Creating expectation and other elements for atrezzo

The way in which you start a reading promotion session has an outstanding importance as the first impression the children get is going to have a huge impact on their attitude, attention, interest and general behaviour.

I, personally, haven't paid much attention to this in the past and I think it is one of my weakest points. However, there are a number of different things that you can use in order to create that sensation of thrill, of expectation that will give us our group's full attention, at least for a while.

For instance, one of our most famous local storytellers has a suitcase full of stories: La Maleta de Leocadio. This is a fairly simple element, but as children are used to have a storytelling session every time you use it, it fulfills its purpose really well.

Other things one might use is a decorated bag, a story box, a balloon piñata, crackers or any other similar elements. Sometimes those elements can serve you to form groups later on, like using different colours for the balloons, or placing different colour papers or numbers, or animals or whatever suits the activity in the cracker. This is an intelligent way of improving your time management.

In addition, one might use other kind of elements that, when used in a recurrent basis, allows the children to anticipate what is going to happen next. Among other elements we could go for a story hat, a story jacket, the story telling staff (as a magician cane), etc. Its strength is taken from the way you use it.

Finger puppets: They can be made with the children as a pre-activity, we can have them made ourselves or we can even paint a rudimentary one with a pen or fine marker on our fingers or thumbs. Even if you have your own, it is still a recommendable pre-activity as it allows the children to participate further later on.

Paper bags/secret object.

As well as the previous activity, this one is adequate either for groups where people know each other for years. Alternatively, it can suit groups that having met that very same year, have been doing a few presentation activities for the last few days and know a little bit about each other.

Everyone has to choose a personal object (or put a previously agreed number of them in a paper bag) and place it into the common box (not allowing anyone to see whose object/bag is it). Subsequently, we will pick them one-by-one and, altogether we will try to guess who the owner is.

Who is this?

Everybody (including the teacher) has to write three things about him or herself on a piece of paper. After that, we will pick the papers one-by-one, read them, and try to guess who wrote it. This activity is suitable for groups that already know each other.

True and false.

Everybody has to write three things about oneself, two of them have to be true and one them false. Once it is done, each person will be standing in front of everybody else and read them (or simply tell them). The others have to decide which things are true and which ones are false. I think it is a pretty good dynamic to help socializing and learning things about each other. On the other hand, I think it is an interesting activity for a second language class, as it encourages real communication between the students.

Hello my name is _____ and my ______ itches.

This is a nice dynamic that helps people introducing to each other as well as it helps socialization through physical contact. To start, everybody has to be standing up in a circle. Then, in turns, each person will be saying his or her name plus a part of their bodies that itches (e.g. hello, my name is Diego and my ear itches). After one round, each one will say the name of the person next to them, the part of the body that itches and scratch it (e.g. his name is Diego and his ear itches [while scratching it]). It might seem a bit dumb, but I found out (being one of the participants) that it really helps to break the barrier we all have towards people that we do not know, opening the gates to other kind of dynamics, activities or games that imply physical contact (besides being a good way to learn each other names).

SNOWBALLS

Using a paper ball (it can be made with something we have already used for a previous activity) we are going to engage on a presentation dynamic. Basically one person is going to ask a question previously arranged (e.g. could you tell us your name and where are you from?) and throw the ball to somebody else who will have to answer the questions and repeat the whole process asking somebody else. It is a good start, as it usually involves people standing, and moving a little bit which helps to create and active mood (in opposition to the one created by passive activities sitting on the desk from the first minute) that might be very helpful for the subsequent activities.

I’ve never, never

This is a popular drinking game both in Spain and the UK, but it can be used to encourage conversation within an EFL class. One of its main advantages is that you can easily adapt it to the level of the group or even the individual person who is speaking at certain moment.

How it works:

Everybody will think of something they have never done but they think (or they know for a fact) that somebody has done. For instance, somebody might say :”I’ve never, never, been in Barcelona”. If somebody has been in BCN, he or she has to stand up. Here it is where we have to be careful to adapt it to the students’ level. Ask questions and encourage the students to talk about that particular experience, but don’t push them. Allow them to develop their communication skills (strategies) by attempting to communicate with the means that they have. Tell them an expression they might be looking for only if they ask you.

Ta very much for the idea Debbie.

Books, movies and albums you will carry with you in the event of going to a desert island.

It is a good dynamic that my English teacher usually uses with new students, specially those who come for conversational classes. It provides with a topic that can be used for an hour or even longer, both in one-to-one classes and small groups. It has all the advantages of other first week/first contacts techniques as it provides the teacher with a valuable information on his or her students interests. In addition, it is very easy to adapt it to different ages and levels.

How does it work:
Ask each student to think of the three films, books and records that they will be carrying with them in the event of going to a desert island. For advanced students it will offer you a framework for conversation (either one-to-one with the teacher or working in pairs). If you have a beginners class it is a good chance to practice real communication in pairs. Just adapt the amount of information they have to transfer to their level and provide them with a little scaffolding for the beginning.

Poster with your name on it.

It is a classic resource, but when we used it in our class we did it adding further information (our favourite classic story, when we did it for ourselves) making it far more interesting. However, I believe it could be made even more interesting by adding even more items. For example, using a folded sheet's four corners, we could write (for children between 6 and 10 years of age): a game I like a lot, a game I don't like very much, a character (from books, stories, movies, TV, cartoons etc.) that I like a lot and a song I like. This way, not only do we help them to socialize with each other by showing each other their interest and personal likes and hobbies, but we find out about them ourselves (and have them right in front of our eyes to remind us of them).