particularly for lower-level
students, they can design activities that allow students to explore and get
comfortable with the formal properties of modals and semi-modals. When
designing these activities, teachers should be mindful of the fact that the
formal properties of one semi-modal will not necessarily transfer to the next.
In fact, many of the mistakes that students make with semi-modals come
from over-generalising formal properties.
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Although great attention has been paid to the new national curriculum,
there are still aspects of the language that are rather neglected or not studied
thoroughly. It is the case of modal verbs and their power to help students
cope with many aspects of the language due to their various pragmatic and
semantic characteristics.
Students need to learn the formal properties of the various modal
auxiliaries and semi-modals and learn how to manipulate those properties
appropriately. Moreover, they not only have to learn three categories of
modality (epistemic, deontic, and dynamic), and the uses of the various
modals and semi-modals for each, they need to learn to distinguish between
the three categories.
Consider the different meanings of can’t in these three sentences:
e.g. You can’t be Laura’s brother – she’s an only child (epistemic,
certainty)
I’m sorry, you can’t leave yet (deontic, permission)
You can’t swim (dynamic, ability).
Students also need to learn about the pragmatic considerations of
modality, such as the difference between can and may when giving
permission.
When developing activities that focus on the meaning of modals and
semi-modals, teachers can make sure that there is a strong connection
between the words and the meanings. One example of this would be to
present students with a sentence containing a modal together with possible
meanings:
e.g. You should study French.
This sentence talks about 1) advice 2) obligation 3) permission
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At higher levels, such an activity could ask students to choose between
categories:
e.g. She must be the new French teacher.
Do you think this sentence talks about 1) certainty 2) obligation 3) advice?
Or students could be asked to rephrase a sentence using an appropriate
modal:
e.g. Diane has the ability to speak French.
Diane__________________________ (can speak French).
Most students become familiar with the most obvious formal
characteristic of modal verbs, namely that there is no -s ending for the third
person singular present. But there are other determining factors on a formal
level. The first is that the modal auxiliaries have no non-finite forms. The
second is that you cannot chain modal verbs together in a sentence. There are
also a number of formal characteristics that modals share with other
auxiliaries. These criteria include
1) inversion with the subject in questions ,
2) forming the negative with -n’t
3) verbal ellipsis
4) emphatic stress ( Palmer, 1990).
Many students seem to learn better if they are asked to think about
the language they are coming in contact with. Thinking about the sentence
allows students to use their knowledge. The practical implications of this
view are quite clear. Instead of explicitly teaching the modal verbs, for
example, we could expose students to examples of it and hen allow them,
under our guidance, to work out for themselves how it is used. One powerful
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reason for encouraging language students to discover things from themselves
is the complex.
2. Strategies for teaching the modals expressing
obligation and necessity
Apparently, the basic aim of foreign language teaching is to “teach
the language”, that means, to provide the students with vocabulary and
grammar and endow them with linguistic competence. However, language is
a living body that adapts itself to the communicative context and situation, so
that the educator, who wants to produce competent users of English, must
target the students’ communicative competence. Consequently, students
should be able to interact with the other members of the social group, to
share information and negotiate the meaning, to use the language
functionally and strategically to achieve the desired effect.
To achieve this, the teacher must target simultaneously a variety of
language areas and skills, so that vocabulary and grammar, listening and
speaking, reading and writing must be taught in an integrated way.
Nevertheless, present day theories of language teaching suggest that, for
pedagogical reasons and classrooms practice, communicative competence
should be broken down into language skills and each skill to be taught and
practiced separately.
When teaching grammar, the teacher’s choice of strategy largely
depends on three factors: on the grammar item to be taught, on student’s age
and language proficiency and on their personal characteristics. It is according
to these features that the teacher decides upon the best techniques and the
most appropriate teaching material to be used:
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• relevant texts; dialogues that illustrate the grammar pattern,
text that present the new item comparatively with one that
is already known to the students,
• auditory material, visual demonstration; detailed
explanations, tapes, situational pictures, hands and arrows,
grids, charts.
The teaching of a grammar item must be done by isolating it and
lying special emphasis on the item, so that the student’s attention should not
be distracted. The teacher must proceed - explain and illustrate it – so that the
students should get a clear view of its meaning, form and use. Then, the
students use the structure in exercises.
Whatever student’s age or type may be, visual demonstration can be
very useful to explain and teach grammar, as visuals provide a concrete
equivalent and palpable support for abstract matters. Gestures, icons, arrows,
time lines, patterns, make grammar problems palpable and memorable. With
young students, it is not wise to use too much theoretical presentation – they
learn better when they have some concrete support: pictures, songs,
movement. Thus, it is easier for them to understand simple grammar
problems. More advanced learners may prefer patterns to clarify or
systematize the complex items.
Grammar teaching sometimes happens as the result of other work
students are doing. When they study language in a text or when a grammar
problem presents itself unexpectedly in the middle of a lesson they need to
deal with it immediately.
In a recent article, Leech has drawn attention to the changing status
of modals in present day use. He says: “According to an exploratory
investigation we have undertaken, the English modal auxiliaries as a group
have been declining significantly in their frequency of use”, and explicitly
recommends “to those involved in the teaching of English as a second or
foreign language” not to “waste hours of valuable classroom time teaching
shall and ought to”.
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Modal verb teaching, just as any other grammar structure, may grow
directly from the tasks students are performing or the course books we are
using may help us. Most teachers have their own favourite course books and
grammar presentation. The modals can be introduced in a number of ways
and we’ll see some examples but students may also want to work out for
themselves and see how the language is constructed. We should also offer
students opportunities to practice the grammar points and play grammar
games.
• Introducing grammar:
Language: Learn the modal forms 'have to' and 'must', Grammar
introduction/review, talking about daily routines and interview game
Age: teenagers
Level: lower level
Many students often confuse the usage of the modals 'must' and
'have to'. While meaning is generally maintained in incorrect usage in the
positive forms, a mix-up in the negative forms can cause confusion. This
lesson uses daily routines and an interviewing game to help students master
these important modal forms.
Outline:
• Ask students to talk about their daily routines. Have them make
a list of five things that they have to do every day.
• Introduce the grammar by having the students take a look at the
grammar sheet below.
• Discuss the differences between 'have to' and 'must' in the
positive form. Make sure to point out that 'have to' is used for daily routines
while 'must' is used for strong personal obligation.
• Discuss the differences between 'don't have to' and 'mustn't'.
Make sure to stress the idea that 'don't have to' expresses the idea that the
person isn't required to do something but may do so if he/she would like
while 'mustn't' expresses the idea of prohibition.
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• In order to encourage students to favor the use of 'have to',
spend the rest of the lesson focusing on daily responsibilities in the following
exercises.
• Ask students to take out the list they created earlier and re-write
the list using 'have to'.
• Ask students to choose a job from the list provided (you might
want to first check that students are familiar with the jobs listed) and think
about what a person working in that profession has to do.
• Once you have given students a chance to think a while, play a
variation on the 20 questions game. You can begin by choosing a profession
and having students ask you 10 or 15 questions about what you have to do in
this job. Questions can only be answered by 'yes', 'no' or 'sometimes'.
• The student who guesses the name of your profession should be
the next to be asked the 15 questions. Another variation on this game is for
students to play the game in pairs.
Have to - Must
Study the Use of 'Have to' and 'Must' in the Chart Below
Must / Have To - Mustn't / Not Have To
Listed below are examples and uses of must / have to / mustn't / not have to
Example Chart
Examples Usage
We have to get up
early.
She had to work
hard yesterday.
They will have to
arrive early.
Does he have to
go?
Use 'have to' in the past, present and future to express
responsibility or necessity.
NOTE: 'have to' is conjugated as a regular verb and
therefore requires an auxiliary verb in the question form
or negative.
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I must finish this
work before I
leave.
Must you work so
hard?
