How to practice modal verbs

How to practice modal verbs

In this chapter I am going to present some techniques and materials designed to give students practice in using the modal verbs. I am going to present both oral and written practice techniques.

ORAL PRACTICE

I this section I am going to present different ways of getting students to practise English modal verbs orally. I am going to talk about oral drills, information gap activities, games, personalisation and localization and oral communicative activities.

Oral drills

Jeremy Harmer [1]points out that: "Drills are usually very controlled and therefore they have limited potential. Because they are fairly repetitive and not very creative they should not be used for too long or too frequently. However, they do give students the opportunity for 'safe' practice; accuracy can be focused on as the students get a chance to rehearse language."

a)     Four-phase drills

In a four-phase drill the students are encouraged to ask a question and on the basis of the answer they follow it with another question.

When I conduct a four-phase drill designed for beginners to practise the question form: "Can you . ..?", first I start the activity by showing flashcards of people doing different activities and I elicit the names of these activities from the students (e.g. play football, speak French, write stories, skate, etc). Then I pick a card and I ask a student, for example:

T: Can you speak French?

S: No, I can not.

T: What language can you speak?

S: I can speak English.

Next I ask a student to pick another card and to question another student about the activity on the card:

S1: Can you skate?

S2: No, I can't

S1: Can you play football?

S2: Yes, I can.

After the drill is practised in front of the whole class I put the students in pairs, giving them photos of different animals or birds. The students are to ask each other about the abilities of those. Then some pairs are to do the drill in front of the whole class.

Four-phase drills are useful for practice and revision of specific question forms and they can be successfully used for a quick five-minute sessions after these questions have been introduced, perhaps in a previous class.

b)     Mixed question and answer drills

The difference between mixed question and answer drills and four-phase drills is that the former have more questions than the latter and they can be asked in any order.

In the following example I use four postcards on which I have drawn a spider, a parrot, a tortoise and a rabbit. Near each of them I write two activities (one which can be done by that animal and one that can't be done). I ask a student:

"Can spiders crawl? "Can spiders swim?

S1: Yes, they can." S2: No, they can't."

Then I write these two questions and answers on the board and ask the students to practice the questions for the other drawings in pairs.

As an extension the students can write their own model, e.g. "Spiders can crawl but they can't swim."

c)     Chain drills

Chain drills are ways of practising a particular structure over and over again in the context of either a game and/or a personal element. For example I ask the students to sit in a large circle and to imagine a big lie about what they could do when they were two. I begin by saying: "When I was two I could train a dolphin to read". The student staying next to me has to repeat my lie and to add his own, e.g. "When I was two I could train a dolphin to read and I could fly". The third student has to remember the first two lies and to add his/her own and so on. The student who can't remember what the ones before him have said gets out of the game. The student who remembers all the lies wins.

This chain drill is an amusing way of getting practice of a modal verb. The memory element added makes the game more interesting.

Information gap activities

With information gap activities different students are given different bits of information. By sharing this information they can complete the task. They are more involving than drills and also more motivating than a lot of question and answer practice.

For example a 'Picture dictation activity' is an information gap activity used to make the students understand that the modal verb can accompanies the verb 'to see' to express an action taking place at the moment of speaking.

To start this activity I put the students in pairs and give to one of them a picture, asking him/her not to show it to his/her partner. Then I ask the student holding the picture "What can you see in this picture? Describe it to your partner." The other student has to draw what his partner is describing to him. In the end they compare the drawing and the picture to see if they did well.

Another example of an information gap activity is called "The Application". This is designed for intermediate students and it can be used for oral practice but also for reading and form-filling, too.

Students are divided into pairs, asking them not to look at each other's papers. They are told they must each complete the paper in front of them.

This is what Student A receives:

By asking Student B questions, fill in the missing information in the letter of application below. (Student B will also ask you questions).

When you have finished, compare books to check that you have filled in the missing information correctly.

And this is what Student B receives:

Asking Student A questions, fill in the missing information in the form bellow. (Student a will also ask you questions.)

