ESL Activities With Little Preparation

You can never have too many fillers, warmers or ice-breakers up your sleeve - activities which you can slot into a lesson if you finish five minutes earlier than expected, or use if you see pace has dropped and students need an energising activity. In this article, Keith Taylor describes some of his favourites.

How often do you find yourself preparing a class, racking your brain for something different - a new activity to liven up a group of tired students, or just to bring something fresh to the classroom? If you are like most teachers, thinking of something new and exciting every day is not easy, and often we simply don't have the time (or energy!) So we revert to our tried and tested (and sometimes a little worn) ideas, or to following page after page of a textbook.

Well, it doesn't have to be that difficult. A lot of ideas can be adapted to many different language points, giving you something that can be used again and again. If the activity has a clear focus, motivation (students need to know why they are doing something - adding an element of competition to an activity is one way to achieve this) and, of course, clear instructions, then you're on to a winner.

There are many good resource books available with hundreds of quick and easy activities requiring little or no preparation. Have a hunt around your school's resources for books such as "Five Minute Activities" by Penny Ur and Andrew Wright, or "Keep Talking" by Friederike Kippel. Don't forget that your fellow teachers are good resources too - use them!

Here are a few ideas to get you started:

1 You may know Backs to the Board, where a representative from each of two teams faces away from the board, while his/her teammates try to explain the word that you have written on the board to him/her, without saying the word or any variations of it. Well, why not extend this to whole sentences? The teams have a minute to explain the sentence to their teammate, without using any of the words, or spelling them, or using gestures. You can adapt this to any tense or structure that you want to practise.

2 Sentence reduction: Write a long sentence or a short paragraph on the board, rich in vocabulary. In teams, students take it in turns to erase either one, two or three consecutive words. The sentence must still make sense, gramatically, afterwards. If it doesn't, replace the words and move to the next team. Carry on until no further reduction is possible (your students will be amazed at how short the sentence can become, while retaining its grammatical sense!) The winning team is the one who removes the most words. (Variation: Do the opposite - start with one word and have students replace it with two or three, expanding the sentence).

3 For spelling and vocabulary practice, try this: Start with one letter on the board, say "S". The first student then thinks of a word beginning with "S" and adds the next letter, for example "ST". The next student then thinks of a word starting with "ST" and adds another letter, and so on. If someone in the group thinks there is no such word, he can challenge the writer to name his/her word. If there is no such word, the writer is out, but if he/she was thinking of a real word, then the challenger is out. The winner is the last student remaining.

4 If your students are imaginative, give each group four or five pictures cut out from magazines, and get them to create a picture story - you can keep the context very open, or have them focus on a particular tense or function. If you want to focus on oral communication, don't let them write their story down! If you also want to evaluate their writing, have them write it down as they go along. When they've finished, have each group tell their story to the rest of the class.

5 As a Getting to know you exercise, ask students to write three things which are true about themselves, and two which are not true (but believable). Students take turns to read their sentences to the rest of the group, who must discuss, and ask questions to the reader, and try to find out which of his/her sentences are true. A good ice-breaker is to do this yourself first so that they get the idea - write the five things about you on the board. (Variation: Write five one-word facts about yourself on the board, for example "32", "Liverpool", "Three", "Bloggs", and have students, in pairs, try to guess the questions which will give them these answers.)

6 Another one for imaginative students: Dictate the first line of a different story to each of several groups. They have a few minutes to continue the story, and then pass their piece of paper to the next group, who read the story so far and add the next part. Carry on until the stories reach their original groups, who then conclude and read out the stories. To focus on a particular language point or item of vocabulary, you can do this orally as a chain story: Give the first sentence, then have the first student continue the story. They must at some point use the tense, or structure, or word (allocated beforehand), that you want to work on. Carry on until all the students have contributed.

7 For some energetic writing practice, divide the board into three columns, and give each column a header with three structures that you want to practise (for example "first, second, third conditional", "yes/no questions, indirect questions, tag questions", "present perfect simple, present perfect continuous, past simple"). Split students into pairs. One from each pair is the writer, the other is the runner. Give each pair many small slips of paper and some blu-tac, and tell them that they must construct as many gramatically correct sentences as they can, in each of the three categories, and stick them on the board (with their initials to identify them). Set a five or ten minute time limit. The writer writes a sentence, then the runner takes the slip of paper and sticks it on the board. Shout "CHANGE" every so often for them to swap roles. At the end, have all the pairs look at the sentences and evaluate them. If they find an incorrect one, they tell you, and that sentence is not counted towards that pair's score. (Variation: You can make this activity more difficult by saying that each sentence must contain a minimum of 10 words, for example.)

