telling tales: using stories, jokes and experiences in the english as a foreign language classroom...
TRANSCRIPT
Telling tales: using stories, jokes and experiences in
the English as a Foreign Language classroom
Alan Marsh
MATEFL June 2014
The Day I Met A Ghost: How I started believing in them
• Where did it happen?
• When did it happen?
• How did it happen?
• ?
• ?
• ?
The Duffle Coat: prompts
• Motorway York – London - Girl• Raynes Park: lift• Duffle coat• Junction – sudden braking – no girl• Find her house!• Mum: spitting image• Fatal accident - a year ago to the day – motorway
outside York• The churchyard – Tombstone - Folded neatly on the
grave was …
Focus on language: meaning
• If I hadn’t picked that hitchhiker up, I wouldn’t have started believing in ghosts
• What kind of conditional sentence?
• Did I pick the hitchhiker up?
• Did I start believing in ghosts?
Focus on Language: form
• If I hadn’t picked …up …
• If + S + PAST PERFECT
• …I wouldn’t have started …
• S + WOULD (NOT) HAVE + PAST PART.
Language use
• Write a past conditional which is true for your own life, beginning with If I …
• Work in threes. Ask each other questions about the sentences your partners have written. Find out as much as you can.
Reflections on Live Listening
• Why did I ask you to talk about believing in ghosts at the beginning of the lesson?
• Why did I choose the “when/why/how” type questions as a pre-listening exercise?
• Why did I ask you to make up some questions of your own before I told you the story?
• Why can telling the story be more flexible than playing a CD?
• When you retold the story I said ‘change” about every 30 seconds. What were my reasons for doing so?
• What was the difference for you between listening to me telling the story live and listening to a recording of it on a CD?
• How did I exploit the last line of my story?• Thanks to my colleague and friend Simon Marshall for
inspiring this idea.
Advantages of ‘live listening’: teachers telling stories, jokes, personal
experiences• Active/interactive listening. You can see the speaker• Realworld listening, not classworld listening• Can embody features of language which learners can
unconsciously pick up …• … and/or which the teacher can go back to/raise
consciousness about• Learners enjoy being told good stories, anecdotes and
jokes (like everybody else)• Learners enjoy listening to their teachers – as long as its
purposeful and interesting• So …. OUT with UTTT and IN with VTTT!
Tell it rather than read it!
An outline or skeleton of the story: main points
Stresses – ‘punch’ the important words: voice and body
Pauses – at key moments
Sit up or stand up
Expression, mime, and gestures (mirror!)
Adopt different voices: high/low, soft/harsh, etc.
Speak slowly - enjoy the sound of the words
Keep eye contact: ‘work’ your audience
Be confident : beginning and finishing
Don’t rush it, enjoy it
Over to you
• Read through your joke (only yours)• Read again and underline key parts• Write a skeleton outline• Rehearse it in your head: prepare to tell it to
someone else –without looking at the joke• Joke 1: Telephoning page 5• Joke 2: Quattro page 5• Joke 3: The Birthday Present page 6• Joke 4: The Lawyer and the BMW page 7
Acknowlegement: Seth Lindstromberg
Double slashes show good places to pause:
Once upon a //
time, a long time
//ago, there was a beautiful //
princess who lived in a //
castle made of black //
stone with her parents, the king and //
queen.
Double slashes show bad places to pause:
Once upon a time, a long time ago, there was a //
beautiful princess who lived in a castle//
made of black stone //
with her parents, the king and queen.
The Stupid Monkey
What comes next?
• Read your part
• Read slowly and clearly
• Use mime and gestures
• Leave pauses. Give feedback.
• Don’t wait for more than 5/6 seconds before giving the word
Language focus
• near the entrance ___ a park
• a small crowd ___ people standing ___ a circle
• they were looking ___ something
• the old woman shouted ___ the monkey
• the monkey stood ___ its back legs, screamed and fell ___.
The Caliph and The Servant
Baghdad and Basra
Imagine that!
• Read your part of the story to yourself
• Read it out loud, slowly and carefully
• Pause and leave your partner enough time to use their imagination!
Language focus: food gone bad
• Fruit can be r_____
• Bread can be s____ or m_____
• Milk and meat can be o____
• Butter and oil can be r____
• Beer and fizzy drinks can be f_____
Telling tales: using stories, jokes and experiences in
the English as a Foreign Language classroom
Alan Marsh
MATEFL June 2014
If you want these slides …
www.alanmarshelt.com
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