The material makes students ask a large number of questions in order to complete their task. In order to ask these questions both students have to read their material and work out what questions to ask.

Before students are put in pairs I usually demonstrate this technique by using another application form and working with a student in front of the class.

When this activity is over I can conduct feedback by getting the students to ask and answer the questions with the whole class listening. This serves to check if they got the information right.

Information gap tasks provide students with a reason to communicate with each other, and can be designed to practise, as in the model above the use of modal verbs.

Games

Games are a vital part of any teacher's equipment, not only for the language practice they provide but also for the therapeutic effect they have. Jeremy Harmer points out: "Games can be used at any stage of a class to provide an amusing and challenging respite from any classroom activity, and are especially useful at the end of a long day to send the students away feeling cheerful about their English class." I shall give a few examples:

a)     Ask the right question

I play this game at primary school students especially as a warm-up activity. Students are divided into pairs in which there is A and B. Student A in each pair is given five cards on which there are written different words such as the following:

in the morning, can, play basketball, M. Jordan, cook pancakes.

Student A then has to ask B questions so that B gives exactly the answer written on A's card. If B fails to give the exact answer A has to ask the question again until B gets it exactly right.

This game is suitable for all levels and for more advanced students I usually choose more difficult answers. It is also great fun and quite difficult since A has to think of exactly the right question to get exactly the right answer.

b)     'Yes/no' game

Students are divided into teams. Each team must think of a famous person and his skills. The game commences when one person from A team asks someone from B team a question which can only be answered with 'yes' or 'no'.

If team B finds out the name of the famous person after only a maximum of ten questions they get two points. If it takes them between ten and twenty questions they get one point. They get no point if they do not discover who the famous person is after asking twenty questions. The questions could begin with "Is this person a man?"

(the question "Is this person a man or a woman?" is not acceptable because it is not a 'yes/no' question).

A charade element to the idea so that students can mime either actions ("Can you swim?") or occupations ("Do you play football with other people?")

c) Noughts and crosses

This popular children's game can easily be adapted for the English classroom enabling me to ensure practice of the modal verbs.

I divide the class into two teams; one representing noughts (O) and the other crosses (X). I put the following on the table:

Was able to had to could

Should can need

Don't have to ought to must

The team selects the square it wishes to play for, and a member of the team has to say a sentence using the word on that square. If the sentence is correct the square is filled wih a nought or a cross, depending on the team the player comes from.

More fun can be added to this game if I use a card on which all the squares are covered. The students select a square which I uncover, and the team has to make a sentence with whatever is underneath.

d)Quizzes

Quizzes can always be used to practise modal verbs in a pleasant and motivating way. In this example students will be practising the use of 'was/were able to'.

The students are divided into two teams. Each time is given time to write a number of general knowledge questions using 'was/were able to'. Their questions might be like the following:

Who was the first man who was able to speak on the phone?

Who was the first man who was able to drive a car?

Which was the animal that stepped first on the moon?

Which place were people able to fly for the first time? etc.

In the game a member of Team A asks a question to a member of Team B. If the question is said correctly Team A gets one point. If the member of Team B gets the answer immediately the team gets two points. If she or he has to confer with the rest of the team to get the answer the team gets one point.

Games are great fun for the students and provide practice in an amusing context.

Personalisation

Personalisation refers to that stage of practice where students use language they have recently learned to talk about themselves and their lives. Such stages can obviously be very controlled or very free. I think that when students are involved in an immediate creativity stage and I ask them to produce their own sentences using a modal verb, I should insist on additional remarks to be done. What I want to say is that where a student gives a yes/no type answer he or she must then add a comment to it like in the example:

S2: Can you play football?

S1: Yes.

T: Yes . and?

S1: Yes . I play football every weekend.

Particularly during personalisation the teacher can prompt the use of additional remarks and follow-up questions in order to encourage realistic communication.

An example of personalisation is this: I bring a number of cards of different activities and I ask a student to come and pick a card. If the student, for example, picks the card with the verb 'dance' on it I ask the student:

T: Can you dance, Mary?

S: Yes, I can.

T: Where do you dance?

S: I dance at a dance class every Monday.

