Do you want to be TEFL or TESOL-certified and teach in Punan Zhen? Are you interested in teaching English in Lianyungang Shi? Check out ITTT’s online and in-class courses, Become certified to Teach English as a Foreign Language and start teaching English ONLINE or abroad! ITTT offers a wide variety of Online TEFL Courses and a great number of opportunities for English Teachers and for Teachers of English as a Second Language.
”Stories are memory aids, instruction manuals, and moral compasses.” – Aleks Krotoski, The Guardian Throughout my experience of a summer camp teacher and a mother, I observed how both children and their parents can be fascinated by a good story. No heart can resist intricacy of adventures to be revealed, no mind will remain still when others are carried away, to the world of imagination. Storytelling is the oldest form of human communication. When implemented in the language learning process, storytelling creates a fun learning environment, raise students’ motivation to learn a new language, and develop receptive and productive language skills during participation in the activities. Storytelling activities can help students to learn the language in a meaningful and memorable context, and acquire grammar and syntax intuitively, by reading and memorizing repeated patterns in the text. Activities, built on storytelling, can suit the needs and interests of students, regardless of their age and language proficiency. Finale Unknown. For the introduction, a teacher will begin to read an intriguing story to the class. Upon the climax of the plot, a teacher will stop, leaving off the ending of the story, elicit vocabulary from the students by asking questions about the probable finale. The teacher then will split the class into pairs and offer the students to write their finale for the story. A teacher should encourage students to unleash their imagination and get creative. Upon the completion of the assignment, students will take turns to share their outlines with the class. Who am I? For this activity, a teacher should pick a short story with a few memorable characters, write their names on pieces of paper, and throw them into a sack. As an introduction to the activity, the teacher will read the story to the students. Afterward, the students will take turns to pull papers from the sack and describe a character, the name of whom they picked, to the class. Classmates will have to guess, which character is being described. This activity will help to practice target vocabulary and enhance it with new words. Story-to-Haiku. All of us more or less familiar with Japanese haiku poems. What students need to know about haiku, to participate in the activity, is that haiku is a traditional Japanese short poem consists of 3 lines (five-seven-five syllables) and usually written about things that are recognizable to a reader. A teacher can read one or two haiku poems to the class as an example. Afterward, a teacher will read a short story to students, discuss its theme, and prestudy target vocabulary. Next, the teacher will split the class into teams. Students will have to write as many haiku on the subject of the story, utilizing target vocabulary, as they can within a given time. In the end, students will take turns to present their work. The team, which came up with more haiku poems, wins. This activity integrates all four language skills and engages students in a creative and fun process of language learning. Prompted Story. Students have to get creative and come up with their own stories, based on pictures, presented by a teacher. The teacher can split the class into pairs or groups to improve students’ communication skills. Pet Fairy Tale. As an introduction to the activity, a teacher will read a fairy tale about animals. Afterward, a teacher will engage students in a discussion about basic elements and phrases of fairy tales, such as talking animals, an element of magic, make-believe lands, good triumphs over evil, heroes and villains, etc. For the activity, students will be asked to write a fairy tale about their pets, using set phrases and basic fairy tale elements Afterward, students will reveal their stories to the class. Storytelling activities are able to advance learners’ competence in all language skills by providing an authentic situation for language learning. Since stories contain text, intended for native speakers, listening and reading to stories help students to focus on building understanding and awareness of the language and provide a great example of the high-quality written language in context.
