Stuck for conversation
 

[Hello, Just looking for tips on conversational lessons, I have sort of moved into this and it is not really my field.The class i have are adults i would say intermediate, and I dont really know where to find material to help me plan my lessons. Any Ideas would be gratefully recieved. Thanks

Meggy:)

Re: Stuck for conversation
 

Hi Meggy,
If you look on the Games and Activities forum you'll probably find quite a few ideas. Or here you'll find six articles which describe activities you can use.The later ones will probably interest you most - scroll down the page.

Re: Stuck for conversation
 

Hi Susan, thankyou so much, for taking the time to help me out.Its been a great help to read all the material, and also to help me to have a bit of an idea as to where to start. If you have any more tips on holding conversational classes, please let me know, as im quite nervous each time i do one.
Thanks again,
Meggy

Re: Stuck for conversation
 

Hi meggy,

For conversational lessons when I started out I used to pick an article from Yahoo, always an interesting one (I think it's Odd News or something like that) and copied that into Word. I then edited it out depending on the level of the class and underlined certain words that I would want them to learn in the class. Of course you could always get a topical talking book where your class can have discussions in the class but it helped me a lot when I started off to pick my own articles and edit them. My class was an intermediate class so they couldn't just read an article and talk about it, I had to ask them questions and give them time to form their own opinions in their head. After doing this a few times I got a real feel for it and really enjoyed doing them.

It's just an idea that you might want to try. Also you can set your students into pairs and assign them some questions which they can answer together. Proved a good hit in my earlier classes (before I had books :becky: )

Best of luck and let us know how you get on

Re: Stuck for conversation
 

:) Hi and thanks for the good advice. Im going to give it a go, in my next class, its great, when people help share their teaching experiences. I shall certainly let you know:D cheers.

Re: Stuck for conversation
 

Well this reply maybe slightly late, but better late than never. I use News articles in my conversation classes. This helps students to understand the world around them in English.

Furthermore, I also use Speaking Extra, which is a great resource book for groups of students. You cannot use it for individual students though. However, when you look at the contents of the book it helps you plan what to teach during the week. Please see below a list of the contents for some ideas for your conversation classes:



1 Personal Information:
1.1 What about you?
1.2 Life experience
1.3 Spy Catcher

2 The family:
2.1 She's got her dad's eyes
2.2 Family tensions
2.3 Family values

3 Daily activities:
3.1 Whose Saturday?
3.2 Are you in touch with your body clock?
3.3 Beyond the routine

4 Homes:
4.1 House doctor
4.2 A perfect home
4.3 A messy home means a messy mind

5 Town and country:
5.1 A nice neighbourhood
5.2 Then and now
5.3 A business proposition

6 Travel and tourism:
6.1 Hotels
6.2 Traveller's tales
6.3 Life's an adventure!

7 Food and drink:
7.1 Recipes
7.2 Menu, please
7.3 Food for thought

8 Describing people:
8.1 Lost!
8.2 Who's who?
8.3 Star quality

9 Describing things:
9.1 Can you describe it?
9.2 Lost property
9.3 In your mind's eye

10 Friends and relationships:
10.1 What kind of friend are you?
10.2 Moral dilemmas
10.3 What are friends for?

11 Health and fitness:
11.1 Well-being
11.2 Healthy, wealthy and wise
11.3 First Aid

12 Leisure time:
12.1 What's on?
12.2 Focus on leisure
12.3 Leisure centre

13 Education:
13.1 Learning to learn
13.2 The best years of your life
13.3 A preparation for life

14 The world of work:
14.1 Why work?
14.2 The right person for the job
14.3 Great perks!

15 Money:
15.1 Sale or exchange
15.2 Common currency
15.3It's all about image

16 Past experiences and stories:
16.1 Really?
16.2 Interruptions
16.3 Small ads

17 Science and technology:
17.1 Gizmos and gadgets
17.2 It'll never happen
17.3 It will change our lives

18 Social and environmental issues:
18.1 How green are you?
18.2 Pressure group
18.3 Keeping an open mind

---

Also click here for some sample material with the textbook.

I hope the titles gets you thinking about how you could plan for your lesson and topics to introduce to the conversational classes. :)

Re: Stuck for conversation
 

As for articles you can try http://www.breakingnewsenglish.com/
They have recent articles all set up to teach, with discussion questions, and questions on the articles.

Re: Stuck for conversation
 

Hello, Whistleblower. Wow great material, thanks so much,im certainly going to have lots of topics to keep me going through the months ahead.What i thought was going to be a very daunting experience, teaching a class of basque school teachers some english conversational lessons, might actually have a good ending. so many thanks i really appreciate it::) Meggy

Re: Stuck for conversation
 

Did you get that book in Korea whistleblower or from Cambridge's website? I guess that it would be pricey as those group / pair work work books are. I got a few from Penguin. Cost me a bloody small fortune (but worth it)!

Re: Stuck for conversation
 

I got it from Korea LiK. In fact I persuaded my boss to buy it for classes because he had so many Konglish books for the students and nothing from reputable publishers like Cambridge or Oxford.

I am going back to the UK for a small holiday, although I work during this time taking students around the UK, I shall pop into some book shops and get some decent teaching material for future classes or students.

Re: Stuck for conversation
 

That's great. When you go back on the holiday definitely check out some shops and post up a list for us to look into :becky:

Re: Stuck for conversation
 

;) Yes im off back home for christmas, so i also shall hunt down some good books to. Hopefully ill find them cheaper, then when i return to spain ill post you some new ideas ok.:p

Re: Stuck for conversation
 

Hi again Meggy,

I've just found this site for conversation classes - it gives great long lists of questions you can ask on lots of topics. It's a nice springboard, but I think would be pretty boring if you just ploughed through the list. Try it like this :

• Give the whole list to the students (delete any which are above their language proficiency though) and ask them to choose three (or five - depends how many people there are in the class and how long you want to spend on the activity.Twenty mins would be about right) which they want to ask to all the other members of the class.
• When they're ready they stand up and circulate - each person only asks the three questions s/he's chosen, but of course they'll be answering different questions, the ones the others have chosen.
• When they finish each person reports back on something like : What was the most interesting (or strangest, or funniest, or most unexpected - whatever) thing you found out?

Re: Stuck for conversation
 

:clap2: Hello Susan, Thanks again , this sounds like a really good lesson,and really is not limited to an age group, im very gratefull to you, Its really all abit strange when your first starting out. But im getting alot of help and ideas, so im starting to lose the nervousness :doh:
a bit.
if you have any more ideas, id be happy to hear about them
Thanks again, Meggy