Somehow, I managed to teach ESL for over 10 years before I learned what this is. The expression “is supposed to” is called a semi-auxiliary verb. In the sentence in the title, “study” is the main verb.
The expressions below are all called semi-auxiliary verbs. They are followed by the main verb.
This is one of the best things we’ve implemented in programs where I’ve taught for three reasons:
1. It has helped students improve their reading and writing skills, and grammar, and vocabulary.
2. It adds NO EXTRA WORK for teachers.
3. It costs relatively little money.
As most teachers in the field already know, one of the best ways for students to improve their skills is to do more reading. (See A True Story to Motivate Students to Read More a detailed example). However, adding more reading assignments usually means more work for the teacher—in the form of worksheets or quizzes or feedback in some way—because students need to be held accountable for actually doing the assignments.
(This posting includes a handout which you are welcome to use with your students.)
Here is the basis for this discussion: According to research, loneliness has little connection to how many people are around us. In his book, Lost Connections, Jonathan Hari explains that loneliness is caused by a loss of connection to others. To end loneliness, according Hari, we need two things: other people and a feeling that we are sharing something meaningful or something we care about with another person or other people.
1) A one-page article usually including a brief summary of a high-interest research study.
2) Ten true-false comprehension questions.
3) Pre-Discussion Exercise in which students read and think about several questions about their experience and opinions about the topic before discussing them in groups.
4) Small-group discussions of the article in which each student is given a paper with different content/personal experience questions in the form of Student A, B or C.
(This posting includes a handout which you are welcome to use with your students.)
We might think that the students who say little in a conversation are lazy or just quiet by nature. That’s not necessarily the case. Some students have told us that they are trying to be polite and let others talk. Others just don’t know what to say, so they say the minimum. And some just aren’t aware that they should speak more.
This activity is designed to help these types of students. It “gives permission” to the polite students to talk more. It “requires” the lazy or quiet ones to contribute to the conversation. And it “pushes” everyone to think of something, anything, to say.
The activity is call Responding with Details. In groups of three, students ask each other the supplied questions (in a Student A, B, C format). Every time the members respond, they have to answer with “and, but, so, because or with two sentences.”
(This posting includes a handout which you are welcome to use with your students.)
Here is the basis for this discussion: Researchers have found that when we are in a stressful situation, we will be better at handling it if we say to ourselves that we are excited rather than try to calm ourselves down.
1) A one-page article usually including a brief summary of a high-interest research study.
2) Ten true-false comprehension questions.
3) Pre-Discussion Exercise in which students read and think about several questions about their experience and opinions about the topic before discussing them in groups.
4) Small-group discussions of the article in which each student is given a paper with different content/personal experience questions in the form of Student A, B or C.
5) Optional writing reflection activity.
(This posting includes handouts which you are welcome to use with your students.)
When written with enough details by students, a person description can be fascinating for teachers to read and can give them great insight into their students’ lives.
And, best of all, after they have learned some specific tools, these can be a lot of fun for students to write.
Needless to say, when we talk about a person-description writing assignment, most people first think about physical appearance. However, that is only one aspect of a person that students can include in their papers. There are several other characteristics that they can describe, for example, habits, routines, plans, likes, and dislikes.
For some strange reason, some ESL instructors think they can improve any activity by making it as some kind of competition between students or between groups. Unfortunately, doing this can be counterproductive and actually discourage the most serious students.
To illustrate, consider an information-gap activity like the one from the March 1st posting Another Conversation Activity: Listen to Partner and Ask Questions to Complete Information-Gap Chart . In this, pairs of students fill in missing information in a schedule by talking, asking questions, and using clarification strategies.
Imagine the teacher tells the students that he will give a prize to the pair who finishes the schedule first. This is what will happen and how students will miss out on the skills that the activity is meant to develop.