T: Could you dance last year, too?

S: Yes, I could. I started dancing when I was ten.

This type of exercise can be used at some stage after the students have learnt the new modal verb or it may form an immediate creativity stage.

Oral interaction

Oral interaction means activities designed to encourage practice of specific language in an enjoyable and active way. I shall present two activities of this kind.

a)     Find someone who

This activity is designed to get the students asking a number of different questions in an active way.

Each student is given the following card:

FIND SOMEONE WHO: NAME:

has to wear a uniform at school  . . . . ..

doesn't have to take the rubbish out . . . . ..

has to water the plants  . . . . ..

has to make his/her bed . . . . ..

doesn't have to wash his/her socks . . . . ..

has to clean her/his room  . . . .

b)     Questionnaire: "What can you do in the countryside but you can't do in the city?

Questionnaires are a useful way of encouraging practice of specific language items in a motivating and interesting way. In this example students will ask each other specific activities for living in the countryside compared to living in a city and they will also ask different opinions about these.

First I and the students discuss different spare time activities. The students are then given the following form:

The students then question each other asking questions as: "Where can you milk a cow?", "What do you think of this?". As the form suggests they put ticks where indicated.

When they have filled in their questionnaire they will write a short paragraph such as the following:

'Most of the children can feed the poultry and milk the cow in the countryside. They think these activities are boring', etc.

This questionnaire thus provides practice of the present form 'can' and shows how oral and written skills can be integrated.

Oral communicative activities

1 Reaching a consensus

In this activity students have to agree with each other after a certain amount of discussion. The task is not complete until they do. Consensus activities are very successful in promoting free and spontaneous language use. An example of such activity is called "Moral dilemmas". The stages for this activity are:

Stage 1 The students are given a situation and alternative suggestions for acting in such a situation. They are told that they are invigilating an important school exam. They see a student cheating with notes he or she has illegally brought into the exam room. They have four possible courses of action:

Ignore the accident.

Warn the student that if he/she cheats again he/she will be reported to the authorities.

Ask the student to leave the exam, tear up his/her exam and mark him/her as absent.

Report the student to the authorities, in which case he or she will have to leave school.

Stage 2 Students are put in small groups to reach a consensus on this issue.

Stage 3 Pairs of groups are combined and have to reach a consensus on which alternative to adopt.

Stage 4 The procedure can be repeated with groups joined each other.

After Stage 3 a feedback session can be conducted in front of the whole class in which groups are to justify their choices.

2 Discussion

In order to start an interesting discussion a teacher should:

a)     Put students in groups first. This will allow them to give opinions in a less threatening environment than in front of the whole class and it also gives the teacher a chance to see if the topic is interesting for the students.

b)     Give students a chance to prepare. Where a more formal discussion is due to take place students need a chance to prepare their opinions. This is suitable especially for debates.

c)     Give students a task. One way of promoting discussion is to give students a task as part of the discussion process. They can be given a list of controversial statements about a topic and asked to score them from 0(=very negative) to 5 (=very positive). They can do this in pairs and groups.

The example I am going to present is called "Smoking?!" and it is based on a controversial topic. The activity begins like this: the students are giving the following statements about smoking and then they are told they have to circle the number which best reflects their agreement or disagreement with the statement ( 0=totally disagree, 5=totally agree)

1 Smokers should be forced to give up this habit.  0 1 2 3 4 5

2 Smoking should be banned in all public places.  0 1 2 3 4 5

3 There should be separate area for smokers an all restaurants and cafes.  0 1 2 3 4 5

4 People who smoke in no-smoking areas should be put in prison.  0 1 2 3 4 5

After scoring the students compare their answers in pairs and then in groups and they have to agree on a score.

A more formal discussion is called a debate, an activity suitable for more advanced students. In a debate the students are divided in two sides and each side argue a case which is then put to vote. In such an activity I give students a controversial proposition such as "Whoever sells drugs to teenagers should go to prison for life". Then I put the students into two groups which have to prepare arguments either in favour of the proposition or against the proposition. When the arguments are ready the teams elect two persons who make formal speeches to argue their case. All the other students can then take part with short interventions. At the end of the discussion a free vote is organised to see whether the proposition wins or not.

