Search results matching tags 'vocabulary' and 'learning strategies'

896. The more words the better

Anonymous — Mon, 27 Aug 2012 13:10:00 GMT

One day teacher of English B said to teacher of English A, “ ‘Ruthless’. It’s curious: I’ve just finished to read a part of an English text I try to read every single day, and when I was putting back the novel and the dictionary in my bookcase, suddenly a word popped up in my mind, ‘ruthless’.

At that moment I thought that word could really exist, so I wanted to check and look up that word in the dictionary: it does exist. Was that word stuck somewhere in my memory or something like that?

Sometimes when I’m writing in English suddenly comes to my mind an expression or word that suits in the text I’m composing. Because of all this I think that in some way I keep learning and polishing my English, and I’m making a tank of vocab and idioms or ways of saying things in English that are useful for the moment when for communication I need words and expressions.

When I say 'communication' I’m referring to both written and oral communication.” / Photo from: langwitches org. interactive smartboard

864. Building the edifice of vocabulary

Anonymous — Fri, 06 Jul 2012 09:50:00 GMT

One day teacher of English A said to teacher of English B, “Being able to retrieve a word in English when you just need that word is easier when you have a lot of practice learning words.

You told me you learn one new word every day: this exercise is making up a tank of words to you. This habit may consists of kind of taking a mental picture of a new word. Some words are simple to learn because they have a cognate word in Spanish, your mother language, like for instance ‘intervene’, which is similar in form and meaning to ‘intervenir’.

As well it can be sound: you spell new words several times or you write it,

you teach that word to your students,

you play with the word and write an original sentence with it, you use it in your personal notes and organizer,

you focus on the context where that new word appears.

The more you read texts in English, you, a non-native teacher, the more you will be acquiring the sense of the language – the ways native people speak and write that language. Every word you learn is one more brick in the learning (and acquisition) of the language: you’re building an edifice on the foundation of your previous knowledge, of which you may not be conscious and aware.” / Photo from: farmcollector com. milkman

565. Just study

Anonymous — Sat, 12 Feb 2011 17:24:00 GMT

One day teacher of English A said to teacher of English B, “My students utilize different strategies to learn new words. They notice the resemblance with a French or German word they already know. Or with a Spanish word, and they focus on the similarities and differences, and the root-origin, either Latin or Germanic.

They use the word in the next opportunities they will find to express some specific message. So, I mean, they use the words.

Some of them write lists and revise them from time to time.

If they are teachers themselves they use the word in the following class, because it fits well then.

Some write a word several times, focusing on the sequence of letters.

Some compare the spelling with the pronunciation.

Some make mental and visual linkages with the word, or write cards and shuffle them.

Some learn a few words every day, not many.

Some read common everyday language in the Web, so as to learn language a native speaker would use. They gain and expand their memory with precisely the habit of learning new words.

Some just study a piece of the dictionary every day, or a text every day. For example some focus on learning new phrasal verbs, and comparing the meanings of the prepositions or adverbs, subsequent to the verb, with the ones collocated to other verbs, and draw certain theory.” / Photo from: education uoregon edu

557. An indispensable engine

Anonymous — Thu, 03 Feb 2011 07:45:00 GMT

One day teacher of English A said to teacher of English B, “One way we can easier remember one person’s name is linking that person, physically, with his or her name. In other words, we remember better the people we are interested in, the people - the students for example, we put interest in. Furthermore memory is something suitable to be trained, practiced, enhanced. There arrives one moment when the teacher of a language, for example, can remember a new word better than a person who is not so much dedicated to learn words. Memory is essential to learning a language. Memory is helped by practice of those words and expressions, helped by using them actually.” / Photo from: full_truck www partseek com

529. Know - knew - known

Anonymous — Fri, 31 Dec 2010 12:00:00 GMT

One day teacher of English B said to teacher of English A, “The irregular verbs? Like you know, they keep being irregular because their use is daily. In early Medieval English most of the verbs were irregular in this sense. A few words about their learning and usage: One teacher I know told me once that the student has to learn them by studying them, for example, in triplets: ‘do-did-done’, ‘bring-brought-brought’, as any of us has learned them. Nonetheless the student must use them in the naturalistic atmosphere of the classroom. No use, not retaining in memory. As well and very helpful at early steps of studying the irregular verbs we can set drills, as for example, leaving blanks to be filled out. Study plus practice.” / Photo from: Asian_Indian_Family pmec org uk