Use 'must' to express something that you or a person
feels is necessary. This form is used only in the present
and future.
You don't have to
arrive before 8.
They didn't have to
work so hard.
The negative form of 'have to' expresses the idea that
something is not required. It is however, possible if so
desired.
She mustn't use
such horrible
language.
Tom, you mustn't
play with fire.
The negative form of 'must' expresses the idea that
something is prohibited - this form is very different in
meaning than the negative of 'have to'!
Did the have to
leave so early?
He had to stay
overnight in
Dallas.
IMPORTANT: The past form of 'have to' and 'must' is
'had to'. Must does not exist in the past.
Choose a profession from the list below and think about what a
person doing that job has to do every day.
Professions and Jobs - What do they have to do?
accountant actor air steward
architect assistant author
baker builder businessman /
businesswoman / executive
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butcher chef civil servant
clerk computer operator /
programmer
cook
dentist doctor driver bus / taxi / train
driver
garbage man (refuse
collector)
electrician engineer
farmer hairdresser journalist
judge lawyer manager
musician nurse photographer
pilot plumber police officer
politician receptionist sailor
salesman / saleswoman
/salesperson
scientist secretary
soldier teacher telephone operator
• Discovering grammar
Activity: Rules and freedom
Language: functions expressing obligation (can’t / have to / must / allowed)
Age: adult
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Level: intermediate
In this example the students are going to look at the obligation
language, some of which they may have encountered separately.
The teaching sequence starts when the students discuss what rules
they expect to find in places such as airports, bars and pubs, beaches,
hospitals, libraries. They then look at a list containing a certain number of
different signs and say where they would expect to see them and what they
mean.
Staff only e.g. shops, restaurants,
bars, hospitals,
No diving
Cyclists and pedestrians only
No mobile phones!
Please, have your boarding card and passport
ready for inspection
Dress regulations: NO DENIM!
NO T-SHIRTS
Smoking area
Wet paint
NO DOGS! NO FOOTBALL!
No parking!
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Now, that the students are properly warmed up and engaged with the topic,
the students are asked to look at the messages again and tell which of the
express the idea of forbiddance and tick the right answers.
Staff only
No diving
Cyclists and pedestrians only
No mobile phones!
Please, have your boarding
card and passport ready for inspection
Dress regulations: NO DENIM!
NO T-SHIRTS
Smoking area
Wet paint!
NO DOGS! NO FOOTBALL!
No parking!
Once the teacher has checked that the students have been able to complete
the analysis chart, she / he can get them to do a fill-in exercise where they
have to discriminate between have to, don’t have to, should, shouldn’t, are/
aren’t allowed. Then, they can make their own sentences about what rules are
in places from the first exercise and read them to their classmates who have
to guess what they are talking about.
e.g. Which sentences from above do the following relate to?
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1. You mustn’t smoke in the smoking area
You are allowed to smoke in the smoking area.
You can smoke in the smoking area if you want to?
2. You mustn’t leave your mobile on.
You can’t use your mobile.
You shouldn’t use your mobile.
3. You have to be careful of the wet paint.
You don’t have to be careful of the wet pain.
You ought to be careful of the wet paint.
• Practicing grammar
Activity: Matching sentences halves/ contexts
Language: expressing obligation and necessity
Age: young learners
Level: intermediate
One of the best ways of making students think of sentence
constructions and sentence meaning is to get them to match sentence halves
or sentences with a context.
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The teacher gives the students two lists that they have to match up. This can
be done in pair or by students working on their own. For early stages, this
activity can be more fun and interactive if the teacher puts the sentence
halves on cards. Each student gets a card and has to walk around the room to
find his pair. For the advance stages, students can do this thing without
showing their cards one another so they have to read them aloud and then
discuss which pairings are possible or not.
•
It is prohibited to take photos here.
•
They must pay in
advance.
•
Paying in advance is obligatory at this
school. •
They must obey the
regulations.
• Wearing a uniform is not obligatory.
• They mustn’t take photos.
•
If they don’t obey the regulations, they’ll
get a fine. •
They needn’t wear a
uniform.
Another types of exercises that can help students are multiple choice, fill in
the blanks, etc.
1. I ....... go to see the doctor last week because I was very ill.
(a) must (b) must to (c) had to
2. I ....... go now because I am already late for my class.
(a) must (b) had (c) have
3. Do you ....... clean the house every day or every week?
(a) must (b) have (c) have to
4. They ....... do their homework today because it is a holiday at the school.
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(a) must not (b) don't have (c) don't have to
5. I may ....... go to Paris next week because there is a very big exhibition
there.
(a) have (b) have to (c) had
• Grammar games.
Activity: Zoo animal
Language: Introducing vocabulary - Zoo animals, Colours, patterns and
colour combinations Modals – can, must, mustn’t (as piece of vocabulary
not as a grammar focus)
Zoo verbs – buy, touch, feed, listen, watch, eat, run, shout, stroke…
Age: young learners
Level: elementary
Children love learning about animals, especially ones that are big,
scary, colourful, wild, and potentially dangerous! Once you have them
captivated by the subject the teacher will find that they are more than eager
to learn the English vocabulary needed to talk about it. There are hundreds of
language focus points that teachers can develop, when doing topics on zoo
animals. Here are just some ideas to get started.
Materials
• Map of the world
• Silhouette coloured stickers of zoo animals (buy by the bag in
craft shops)
• A3 copies of a zoo diagram
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• Zoo animals flashcards
• Scarf to blindfold
• Blu tack
• Coloured card
Rules at the zoo
The teacher elicits students’ brainstorming dos and don’ts at the
zoo. The ideas can include the following:
1. You can feed the ducks.
2. You mustn’t feed the lions.
3. You mustn’t touch the elephant.
4. You must buy a ticket.
With young students, it is not wise to use too much theoretical
presentation – they learn better when they have some concrete support:
pictures, songs, movement. Teachers can easily demonstrate the difference
with how stern or relaxed theylook when saying ‘You can feed the ducks’
(raise eyebrows and smile!) ‘You must buy a ticket’ (nod head and wag your
finger) ‘You mustn’t feed the lions.’ (look horrified, shake head and pull a
stern face!)
Consequently, it is easier for them to understand simple grammar problems.
So, the teacher will pre-teach verbs such as - feed, touch, buy, run, watch,
shout, eat, stroke, etc. but there is no need to go into the complex difference
between all the modals.
Students, guides by the teacher, can make a class poster of rules.
This idea can also be adapted for more advanced pupils and make up
opposite, rebel rules such as ‘You must eat lots of ice-cream.’ ‘You must
stroke the lion!’ The teacher has to make sure they understand that these are
opposite rules though! To help explain the teacher can take the rules already
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created and make them into opposites before letting the children use their
imagination.
In order to practice vocabulary, the young learners can design their
own zoo. The teacher asks them the following questions:
• If they ran the zoo, what changes would they make?
• What animal should go where?
• Should the bears go next to the fish?
• Why shouldn’t the snakes be in the same cage as the birds?…
The teacher can draw a simple plan of a zoo with the word zoo
written at the bottom, middle of the page on a gate. Then around the page,
s/he can draw several cages, photocopy onto A3 and distribute to small
groups or pairs. Each pair should have cut outs or stickers of animals that
they can move around the page until they are satisfied with their allocation of
animals into the cages. They should think about noises each animals makes,
what they eat, whether they need a very cold cage or a very hot cage etc.
Listening, speaking, reading, and writing can all be vehicles for
guided practice activities. For example, drills and dialog substitutions
involve listening and speaking. Conversation cards require reading as well as
listening and speaking, and grids involve all four language skills. These and a
selection of other popular activities are described in this section.
Drills can help adult learners commit grammar patterns to memory.
They also provide students with practice in pronouncing new patterns,
helping them to become comfortable articulating the target language forms.