8 Another favourite is to give each student a secret famous identity, which they stick to their back or forehead. They go around the class, asking yes/no questions to establish their identity. You could make sure they practise the past simple by making all the famous people dead (Did I live in the USA?), or present perfect, by making them alive (Have I acted in many films?), or future, by imagining that these famous people have not yet been born (Will I be an actor?).

9 Stand students up, and shout out two opposing ideas, or people, or concepts, or adjectives, or places. For example, "beach or mountains", "Spielberg or Hitchcock", "red or blue", "Playstation or Nintendo" depending on the age/interests of your students. Point to one side of the room for one idea, the other side for the other. Students move to the side of the room they choose - pick a few students each time to explain the reasons for their choices. If you like, you can let it develop into a debate between the two groups.

10 Do a grammar auction or gap fill auction with mistakes that students have made (and that you've made a note of) or with a language area that you want to work on. Split students into teams, and allocate each team $100, or 10,000 yen or any amount you like. If you can photcopy some real money, so much the better. For the grammar auction, give each team a worksheet with 10 (or more) sentences (based on the mistakes they've made or the language area you're working on). Some should be grammatically correct, others incorrect. Give teams some time to discuss whether they think the sentences are correct or not, and then have them gamble on that decision for each sentence. Then give them the answer - if their decision was right, they double the amount they gambled - if not, they lose their stake. For the gap fill, give them 10 or more gap fill sentences (again based on the area you're practising or their mistakes) and this time they choose the correct word to go in the gap and gamble on it.

You can find variations on these activities, and many, many others in the books mentioned at the beginning of this article, among others. Try one of them today for something different in your ESL classes!

Keith Taylor is the founder of esl base, providing resources, information and advice for TEFL teachers, as well as a directory of TEFL courses and TEFL jobs worldwide. He also maintains the eslbase language exchange, an easy way to practise any language online.

Acknowledgements

Article Source: EzineArticles

Photo provided by Matthew Weston under Creative Commons Licence by via flickr

An ELT Notebook Recommends...

Community Language Learning : Part Two

I’ve never trained as a CLL teacher, and I’ve never taught an entire course through CLL. However, I have sometimes used it as a component of a course.

One of the courses which I remember best was a mixed ability course with a group of six students ranging from complete beginners to upper intermediate level. It was impossible to teach them as a “normal” lockstep class, and I decided to get them working on self-access materials each at their own level while I circulated, helping and guiding as necessary. But to do that for the whole course would have meant an incredible amount of preparation – I needed to prepare materials for four different levels at each lesson. So I decided to spend half of the time using a CLL approach, sometimes letting the most advanced student work as the knower to increase the challenge for her, while I just confirmed her input and handled the analysis and reflection stages. It worked well, as even when the lower level students heard more complex language than they were ready for, they had already heard the sentence in their own language, and therefore didn’t have to panic about meaning. The reflection stage also usefully allowed the students to express their feelings about being in such a mixed ability course (which had been imposed on all of us) – the lower level students discussing their insecurity and fear of looking stupid, while the higher level students talked about their fear that they would not learn anything. Together they reached the understanding that the method would allow them each to use and to ask for analysis at their own level. The higher level students would be able to confirm their own understanding of more basic structures, while the beginners realised that it would often be more sensible to focus on general understanding of the higher level language, without worrying too much about the details.

However, the group which I want to describe in most detail was a group of three complete beginners. They were managers from a company, ranging in age from early forties to late fifties, and were sent by their company to do an intensive course – six hours a day for two weeks. I was in charge of designing the course and teaching most of it, but I had the help of another teacher for an hour and a half each day.

My first concern when I heard about the course was its intensity – I was sure that the students would not be able to cope with six hours a day “straight” group teaching. My first concern was therefore to build in a variety of approaches, and above all, a change of pace at different points in the day. I didn’t think there’d be too much problem in the mornings, but I was worried about the “post-lunch dip” and tiredness in the later afternoon. I therefore decided that the two sessions in the morning would be “normal” teacher led lessons, but that after lunch we’d change approach. The first session would be self-access based. The school had a good self-access library which the other teacher was familiar with, and he therefore took charge of this session. The final session of the day was CLL.

