2021 First lesson back
Photo by Danielle MacInnes on Unsplash
Some lesson ideas for the first class back of the New Year
New Year’s resolutions, goal setting, intention making - this is the time of year when we are invited to think about the (better?) person we want to be. And it’s no different for language learners. This is an opportunity to encourage reflection about what they want and how they can achieve it.
Below are some ways to encourage your students to think back and look forward in the first lesson back. These activities all work well online, 1-1 or in a F2F classroom.
You can adapt them for any level, they will work best with teens and they require very little preparation.
Looking back
Invite your students to look back through the topics covered in the previous term. In groups, ask them to design a quiz/game covering the topics (e.g. ‘Which famous singer did we read about?). You could also ask them to design a quiz/game about events that happened in your class/town/regionlast term.
Language goals
Encourage your students to make a list of everything they learned last term e.g. grammatical structures, vocabulary, pronunciation points and so on. This can be especially helpful with higher, plateaued levels who can find it hard to see that they are making any progress. Now they can highlight which they are going to actively use in their language in this term.
Likewise you can invite your students to identify some errors they keep making (not all, just say, a top three). These could be grammatical (e.g. wrong tense) or perhaps wrong word, or a pronunciation issue. By awarding these errors heightened importance, they will be more likely to self-correct.
Life goals
Ask your students to write a letter to themselves in x months’ time. It could be for the end of the year or the end of the term. They write about what they want to have achieved. Brainstorm some topics e.g. screen time, kindness goals, environmental goal, fitness as well as language learning. At the end of the year, you mail them their own letter. This can be a lot of fun especially as few of us receive post these days! If that is not a practical option for you, students could send it to a cloud service and again you release the letter back to them at the end of the term. Agree in advance with your students if you are going to read the letters or not.
Class challenge
Set a class challenge together based on good language learning habits. Here are some ideas to get started.
Students note down new words in a vocabulary book.. It’s about the process of noting the word down and then looking at it again. If an online notetaking app will work, great – if not a notebook works just as well. Challenge example: learn a new word every day.
There is nothing like a good book, and of course nothing like unconsciously seeing the language in context. Challenge example: read a book in 2 weeks.
For some students, speaking English in class can be tough! Establish with your students some opportunities when they might be able to speak a bit more. Even if they just add one more sentence to a group discussion, for a student who rarely participates, that’s a lot! Challenge example: Always utter two sentences rather than one!
I hope this post has given you some ideas to use in your first class back!
Happy teaching!