ELT News Think Tank

This Month's Think Tank Panel

Marc Helgesen

Chuck Sandy

Setsuko Toyama

Curtis Kelly

Panelists: Marc | Chuck | Setsuko | Curtis
Date: April 2003
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Topic: "How are you going to change your teaching this year?"

Marc Helgesen

Change for the sake of change really is important. I was recently reading Mario Rinvolucri's new book, 'Humanising your Coursebook.' In the preface, he describes a teacher who has been teaching the same book several times. The teacher likes the book and says the material is still good but, "I am bored...I don’t want to change books (but) I want to teach the same material differently."

“I think it is important for myself as a teacher to build in change. It keeps me thinking and my teaching fresh.”

I think it is important for myself as a teacher to build in change. It keeps me thinking and my teaching fresh. I’ve talked about innervoice and physical warm-ups before in this column. Those are things I started playing with in my classes and then consciously and methodically built into my lesson plans. Both were change for the sake of change. And the changes improved my overall teaching and kept me and the learners involved.

This year I am playing with three specific changes:

• Organizing out-of-class learning strategy work. A couple of the books I’ve written start with an activity called "It's up to you." This is a list of learning practice strategies that learners can do on their own (write to Key Pals, do karaoke in English, look out the bus/train window and silently narrate what you see, etc.). I’ve been using these in my own classes for a while.
  
  Last fall, I met a teacher in Sapporo named Wilma Luth. She described how she was using the tasks and I thought the ideas were great so this is how I’m starting my classes. I’ve put all the strategies on cards. The students work in pairs to group the cards in a few different ways (in-class vs. out-of-class strategies, things I’ve already tried vs. new ideas, things that are easy to do vs. challenging. etc. The idea behind all the grouping is to make the learners really think about the strategies and imagine themselves doing them.
  
  Then ­ and here’s the important part ­ I give them an “It’s up to you” log sheet. During the term, they have to do at least one out-of-class activity a week. They write down what they did, when and what they experienced. It is part of the homework. And, by doing something concrete like writing on the log, it makes it easier for me to make sure I follow up.
• This next one is actually restarting something I used to do but got away from. I used to bring a hot water pot and coffee and tea to my early morning classes. Later I was assigned a room where food wasn’t allowed so I stopped. Once I was back in a room where it was ok, I just never started up again (until reading Chuck’s comment on motivation in Think Tank a few months ago.). It made me remember that, yeah, little things contribute a lot to the atmosphere. So I started do this in January and will be doing it in all my classes this year.
  
  I’m not doing coffee and tea just to be a nice guy. I am trying to create a feeling that is consciously not what you usually do at school (i.e, this class can not be top down). The students need to be interacting. What else can you do to create that atmosphere? Background music? Art on the walls (OK, I know I’m lucky in that my school has classrooms that are only used for language classes and they let up put up art. But think about it. If you went to someone’s house that there were no decorations of any kind, you’d think ­ “Is this person psychotic or what?” Yet why are so many classrooms void of any kind of visual stimulation? How far can you take the idea of creating atmosphere? Use your imagination (by the way, they do sell electric aroma therapy burners at Tokyu Hands [electric so you don’t forget about the candles and burn the place down.]).
• Joy of sets. This is something I started doing last year and am expanding on. 100-yen shops are a wonderful source of sets of materials. I started simple by buying about 20 scissors and 10 packs of colored pencils. Suddenly the ease with which we could do a whole range of new activities expanded. Next came about 15 clipboards. “Stand up and move around” tasks became easier. Since then, the possibilities keep jumping out at me. Stuffed animals for throwing task (unlike rubber balls, they don’t bounce away when dropped). Glue sticks. Ropes. Blindfolds (Not as kinky as it sounds. They are great for “giving directions” activities as well as some imagination tasks.) Note that a class set doesn’t necessarily mean one item for each student. It just means enough for groups to do different types of things. 20 scissors is easily enough for a class of 40 or more.

I need to end this column now. I am writing it on the last day of Spring break. Classes start tomorrow morning and I want to stop by a 100-yen shop on the way home. Imagine.

(Note: Mario Rinvolucri's book, "Humanising your Coursebook" is available from the David English House Book service:
http://www.eltnews.com/DEHForm/resources-adults.htm)

Panelists: Marc | Chuck | Setsuko | Curtis

Discuss this topic on our Message Board.

Marc Helgesen, Miyagi Gakuin Women's College

Co-author of English Firsthand and Active Listening

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