Teaching English through Literature

For those of you who have an idea of my personality, you must know by now how much I care for literature. Now that I am discovering all this new ESL world that was somehow hidden before I started these classes to become a proper English teacher, I have been trying to figure out a way of combining the use of literature to stimulate reading in my future ESL students and at the same time, I would like to make them fall in love with all the styles of writing, vocabulary and cultures that English language authors can offer.

I surfed the net looking for tips and recommendations on how to use texts in the ESL room. Fortunately, I came across a section at the British Council website giving pieces of advice on how to take advantage of literature to teach English. I had not realised of the guidelines that must be followed before using extracts of literature (poetry, novels, etc) in the classroom.

Before using any piece of literature, we as teachers must respect first of all copyrighting. Chosen texts must be free of any copyright limitations imposed on them. Then if we only choose texts that can be perfectly used for they are old enough to be free from any copyright issue, we can fall into this little problem: presenting only classics that could not be as interesting for students as contemporary literature. It is our task to look for ways to solve these issues. We also must take into consideration preparing students to face the texts before we hand them to them. It's our job to introduce the author, the context and the repercussions of the literature piece in the society and in English language so they are more comfortable with the reading. This way they will be more eager to reading the texts and will achieve the goals we have set with the activity.

I cannot wait to find the perfect activity to use a book I read a decade ago. It is called "Animal Farm" and it was written by George Orwell. This book addresses very serious political issues in the form of a fable and set for me a milestone in terms of politics and the extent of human ambition and power.

Expressing Anger in English

I found these expressions to convey anger in English and thought they could come up handy for an exercise for upper intermediate students. First, have your students go to your blog and read the expressions. Then post a list of possible situations that could push their buttons and ask them to find the correct expression that matches their feeling about the situation. For instance:

I.e: Imagine the situation: Someone is chewing with his/her mouth open next to you making loud noises. How would you feel?

Answer: I would be pissed.

Situations:

1.- You meet someone and that person starts telling you every detail of his/her life immediately.

2.- Someone makes screeching sounds on a board.

3.- Someone boring invites you to dinner at his/her house and you cannot decline the invitation.

4.- You have worked on a paper for a while then the power goes off and you lose all the information.

5.- Finally, you get to go to the beach and it rains.

6.- Losing your salary on a bet.

7.- Not being able to turn in your homework on time.

8.- Getting an uneven haircut.

9.- Not being able to remember phrasal verbs.

10.- Going out of the house and leaving the keys inside.

Creative Writing Activity

A couple of months ago, we were introduced in Linguistics Class to someone I did not know, his name was Steven Pinker. We watched a video where he discussed the mechanics of thinking and language. I personally found his notions very avant-garde for he stated that thinking was not only related to words. When we think the brain makes a series of very complex associations where images, sounds and concepts meet. Then, he exposed the human capability of thinking without words, which is a fact.

Today, I remembered this clip which I discovered a few years ago. This masterpiece is the result of combining the minds of two of the most powerful artists of the past century, Salvador Dali and Walt Disney. When it was first made, it was banned for children for its strong visuals concerning sex and other taboo issues (such religious notions). Then it was presented to the public, including me, and it is truly delightful.

I was thinking of using this clip to encourage students to work on creative writing. Before presenting the video, they could go through summarized biographies of the two artists and how they were pioneers in their own areas. After discussing their impact on art, they watch the sequences and the morphing characters in the story and try to recreate in their own words their story, what they think the images try to convey.

This could be a great exercise to stimulate thinking through music and a sequence of images that could be interpreted in so many levels of thinking and that could realted to every student in a very personal way and also discuss their current effect in art.

I found this quote in youtube and it could not be more suitable to describe Dali's genious "

I hope there's a heaven, so that Dali can be there. Who else would they have for an architect?"

Enjoy.

Teaching English to Little Kids

I found this video clip featuring the letters and examples of words in English. I like the fact that the song is really catchy and sweet. I imagine that it could be a hit when teaching English to little kids. It a great way to introduce the words and sounds of English to the little ones. According to the comments on youtube, this clip has been used before to do so and it has proved to be a success.

English Vowels

I loved these videos so much that I kept on posting them. This time around, this lady introduces the 12 different English vowels sounds. I find this subject particularly difficult to get it understood by students. The concept alone is terrifying, I got truly scared when I was told that there were 12 different ways to pronounce vowels in English and at first achiving this seemed almost an unattainable task.

In this video the foundations of the vowels sounds are explained in details. The length, the place in the mouth were they are produced and so on. When I have students in the future (hopefully soon) I'll have them practice vowels with this video. Thanks retro lady.

English Consonants

For this clip focuses on a subject that I absolutely adore, I decided to post it. In this video there's a review of all IPA English consonants. This lovely lady, who brings the retro vibe back, takes her time to carefully articulate the sounds and then gives examples of use of the phonemes. This link could come extremely handy to introduce students to all English consonants and have them practice before starting a lesson on Phonetics or helping them out to read the transcriptions on dictionaries.

Enjoy and don't get hypnotized by her calmness and soothing voicing powers.

When Words Make you Burst into Laughter

Thanks to my new best friend Twitter, or as I call my buddy "El Tuito"; I came across this file featuring three people who engage in a ramdom conversation while waiting for the bus. I clicked on the link and I laughed like crazy while listening to the conversation. It is true that there are so many words in our native language that are just hilarious, let along when you are learning a new one and there are lots of new combinations of sounds that make bizarre connections in your brain that bring the chuckles. Anyway, I hope you enjoy the vid.