Discussion activities are an important part of many lessons. The main thing a teacher should remember is that proper organization can ensure their success.

3 Relaying instructions

In this type of activity students have to give each other instructions. The success of the activity depends on whether the students to whom the instructions are given perform the task successfully. A relaying instructions activity is called "Exercising". The stages of this activity are:

Stage 1 I write down some instructions, e.g. "You must jump as high as you can", "You must stand on your left leg", "You must touch your nose twice". These are given to individual students without the others to see them.

Stage 2 The students have to get their colleagues to do the exercises using only words (not gestures).

This activity can be very amusing and involves real communication.

Problem solving

Problem-solving activities encourage students to talk together to find a solution to a problem. An example is the following:

The students are given a complex situation and told to solve the problem: "There is a man, hanging from the ceiling in an empty house in the desert. There is nothing in the room, not a single piece of furniture; there is just a little water on the floor and a truck in front of the house. How could the man kill himself?"

Students are put in groups and they are to express different possibilities till they find the right answer (the man must have stood up on a block of ice he had brought there using the truck, when the ice melted, he must have been left without feet support). The most ingenious students are given good marks.

This exercise is suitable for intermediate students. Apart from organizing the groups and conducting feedback, I can leave the students very much on their own.

5 Talking about yourself

A teacher can use students' lives and feelings for interpersonal exchanges. Such activities are often used at the beginning of a class (warm-up activity) to create a good and positive atmosphere and willingness to discuss. Such an activity is called "What skills we have in common". It is used for beginners. Students are put in pairs and told to discover five skills they have in common. These encourages them to cover a large range of activities as leisure time activities, hobbies, etc (e.g. "Can you play the piano/ play football/ write backwards?") This activity is also a positive one since it investigates what joins people together.

6 Simulation and role play

The idea of simulation is to create the pretence of a real-life situation in the classroom: students 'simulate' the real world. This way, a teacher is actually trying to give students practice in real-world English. Sometimes the students are asked to play someone else and thus they do a role play.

The main advantage of a role play is that the students do not have to take responsibility for their actions or words- in other words it's the character they are playing who speaks, not themselves. I have noticed that some shy students are more talkative when playing roles.

During a simulation a teacher can act as a participant (the advantage of this is that he/she can help the simulation along if it gets into difficulty) or as a prompter (making suggestions about what the students could say and do next but only when it is absolutely necessarily for the success of the activity). A simulation should never be teacher-dominated because this would restrict the students from communicating among themselves.

After the simulation has finished the teacher should conduct feedback with the students. The object here is to discuss with them whether the activity was successful and why certain decisions were reached. It is important for the teacher to conduct feedback about the context of an activity such as simulation as well as discussing the use of English. The main motive of this activity is to make students to develop their ability to communicate efficiently.

The role play I am going to present is called "Giving advice". As a preparation of the role play I make copies of the material so that every student in the class has a card. The stages of this activity are:

Stage 1: I write the words Money Problems on the board and ask students to brainstorm in pairs as many different money problems as they can think of. I set a time limit of 2 minutes. I also give the first example:"You owe money to a friend and you can't pay it back".

Stage 2: I elicit students' suggestions and I write them on the board. I also use this stage to review the following words: to owe, to borrow, to lend, to spend, to inherit, and to pay.

Stage 3: I explain to the students that they are going to do a role play on some money problems and that I am going to give cards to only half of the students. I also explain to them that they have a problem listed on the card and that they must talk to three different people and ask for their advice.

Stage 4: I distribute the role cards and I tell the students with the cards to talk to a partner about the problem. After three or four minutes, I tell the students with the cards to talk to a different partner.

In order to accomplish this task only the students with the role cards need to move around. The other students remain where they are.

This stage has to be repeated two times to make the role play more successfully.

Stage 5: At the end of the activity, I ask the students to tell their problem to the class and to explain what was the best solution offered.

