Teaching > Non Textbook-Based Lessons
High School - Low level/technical students tips and lessons
jeknibbe:
I'm another technical high school teacher battling the same issue as others that have posted here. Here is a lesson I did about jobs/professions. It is a deliberately biased towards technical and manual jobs and the pictures of company worker jobs look boring; because most of my students will end up doing those types of things. There are also a couple of super simple grammar points. I opened the lesson with a short YouTube video showing a barista because I thought this was a little interesting and cool. Obviously change it to your own or your students' preferences.
It's a little boring, and possibly even too easy I'll admit. You can make it more of a challenge by adding things such as some more target sentences and a short interview task about what people want to do after they've finished school. I also finished the lesson with charades or Pictionary.
Also, one or two of the pictures are taken from someone else's presentation that was posted online - sorry about that.
Sugarbabes:
Hope this helps if youre focusing on a lesson describing people you can use funny pictures and get some good Youtube clips to go with it.
korr:
--- Quote from: leaponover on April 18, 2012, 01:14:56 PM ---I'm in a Tech and Mech school too and am trying to build up my 5 posts. I have experienced a lot of what most people on here have. I have to tell you that a lot of my classes "turned the corner" once I found a reward system. I just have coated name tags and I give them stickers for answering questions in English. It made a lot of them wake right up. Yes, there is still some sticker theft and some students actually answer questions and give their stickers away, but it's helped a lot! They are mostly boys so I definitely had to find boy stickers and because it's high school some really aren't into them. It's mostly the competition I tried to encourage and most have gotten into it. I have a couple students who claim to be "sticker killers". Anyway, if you are struggling I would seriously consider a reward system...
--- End quote ---
I think this may be because you have boys? I tried a reward system last year and my girls were completely uninterested in it. They're less competitive and more completely disinterested.
What did work for my girls was letting them do a pop song class IF they could explain why learning pop songs would help their English. I handed each group a whiteboard and a marker. They had to write one complete, grammatically correct sentence for each member of their group, stand up, and present their reasons to the class. I go some really good, complex reasons out of them.
This doesn't work unless you've got a coteacher handy or if you speak enough Korean to talk to the kids directly, but sometimes if a lesson is really bombing I stop the class and very seriously ask why it isn't working for them. I'll occasionally get the usual "not funny" answers, but a lot of the time I get something concrete and useful: the topic is too hard or too easy, they don't think it's relevant to their careers, etc. I've done class brainstorming sessions to ask what they think will be useful to them later.
They're still not exactly perfect students, but they're a lot more well-behaved if they feel like they have some investment in the class and that I'm not just making them learn random topics.
neliakk:
Hi
I teach middle school but have the exact same probems as you!!!
jeknibbe:
Here is a lesson that I have taken off this website and modified somewhat. It's for teaching comparatives and superlatives. There is a presentation including 3 short videos, then some worksheets, then a game and a quiz. Actually these materials can easily cover two lessons, but you will probably need to supplement another worksheet of your own for the ss to practice the meanings of the target language before the games.
For the game (part of the main presentation ppt file), split ss into teams; it requires students to populate the full column of the table with questions right at the end. The teams will need a copy of the answer slip handout. Gives ss words (must be nouns - the example is 'apple') and have them say/write 'something bigger', 'something smaller' etc. Give them as many words as you have time for and it's a race to see who ca finish first.
The quiz mostly comprises true or false questions. I have attached two versions - one with the answers on the same slide as the question, and another with the answers all on separate slides. If you want to score as you go, use the former; but if you want to get ss to write answers and score after, then use the latter.
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