Age Level: 19-32
Ability Level: Level 2A (First half of level 2)
Type of Lesson: Review of Previous Lesson
Objectives- By the end of this lesson, students will be able to:
- Define and provide examples of nouns
- Identify various objects (e.g., door, ceiling, desk)
- Recognize mistakes in identification
- Express that something is different
- Use correct pronunciation when defining nouns
- Use listening skills and subtle clues to solve answers
- Use nouns (words) in sentences while upholding grammatical integrity
- Use speaking and listening skills to express differences
Materials Needed:
- Cards (provided by the teacher)
- Computer
- Tape
- YouTube
- Classroom
Preparation: before the start of the class, the teacher will have moved all of the cards that the students hung in the last class to different locations.
Location: Regular Classroom
Warm up/Anticipatory Set/Activation (5 minutes): When the students enter the room, the teacher will say (for example): “Welcome, class. Just give me a few minutes to sit at my ceiling and take attendance…Ah, I can’t find a clock to write with. Does anybody know how to turn the marker on? It doesn’t seem to be working!” The teacher will then proceed to take attendance and glance up to see if the students realize what he just said; if the students show discomfort or look baffled, the teacher will inquire as to what is wrong.
- There is a good chance that at least one student will notice that the card on the teacher’s desk says ceiling, the card on the computer says marker and so forth; then, upon looking around the room, the students will see (and likely express to each other) that everything seems different.
- The teacher will then say, “uh-oh! It looks like everything is messed up! I guess someone came and moved all of our cards around; why don’t we try to put them in the right spots again?”
Review (10 minutes): The teacher will pose the question, “What’s a noun—who remembers?” When the students say, a person, place thing or idea, the teacher will ask probing questions such as, “Good, so is this a noun (holding up a water bottle). How about this (showing the color blue). What about the word ‘pretty’, is that a noun?” Of course, some students might say that the word ‘pretty is a noun’, for example, and so the teacher will ask the student to show him “a pretty.” The hope of this is that the student will realize that “pretty” describes a noun (i.e., the pretty girl), but is not, itself, a noun.
Presentation of New Material/Procedure (15 minutes): The teacher will ask the students to work in pairs to try to re-arrange the cards to their correct location. The reason for pairs is so that the students can speak to each other (in English only) to try to remember the clues the teacher had given in the previous class and as an attempt to teach students how to work together to problem solve.
- It is assumed that students may not know where some of the cards belong, so they can ask another group for help; if, at this point. The students are still uncertain, the teacher will provide the same clue as he did yesterday.
- Further, each pair will be asked to remember which cards they moved (being there are only 8 students in the class, each pair will have a different part of the room to re-arrange) and to state the noun (e.g., chair), say where it was, and then identify where they re-arranged it; this will also be used for the pronunciation and grammar sections of the lesson.
Pronunciation (5 minutes): See presentation/procedure
Grammar (5 minutes): See presentation and procedure as well as the closing activity.
Closing (5 minutes): As a closing activity/informal assessment, the students will be asked to write three things they learned or liked from this lesson and three things they found difficult. For example: “I learned that pretty is not a noun.” “I learned that pen and pin have a similar sound.” Finally, the students will read their six sentences aloud.
Rationale: The structure of this lesson has been carefully thought out based upon the teacher’s knowledge of the students’ learning styles. Further, this lesson allows students to be active in their learning rather than stative and also permits the students to learn from each other as well as embodying all of the elements of the communicative approach.
By Robert J. Platt, M.A.