Drills fall into two categories, mechanical and meaningful.
Mechanical drills require minimal comprehension of content on the part of
students and serve only to reinforce patterns. In a “backward buildup” drill,
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for instance, the teacher leads and students usually respond as a whole group.
They are practicing the pronunciation of the negative form of the modals.
e.g. Teacher: mustn’t
Students: mustn’t
Teacher: oughtn’t
Students: oughtn’t
Teacher: needn’t
Students: needn’t
In contrast, meaningful drills require students to understand the
language in order to respond correctly, but the activity is tightly controlled
because only one answer is possible. The following is an example of a
“substitution” drill focusing on obligation and forbidance:
e.g. Teacher: (holding up a picture of a child crossing the street on the
red light)
What mustn’t he do?
Students: He mustn’t cross the street on the red light.
Teacher: (holding up a picture of a child playing with matches)
What mustn’t he do?
Students: He mustn’t play with matches.
To focus on form and meaning, the teacher can set up a drill like the
following. S/He writes on the board the words:
- POSSIBLE
- IMPOSSIBLE
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- CERTAIN
The teacher says different phrases and shows how the sentence changes
depending on if it’s possible, impossible or certain, e.g.
e.g. We go out. (point to CERTAIN) We’ll go out.
We stay at home. (point to IMPOSSIBLE) We can’t stay
at home.
We go to the cinema. (point to POSSIBLE) We might go
to the cinema.
The activity continues with the teacher giving other cues. These cues could
be spoken, or written on cards, which can be shown to the students, e.g.
1. I have a drink. (CERTAIN)
2. I have coffee. (IMPOSSIBLE)
3. I have tea. (POSSIBLE)
4. We work tonight. (POSSIBLE)
5. You work tonight. (IMPOSSIBLE)
6. I work tonight. (CERTAIN)
Dialog substitutions are short conversations (usually two to four
exchanges) that students repeat, each time substituting different vocabulary
but repeating the target grammar. In the following example, focusing on must
used for external authority, students look at pictures of people doing different
thing, which are forbidden. They read and practice the model. Then, working
in pairs, they repeat the conversation, replacing the boldface words with the
numbered cues.
e.g. Student 1: John is walking on the grass!
Student 2: John, You mustn’t walk on the grass!
1. Brian / open the zebra’s cage
2. Lee / feed the animals
3. Ali / eat with dirty hands
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4. Lisa / climb fences
5. Andrea / ride the bike among the flowerbeds
6. Ray / pick flowers
An advantage of dialog substitutions is that students are practicing actual
conversations that may be applicable to their daily lives.
Grids (also called charts) present information for students to use in
forming questions and answers. Grids differ from dialog substitutions in that
the cues for speaking require reading rather than recognition of pictures. At
higher levels, grids may have significantly more print, as in this guided
exercise for practicing obligation and necessity.
Make the appropriate
sentence for each item MUST DO MUST NOT
DO
DON’T
HAVE TO
DO
a. improve your English
b. enter the classroom after
the lesson begins
c. be in time for school
d. do your homework
e. buy expensive clothes
f. go swmming
Using the cues, students produce sentences like these:
e.g. I must improve my English.
We mustn’t enter the classroom after the lesson begins.
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Conversation cards are index cards (or strips of paper) that provide
cues for guided conversations between two students. For example, cards like
these can be used to practice the modal verbs expressing obligation and
forbiddance.
Each student receives a card. Students stand up and move around
the room, pairing up with any classmate they meet. Student 1 asks a question,
which remains constant; Student 2 answers according to the information on
his or her card. The students then switch roles:
Name three things you must not do
in a library
Name three things you must do in
your country to obtain a driver's
license.
Name three things you must not do
in a hospital
Name three things you must do to
be accepted to a good school.
Name three things you must not do
in an airport
Name three things you must do to
get a good job
Name three things you must not do
in this class
Name three things you must do to
have good, true friends
Name three things you must not do
in a prison
Name three things you must do to
become a pilot
After both students have practiced the question and the answer, they
exchange cards and each moves on to talk to a different classmate. In
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addition to reinforcing the target grammar, conversations based on
conversation cards expose students to a wide range of vocabulary items.
Students also enjoy the opportunity to interact with a variety of classmates.
Word strips are sentences cut up into words. Students arrange the
words to form questions or statements. These two examples provide practice
with the modal verbs.
e.g. The guard shouted that everybody must give the password.
The password / shouted / must /the guard /that / give / everybody
She must have dialled the wrong number.
The number / must /wrong / she / have / dialled
Word strips are especially effective with kinesthetic learners –
students who learn best by moving or manipulating objects. The strips also
reinforce the connection between spoken and written English.
Information transfer activities require students to take information
presented in one form and put it into another form. For example, this is in
activity designed for practicing prepositions of location (next to, across from,
between, etc.) and modal verbs expressing advice, obligation and necessity.
Students are given both a short narrative reading that describes the locations
of places in a neighbourhood or give instructions about how to get there and
a map of the neighbourhood with the names of the locations omitted. Using
the information from the reading, students write the names of the places in
the appropriate locations on the map.
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Information gap activities usually consist of two worksheets
labelled A and B. They contain some information that is the same, but each
worksheet is also missing some information that is found on the other sheet.
Partners must ask each other questions in order to get the information
missing from their respective sheets. In this example, students practice the
‘obligation and permission' modals, can, can't, have to, must, don't have to,
mustn't and asking and answering questions using the modal verbs. The first
item in each student’s worksheet is filled in as an example.
e.g. Student 1: Must we do our homework? Student 2: Must we do our
homework?
Student 2: Yes, you must. Student 1: No, you needn’t.
Student 1
We don't have to do homework
We mustn't smoke in the classroom
We have to respect the teacher (even the worst groups come up with
this one)
We can watch films in class
Student 2
We have to get out of bed at 4:00.
We mustn’t answer back or ask questions.
We don’t have to wear a uniform.
We have to run after dinner
The students are presented four schools and they are asked to
identify which are the two whose rules they have found. As a further activity,
the students are to choose a school from the four described. They must
consider the pros and cons of all four and have reasons for their choice.
• School no. 1
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This is a positive school which believes in student independence.
There aren’t a lot of rules. You can do many things that you can’t do in other
schools. For example, you don’t have to go to lessons if you know the
information from that lesson. You don’t have to come to school in the
morning if you have no lessons, and you don’t have to go to assembly if you
prefer to do private study in the library.
But there are some responsibilities too. Students have to wear
uniforms and they must wear a tie (even for sport).
Students don’t have to study 12 subjects if they don’t want to but
they must study at least 9 and have to do lots of homework for each subject
every week. They must show that they are learning or they have to go back
and repeat the year.
• School no. 2
This school is a very fair and happy school. All the students want to
stay in the school when they are 18 and don’t want to go to university. They
must leave, but because they don’t want to, the school has to pay very big
strong men to move the students out of school on their last day.
Why is it so popular? Well, it’s simple. Students have to come to
school, OK, but when they are there they don’t have to study grammar, they
don’t have to read boring stories by old writers who are famous but terrible,
and they don’t have to listen to the teacher talking and talking all day. They
learn because the teachers understand that people learn when they want to
learn and when they are interested.
But they have to keep quiet when the teacher is talking.
• School no. 3
This school is where Bill Gates went. The school is very proud of
this, so they are now an IT school, where students have to do all their work
over the internet. So, students don’t have to go to school. They must be
online from 8:00 until 12:00, and from 1:00 to 4:00 with a Skype connection
with their robot teacher. They don’t have to go to the school building, but if
their computer has a virus, they have to buy a new computer or their
education suffers.
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They only have to study three subjects, Information Technology,
Computer Science and Computers in Society. In reality, this is the same
subject, but because of this, students don’t have to do more than one lot of
homework every night.
The big rule, students MUST NOT download music from the
internet.
