Lesson 12: teaching speaking in primary level pupils: monologue and dialogue questions to be discussed

What’s The Question? - Write up ten answers about yourself on the whiteboard, such as things related to where you are from, your hobbies, family, age (if you wish), musical instruments you can play, any languages you can speak and anything else. Put the students into small groups of three or four students. The group of students then have to think of questions which will give the answers written on the whiteboard. For example, if I have written up “Tenor saxophone” the students will have to ask the question “What musical instrument can you play?” Should they ask the correct question, then you can tick it on the whiteboard. This activity lasts around 20-30 minutes. If students don’t know each other, you could personalise the activity and get the students to do the same thing with their group. Students could then share anything that they found interesting in their group and share with the rest of the class.

  Two Truths And One Lie - Write three sentences about yourself on the whiteboard with one of the sentences being false and the other two being true. You could write up:

I have lived in 6 countries

I can read and write Korean

I am 40 years old

I usually write (as I have written here) my age as false (I will not be telling anyone my real age as it’s far too embarrassing) and the students have to guess which is true or false. It gives students a lot to talk about and share before deciding. Students could then ask follow up questions and feel free to personalise it for the students and they can do it in their groups or in pairs should they not know each other.

  This Is Me - Before class, get some pictures to show to your class about your hometown, family, friends and hobbies. You could use this to tell them about yourself and then the students then retell each other using the pictures as prompts. Give them a worksheet with comprehension questions to answer and see if they can remember anything. Work together as a class to figure out the answers. The students could then do a similar activity by bringing in photos (or showing them on their smartphones) and telling others about themselves.

  Important Object - Bring in an object to the first class which you consider to be important to you. It doesn’t need to be anything large or clumsy. You could bring in a favourite CD or a toy you have had since you were very young. Before showing the object to the class, get the students to guess what is in the bag or box. Board up some ideas and review some functional language “I guess it might be …”, “It could be …”, etc. Once you have some ideas up on the whiteboard, show students the object and tell them why it is important to you. As with the other ideas, you could ask students to bring in an object next lesson which they consider to be important for themselves.

  3. Rules For The Classroom

Once you know the names of your students, generated some rapport and feel comfortable with the learners, you could then progress towards classroom rules with students. This will lay the foundation for positive and appropriate behaviour in class and will reinforce what is acceptable and unacceptable in class. It is vital that teachers make students aware of what is expected. One way to do this is by developing classroom rules.