Современные методы обучения на уроках английского языка

Цель: повысить эффективность обучения через применение различных приемов и методов в учебном процессе.

Задачи:

• Тренировать учащихся с помощью различных упражнений, направленных на развитие лексико-грамматических навыков;
• Формировать потребность в практическом использовании языка через применение различных технологий;
• Расширение эрудиции учащихся, их лингвистического, филологического кругозора.

Актуальность, новизна работы: разный уровень учебных возможностей школьников.

Результаты внедрения в учебный процесс:

1. Уровень посещаемости занятий 100%

2. Пропуски только по уважительным причинам.

3. Желание заниматься не только под контролем учителя, но и самостоятельно.

4. Высокие результаты итогового тестирования, промежуточной аттестации.

Степень апробации: на уровне школы.

Вывод: использование современных методов и приемов в образовательном процессе стимулирует познавательный интерес к изучению английского языка, способствует повышению качества обучения.

“Better untaught, than ill-taught!”

Nowadays various innovative techniques, course books, teaching aids appeared in language teaching. In case they are correctly chosen and taught, effectiveness in mastering a foreign language under such favorable conditions is undoubtedly expected to increase. Does it happen in reality? It does, but not always and everywhere, as the effectiveness in language teaching and learning depends a lot on the factor of the so-called choice. At present teachers are faced with quite a difficult problem of choice. Which method or course book will probably work out with the group of students, how to keep students’ interest alive..? Too many questions arise, some of them need thorough consideration before being settled, others, such as the choice of appropriate techniques are made by practice, when students are offered to try to do brainstorming, discussion free or controlled, role play, acting out, project work, interview, etc. The above mentioned are all communicative activities, they are meant to fulfill the outmost task in language teaching, that is, speaking.

You know that a classroom is a threatening environment. We, teachers, should give students the opportunity to practice speaking. We should create the environment to make students speak and it is OK to make mistakes. It is useful if you recorded the conversation. They can compare themselves and they correct their mistakes in pronunciation, grammar; students find those areas which they can improve. You know that discussion requires preparation; you should choose a topic you want to discuss. We suggest the following speaking activity for pre-intermediate and intermediate students:

“A Balloon Debate” (a role-play). Topic “Jobs”. The idea is as follows.

On board of the balloon there are people of different jobs.

Suddenly something has gone wrong with the balloon. In order to survive someone should be the one to go out of the board (a driver or a teacher). The teacher says to the driver, “You go out of the board, because you pollute the air, we do not need you…” Discussion begins. Only one man will survive.

So this speaking activity develops you to think on your feet and practice speaking. Though we must admit that in order to be able to reach communicative aims one needs to do a lot of other learning activities dealing with pronunciation, reading, learning vocabulary, grammar and writing, which at times are becoming too complicated for students to cope with.

To practice pronunciation we suggest you use the following games like “Hidden Names”, “Pronunciation Journey” and “Stress Maze”.

“Stress Maze”

Preparation

Make a copy of the maze for each member of the class.

Presentation

Write the following words on the board:

Germany grandmother restaurant eleven policeman September

Elicit that all the words have three syllables. Then elicit that the words in the first group have the stress on the first syllable and that the words in the second group have the stress on the second syllable.

Conducting the game

Give each student a maze. (The game could also be played by students in pairs.)

Explain that the object of the game is to find a path from the entrance in the top left side of the maze to the exit in the bottom right.

Draw attention to the stress pattern ••• below the maze and explain that you can only move across a square if it contains a word with this stress pattern.

You can move from one square to the next horizontally or vertically but not diagonally.

When students have finished, check the route together.

Key

The correct route is:

hamburger • Saturday - regular - possible - yesterday - passenger - holiday - traveller - telephone - recognise - officer - cinema - government - photograph - aeroplane - opposite - hospital

Making your own versions

If you want to make other versions of the puzzle to use vocabulary from your course, choose about 20 words with one particular stress pattern and write them on the grid so that they form a continuous path from entry to exit. Then fill the remaining squares with words with different stress patterns.

“Hidden Names”

Preparation

Make a copy of the maze for each member of the class.

Presentation

Write the following words in a vertical column on the board and ask the class to identify what sound they all have in common:

Eight rain face plate

Elicit that the sound in common is the vowel sound /ei/

Conducting the game

Give each student a maze. (The names of the four members of the family are hidden.)

To find the names it is necessary to find the common sound.

 

 

 

Key

Mother = JOAN

Father=CHARLES

Daughter=SHEILA

Son=MATTHEW

Making your own versions

You can make other versions of this puzzle using other names, or in fact any words.

How to teach grammar?

There are the following rules:

1. Rule of Context (teach grammar in context).
2. Rule of Economy (economize on time, maximum practice).
3. Rule of Nurture (learning is a gradual process. It means “I explained and drilled. They made mistakes. I explained and drilled again”).
4. Rule of Use (It means “I presented the rules of adverb order and we did some exercises. Tomorrow I am going to do the Second Conditional).

There are two ways of teaching grammar: a deductive approach (grammar translation method; explanations of grammar rules are given in the mother tongue, you present grammar and do exercises); an inductive approach (teaching grammar from examples, children discover rules and they are actively motivated to work). We suggest such method of teaching writing as “DICTOGLOSS” (grammar dictation). Technique:

1. A short dense text is read twice to learners at normal speed.
2. As it is being read, learners jot down familiar words and phrases.
3. Working in small groups, the learners pool their battered texts and work on reconstructing their version of the text from shared resources.
4. Each group of students produces its reconstructed version, aiming at grammatical accuracy and textual cohesion but not at replicating the original text.
5. The versions are analyzed, compared and refined.

Presenting a reading lesson (types of reading activity)

1. Extracting main ideas
2. Scanning(reading for specific information, for dates, numbers); Skimming(fast reading for 2 minutes, for a general idea)
3. Understanding text organization
4. Predicting
5. Checking comprehension
6. Inferring
7. Dealing with unfamiliar words
8. Linking ideas
9. Understanding complex sentences
10. Understanding writer’s style
11. Evaluating text
12. Reacting to text
13. Writing summaries

You know that Listening Comprehension takes an important role in teaching English. Which types of activities can we use when listening?

1. Gap filling a text
2. Transferring info to a table
3. Listening for specific info
4. General comprehension/gist
5. Correcting an incorrect summary
6. Deducing the meaning of unknown words
7. Sequencing of events
8. True/false questions
9. Predicting the topic of the listening
10. Multiple choice questions
11. Picture matching

Well, the period of work at teaching English made me reconsider the approach to such method of language teaching as Translation. People’s inner thinking is done mostly in Russian, that is why while students start speaking in English and stumble for the necessary word, they stop and ask a teacher for a word or phrase in Russian. This is to prove that inner thinking goes on in Russian, so if we do not teach them to compare 2 languages by doing the translation from Russian into English, and vise versa, we will not manage to get rid of numerous mistakes in the correct use of grammar structures and vocabulary.

Electronic teaching aids, computer assisted learning and teaching will inevitably lead to progress. Nowadays using the Internet is becoming a part of teaching process because teachers realize that its opportunities are enormous.

To sum up, our personal outlook on effective language teaching presupposes the necessity to wisely combine traditional language teaching methods with innovative technologies, making stress upon computer-based teaching as the latter proved to be quite effective in our teaching experience.

Our Motto: “We are teachers. We never stop learning!”