• School no. 4
This school has a reputation for having the toughest students on the
planet! They’re as hard as nails. We can see why.
Every morning, the students have to get out of bed at 4:00 and run
ten miles in bare feet. Then they can go for breakfast, which is one apple.
After breakfast they must do their homework, five hours, and then
they have to go to class, where the teachers shout at them instead of teaching
them. The students mustn’t answer back or ask questions.
Then, they have to run another ten miles, and at 8:00, after their
dinner, another apple, they must go to bed and they can’t read or talk to
each other.
It’s a tough school, but they don’t have to wear a uniform.
Though guided, information gap activities mirror real-life
interactions in that listeners do not know the missing information until their
partners supply it.
3. Types of exercises
Teachers tend to talk about the way we use language in terms of
four skills – reading, writing, speaking and listening. These are often divided
into two types: receptive skills and productive skills. On the other hand, it
makes little sense to talk about skills in isolation. Work on language skills is
often the previous step before working on various aspects of language
39
construction. The ideal learning sequence will offer both skill integration and
also, language study based around a topic or other thematic thread.
Here are some examples of developing the four skills while using
the modal verbs of obligation and necessity
A 1. Developing listening skills
Aim: practicing listening skills, the uses of: must, mustn’t and needn’t
Course book: Solutions, Oxford
Level: pre-intermediate
Students have to listen and complete the text with: must, mustn’t and
needn’t.
How to be polite at a Chinese meal
You ….. start your food until the host picks up his or her chopsticks. In
general, if the host offers you food, you …. accept it. (It is better to leave it in
your bowl than refuse it.) Periods of silence during a meal are not considered
embarrassing in China, so you … talk just to fill the gaps. As the Chinese
proverb says: “Your speech should be better than silence. If not, be silent.”
After completing the answers in the listening exercise, they have to complete
the rules with: must, mustn’t and needn’t.
40
• We use ………… to express necessity (something that is very
important to do)
• We use ………. to express lack of necessity (something that isn’t
necessary but isn’t against the rules to do)
• We use ……. to express prohibition (something that is against the
rules to do)
A.2. Developing speaking skills
Aim: practicing speaking skills, the uses of: must, mustn’t and needn’t
Level: pre-intermediate
Students are asked to work in pairs. They have to think about the customs in
their country when they visit somebody’s house for a meal. They can use the
following ideas:
• Arrive exactly on time
• Belch at the table
• Bring flowers
• Take your shoes off when you enter the house
• Eat everything that you are given
• Eat your fingers
• Eat with a knife and fork
A.3. Developing writing skills
Aim: developing writing skills, the uses of: must, mustn’t and needn’t
41
Level: pre-intermediate
Students are asked to write a short note to somebody who is visiting their
country. They have to explain how to be polite when you go to somebody’s
house for a meal. They can use the ideas from the previous activity or some
others of their own:
• Arrive exactly on time
• Belch at the table
• Bring flowers
• Take your shoes off when you enter the house
• Eat everything that you are given
• Eat your fingers
• Eat with a knife and fork
Hi ____________,
Here’s some advice about how to be polite when you go to somebody’s
house for a meal.
You must________________
You mustn’t _______________
You needn’t ________________
Best wishes
_____________________
A.4. Developing reading skills
42
Aim: developing reading skills, using must and mustn’t
Level: pre-intermediate
Rules and regulations - Pictionary
The class is divided into four groups. Each group receives a sheet of paper
with a list of things that are forbidden. Each group has to draw signs
illustrating the rules below. Then they exchange the sheets of paper so that
they can guess what the rule is (they don’t have to use exactly the same
words):
Group 1.
1. You aren’t allowed to chew gum
2. You aren’t allowed to fly remote control planes and helicopters
3. You shouldn’t push the revolving door
Group 2
1. You should hold onto the escalator handrail
2. You mustn’t jump up and down in the lift (= elevator)
3. Do not put your feet on the toilet seat
Group 3
1. Drinking in the street is banned
2. You mustn’t throw litter (= rubbish = garbage) in the street
3. You aren’t allowed to urinate (= go to toilet) in the street
Group 4
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4. You can’t smoke while you are walking
5. Dogs are only allowed if you carry them in a bag (= Dogs must be carried
in a bag)
6. Horses aren’t allowed on the highway.
As far as the modal verbs are concerned, there are some other types
of activities that can focus on their meaning, form or use or on a combination
of some of them.
A.5. British and American business etiquette
Aim: developing reading skills, using modal verbs for business rules and
conventions
Level: upper intermediate
This activity is extremely useful for the ESP students. It is meant to focus
both the grammar structures, in this case the modal verbs, and on business
English. It can also be considered as a sort of test for checking the students’
knowledge about the differences between the American and British culture.
The students are given the following statements and they are asked to use
modal verbs to fill in the gaps so that the statements are true.
• You … call a Welsh, Scottish or Northern Irish person
“English”.
• You ... call the managing director of a company the
“CEO”.
• In America, you … mention your achievements in a job
interview, but in the UK you ….
• In America, you … say how proud you are of your
children’s achievements, but In the UK you …
44
• The British often make critical comments about their
country. You … join in by making other negative
comments about the UK.
• In the UK, you … say sorry to someone who has bumped
into you, even though it isn’t your fault at all.
• In the UK, you … pay for each round of drinks and take
turns paying.
• You … smoke in a British pub.
• In the UK, you … bring humor into every meeting,
presentation and conference speech.
• You … be exactly on time for a British business meeting,
but you …. arrive ten to twenty minutes late for a dinner
party at someone’s house.
• You … use first names with all but the very top managers
of your company in both America and the UK.
The activity can be continued by asking the students to discuss in groups on
the following topic: What things above are different in your country?
A.6. Accommodation rules guessing game
Aim: travel English (vocabulary connected to accommodation Hotel, youth
hostel, dorm, university halls, B and B, and host family rules) , modals
Level: upper intermediate
A: Choose and circle any one of the rules below and see if your partner can
guess which one you have chosen by asking yes/ no questions, e.g. “Are there
any special rules about the bathroom?” or “Do I have to do anything at any
particular time?”
B: Circle one more rule. The rule you have circled is one of the rules of the
accommodation that you are the owner of. Your partner can choose if they
45
are looking for a youth hostel, host family, university halls (dorm), hotel or B
and B (bed and breakfast). Take questions from your prospective guest and
try to persuade them to stay in your accommodation. You can try to avoid
telling them any bad rules you have, but you cannot lie about it.
• You are supposed to vacuum your room after you have finished
staying in it.
• You are only allowed one shower a day.
• You mustn’t shower for more than 10 minutes.
• You are supposed to pray before you start eating.
• There is a 10 pm curfew (= you can’t go in or out after 10 pm.)
• You aren’t allowed to invite people of the opposite sex into your
room after 8pm.
• You have to bring your own towels.
• You have to bring your own bedding (sheets, pillowcase, duvet
cover etc.)
• You can’t enter your room from 10 am to 3 pm.
• You have to sleep in bunk beds.
• You have to clear away your dishes after you have finished eating.
• You have to take all your rubbish with you when you leave.
• You aren’t allowed to flush the toilet after other people have gone to
sleep.
• You have to turn the lights out by half past ten at night.
• You have to use a communal shower (= a big shared shower)
• You are allowed to keep a pet, but only one that can hold its breath
underwater for at least 6 minutes.
• You aren’t allowed to cook meat in the saucepans provided.
• You aren’t allowed to swear (use bad words)
• You can’t dye your hair in the shower
Discussion questions
All the rules above are true somewhere. Have you ever stayed anywhere with
any of these rules?
46
Which ones do you think are the best and the worst rules? Why do you think
they exist?
In pairs, one person take the role of a host parent and one person take the
role of a student staying in their house. Negotiate the house rules.
A.7. Past Modals Advice
Aim: expressing advice in the past
Level: upper intermediate
What advice would you give the following people?
