Being in a new town and a new job, I've found myself having the same conversation over and over. Within a few minutes the conversation generally runs to "I work at the language school - Oh, how long have you been working there?"
Teaching this usage of the present perfect continuous prepares students to have a natural, normal, real-life conversation. What could be better?
Procedure
First, have each student take a small piece of paper and write the following items. Stress: not your own name and workplace but a made-up one.
Name
Place of work
Small number
|
Example:
Sopheak
Hospital
3
|
Take the papers in, shuffle and redistribute. Model the conversation:
"Hello, what's your name?"
"My name's..."
"Where do you work?"
"I work at the..."
"How long have you been working there?"
"I've been working there for X years!"
Now the students mingle around the classroom to practice the questions and answers using the cues on their paper. To give a motivation for speaking to everyone, challenge them to find someone who works in the same place as them. Obviously this may or may not happen depending on what the students have written, but they will have to speak to everyone to find out!
Happy mingling!
I use a lot of stripping'' activities for free oral practice. Old sheets of A4 are cut into strips (guillotine!) and each student gets 3 strips. I usually write 3-5 sentence heads on the board and then ask the students to choose any three and complete them so they are true for them. You then collect all of the papers - quick review of how to form questions from the grammar you are practicing and then each student takes one strip from you. They make a question from the strip and then ask around the class until they find the originator. They then ask questions to find out more (Remember Bob's favourite question? - Why?) When the conversation has naturally exhausted then the student takes another strip from you and starts again. Quick feedback at the end of the most interesting things discovered and any language you thought was really good or caused a problem.
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Sounds simple, effective and a snip to prepare for!! Thanks for the tips, Bob. I appreciate it!
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