Click here for a link to Purina All Stars, a video archive of animals. Watching these short video clips with your students will make great discussion starters.
Put on the board questions like:
If you scroll down and look to the left side, you will see tabs for other pages – wildlife, meow, woof, odd couples, little critters and more.
Below is a list of more animal videos. I suggest previewing and downloading the videos before showing them in class ( just to make sure that there are no glitches and nothing inappropriate pops up on the screen – the videos tend to load one right after the other.)
If you don’t have Real Player, click here and download the free version.
I’m just going to throw my two cents worth in here while I’m at it.
When you are teaching, be sure to include the tactile/kinesthetic learners.
You can do this in two ways -
Both ways help the students acquire “muscle memory” which helps
in the acquisition process. (It lowers the affective filter too.)
Auditory learners may benefit from not only hearing and repeating the target vocabulary a few times, but it may help if you can search around
and find a sound bite to go with the image as well. For example,
here is a link to a site that has a boatload of sound bites to choose from.
This link will take you to a page of toothbrushing sounds.
FYI – Soundsnap only gives your 5 free downloads a month. This site is free all the time.
Click here for a link to a website that has royalty free photos.
Now, let’s take it a step further. Why not turn it into a game?
Put up three pictures on the board. Then play the sound bite and
have some fun letting them guess which one it is!
introduction
instructions
page 1
page 2
]]>Really it is just a fancy definition for words that seem contradictory when put together, like pretty ugly.
Merriam Webster definition
Oxymorons from A to Z & by category.
Lesson plus the printable activity
Colorful white board flip chart
Cute cartoon
Examples of Oxymorons in Poems & Poetry
Lesson plans
Short article
And now for something completely different…
Do you speak English?
HD movie trailer
Lesson plans & more
All about foxes
]]>The wonderful people over at ESL Gold have a page that is dedicated to Phrases for Conversation which are broken down into the following levels: Low Beginning, High Beginning, Low Intermediate, High Intermediate & Advanced. What makes this site stand out above the others is that it provides audio. The speakers are native North American speakers and they speak slow enough for the ELL (English Language Learner) to pick up on what they are saying, but not so mind numbingly slow that you want to bang your head against the wall. Also, you can tell the narrators are some what professional because the inflection is in the right place, even if it does sound somewhat forced on some of the examples. This would be a great site for Chinese teachers of English to brush up on their English skills, assign as homework or use as part of a language lab.
]]>With that being said, I have posted a few links for nostalgia’s sake. So, if you are stuck in a foreign country and there is no American football to be had, why not get your football fix by dedicating a thematic unit to (wait for it, drum roll please) FOOTBALL!
Okay let’s kick off with a link to the NFL…
Click here to go to a link to the National Football League (NFL)
Click here to view the inspirational movie trailer for The Blind Side
Click here for a site that gives lots of biographical information and includes clips from Fox and other sources, including the transcripts.
Click here for a link to an National Public Radio interview describing how Michael Oher is the “perfect” position of left tackle.
Click here for a link to the New York times article called, The Ballad of Big Mike.
Click here for a concise rundown of the basics of football.
Click here for a copy of a printable worksheet.
Click here for a link to a talking point worksheet that asks the question, “Is Football a Waste of Time?”
Click here for a link to another Football worksheet.
Click here to go to a link to an online grammar quiz focusing on the noun record and the past simple and past participles of win and lose.
Click here for a fictional conversation full of sports idioms.
Click here for a link to page that describes an American Football ESL game.
]]>Below is the link to the trailer site. There is a veritable smorgasbord to choose from. It may not be such a bad idea if you want to mix things up and/or kill some time. Or, if you get a positive response from the students you could do it as a regular thing, turn it into “Movie Monday.” It doesn’t have to be on a Monday, but you get the idea.
http://www.apple.com/trailers/
You could do a bunch of different activities along with it, like:
For example, Invitcus http://www.apple.com/trailers/wb/invictus/ can be used to teach about Nelson Mendela and apartheid. If you’re a Rugby fan then “forget about it!” You could springboard a mini-unit about the game, history, rules, etc; Maybe you could get a Rugby club going with the students? Do you think they would go for that? I don’t know, but my teenage son would be totally into that (he plays’ American football – which is kinda like Rugby except with armor, right?)
What about Where The Wild Things Are? This story is a children’s classic. I remember reading it to my son when he was a little guy. http://www.apple.com/trailers/wb/wherethewildthingsare/ Can you get your hands on the book? This would be a great one to teach the kids.
Here is a random list of resources that can be found on the net:
This lesson incorporates math and science
Students create their own wild things
Character development lesson
Beginning, middle, end
Sequencing monster
What about A Christmas Carol? Another timeless classic.
and let’s not forget the ppt’s!
Then there is Amelia. http://www.apple.com/trailers/fox_searchlight/amelia/
Is she dead? Is she alive and living with Elvis on a deserted island?
lesson plans
Even if you don’t have the series, you can still glean nuggets that you can use in class.
biography
Forensic evidence – create a discussion – is she alive or dead? Let the students decide based on evidence provided by the following sources and then present their position to the class.
Is she alive? http://www.irene-amelia.com/index.html
Is she dead? http://www.nndb.com/people/943/000026865/
There’s lots of rich material to choose from. It can be used year after year once you put the lesson together. So a little bit of work will pay off in the long run.
]]>Click here for a link to an article at ESL Focus about using ESL games to motivate adults. At the end of the article she offers 10 tips.
More ESL games
http://www.teflgames.com/games.html
http://www.stickyball.net/games-and-activities.html
http://www.manythings.org/e/easy.html
http://teachingenglishgames.com/
http://eslplayground.com/
Click here for a cute Alien zookeeper game.
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