518. Like a private teacher

Anonymous — Fri, 17 Dec 2010 15:38:00 GMT

One day teacher of English A said to teacher of English B, “I tell my students to play with the dictionary; that the dictionary is like a private teacher, at disposal at any time. Also I’m referring now to online dictionaries. To play with the dictionary I said. To read and memorize words and their meanings, expressions within the entrance of a word, to find interesting meanings, also to use those words in fanciful sentences, alike as when writing an essay I set as homework. My students so build up a useful stock of words, which come up when writing, sometimes being unaware that they have learned those words. No words, no communication in English.” / Photo from: westchesterlibraries org

511. Things clear, please

Anonymous — Thu, 09 Dec 2010 11:56:00 GMT

One day teacher of English B said to teacher of English A, “A student of mine has told me a trick he utilizes to learn new phrasal verbs and verbs with following prepositions and adverbs. He says each preposition or adverb which follow a verb have common meanings: up and down refer to directions. However this can be dangerous, but it helps some way. Can be too risky because you can say something you really don’t mean, in some cases! Yet he thinks that the meaning of each word - away, off, up, down, out, in, into, on – helps. Some examples of clear-meaning phrasal verbs, and others not that obvious: take off, put away, put on, get up, look down, check out, break in, break into, put on, get on, get off, check in, break up, break down, look up, kick off, fill in.” / Photo from: vagabundeoresplandeciente wordpress com

492. Catch every ball!

Anonymous — Fri, 12 Nov 2010 11:40:00 GMT

One day teacher of English B said to teacher of English A, “Active listening: when the students listen to you as explaining in English how to carry out an exercise from the text book or a game, they are actively listening to you, not simply hearing something.

For example this active listening can take place when you (or a student) present, explain the meaning of a word they’ve got to guess, and which one they’ve already learned.

Each student has their unique way to grasp the hints.

They may, for example, catch one word - from the presentation - they already know.

Another word sounds as something which resembles a term of their mother tongue, albeit this term has got a very different meaning in English.

The students listen carefully, and gaze at any visual prompt from the teacher.

They stare at the quick and short process of drawing the object on the board.

Uncounsciously they link chunks of information, making up a scheme of the meaning, although later they can get confused and lost, because there are some words that distract their effort to understand.

They connect the description with already known concepts of objects, without being aware of this step of the process.

Summing up, this activity in the class is a nice step forward in their learning a language.”

/ Photo: Wimbledon, from Top10inlondon web-site.

464. She either has no clue to prepare an exam...

Anonymous — Thu, 07 Oct 2010 08:18:00 GMT

Ayer leí lo siguiente que te puede hacer pensar:

La vitalidad del mundo educativo es siempre un signo de esperanza. Su ágil capacidad de reacción ante los hechos que puedan afectar su encomiable tarea honra a este gran número de profesionales. Padres y profesores son los coprotagonistas del complicado viaje de aprendizaje, en el que sus hijos y alumnos se formarán, a su vez, para ser los “maestros” de la siguiente generación. Por eso, el sector educativo –con las familias al frente- es uno de los pilares fundamentales de la sociedad. Y, precisamente por eso, hay que alegrarse de su inconformismo ante un uso rutinario y esclavo de las pantallas[1].

Ya he hablado de cómo evaluar el progreso del alumno. Ahora vamos a ver cómo pueden ellos preparar un examen escrito.

Si le preguntas a un alumno tuyo, te dirá que estudiando más. Bien. Si le preguntas cómo aprender inglés, te dirá que estudiando más. Bueno. Qué tienes que estudiar más, le preguntas a continuación: el vocabulario y la gramática. Bueno está.

El profesor debe evaluar el aprendizaje o adquisición de la lengua, día a día. Un solo examen al trimestre no refleja fielmente el proceso de aprendizaje. El aprendizaje es para la práctica, para la comunicación, algo pragmático. Ya dije que el examen debe ser práctico, en perfecta consonancia con comunicación. Es más, es un acto de comunicación. Ya hablamos más arriba de la evaluación de la destreza de la expresión oral (speaking), que naturalmente no se puede introducir en el examen escrito: las otras tres destrezas sí: listening, reading y writing (comprensión oral, comprensión escrita, expresión escrita).

La preparación, por tanto, no consistirá en estudiar la víspera, sino una actuación comunicativa día a día. Sí puede ser que tengan que repasar alguna forma gramatical o un vocabulario... pero que han practicado de forma práctica a lo largo de los días (dejo la redundancia conscientemente).

