“My favourite part of the day is when the children sit in the hall waiting to see which class room I walk into, which ever class I walk into the students let out a great big cheer.” Michelle Bainbridge, Volunteer in Thailand 2012
Tag Archives | teaching activities
Help – I need some tips to control my class
For students, having volunteers in their classroom is a new and exciting novelty, and like students anywhere they will try to push the boundaries at the beginning. Below are a few tips that will help you manage the behaviour of the students, particularly in those first few weeks as you settle into the role (some of them may sound very […]
Starting an After School Club
There are lots of opportunities to run extra-curricula activities and it is a great way to fully involve yourself in the project. Just make sure you ask permission from the school before you set anything up. My experience teaching English in Kerala I spent three months teaching English in Kerala. The students in the English medium class […]
Volunteer Case-Study : A Day in the Life
“We made a difference by teaching English to children who live in poor conditions and seeing them improve day-by-day in their English language as well as having fun, smiling and laughing with happiness was a joy every day.” Emma Powell, Thailand, 2010-11
Songs : Row, Row, Row Your Boat
Songs are a great way of learning a language. They help with pronunciation, vocabulary and rhythm. And kids (and adults) love them! Particularly if there are actions to go with them! The kids really won’t mind how terrible you are. Trust me, I’m terrible and they still ask me to sing (again, and again, and […]
Student Talk Time
Increasing student talk time is a very valuable thing to do in a second language classroom. Here are a few ways of helping to make that happen. Ensure that all students have the relevant vocabulary for the lesson. In this example we had been looking at places in town: bank, hotel, museum, library, police station, […]
ESL Letter Cards
My favourite teaching resource is letter cards. They are cheap and easy to make. They’re versatile and the kids love them. What you Need: A list of words Coloured card (4 or 6 different colours depending on how many sets you’d like to make) Black marker pen You can also do it with white card […]
Using Art to help teach English
Here is a story of some primary students at a school India from a volunteer who had success using art projects in the classroom. “The students were quite disruptive and could be a handful at times. The school was in a poor fishing community in Kerala and many of the students came from very difficult […]
Visual Aids for ESL Teaching
When I arrived at my new school, many classrooms didn’t have any visual aids on the walls. I thought it would great to create a few engaging, colourful displays to help stimulate the kids and it proved to be a get way to get them all interacting with me. Here are some ideas for visual […]
My Volunteer English Teaching Kit
There are two parts to my volunteer teaching kit: what I take to class everyday and what I have at my homestay placement. I buy as many of these things from the village closest to my homestay placement as I can. Sometimes I need to make a trip to a nearby big town or city […]
My First Lesson
The first lesson with any group can be a bit scary. Here’s an activity that I’ve found useful when dealing with students from about Grade 3 (Sri Lanka) or 3rd Standard (India) all the way through primary and secondary and on to working with adults. It lasts for about 30 mins but you can make […]