• “I started smoking just in the evenings when I went out drinking
with my friends, who all smoke, but now I think I am addicted and
smoke 20 a day”
• “I left the country because I didn’t believe in doing military service,
but that now means I can’t visit my family without being arrested”
• “I have 30,000 dollars of student loans to pay back, but with the bad
economy I can’t get a well-paid job”
• “I was hungry and had no money to buy food, so I stole a sandwich
from the corner shop. I thought I had escaped but the shopkeeper
had seen me and I have been arrested for shoplifting”
• “My parents refused their permission for me to get married when I
was 17, so we went across the border to Scotland and got hitched.
Now my family won’t speak to me”
• “My crazy ex-boyfriend was following me around and making
threats, so I started carrying a gun to protect myself. Unfortunately,
the police stopped me for speeding and found the gun”
47
• “I brought home a fish I had caught and gutted it in the kitchen
when my son was there, but he was so disgusted that now he refuses
to eat fish or meat”
• “Before my mother went into hospital she had signed a statement
saying that if she lost consciousness she wanted us to switch off the
life support machine, but now I think she might have already had
Alzheimer’s when she signed that document”
• “I worked 50 hour weeks to finish a big project on time because I
thought I would be able to take it easy for a while because there
wasn’t much to do after the project finished, but now my boss and
colleagues are making pointed comments about me taking long
lunch breaks etc”
Change partners and discuss what advice you would give again, but this
time only discussing what they should have/ could have/ shouldn’t have done
in the original situation (rather than what they can do now to react to the
consequences) or what you would have done if you had been in that
situation.
A.8. Modals and idioms
Aim: travel English (vocabulary connected to accommodation Hotel, youth
hostel, dorm, university halls, B and B, and host family rules) , modals
Level: upper intermediate
With your partner, choose the verb which you think matches the situation
best. There is often more than one possible answer, depending on what you
think the best action is and cultural differences.
• If your latest project blows up in your face, you mustn’t/ shouldn’t/ can/
should/must quit your job as soon as possible.
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• If you are on the crest of a wave at work, you mustn’t/ shouldn’t/ can/
should/must quit and use that experience to get a better job elsewhere before
something goes wrong.
• If the share price has dipped, you mustn’t/ shouldn’t/ can/ should/ must sell
your stock.
• If you get off on the wrong foot with your colleagues, you mustn’t/
shouldn’t/can/ should/ must tell your boss about the problem and ask his or
her advice.
• If you’re glad to see the back of your boss, you mustn’t/ shouldn’t/ can/
should/ must tell everyone you feel that way once he or she has left.
• If you are sure there is something wrong with the latest business plan but you
can’t quite put your finger on it, you mustn’t/ shouldn’t/ can/ should/ must
mention your concerns in meetings about the plan.
• If a member of your family joins the same company as you, you mustn’t/
shouldn’t/ can/ should/ must keep them at arms length at work.
• You mustn’t/ shouldn’t/ can/ should/ must keep your subordinates on their
toes at all times.
• You mustn’t/ shouldn’t/ can/ should/ must use rules of thumb in most
business situations.
• If you’ve had to lay someone off due to overstaffing, you mustn’t/ shouldn’t/
can/ should/ must say “You’re fired”.
• In Britain, if they all give you a big hand at the end of a meeting, especially a
small one, you mustn’t/ shouldn’t/ can/ should/ must look embarrassed by
their praise.
• In Britain, if you can’t eat any more when you are someone’s guest, you
mustn’t/ shouldn’t/ can/ should/ must say “My eyes were bigger than my
stomach”
Do you think the advice for the last two would be different in your country or
the USA?
Do you know any other cultural differences between America and the UK?
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A.9. Modals in the kitchen
Aim: modal verbs expressing absence of obligation and necessity
Level: intermediate
Making an Omelette
Making an omelette is easy. You … be a great chef to do it. Here are some
basic instructions:
1. First, break some eggs into a bowl. Break them carefully. You … let any
of the shell get into the omelette!
2. Next, mix up the eggs. You … use a special food processor — mixing
them with a fork is fine.
3. Then, heat some oil in a pan. Olive oil is best, but you … use olive oil.
You can use ordinary corn oil if you want. You … let the oil get too hot, or
it will start to burn.
4. Pour the egg mixture into the pan, and mix it a little.
5. When the egg mixture gets a little hard, fold it in half. It … be very hard
— just enough so that you can fold it.
6. After a couple of minutes, turn the omelette over. Be careful! You …
break it.
7. When the omelette is cooked, serve it immediately. You … let it go cold,
or it will taste horrible.
A.10. Advice to New Recruits
Aim: modal verbs expressing obligation and absence of obligation and
necessity
Level: upper - intermediate
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The following note comes from an army booklet, "Advice to New
Recruits." Complete the instructions by filling in the blanks with suitable
modals.
Welcome to Ranor Barracks!
Follow the rules, accept the advice and you will find your life in the
army interesting and fulfilling. You _____ have your hair cut very short in
the first month. After that you ________ grow it longer but it ______ never
touch your collar. Your uniform ______ be kept clean and tidy. Boots and
buttons __________ be polished daily. You ______ use cell phones on the
campus but you _______ switch them off during the training sessions. Before
joining you _____ have a medical check-up. You ________ undergo medical
examinations once a year during service.
A.11. The Environment Monitor
Aim: modal verbs
Level: upper - intermediate
In some schools the student - council members are assigned duties at
the beginning of every academic year. Write a job description to be given to
the newly elected Environment Monitor of your school. You may do this
individually. Later your class as a whole can come out with one duty list to
be displayed on the soft-board. You may use the words given below.
can, may, can't, mustn't, must, should, have to.
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One of the most direct methods for providing experience with
modals is to ask to students to re-phrase sentences. This can be done either as
a speaking or as a writing exercise, and offers an advantage over more
traditional cloze exercises in that the context is not open to interpretation.
Such interpretations of context are common and make it difficult to evaluate
whether the student is using the modal correctly (i.e., is he using should
because he thinks that the sentence refers to a suggestion or because he
thinks should is used to express obligation?).
Generally, with re-phrasing, students are given a sentence that
expresses modality without using a modal. They are then asked to re-phrase
this sentence, using the appropriate modal.
e.g. There is no need to live in Canada to study at the University of
Victoria. You can take a course by Internet.
………………. live in Canada to study at the University of Victoria.
You can take a course by Internet. (You needn’t))
However, there is no reason the presentation cannot be reversed,
with students being asked to re-phrase a sentence that contains a modal.
A variation, which might be helpful for lower-level classes, would
be to give students a choice of three possible answers / re-phrases
e.g. 1. You … buy the text book for this course. You can borrow mine.
a. You mustn't buy ..
b. You don't have to buy …
c. You should not buy …
2 This bus is free! You … buy a ticket.
d. You mustn't buy ..
e. You don't have to buy …
f. You should not buy …
3. You … pass a test to ride a bicycle.
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a. You mustn't pass ..
b. You don't have to pass …
c. You should not pass …
Fill-in-the-blanks, multiple choice and so on, are as many means of
practicing the use or the form of modals expressing obligation and
necessity.
e.g. Choose the right answer
1. According to the law, drivers … at stop signs.
a. must stop
b. must to stop
c. must stopping
2. When a police officer asks to see your driver's license, you … to him/her.
a. must to show it
b. have got to show it
c. have got show it
3. If Richard wants to become a professional musician, he … every day.
a. has to practice
b. have to practice
c. haves to practice
4. Son: Mom, I don't want to clean my room. … it right now?
Mother: Yes, right now.
a. Do I have to clean
b. Do I must clean
c. Have I to clean
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5 Friend: … pay to see the doctor?
