Category Archives: Speaking

No qualifications or experience needed to just teach conversation

Posted on 18/07/2010 by alexcase

It’s true, you don’t need any qualifications or experience to converse, although some people seem to lack that basic communication skill even in their own language. Even for the most chatty of one to one “classes”, though, experience of grading … Continue reading →

Posted in links, Skills, Speaking | 7 Comments

New TEFLtastic worksheets Feb 2010 Part One

Posted on 08/02/2010 by alexcase

Your city and life Add the quantifiers speaking Next weekend and future tenses Describing objects 20 questions and extended speaking A report on weekends- Language of generalisation or phonics picture flashcards ee phonics picture flashcards Writing reports in English useful … Continue reading →

Posted in board games, countable and uncountable nouns, Future tenses, Language of generalisation, links, Photocopiable worksheets, Reports, Speaking, Speaking games, Technical English, Writing | Tagged | 1 Comment

Two ways of livening up textbook dialogues

Posted on 17/06/2009 by alexcase

I’m going to write about how to use these in more detail later, but thought I’d give the links first in case this saves someone’s day: http://www.xtranormal.com – students can make an animated “film” from the script just by typing … Continue reading →

Posted in ELT publishing, Functional language, links, Macmillan, Roleplays, Speaking, Teaching teenagers, Teaching young learners, Technology, TEFL, TEFL games, Writing | 3 Comments

The best end of term revision games

Posted on 10/12/2008 by alexcase

One way of finishing the term is with Xmas-themed stuff (see the post below). Another good one is lots of fun revision games. As I’ve spent a few years teaching students who want to do every page in the book … Continue reading →

Posted in Business English and ESP, Business English games, Collocations, ELT publishing, English for study abroad, Functional language, Grammar, links, Materials, Personalisation, Photocopiable worksheets, Revision games, Speaking, Speaking games, Taboo, Teaching teenagers, TEFL, TEFL games, Usingenglish, Vocabulary, Vocabulary games | 2 Comments

TEFL conspiracy theory of the day

Posted on 12/11/2008 by alexcase

Talking of TEFL jargon , am I the only one to notice that since Scott Thornbury wrote “An A to Z of ELT” his other books have suddenly become full of more jargon than you can shake a dictionary at? … Continue reading →

Posted in Cambridge University Press, ELT publishing, links, Materials, Speaking, TEFL heroes- Scott Thornbury | Tagged | 2 Comments

Stolen teaching idea of the day

Posted on 05/11/2008 by alexcase

Backwards dialogues Students write a dialogue and then read it out starting with the last line, then the second to last line and last line, then the last three lines etc- working their way towards the beginning of the dialogue until the … Continue reading →

Posted in Alternative teaching techniques, ELT publishing, Functional language, General English textbooks, links, Materials, Oxford University Press (OUP), Skills, Speaking, Speaking games, TEFL, TEFL games, Telephoning, textbooks | Leave a comment

Dr Johnson plays Call My Bluff

Posted on 12/10/2008 by alexcase

More making up for the fact that Dr Johnson was never lucky enough to be a TEFL teacher, this time with one of my favourite TEFL games ever, Call My Bluff. In the classroom version you get the students to … Continue reading →

Posted in call my bluff, Linguistics, applied linguistics and SLA, Materials, Speaking, Speaking games, TEFL celebs/ TEFL heroes and villains, TEFL games, Vocabulary, Vocabulary games | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

Dr Johnson does TEFL

Posted on 10/10/2008 by alexcase

Even with all the things written about Samuel Johnson’s Dictionary of the English Language, I think I might be the first to try adding some TEFL-style pointless elicitation. And so here goes… Try to work out which word he was … Continue reading →

Posted in Linguistics, applied linguistics and SLA, Materials, Speaking, Speaking games, Taboo, TEFL celebs/ TEFL heroes and villains, TEFL games | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Tired of typical ELT dialogues?

Posted on 15/08/2008 by alexcase

I thought so.  Try these with your classes, then: Student A: How are you? Student B: Old Student A: How are you? Student B: How am I? How should I be? Student A: How are you? Student B: How should I … Continue reading →

Posted in Alternative teaching techniques, Linguistics, applied linguistics and SLA, Speaking, TEFL | Tagged , | 2 Comments

Surprising things about speech acts

Posted on 09/07/2008 by alexcase

My first surprise was introducing students to the piece of ELT jargon “speech acts”, something I only vaguely remembered from my reading for my DELTA myself, but more about that when I get round to reviewing The Cambridge Grammar of … Continue reading →

Posted in Cambridge University Press, Functional language, Grammar, Linguistics, applied linguistics and SLA, Materials, Speaking, TEFL, TEFL reviews, TESOL | Leave a comment