Born to create drama – by Rosa Perez Parapar

In the run up to the forthcoming ELT Blog Carnival on video, here’s another terrific guest post – this time from Rosa Perez Parapar. Rosa describes how she sets up a very successful speaking activity. Thank you Rosa!

STEP 1: I divide my class into 2 groups; each one of them watches one of the following videos in class while the other waits in the corridor.STEP 2: In order to keep them busy while they are in the corridor, they are asked to do the following:

• GROUP 1 / VIDEO 1: they must find out how to say the following words in English: swing, wedding, bride and groom. I tell them the words in Spanish and I let them use a dictionary.

• GROUP 2 / VIDEO 2: I make sure they have understood the story answering the 5 w-questions: who / what/ where / when /why

STEP 3: after both groups have watched their videos a couple of times and they have practised telling the stories in their videos out loud ( in their groups) I pair them (one student from each group) and they tell each other the story they have seen

STEP 4: To make sure they have understood the story correctly, they retell each other´s stories in their pairs

STEP 5: The whole class watches both videos

STEP 6: Homework assignment: Each student must imagine an ending to his/ her video at home. 2 volunteers tell the story to the whole class the next day. They must:

• – narrate the story in 1st person (as if they were one of the characters )
• – explain what happened afterwards

What a gem of a lesson! Thank you Rosa!