Brother: No, she … because she has medical insurance.
a. Do your sister have to / don't
b. Must your sister / mustn’t
c. Does your sister have to / doesn't
e.g. Fill in the blanks with a suitable form:
1. New drivers … take a test in order to get a driver's license. They have no
choice.
2. A: … go to work today? B: No, I don't because it's Sunday.
3. John … finish the report quickly because the deadline is today at 4 pm.
4. A: Jennifer lost her passport. … get a new one? B: No, she …. .She found
it in her purse.
5. I'm sorry, Mom. I … call you back later. My cell phone battery is dying.
4 Analysis of typical errors
The child's acquisition of his mother tongue coincides with the
development of his thinking power whereas at school, the development of his
native language coincides with his intellectual development.
When the pupil begins the study of a foreign language, at the age of
8 or 9, the habits of correct expression he has already acquired in his mother
tongue will obviously exert an important influence upon the new habits he is
expected to acquire in the foreign language.
That is why, on the one hand, the pupils will make a number of
pronunciation, lexical and grammar mistakes under the negative influence of
the native language and, on the other hand, certain common sounds, words
and grammatical structures in both languages will have to be turned to good
54
account through their transfer from the native to the foreign language. The
background of foreign language learning consists of certain linguistic habits.
These habits have been acquired during the acquisition of the mother tongue
and the acquisition of certain linguistic habits does not repeat in an identical
manner the child's acquisition of its native language.
In the process of learning, two linguistic systems are struggling
against each other in pupil's mind: the old system deeply rooted in his mind
which is used in the communication process in his native language and the
new system of the foreign language under study.
At first the learner of foreign language endeavours to approach the
foreign language starting from the phenomena in his mother tongue. The
greater the number of similarities between the two languages, the easier for
the young learner, the transfer of linguistic knowledge and habits. In fact, in
most cases, there are a great number of deep and essential differences
between the two languages.
A contrastive study of the two languages should not confine itself to
the major differences between two given languages. Similarities between two
linguistic systems are as important as the differences.
The complete linguistic material should be graded in such a way as
to ensure a more rapid and accessible assimilation of the foreign language.
The contrastive study of the foreign language and the native language should
precede the teaching process. Contrastive analysis will show the language
teacher the best procedures and techniques he must make use of in each
concrete instance, in order to present and cure the possible false analogies
inherently established by the pupils in their minds during the learning
process.
Some authors doubt whether pupils’ difficulties may be anticipated
from a comparison between the foreign language and their mother tongue.
Other authors hold the view that all languages are structural and systemic. In
other words, the ease of the difficulty of learning any pattern of a foreign
language rests not upon the intrinsic characteristics of the foreign language
55
itself but rather upon the structural characteristics of the native language
which child has learnt first and uses in thinking.
English modal verbs are regarded as one of the most difficult
subjects when students learn English grammar. Celce-Murcia & Larsen-
Freeman’s mentions that modal auxiliaries are among the more difficult
structures ESL/EFL teachers have to deal with. One of the reasons for this is
the form of modals. Some of your students, who have been told repeatedly
that present tense verbs with third person singular subjects require an –s
ending, over-generalize this rule to modals
e.g. She cans play tennis. (incorrect)
This overgeneralization results in errors because in English modal
auxiliaries (can, may, shall, will, etc.) are distinguished from other auxiliary
verbs (be, have, do) as well as from ordinary verbs by their lack of tense and
their resultant lack of subject-verb agreement; that is, modals do not inflect.
Also, specialists point that the different grammatical forms between
English modal verbs and ordinary verbs are responsible for the learning
difficulty in students. However, students seldom make such errors as adding
–s to modal verbs, combining two pure modal verbs in one sentence, or
inserting “to” between modal verb and main verb, because the grammatical
characteristics of modal verbs are as easy as those of ordinary verbs. What’s
more, when teachers teach modal verbs, they always emphasize the
grammatical differences between modal verbs and ordinary verbs. Thus,
students won’t have much difficulty learning the form of modal verbs.
Since the form of modal verbs is not the major reason that causes
learning difficulty in students, then, the main factors may lie in the meaning
of modal verbs. Each modal can have more than one meaning and each
meaning is a member of an inter-related system. When the student chooses to
use one modal, s/he is deciding not to use any of the other modals, thereby
indicating the degree of stress. Summing up, I could say that associating the
right modal with the right meaning represents the real touchstone. Students
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memorize the modals with their accompanying meanings, but they may have
no idea of the subtle social and cultural information each choice conveys.
Teachers can design activities that allow students to explore and get
comfortable with the formal properties of modals and semi-modals. When
designing these activities, teachers should be mindful of the fact that the
formal properties of one semi-modal will not necessarily transfer to the next.
In fact, many of the mistakes that students make with semi-modals come
from over-generalising formal properties.
In other words, modality itself is rather complicated in meaning.
The English modal verbs used to express modality are also complicated in
meaning. As is discussed above, each modal verb has epistemic and deontic
meanings. Besides, different modals can share the same meaning, but there is
subtle difference among these modals. For example, should, ought to, can,
may, might, and could all have the meaning—possibility.
A: Someone’s knocking at the door.
• B: It should/ought to be Henry. High certainty
• B: It can be Henry.
• B: It may be Henry.
• B: It might/could be Henry. Low certainty
Examples (1) to (4) all denote the speaker’s guessing about who is
knocking at the door; yet, there’s a logical possibility hierarchy among them
as shown above. According to Celce-Murcia and Larsen-Freeman, should
and ought to represent the highest possibility of all. As for can and may, the
speaker uses the former to show a higher certainty about his own inference.
If the speaker uses might or could, what he intends to convey, is a relatively
uncertain assumption. Hence, a speaker can convey different degrees of
certainty about something with different modals according to evidence
available in the real world or the belief he holds.
In sum, on one hand, every English modal has more than one
meaning; on the other hand, different modals can have the apparent same
57
meaning. These features of English modal verbs contribute to a considerable
learning burden for the students because they don’t know which one they can
use in a certain kind of situation. Moreover, other grammarians point out that
the problem lies in the recognition and proper use of the meanings
underlying the English modal verbs.
Another learning difficulty in students lies in associating the right
modal verb with the right meaning or the right situation. Specifically,
students may use modal verbs grammatically correctly; however, it is not
proper or appropriate in the situation.
Last, but not least, another problem with modal verbs arises from
their spelling and punctuation i.e. modals are often treated on the pattern of
a full verb especially when it comes to the negation and the place of the
modal in the sentence
The reason why they make mistakes when working with modals, is
that their knowledge about this is probably wrong and incomplete and that
there are many differences between English and Romanian language.
For example, mustn't causes problems for many students. It may be
substituted, as the opposite of must for:
- needn't, meaning no obligation: ‘I mustn't be in by ten o'clock’ for ‘I
needn't be in by 10 o'clock’
- can't meaning logical impossibility: ‘You mustn't be the plumber.’
Have (got) to is in many instances synonymous with must,
expressing obligation or high probability:
e.g: You must/have (got) to be home by midnight.
Somebody must/has (got) to know the answer.
Students are not always aware that must meaning 'obligation' is
preferred when the will or authority of the speaker is involved (e.g. when
giving an order); have (got) to is preferred when the obligation derives from
some external authority or circumstance not identifiable with the speaker's
will.
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A further difference between must and have (got) to in their
'probability' meaning, hardly noticeable by the students, is that have (got) to
is more emphatic. In the second example above, this difference is not
discernible, but in some contexts, the emphatic tone of have (got) to would
be inappropriate.
e.g.:
(The doorbell rings)
"That must be the plumber. We've been expecting him."
(Addressing a stranger)
"Oh hello! You must be the new typist.
In negative sentences, don’t have to expresses lack of obligation or
necessity, but this is not what was meant in :
e.g. I don't think that a worker has to earn the same as a doctor.
Here the speaker is expressing an opinion about the desirability of a
hypothetical situation (whether or not a worker should earn as much as a
doctor), which requires should.