Stage 6: Optional: I can do correction work on the mistakes I have heard during the role play or I can give examples of the good language I have heard. Then, stage 4 can be repeated but with different students holding the role cards.

The cards for this role play are:

This simulation is suitable for intermediate students and it is very amusing. It gives the students a chance to step out of the role of language students and to use their language in realistic context.

WRITTEN PRACTICE

In this section I am going to write about ways of encouraging written practice. I shall present the following techniques: sentence writing, parallel writing, oral composition, dictation and written communicative activities. Writing is very important and this is emphasized by Rivers wilga M. and Mary S. Temperley[3] who say: "However grammatical concepts are introduced and demonstrated, it is essential that the students' activity be directed as soon as possible to the concept in use. Understanding the operation of the grammar, observing its functioning, or practicing the effective use of it in exercises will not ensure that the student can use it efficiently in writing. Experiments in the writing of English by native speakers have shown specifically that the formal study of grammar and grammatical terminology does not improve skill in writing. After language learners have been shown how the various parts of the language system operate, they seem to benefit more from the discussion of the types of errors they are making in their writing in relation to what they were trying to say, with opportunity provided to correct their errors in context."

Sentence writing

a) Fill-in

In this example of sentence writing the aim is to give students practice in the specific usage of modal verbs in writing. The activity is based on exercise 1 page 66 from the textbook English Scrapbook, ed. Oxford University Press. The students have to fill the blanks in five sentences with the correct forms of can, could and be able to.

e.g.

a) We . . ..still consider Leonardo da Vinci a man of outstanding ability.

b) He . . . .use his both hands with great ease. For drawing and writing he used his left hand, for painting he used his right hand.

c) He . . . ..write backwards from right to left.

d) He tried hard to understand the "why" of everything but he . . . . . ..

e) Nature is too complex. One man . . . . . solve the basic problems but let's hope that in future people . . . . . . solve all life's mysteries.

This activity, although very restricted can be used as a good sentence-writing practice and students feel involved and challenged because they have to choose from three alternatives.

b) What can/can't you do?

This activity starts after the students listen and repeat the words from exercise 2a, page 61, English Scrapbook textbook, ed. Oxford University Press.

In this example students are asked to look at some pictures with different things for leisure time activities in them (bicycle, skateboard, roller-blades, roller-skates, ice-skates, motorcycle). The students are asked to use the pictures and to write five sentences about what they can/can't do.

E.g. I can roller-skate but I can't ride a bicycle.

This exercise has the advantage of getting the students to use specific language (in this case the modal verb can in order to express ability) to make their own sentences. Thus it is slightly more involving than the first example.

Parallel writing

The concept of parallel writing is central to the teaching of connected discourse since it suggests that students should have a model from which to start working. In other words, students will see first a piece of writing and then use it as a basis for their own work. Thus they will be guided towards developing their own ability to express themselves in written English.

This activity is called "Crazes across the ages" and it is based on a newspaper article from the textbook mentioned above page 61 and at the end of the activity they will be capable of writing a short description of a craze (here something in fashion for spending leisure time at teenagers)

First the students are put in pairs to talk about their abilities, saying what they could, can and will be able to do. Then I ask them to read the newspaper article about a craze called in-line skating. After that I find out if there is any vocabulary the students do not understand. When it is clear that the students understood the text I pass to asking comprehension questions to check they have understood the text. I write the questions on the board and after that I ask students to come to the board and write the answers for these:

In which country did this craze start?

Who was it started for?

Why were the blades changed for wheel?

What are the advantages of roller-blading?

How fast can roller-bladers go?

Who can use in-line roller-skates?

This kind of writing that students have to do here is very controlled and the activity is very muck like an oral drill.

Then I put students in groups and ask them to find and discuss a craze they prefer and after that to write six sentences about a craze, using the newspaper article as a model for their writing. At this moment they are free to write whatever they like. This activity is suitable for intermediate students and it encourages freer writing more than controlled writing.

Oral compositions

Oral compositions have been popular in language teaching for a long time. The idea is that the teacher and the class together build up a narrative before the students are then asked to write it.

