184. Make for it as a team!
On this post I release a comment I made to an entry written by a teacher of English, Olwyn Alexander. That entry was published on the website of The British Council - BBC. I hope my comment might help you.
The picture shows a game of cricket. I mean it for Spanish visitors to my blog. The photo thanks to taiyak wordpress com
Fernando M Díez...
Learning in groups
Submitted on 21 August, 2009 - 11:05
Hello, Olwyn Alexander,
I have attended classes of English myself, as a learner, at Centro de Lenguas Modernas, an institution of Universidad de Granada, Spain. We used to work in groups, quite often. The teacher was an experienced one, a kind British lady.
I'll just refer to one point. We were adults, with a professional interest in learning and practising general English. I'm a teacher of English myself.
The fact of working in groups was useful, because each member of the team - teams of two or three - might have a different answer when working out exercises of the course book. As a result we confronted our proposals and we learned from one another; you thought whether your classmate's answer could be the correct one.
I also think that working in groups made you become more, say, tense, and as a result you used to invest more effort and focus.
With regard to adolescent students for example, I'd like to write a lot, but now I'm going to refer to one aspect that comes to my mind first.
You split a large class into two teams. And you all practice, say, one grammar pattern for example, by playing one team vs the other one, so as to have two competitors, two players.
In this way the students of the same team stick together closely, in order to contribute with the best answer or reply. I mean, this competition fosters concentration and working out a specific grammar pattern.
You, any teacher, can have a peek at my blog:
http://fernandoexperiences.blogspot.com
Learning in groups
Submitted on 21 August, 2009 - 11:05
Hello, Olwyn Alexander,
I have attended classes of English myself, as a learner, at Centro de Lenguas Modernas, an institution of Universidad de Granada, Spain. We used to work in groups, quite often. The teacher was an experienced one, a kind British lady.
I'll just refer to one point. We were adults, with a professional interest in learning and practising general English. I'm a teacher of English myself.
The fact of working in groups was useful, because each member of the team - teams of two or three - might have a different answer when working out exercises of the course book. As a result we confronted our proposals and we learned from one another; you thought whether your classmate's answer could be the correct one.
I also think that working in groups made you become more, say, tense, and as a result you used to invest more effort and focus.
With regard to adolescent students for example, I'd like to write a lot, but now I'm going to refer to one aspect that comes to my mind first.
You split a large class into two teams. And you all practice, say, one grammar pattern for example, by playing one team vs the other one, so as to have two competitors, two players.
In this way the students of the same team stick together closely, in order to contribute with the best answer or reply. I mean, this competition fosters concentration and working out a specific grammar pattern.
You, any teacher, can have a peek at my blog:
http://fernandoexperiences.blogspot.com
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