Lessons from nothing

Lessons from nothing

Texts, whether they are articles or news stories or literary extracts, provide fair amounts of exposure to the language, which is the most obvious way of learning. However, the challenge for me is how to introduce a text so I can stimulate the students’ interest as well as activate their mind.

I often rack my brains as to how to present a new topic before I actually hand out the text. It turns out that the best ideas come to me in the process of teaching as the students are the ones who shape the lesson – with their unpredictable responses -- no matter how well-prepared a teacher might be. I therefore call these “lessons from nothing”.

For instance, recently I had prepared a BBC article about the death of baobab trees for my B2 students. I attempted to introduce the topic by asking my students to write down some words they associate with “forest”. They seemed to be stuck (not least because the school year was drawing to an end). So I supplied some words and asked them to ask questions using them.

The words I gave them were:

plant, acid rain, destruction, reforestation, deforestation, human activity

It was a small contribution for the questions I got back from the students:

·       To what extent does acid rain affect trees?

·       In what ways does human activity affect forests?

·       How can we stop deforestation?

·       What is the significance of reforestation?

·       Which is the most effective method of reforestation?

The questions form the basis of a writing topic on forests, and the students could go on to write the answers to the questions if they could do so off the top of their heads or alternatively they could search for answers on the internet.

Another example of how a key word can trigger a variety of improvised activities follows.

This time it was a news item I was introducing concerning an explosion in an apartment building in Wuppertal, Germany, published in The Guardian.

I simply wrote down “explosion” on the board and invited the students to share what the word brought to mind. Not surprisingly, they came up with the very words that constitute the causes of an explosion:

earthquake, gas, bomb, volcano

I grabbed the opportunity for some collocations:

A volcano erupts

Gas leaks

You plant a bomb

At that stage, it occurred to me that it was high time we revised possibility in the past. I wrote on the board:

may

might

could

and underneath a question: What could have caused the explosion?

I then elicited sentences with the other causes mentioned by the students.

·       Gas could have leaked.

·       A bomb might have been planted.

·       There may have been an earthquake.

·       A volcano might have erupted.

In conclusion, lessons from nothing can be thoroughly enjoyable and rewarding for both students and teachers.

The links for the two articles:

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-44418849

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jun/24/dozens-injured-by-explosion-at-apartment-block-in-west-germany

Summer is my source of inspiration. Here is a poem I wrote quite recently to celebrate summer.

SUMMERS

I hanker after them in winter

But spring my longing makes feebler

And when the midday haze

My body in a stupor lays

Subdued and beaten hollow

The Sun my king I follow

The glorious day is gone

A blaze on the horizon

A myriad stars shoot the skies

Which skywards draw my eyes

The silver sliver slices through

Its sovereignty to claim with a coup

The Proud Needle

Time leaves its indelible mark on everyone and everything. We become attached to objects that helped shape our life or sometimes even changed its course. These objects fall into disuse as others take priority over them and are left somewhere, forgotten and neglected—silent witnesses to past glories.

Here is a poem of mine, which was meant to evoke the nostalgia of a past lost to us forever.

THE PROUD NEEDLE

It boasted once

A slender figure

It crafted quilts

And wondrous things

With time it tired

Of frantic hands

It curved and bent

And lost its lustre

A mighty sunny winter day

A casual throw of a hand

Consigned a best companion

To a lake's fathomless depths

Images and Imagination: various forms of writing

It will have transpired by now that I find images a great tool to stimulate learners’ imagination and provide them with some concrete basis on which to build language.

Having said this, however, I must make it clear that I don’t normally ask for a description of a picture as this is far too vague and leaves the students at sea as to which aspect of the image to focus on.

An image may simply serve as a source of inspiration for creative writing without further prompting on the part of the teacher. In fact, I often find that the more uncomplicated the image, the broader the scope for letting your imagination run away with you.

Depending on your students’ level and ability, you can move from the basics to more sophisticated questions and make tasks gradually more challenging.

Here is an image which is highly suggestive and lends itself to all kinds of activities. If nothing else, it puts the learners into a trance, numbing all kinds of inhibitions that they might harbour towards writing!

Dovile, Dagiene, Lithuania,2nd place professional, lifestyle, Sony World Photography Awards

I prefer to prompt my students by providing some basic clues and brainstorm for words or phrases which can be used to answer these basic questions.

Here is the framework for building a text, whatever form of writing the student or the teacher might choose.

WHERE scene, children

WHEN time of day, time of year

WHO

WHAT action(s)

HOW (MOVE)

If you find that the learners are not prepared to do their bit of research in order to find some appropriate words and phrases to use, you may wish to do what every self-respecting teacher does(!): supply a list and demand the students to use them all while answering the questions.

An indicative list follows:

pier

half way along

on the edge

on an autumn afternoon

11 or 12-year-old children

cast a fishing rod

peer at the sea

sound the depth of the sea

bend over

squat

kneel

calm sea

 ripples

You may want to ask your students, after they have answered the questions, to flesh out their notes into a story entitled, for instance, A summer day in the life of three childhood friends.

On the other hand, if you are in the mood to teach describing simple processes, you could do so by asking your students to explain step by step how one can fish.

Here is a very schematic plan, which you might want to expand into full-length text.

Get a fishing rod

Get a bait

Hook the bait on

Cast the fishing rod

Dangle the rod over the water

Sit and wait till the fish bites

Hook the fish

Lift the rod

Pull the fish out

You could ask your students to link the ideas by using some linking words or phrases or you could even proceed to ask them to orally describe a very simple process to one another without completing it and get them to name the process or continue one another’s processes.

Example:

Take a small cup.

Fill it with bottled water.

Put a small pot on a cooker ring.

Turn on the cooker.

Pour the water into the pot.

Open the sugar bowl.

Scoop a spoonful of sugar.

……………..

For those who have not guessed yet, the answer is :

making Greek coffee!