Oral compositions can he handled with visual or aural stimuli. That means I can show the students pictures, mime a story or play a tape for them with a series of sounds.

The example I am going to present is called "A stabbing incident" and it uses pictures. This activity is suitable for advanced students. I start by getting the students to look at the pictures and describe those using modal verbs. I ask the students to use must have+ past participle to express their deductions about the past and should/shouldn't have+ past participle to criticize past actions or express regret.

e.g. He must have felt terrible about stabbing Kim.

He should have been given a toy knife.

He shouldn't have let himself be persuaded.

Then I put them in pairs to put the pictures in the correct order. Next some pairs are to tell the story in front of the class. After that I ask them to look at the final picture for the story which has not been introduced till then and I ask the students to tell if this affect their version of the events.

When doing this kind of activity I must be ready to encourage students to speak by guiding them what to say through questions. A teacher should keep in mind that oral compositions work better if students do not see all the pictures at the same time. Oral compositions can be used for practising various past forms of modal verbs but they take a lot of time and thus they are used sparingly.

Dictation

I shall present two examples of this technique I find very interesting:

a) Poetry dictation

In this activity students dictate to each other in an involving way. For example for 3^rd class, beginners I bring a copy of the poem:

I can sing  I can climb I can draw

Can you sing? Can you climb? Can you draw?

I can dance  I can run I can play

Can you dance? Can you run? Can you play?

Now clap your hands, It's lots of fun, It's a happy day,

Clap your hands!  It's lots of fun! A happy day!

The students are put in groups. Each group sends a member up to the poem where they read only the first two lines. They take the first two lines to their group and dictate them. Now a second member of the group goes to the poem and read the following two lines so that they can be dictated to the group. A third student goes for the next two lines and so on. The technique keeps students guessing about what the next lines will be. They are far more involving in the meaning of the poem than they would be if they were just reading it, and they are getting writing practice.

b) Solving a puzzle

If I want students to discuss without giving them first something to start from, they usually don't say much. Little dictations can get the students working as in the following example:

First I tell the students to get out a pen and a piece of paper and I dictate the following:

"There is a bird in a locked room. How did it get in? It must have got in somehow. It can't have come through the door"

I ask them to write some possibilities or impossibilities to solve the mystery.

This activity is proper for intermediate students. It makes them write motivated and interested in solving the mystery.

Written communicative activities: Writing is often relegated to the status of homework. This is not right, especially because communicative writing can play a valuable part in the class. I shall give examples of 'relaying instructions', 'writing reports and advertisements', 'co-operative writing' and 'exchanging letters' activities.

1 Relaying instructions

In this activity one group of students has information for the performance of a task, and they have to get another group to perform the same task by giving them written instructions. Such an activity is "A shape jungle" in which students draw different animals using various shapes. This activity involves writing the instructions like this: "First you must draw a big circle for the head. You must draw two small circle for the eyes and two triangles for the ears." The stages of this activity are:

Stage 1 A small group of students is given material to draw an animal using shapes: pieces of paper, pencils, crayons, rulers, etc,) and they are told to draw their animal.

Stage 2 The group now writes instructions which will enable other students to duplicate their drawing.

Stage 3 Other students are given the instructions and told to draw the shape animal by reading the instructions.

This activity has the advantage of immediate feedback because the original group can see how well they have written instructions by watching the efforts of the other students to duplicate their shape animal.

2 Writing an advertisement

After the students have learned the household items in the 6^th grade they are to do an advertisement for an ideal household item, for example a 'homework-doer' .The advertisement must contain the skills that make the 'homework-doer' so special.(e.g. It can solve fifty problems a second, it doesn't have to rest, it can write five essays in a minute). The stages of this activity are:

Stage 1 The class discusses what makes a successful advertisement.

Stage 2 The class is divided into groups. They are told that their task is to design an ideal household item and write an advertisement for it which will appear in the class magazine.

Stage 3 When they have completed their advertisements they can pass them round the class. Alternatively they can be given week to design the artwork for their text. The advertisements can then be pinned to the class notice board.