Here are some examples of errors often made by my students
regarding the misuse of the modal verbs:
1. The art school is too far away. It must be easier to reach.
2. For an unwed mother, I think a legal abortion must be possible.
3. When a couple is sure from the beginning that they don't want a
baby it must be legal to abort the fetus.
4. It should be larger or there must be another one like it.
5. But she must have the decision, not some unknown doctor.
6. When the husband earns a lot of money, the wife must not work.
7. I must not pay for my cigarettes. That's why I smoke.
8. The author means you must not be intellectual to learn a foreign
language.
9. Young people are glad that they themselves must not cope with the
problems of retirement.
Students’ understanding of the differences in meaning regarding
must, should , ought to, is sometimes very little. Obligation, necessity,
desirability are notions that are very closely related.
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Must is used in senses parallel to should, but more emphatically or
categorically. That means that where should or ought to indicate desirability
and moderate probability, must expresses necessity or obligation and high
probability.
The examples l -5 describe situations that do not exist but are
desirable, so should or ought to is the most appropriate form. It is true that
the desirability of a state of affairs can sometimes be expressed emphatically
or rhetorically by expressing it as a necessity or obligation, in which must is
conceivable. Must normally requires that the speaker is the person in
authority, the one who is imposing the obligation. For example, a sentence
like Unemployment must be eliminated! would be assumed to have been
uttered by a politician, or member of a political party, who would
conceivably be in a position to exert some influence on the situation. This
implication of the speaker's authority is not appropriate in l -5.
A particular error, frequently made by my students, is that they
express the lack of obligation and the negative obligation by the same means:
must not - the obligation not to do something:
lack of obligation - You don't have to go.
- You needn't go
negative obligation - You mustn’t go.
- You can't go.
In 6 -9 lack of obligation is the intended meaning, for which don't
have to or needn't/don't need to is the correct expression.
Another problem concerning the modals is their past and future
meanings and forms. Learners find it hard to use apparently past and
perfective forms for future reference or having once learnt this, to apply the
form to past or present reference. On the other hand, if students recognise a
'past' form modal they may fail to recognise it as having future meaning or be
unwilling to use it in this way.
For example, the perfect infinitive is usually added to must to
express a past reference but also an inference on the part of the speaker.
Students can also find occasional examples where must + perfect infinitive
is equivalent in meaning with “this should already have been done”.
e.g. You must paid your instalments to the bank before getting another
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loan. INSTEAD OF
You must have paid your instalments to the bank before getting
another loan.
It must have been quite a surprise.
For future time reference, students should use am/are/is, which also
expresses a command or an instruction issuing from the speaker or an
external authority. The error they make is to use will before the modal verb.
e.g. You will must to hand in the paper tomorrow.
INSTEAD OF
You are to hand in the paper tomorrow.
Aside from the complicated meanings of modal verbs, which result
in learning difficulty, the teaching resources such as teachers and textbooks
or grammar books may also contribute to learning difficulty. Sometimes,
secondary school teachers ignore the semantics of modal verbs. They only
focus on the grammatical characteristics without noticing the subtle different
meanings of each modal verb. Nor do they emphasize the appropriate use of
each modal verb. The lack of complete description aggravates the learning
problem. Similarly, textbooks and grammar books only emphasize that
modal verbs are auxiliaries but do not focus on their semantics and functions.
In addition to all the reasons mentioned above, there is still one
more important factor that causes learning difficulty — the interference of
students’ native language. Another source of difficulty with the form of
modals, of course, may be your students’ native language(s).That is because
not all languages have modal auxiliaries.
All in all, English modality is somewhat complex for EFL students.
The form of English modal verbs is not that difficult. The real difficulty lies
in:
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(1) Each modal verb has more than one meaning—epistemic and
deontic meaning. Besides, several modal verbs share the same meaning but
have fine differences.
(2) Students have difficulty associating right modal verbs with
right meaning in the right situation.
(3) Textbooks or grammars books do not provide complete
description and teachers don’t teach modal verbs in context.
(4) Students’ native language(s)’ modality system is different from
that of English, and this results in learning interference. Students can learn
the appropriate usages of modal verbs and apply them in the right situations.
5 Analysis of English textbooks
English is the world’s most widely used language; it is used as an
international medium of communication among speakers, all over the world.
The first results of its worldwide spread character was that specialists from
different domains (linguists, socio-linguists, psychologists) focused their
attention on the study of English and a new methodology developed,
combining old and new theories of teaching English. They have
authoritatively analysed and described the language, its workings standard
and sub standard varieties.
Given the new position of our country in the democratic world and
international institutions, English has become a top priority in the learning
agenda of most Romanians. Eventually, virtually any professional will be
required to possess good mastery of English in order to be able to care with
their duties. Fortunately enough, both learners and officials became aware of
this quite quickly, which explains the learners’ increased interest in the study
of English, as well as the undeniable efforts made by the Romanian Ministry
of Education to modernize the process of teaching and learning English in all
its aspects.
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Although great attention has been paid to the new national
curriculum, there are still aspects of the language that are rather neglected or
not studied thoroughly. It is the case of modal verbs and their power to help
students cope with many aspects of the language due to their various
pragmatic and semantic characteristics.
Many of the course books are structured around a series of language
forms. Teachers and students focus on them one by one because they are on
the syllabus. This is often called focus on form because the chief organising
principles behind a course is learning these forms. Some grammarians
consider this very effective. It is also considered as being very effective the
method of allowing students to notice the form. One way of coming across it
is through instruction. That means that the teacher draws students’ attention
to it. On the other hand, students can notice the forms easily in general
contexts of the daily life, in music, advertisements, music, TV programmes.
e.g. Can I help you?
How dare you?
You must listen to me.
These are only a few constructions that students usually meet all around them
and their acquisition is very easy.
When modals are tackled in the EFL classroom following the design
of most textbooks, they are treated as a grammatical category. Their form
and function are presented on a pair with the form and function of other
auxiliaries, for example be for the construction of the passive voice, or
progressive aspect. However, the criteria used to classify and introduce them
are not based on their grammatical behaviour but on their semantic capacity
to express notions such as possibility, certainty, obligation, permission and
so on. The indiscriminate combination of this double criterion brings
confusion to the subject, for the formal simplicity of modal verbs clashes
with the semantic complexity of the modality phenomenon.
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That is more, most textbooks and grammars generally opt for a
sentential environment or, at best, a much-controlled discourse context to
practise questions concerning meaning and use, thus increasing the feeling of
imprecision during the learning process. This widespread situation gives
evidence of the strong indeterminate grammatical semantic tie that is at work
when modals are taught in the classroom and of the complications that may
derive from this situation. To verify the treatment of modals in the EFL
classroom, I will analyze a reduced but representative sample of course
books which enable us to show some of the problems that may derive from
the inappropriate unconscious use on the part of the teachers of the
pedagogical material.
The textbooks selected are upper intermediate level and have been
chosen at random among a number of books that have been recently used as
textbooks in our English classes or that have been considered potentially
valuable for use in these classes. In all cases, explanations and practice on the
use of modals are found scattered throughout the grammar sections of these
books; they appear together with other varied grammatical aspects such as
tenses, passive voice, the use of the article, transitive and intransitive
constructions, and the like.
However, in the case of modals, this grammatical affiliation is
invariably based on their meaning, as little mention is made, with very few
exceptions, of their grammatical behaviour and formal peculiarities. Some of
the books consulted do not even identify modal verbs as such; they turn
directly to the semantic values they represent although this is done in the
grammar parts of the units.
