Petals of a daisy

If you have a new class or if your students don't know each other, what will you do in the first lesson? Of course you get prepared before the class, however your students won't speak or participate the activity, because they don't want to talk to their new classmates. In order to break the ice in such situations, you can do this activity:

Stick a round colourful paper on the board, this is the body of the daisy and stick the name cards of your students on the board. Prepare as many petals as the student number in the classroom and give one to each student. Then, ask the students to describe their deskmates physically, write their name and their likes and dislikes on those petals. Afterwards, collect all the papers, put them in a box and mix them. Call out loud one student to pick one petal from the box and read it.The rest of the class will try to guess who he/she is, then who makes the correct prediction will come and stick that petal (which has the description on it) on the body of the daisy.Lastly, that student will stick the name card on that petal.

By the help of this activity, your ss have a conversation; they ask likes and dislikes of their deskmates,they speak in English which is our target and we have an enjoyable lesson.(If you want you make it a game, make groups and call one student from each group, those ss will pick up one petal and read it, the rest of the group will try to guess.If they can guess it, they will get a tmark. At the end of the game, the group wtih most marks will be the winner.)

“IT’S NOT FAIR,TEACHER” STICKS

Are you tired of hearing sounds such as: “but teacher, I didn’t do
it.It’s her second term. Me, please, I want to do it.”
Here is a way to get rid of it.

Prepare little pieces of colourful papers and little sticks before the
lesson. Give each student one card and one stick. Ask the students to
decorate that piece of paper and write their names in big size. After
they finish this activity, stick them on a piece of styrofoam. When
you’re doing an activity, you will choose one stick and call out that
name(which is written on the chosen stick).Don’t forget to explain the
aim of this activity. Otherwise, they will go on shouting:
“me,teacher,me,please!”

Nilay UNVER

Class Rules!!!

September 24, 2009



The very first day of school is exciting and frustrating, not only for
students, but also for teachers. Furthermore, this never changes
according to the amount of experience. Every new school year brings
newer excitement. However, your students are inquisitive about what
type of a teacher you are: are you a serious teacher? Or a friendly
one?
Students generally make a test for you including different moods and
behaviours for the first days of the year. They try to convince you to
accept their undesirable behaviours. If you let them to do those, the
whole year you’ll struggle with the problems. The teacher should show
his/her borders clearly, in some way. We, as teachers, can enable this
in different spontaneous situations in the class. Let me give you an
example about young learners. A second grade student (primary school)
wants to go to the restroom and you permit this behaviour during the
lesson. Once you permit, you cannot prevent it, then the whole class
starts to ask for going to the restroom. Teacher shouldn’t give
permission for such behaviours unless the student is in a really hard
situation. At this point, teacher’s strong feelings, anticipations and
experience play a big role. As we should set the borders, for the sake
of the positive learning environment, we candenominate this with some
in-class activities including the classroom rules. Here is an idea:

Teacher prepares big signs of classroom rules just like the big
traffic signs. Each sign should display a rule with a picture and a
short sentence. After the presentation of the rules with those
signs(just for a few minutes), teacher gives one sign to each student
and reads out a story. When they hear a sentence about the sign they
hold, they will raise it up and call out loud the rule. This will make
the rules and your “borders” more comprehensible.

Good luck with your first days at school throughout your teaching life.

Nilay UNVER