3 Co-operative writing

In this activity the process of co-operation of the students is important as the fact as the writing itself. The activity I am going to present is called "A common fairy story". In this activity students are put into groups and told they are going to write joint stories. The stages of this activity are:

Stage 1 Students are put in groups (if possible of equal numbers).

Stage 2 Students are told to write on a piece of paper the following sentence : "Once upon a time there was a huge dragon who could fly and talk but he couldn't get away from a magic spell ".

Stage 3 The students are then instructed to continue the story by writing the next sentence.

Stage 4 The students are then told to give their piece of writing to the student on their left They should continue the story they have in front of them by writing the next sentence. The procedure is repeated have gone round the whole group.

Stage 5 The stories are now returned to their originators (by passing the papers to the student on the left). They must write the concluding sentence. Students can read the resulting tales to the rest of the class.

This activity is very enjoyable for the students because it produces different stories.

4 Exchanging letters

An exchanging letter activity is called "The Agony Column". It involves students writing letters to 'agony columns'- those parts of newspapers and magazines where supposed experts give advice on everything, on any kind of problems. In this activity students invent some problem and then have it answered by other members of the class. The stages of this activity are:

Stage 1 The class and I discuss 'agony columns' and the students come with their own examples. If they can't give examples I shall show them an example of an agony column.

Stage 2 I put students into small groups and ask each group to think of a problem and then write a letter.

Stage 3 The letters from each group are then given to another group who have to reach a consensus regarding the best answer and then write a reply.

Stage 4 The reply is given then to the original group to consider. The best letter or the most amusing one will get a good mark.

This activity is particularly suitable after the students have been working on the language of advice. It can be used with intermediate or advanced students. It provides students with a reason to communicate with each other. When the activity is over I conduct feedback by getting some students to read their letters in front of the whole class

Lesson Plan

School: School Number 14, Pitesti

Grade: 3C, 2 hours a week

Level: beginners

Textbook: Set Sail!-Third grade

Topic: CAN

Date: 10^th March

Method: Communicative

Type of lesson: Mixed

Title of the lesson: Pet Shop Fun!

General Competence: to stir interest in the usage of the modal verb can to express abilities

Specific competences:

-to enable students to listen for details,

-to request students to make their own dialogues,

-to encourage students to speak about their abilities,

Skills:

• Speaking
• Reading
• Listening
• Writing

Strategies:

• personalization
• conversation
• drills
• fill-in exercise

Interaction:

• teacher-student
• student-teacher
• student-student

Aids: textbook pictures, activity books, drawings, cassette, hand-outs, poster, spinners;

Assumption: some activities might take too much time, so the teacher will be prepared to shorten some of them;

Evaluation: continuous through observation and analysis of answers;

Procedure:

stages

timing

class management

teaching aids

procedure

skills

Lesson Plan

School: School Number 14, Pitesti

Grade: 3C, 2 hours a week

Level: beginners

Textbook: Set Sail!-Third grade

Topic: Consolidation of the modal verb CAN

Date: 12^th March

Method: Communicative

Type of lesson: Mixed

Title of the lesson: Unit 6

General Competence: to stir interest in the usage of the modal verb can to express different abilities;

Specific competences:

-to involve students in conversational situations;

-to enable students to listen for details,

-to request students to make their own dialogues,

-to encourage students to speak about their abilities,

Vocabulary: the verbs: to sing, to dance, to climb, to run, to draw, to play;

Skills:

• Speaking
• Reading
• Listening
• Writing

Strategies:

• personalization
• conversation
• drills
• fill-in exercise

Interaction:

• teacher-student
• student-teacher
• student-student

Aids: textbook pictures, activity books, drawings, cassette, poster, drawing paper, flashcards

Assumption: some activities might take too much time, so the teacher will be prepared to shorten some of them;

Evaluation: continuous through observation and analysis of answers;

Lesson Plan

School: School Number 14, Pitesti;

Grade: 7 C, 2 hours a week;

Level: intermediate;

Textbook: English Scrapbook, Oxford University Press, 7^th grade

Topic: Modal verbs should/shouldn't have + Past Participle;