The five textbooks contrasted are:
• PROSPECTS, 2003, Ken Wilson, James Taylor, Deirdre
Howard – Williams
• STRAIGHT FORWARD, 2007, Philpp Kerr, Ceri Jones
• UPSTREAM, 2003, Bob Obee, Virginia Evans
• LINK, 2002, Rachel Finnie
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• MISSION, 2007, Virginia Evans, Jenny Dooley
Out of the five textbooks that have been contrasted, three of them – LINK,
UPSTREAM, STRAIGHT FORWARD - consistently talk about modal verbs
in the sections they devote to them. LINK distributes the uses they study into
three blocks: modal verbs 1, modal verbs 2, and modal verbs 3, nonetheless
attending to customary semantic criteria, as has been said above. In modal
verbs 1 they consider those forms expressing ability, obligation necessity; in
modal verbs 2 they deal with possibility and certainty; modal verbs 3 focuses
on advice. UPSTREAM follows a similar organization and present a section
entitled modal verbs that is divided into three: modals dealing with
obligation, necessity, modals dealing with possibility and impossibility and
modals dealing with ability and permission and a section entitled past that
deals with the past forms and past modals. The third one, STRAIGHT
FORWARD, divides the modal verbs into two categories: modals of
speculation and modals expressing prohibition, obligation and permission.
Each of the three five books has a grammar reference section and
students are sent to the end of the course book for additional information or
just for reminding certain structures. The only course book that has a
language section at the end of each unit is STRAIGHT FORWARD, thus
making it easier and handier for students to look for the information they
need. They include under the double label speculation and deduction can and
might for probability, could for deduction and must or certainty.
While the values covered in the three books are coincident, it seems
of interest to illustrate the potential instability of the semantics of modals that
the authors of STRAIGHT FORWARD, Philpp Kerr and Ceri Jones choose
to include the common values of probability and certainty under the more
general denomination of modals of speculation and deduction. These may be
seen as an indication of the subjectivity and flexibility that is found not only
in the actual use of modals in real discourse but also in the theoretical basis
adopted for their description.
Contrary to the above three mentioned, MISSION never discusses
these auxiliary verbs. It is pretty much a vocabulary based course book. Even
65
if the authors consider that the use of English sections are provided
throughout the book, to enable students to use English effectively, there is, in
fact, only one mention of the modals. The mention is connected to a
rephrasing exercise. There are no grammar explanations or using suggestion
made anywhere except in the grammar reference section where there is a
very short overview of the main modals uses and meanings. In this sense,
they indirectly draw attention away from their grammatical status as a
distinctive formal category.
As far as PROSPECTS is concerned, it fuses both approaches. It
refers to modals merely as forms and therefore, it speaks directly of could
and was/were able to in unit 9; have to and must in 13. The only reference
about the modals is made in unit 17. This unit is about means of expressing
the past and there is a mention about modal verbs in relation with modals in
the past.
It should be mentioned that, one way or another, the problem of the modal
verbs is tackled in all the five textbooks. On the other hand, the teacher is the
one who has to add, adapt and replace, if necessary for the grammar structure
to fit the level or the interests of he students. For example, when we talk
about MISSION, the teacher enjoys the freedom of doing whatever s/he
considers necessary during the grammar classes.
With a good course book, there is a good possibility that the
language content and sequencing in the book will be appropriate, and that the
topics and the treatment of the different language skills will be attractive.
Using course books creatively is one of the teacher’s premier skills. The way,
in which teachers get students do exercises, read texts or solve puzzles, is
extremely important. Another very important moment is at what point at the
lesson the teacher get the students open the books. If the moment is not
appropriate, that means before giving instructions, students won’t
concentrate on what the teacher has to say. Furthermore, do not go through
the book line by line. They use parts of that are the most appropriate for their
class and make suitable changes to the material so that it is exactly right for
their students. For example, if the teacher feels that students need more
66
explanations about modal verbs, or any other grammar structure, s/he can
explain as many times as necessary for the students to be capable to use
correctly the form and to employ the right meaning.
In conclusion, I can say that whatever the quality and quantity of
information may be presented in a course book, the teacher’s duty is to do the
best so that the students get the best understanding and consequently, the best
results.
CONCLUSIONS
Although some of my students have a fairly good understanding of
the form and meaning of the modals, they are very far from understanding all
there is to know about their uses. Modal verbs can be used in very subtle
ways, to try to advise or control others, to express positive and negative
affect, to mark attitude or show authority any they can be considered to be a
very intricate structure.
The work starts form the premise that teaching modern languages is
a very complex process which requires a lot of patience and imagination. We
must emphasize the fact that although foreign language methodology is
based upon a number of fundamental principles, the teaching of each modern
language has certain specific features. These features are determined on one
hand by the peculiar characteristic of foreign language under study and, on
the other hand, by the correlation between the foreign language under study
67
and the native language for the learners. When the pupil begins the study of a
foreign language at the age of 8 or 9, their habits of correct expressions he
has already acquired in his mother tongue will obviously exert an important
influence upon the new habits he is expected to acquire in the foreign
language. Later on, students will become aware of the fact that they need to
master English correctly to communicate properly. The teacher’s job is to
present the students with clear information about language – meaning and
form, and to find the most attractive contexts.
What we say is, in the end, governed by rules – grammar rules,
pragmatic rules, semantic rules, pronunciation rules. There are rules for every
facet of the language. If the teacher can deepen his / her understanding of
those rules, then s/he can articulate to students why it is that we say what we
say. And that is something that rarely leaves people dissatisfied.
Both the student and the teacher can sense the inherent complexity
lying beneath the surface. Capturing that complexity and repackaging it in a
form that students can use to internalise the complexity into their own
language is one of the most interesting, and rewarding, challenges ESL/EFL
teachers face.
The balance normally required in pedagogical grammars when
presenting material that is simplified enough for students to understand, is
double magnified in the modal system. The teacher is required to present an
extremely intricate system with enough complexity to illustrate the
relationship of the modal auxiliaries to each other and their place in a
semantic system. It is never easy to package complexity into the meaningful
pieces of information teachers present to their students. And modals are very
complex indeed. At the formal level we form modal auxiliaries and
determine whether to treat a word as a modal or as another part of speech. At
the semantic level, we not only have to deal with the meanings of the various
modals, but the different classes of modal found in English. Syntactically, the
question is whether all modals are auxiliaries. Since a whole class of modals
is used interpersonally, the pragmatics of modal use must be considered.
68
The biggest problem my ESL students face with modals is their
meaning. Each modal can have more than one meaning and each meaning is
a member of an inter-related system. When the student chooses to use one
modal, s/he is deciding not to use any of the other modals, thereby indicating
the degree of stress. Summing up, I could say that connecting the right modal
with the right meaning represents the most important achievement.
When designing activities connected to the modal verbs, teachers
should be mindful of the fact that the formal properties of one semi-modal
will not necessarily transfer to the next. In fact, many of the mistakes that
students make with semi-modals come from over-generalizing formal
properties.
As far as exercises are concerned, “variety is really the key” says
Michael Swan in his article How to teach grammar: Three Golden Rules.
“There's nothing wrong with mechanical exercises – gap-filling, sentence
transformation and so forth. These can help learners to grasp the form of a
complex structure at the outset without having to think too much about the
meaning. But it's important to move on to activities where the structure is
used in more interesting and realistic ways. The structure-oriented problem-
solving activities and quizzes, games, picture-based work, text-based work,
role-play are exercises that get students using the structure to talk about
themselves and their ideas, exercises that combine grammar practice with
vocabulary learning, and internet-exploration activities, to name just a few
approaches.”1
In these respects, this work is meant to be as an answer given to all
those learning English, confronting with difficulties of understanding, and
consequently using, modal verbs. It is a detailed approach of modal verbs
expressing necessity and obligation, both on account of their form and
1 Swan, M. 7 February, 2011, How to teach grammar ,
www.teachingenglish.org.uk/blogs/michael-swan/how-teach-grammar-0
69
meaning, in order to find ways of dealing with modality and it displays a
wide variety of exercises and activities that can be used in teaching this topic.
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