De todas maneras, sí que es verdad que el examen seguirán preparándolo el día anterior, para qué nos vamos a engañar, como siempre ha ocurrido. Pero teniendo en cuenta lo anteriormente explicado de la pragmática, hasta donde se pueda. Que es mucho.

Por todo lo dicho hasta aquí, los alumnos... aprenderán a aprender. Y esto al margen incluso de lo que les “mandes” como deberes. Mételes este gusanillo. Que aprendan a aprender, que sean autónomos, pregúntales a varios cómo hacen ellos por su cuenta. Todo esto acabará reflejándose en la nota. Díselo a ellos.

Practicad la comunicación en L2. Sugiéreles estrategias de aprendizaje; hazles pensar qué más, qué más pueden hacer para entrenarse cara a la comunicación; lo necesario que es, para hablar, un buen vocabulario y formas gramaticales y expresiones idiomáticas. Sin palabras conocidas y practicadas no hay comunicación. Mantén con ellos conversaciones. Y que practiquen con el profesor nativo.

Pregúntales si van a, y cómo lo harán, para seguir aprendiendo al terminar el periodo escolar obligatorio. Transmíteles el gusanillo. Que te vean a ti aprender cosas nuevas, que te vean entusiasmado, que estés deseando darles clase y verles (no es una utopía. Lo puedes, lo estás consiguiendo). Que te vean que echas de menos al que falta, que te corriges a ti mismo en clase, para pronunciar mejor tal expresión, que te les entregas en clase, con todas tus fuerzas y dinamismo, que cambias de actividad si ves que no funciona, que muestras entusiasmo y sonríes al ver en tu guión qué actividad toca ahora. Que te das cuenta de que estás hablando en castellano, y vuelves al inglés o al francés: hazles ver con humor tu despiste; que Nuria te está preguntando en L1 y tú, lógicamente, le escuchas con atención, y de pronto caes en la cuenta de que ella también debe cambiar a hablar en inglés. Si tienes entusiasmo, se lo transmitirás a ellos. Y todo de manera simpática, atrayente, cercana, entusiasmada, con fuerza, con ganas de que ellos se expresen, también cuando te preguntan algo en L1. Si te encanta la L2 y dar clase, esto les ayudará a ellos a alcanzar el éxito en la adquisición o aprendizaje de L2.

Por el contrario, ya te lo dije, pero interesa repetirlo, me cuentan los chavales que los exámenes en sus centros escolares son de esta o de aquella forma: mucha traducción; ejercicios sin vida, teóricos, que no tienen absolutamente nada que ver con sus vidas; mucha conversión de oraciones (por ejemplo de afirmativa a negativa); pensar la pregunta que se ajuste a tal respuesta proporcionada en el propio examen; traducir unas oraciones coloquiales a español (pero que ellos no pueden saber porque sencillamente no lo habéis trabajado en clase...). Algo de todo este tipo de ejercicios hay que hacer, pero ve procurando poco apoco llegar a un ejercicio práctico, pragmático, comunicativo (insisto). Quizá tú te me encuentres entre los que hacen los exámenes un trozo de vida.

Que sepan qué le gusta a la profesora examinar, y con ello podrán repasar ese tipo de actividades en casa.

Un señor profesor, ya te hablé de él, les devuelve los exámenes y que se queden con ellos. A veces, a veces, incluso miran qué tipo de actividades les pone normalmente. Y aunque no lo miren nunca, van entendiendo qué suele incluir este señor.

/ Photo from: ibeconomics files wordpress com

[1] Tomado del editorial de la revista Contraste, nº 26, abril 2008. Edita: Asociaciones de telespectadores.

375. Correcting their own errors and mistakes

Anonymous — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 10:47:00 GMT

Another contribution to the website of British Council – BBC about errors and mistakes, by one more teacher. Very, very interesting. Picture from Life magazine. A Maori girl and a white one are playing or working at something.

SusanArgiri

Dealing with errors/mistakes

Submitted on 11 June, 2010 - 04:40

I always tell the students to not be afraid of mistakes. Mistakes allow a particular point to be placed in their memory banks. When they make a mistake I point out where the mistake is and let them correct it themselves. If they still get it wrong then I guide them to give them a further chance to correct it. If all fails then I tell them the answer with the appropriate explanation. The whole procedure means they remember.

Mistakes can be beneficial. If a student looks at the grammar rule or finds the correct vocabulary and writes the answer down correctly, that doesn't mean they will remember it when they come across it again. If they have had to correct the mistake there is a much better chance that the memory will be recalled.