Date: 12^th May

Method: Communicative

Type of lesson: Mixed

Title of the lesson: Enigmas

Communicative aims: Expressing criticism and regret;

Specific competences:

-to encourage students to express regret and criticism;

-to raise students' interest and motivate them for the reading activity;

-to familiarise the students with the vocabulary necessary for understanding the reading text;

Vocabulary:

-active: to sink, lifeboat, premonition, enigma, iceberg, to hit, to strike, crew, passenger, to rescue, to warn, to receive, unsinkable, steamship;

-passive: to supply, to launch, survivor, to work in shifts;

Skills:

• READING

• Speaking
• Listening
• Writing

Strategies:

• personalization
• conversation
• drills
• writing a presentation

Interaction:

• teacher-student
• student-teacher
• student-student

Aids: textbook pictures, activity books, cassette, poster,

Assumption:

- some students may not know certain facts about The titanic, so the teacher will be prepared with information concerning this ship;

-some activities might take too much time, so the teacher will be prepared to shorten some of them;

Evaluation: continuous through observation and analysis of answers;

Background Information

The Titanic

A great passenger sheep thought to be unsinkable struck an iceberg in the Atlantic off the coast of Newfoundland during its first voyage from Southtampton to New York and sank, causing a tragic loss of life. The iceberg tore a 300-foot hole in the hull and water poured in. When the wireless operator sent out an SOS signal, six ships began to race towards the Titanic. But the two ships that were closest did not here the desperate call for help. There are now many theories as to why the Titanic sank.

Emily Richards, a survivor of the tragedy said later: "It was the most frightening sight I have ever seen. The sea was full of bodies. The water was so icy that nobody could survive for more than a few minutes".

Exercise 4, page 74

Tapescript

A lot of strange coincidences seem to predict the sinking of the Titanic. Perhaps the best way to explain them is as premonitions.

In 1898, 14 years before the Titanic sank, a novel called Futility was written by Morgan Robertson. In the book, the titan, a huge ship, sank soon after hitting an iceberg. Like the Titanic, the Titan was considered to be unsinkable and so was provided with too few lifeboats for the large number of passengers it was carrying.

The premonitions of the accident also took the form of dreams. At least 9 people reported dreams in which a ship hit an iceberg and sank soon afterwards.

Two fortune tellers also warned of the disaster. They foresaw the accident.

Several other people had strange intuitions that something would go wrong.

Last, but not least, some would-be passengers felt so worried about the journey that they cancelled their tickets at the last minute.

Strangely enough, at least 20 people had premonitions of this kind about the sinking of the Titanic.

Lesson Plan

School: Number 14, Pitesti;

Grade: 7 C, 2 hours a week;

Level: intermediate;

Textbook: English Scrapbook, Oxford University Press, 7^th grade

Topic: can, could, be able to;

Date: 12^th April

Method: Communicative

Type of lesson: Mixed

Title of the lesson: Crazes across the ages

Communicative aims: Expressing abilitits;

Specific competences:

-to encourage students to express preferences and wishes;

-to raise students' interest and motivate them for the reading activity;

-to familiarise the students with the vocabulary necessary for understanding the reading text;

-to help students to talk about crazes across the ages;

Vocabulary:

-active: roller-skates, skateboard, ice-skates, roller-blades, motorcycle, hula hoop, pogo stick, game boy, Rubik's cube, Barbie doll;

-passive: in-line, grow, by storm, old-fashioned, muscle, to develop, smooth, to provide, agility, practice, safety, protective, helmet, knee pads, elbow pad, wrist band, spread;

Pronunciation: Stress on compound words

Skills:

• READING

• Speaking
• Writing
• Listening

Strategies:

• personalization
• conversation
• drills
• playing a game
• brainstorming activity

Interaction:

• teacher-student
• student-teacher
• student-student

Aids: textbook pictures, activity books, cassette, poster, hand-outs;

Assumption: some students may not understand clearly the difference between could and was/were able to for expressing past abilities, so the teacher will be prepared to help them understand these;

Evaluation: continuous through observation and analysis of answers;