d) Doing puzzles
For example, here are the names of 11 countries:
Brazil, Egypt, England, France, Greece, India, Italy, Peru, Portugal, Spain, Turkey
Complete the crossword. Which countries are not there?
1) Imitative writing
Copying
Some discussion of the value of copying is necessary because it is sometimes presented as the first stage in a writing programme. This of course will be the case if the learners have problems at the graphological level (that is, if they have to learn new graphic symbols or how to write from left to right).
Equally commonly, however, copying is held to be valuable because it helps to teach spelling or to reinforce sentence structure. For example, we sometimes write words and sentences on the board and ask our students to copy them down. At the beginning of the course, such an activity may have a certain novelty value, and can of course serve to introduce the learners to the written form of what has been learned orally. But the novelty will soon wear off and copying will then become just one more classroom routine. Besides, what the learners copy tends to get lost in a jumble of notes made in the same way. One may well wonder whether this activity - like reading aloud - is not often just a way of riling in a little time in the lesson.
Yet copying need not be a pointless activity. Most of us would agree, on the basis of our own experience of trying to learn something new, that copying is an aid to retention. Furthermore, in real life, we frequently copy things down in order to have a record of them: for example, we copy addresses, the times of trains, telephone numbers as well as other bits of useful information or material for which we think we may have a future use. For example, we quite often make copies of songs and poems. The students can be asked to make their own copies of this type of material in a special notebook.
Copying, then, can be presented to the learners as a meaningful activity, particularly if we can get them to see it as a way of making a record of something which is not otherwise available to them (i.e. it does not appear in the textbook) or is not available to them in the form in which they have copied it (i.e. they have brought together certain data which is distributed in various lessons in their textbook). We must also demonstrate to them, through some activity either at the time or later, that they have done the copying to some purpose.
Examples:
The following activities mainly involve copying since the learners do not actually have to contribute to the text.
a) Putting a list of words in alphabetical order
b) Putting a list of words in their correct sequence (for example, days of the week, months, numbers,.
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c) Putting words in categories |
FOOD | ANIMALS | CLOTHES |
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d) Doing puzzles For example, here are the names of 11 countries:
Brazil, Egypt, England, France, Greece, India, Italy, Peru, Portugal, Spain, Turkey
Complete the crossword. Which countries are not there? |
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e) Playing Bingo This involves selecting copying and is an excellent way of revising vocabulary sets (e.g. colours, jobs, clothes, etc.) through a game
Write, with the help of suggestions from the class, 12 – 16 items on the board ( e.g. for clothes: jacket, hat,…) Ask the students to copy any words from the list. Then read out the words from the list in any order. The first learner to hear his word read out calls out BINGO! |
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This example is taken from: Donn Byrne: Teaching Writing; Longman 1991
e) Finding the word that is different
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The pupils are given a set of 4 – 5 words like those in the diagram and are asked to find and write out the word that is different. This combines reading with writing. Children enjoy the problem-solving aspect of this activity. |
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f) Labelling items
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For this the pupils use the words listed for them in a box to identify and label, for example, individual objects, people in a group, objects in a scene, etc.
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bird, lorry, cat, cow, donkey, house, pig, tractor, tree, woman |
g) Finding words
The pupils have to find and write out the words which have been “hidden” in boxes like the one below. The words may belong to a set (e.g. animals, clothes, etc.) and a t a later stage may form a sentence, such as an instruction. The pupils can also make their own word boxes, working individually or in groups, using words which they have been given.
h) Filling in speech bubbles
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The pupils have to fill in speech bubbles by matching the sentences with the situation. The activity is more interesting if the pictures form a sequence |
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i) Forming dialogues or stories from jumbled sentences
This makes a good pair work or group activity and can be based on something the pupils have already heard.
From these suggestions it should be clear that copying need never be a boring activity! When students copy they actually don’t contribute to the text.
What about a typical classroom situation?
The students are asked to copy from the board or from books – often they are expected to do so without being asked (students who do not write are regarded as extremely off-putting).
Items copied are generally examples of grammatical structures, grammatical rules and items of vocabulary.
Occasionally, students are asked to copy a dialogue or a short narrative from the board for reference.
Many teachers stress the value of a written record of what has been presented in class and the importance of a student vocabulary record.
e)
Dictations
Dictations typically involve the following steps:
Teacher reads a short paragraph one or twice at normal speed.
Teacher reads the paragraph in short phrase units of three or four words each, and each unit is followed by a pause.
During the pause, students write exactly what they hear.
Teacher then reads the whole paragraph once more at normal speed so students can check their writing.
Scoring of students’ written work can utilize a number of rubrics for assigning points. Usually spelling and punctuation errors are considered as severe as grammatical errors.
