Sultan Zeydan's Blog

Sultan's ELT Topia

Entries Tagged as 'ACTIVITIES'

Edublog Awards 2012

November 26, 2012 · No Comments · ACTIVITIES

Edublog awards are a great way to highlight worthy reading and valuable resource sites in the virtual education network. I love blogging and social media so I appreciate their support and effort for this. Here are my nominees for this year:
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I would like to nominate Aslı Sağlam’s Blog as the “Best Teacher Blog” and Aybike Oğuz’s Blog as the “Best individual Blog”
Good Luck to everyone and happy blogging.

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Reflections on IATEFL LTSIG EVENT

May 27, 2012 · 3 Comments · ACTIVITIES, CONFERENCES

To be Plugged or Unplugged? Is this the whole question? Is everything so black and white? What are the ways to integrate these into teaching not only without losing the real communication but also following the newest trends in ELT? These were just some of the questions in my mind while going to the conference held on Yeditepe University this weekend.

 

The first star on the stage was Scott Thornbury who is the founder of the big idea “Dogme”. He gave a speech about the importance of Dogme both for students and teachers and pointed out something very important that most of us have forgotten nowadays. Do we really take the correct action plans for the students’ engagement and talk or just unburden ourselves by using course books and technology more than ever.

“We are looking for ways of exploiting the learning opportunities offered by the raw material of the classroom that is the language that emerges from the needs, interests, concerns, and desires of the people in the room”
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Some Golden Suggestions for the ELT world
1. Don’t complain: You don’t have to be sunny about everything.
2. Ask an unscripted question: If you ask a question the machine begins to feel less like a machine.
3. Count something: If you count something, you find interesting, you will learn something.
4. Write something: By offering your reflections to an audience, even a small one, you make yourself part of a larger world.
5. Change: Be willing to recognize the inadequacies in what you do and to seek out solutions.
Keeping these valuable ideas in mind I will go on looking for how to channel technology into Dogme.  Hope to find many sparkles on this journey.
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The second star was Lindsay Clanfield who writes books and materials for English language learners and teachers. His session was interesting in a way that reminded me the old days before technology developed so much. Lindsay looked at Teacher Development from a triangle perspective: Person, Teaching and Language. He underlined that the length of these items may not be equal, which causing a kind of difference among teachers.

It is well known that media has changed the person, teaching and language a lot for 15 years and here is the intelligible summary of the current changes from Lindsay’s point of view:
1. PERSON: Friends- Support Network (PLN) – Self Esteem
2. TEACH: Accessing to materials – sharing/unboxing our own materials – reflecting while writing – asking questions to teachers
3. LANGUAGE: Language trends-exposure to English-Reflection- Sharing
Lindsay finalized his talk suggesting an application called “Outsmarter” to set time limits for addictive websites. It worths keeping in mind since the new innovations on media are multiplying each day.

Looking forward to attending the next conference at Yeditepe University.

 

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Fun DELTA Activities

March 18, 2012 · No Comments · ACTIVITIES, grammar, speaking, vocabulary

Last Wednesday was my first day at DELTA. It was such a tiring but also a full day for me. Of course, from day one I involved in lots of various activities with my new friends. Here is a brief selection from those that mostly caught my attention.

Get rid of the cards (Relative Clauses)
You can use this activity to revise vocabulary or some grammar topics. Actually I preferred to use it to revise relative clauses in my class. The aim of the activity is to get rid of all the cards until the end of the game.

- Beforehand prepare the questions and the answers on the same card as in the example.

Question: I talked to the girl. Her car had broken down in front of the shop.
Answer: I talked to the girl whose car had broken down in front of the shop.

- Tell students to fold the paper so that the answers are not readable from the others. On the other hand, the question side is open to the other students. (On one side the question, on the other side the answer is written.)

- Give four question-answer cards to each student

- Tell them to stand up and mingle with others.

- While walking around and they show the questions to others The student who cannot answer any question correctly has to get that card from his friend. If they answer a question correctly, they keep the cards.

Clockwise Speaking
- Divide the class into two groups.

- Tell the first group to line up around the class in a random order.

- Tell the other group members to choose a student from the first group and stand next to him.

- Set a question so that they can start a conversation.

- Don’t forget to set a time limit.

- When the time is up, the members of the second group move in the clockwise and match with a new partner.

- Set another question to be discussed then.

Picture Dictation (How to Teach Articles)

- Have you ever used picture dictation to teach articles

- Tell the students to draw a big table on a piece of paper.

- Tell them to draw a pair of shoes under the table.

- Then go on dictating the picture in your mind.

- The important thing is to start drawing the new object repeating the previous one using “the”.

If you have any memorable activities from your DELTA years; please share them with us.

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