On the first day, I explained the method to the students and they got started. Each of them in turn started a monologue – My name is … I come from … and so on. They stayed within a fairly basic range of language, but even so, there were things which I was dying to point out in the analysis stage. But they didn’t ask. In the reflection stage, they expressed general satisfaction with the method and welcomed it as a change of focus at the end of a long day, but said it had been a bit boring because they already knew everything which each person had said about himself. They therefore decided that they would each think of a more interesting topic to talk about the following day.

On the second day, the first student again started a monologue on his chosen topic – but this time did not stop. In the end, each of the other students had a chance to say something, but very soon the allotted twenty minutes ran out. Stevick (in A Way and Ways, cited in the first part of this article) says that he indicates to each student when they’ve had their turn, but I wanted this to be one of the things the students worked out for themselves. In the reflection period, they were clearly dissatisfied with how things had gone, and I started by asking the student who had talked the most for his feelings. He said at once that he realised that he had dominated and that it had been unintentional – what he’d planned to say had just taken longer than he’d thought. I then asked if they had any suggestions as to how they could do things differently so as to make things more useful. Almost immediately they suggested that they should stop monologuing, and start having a more natural conversation. They also came up with the idea of repeating some of the situational dialogues, roleplays etc that they’d studied in the morning in order to consolidate the language they’d been learning.

From that time on, there was no problem with the content of the discussions or the turn-taking. They came up with different ideas for conversations each day, but it was always something interesting and useful. On the other hand, I was never entirely happy with the analysis phase, which was the aspect of this particular course which most tempted me to revert to a “teaching” role. I felt at first that they were simply not “noticing” some of the language that was coming up, rather than that they truly did not want to take an analytical approach, as Stevick reported with some of his learners. But in retrospect, this may have reflected my own preferences rather than theirs, and probably had a lot to do with the time. By the time they got to the analysis stage they’d been going for nearly six hours.

This course, however, illustrates what I suggested in Part One of the article : CLL is not something which will work most effectively the first time you do it, and in my experience there are generally one or two sessions which the students are dissatisfied with before they truly make the method their own. If you want to use CLL, you therefore need to allot a sizeable portion of the course to the method, and to possess the skills necessary to “counsel” the students through any negative patches – in particular active listening skills, and the ability to support students while they work through their own reactions to the method, without imposing your own ideas about how they “should” be doing it, but helping them to find out for themselves.

Acknowledgement

Photo provided under Creative Commons License by ExtraOrdinary people via flickr

Teaching Young Learners : What Makes for Good Practice?

Do you have trouble keeping your younger learners concentrated? Do they seem to get bored in your lessons? In this article Mark looks at what children enjoy and suggests some ways of making the lessons more fun and involving.

Mark lives and teaches in Japan, and also runs the site Mes-English.com where you'll find free flashcards, worksheets, lesson plans, games - and a host of other resources.


Aside from teaching have you ever played with children? I'm sure you have. We all have horsed around with nieces, nephews, your own children, friends children, etc. When you've made them laugh, what's the next thing the child says?

"Do it again."

This is an extremely powerful tool. When children are having fun or if they find something amusing, they will do whatever it is again and again and again. It's amazing. Not only will they want you to do it again then, but the next time you see them, they'll ask you, "Do that thing again." (Problem is you have to remember what it was.) In designing lessons plans this can be a key point for game/activity selection and/or creation, as well as presentation. If the students find something amusing they will want to do it over and over again (just ask Nintendo.)

The problem is other than tossing them around, tickling them, physically harming yourself, what do they like?

• Funny sounds: If you are drilling, try raising your voice 7 octaves at the end and have the students model, sing the word, whisper the word, shout the word, dance to the word, what ever sells.
• Funny words: Don't be afraid to make up words or combine words to make non-sense. Children do this and love it. Tell them you want an elephant-pencil. "An elephant-pencil? No, no a monkey-pencil! No, no. A ROCKET-pencil." "A pocket-pencil? What's that?" Children will jump in and start talking!
• Physical comedy: Unfortunately this could mean physically harming yourself, but the pros just pretend. I do a lot of street side performance type material that really gets kids laughing and on my side. For example when I meet a child for the first time I may go to shake their hand, miss and run right into them. Then, do it again. And again. And again, until eventually I just deem that there must be something wrong with the childs hand and make him/her shake hands with another child just to verify that his hand actually works and repeat.

So, what makes for good practice? Is it clown type humor? Physical humor? Goofing off? I think the fun needs to be structural and can be any, all, or none of those. If you can plan a lesson that is structurally fun, not necessarily contextually fun, you'll find the lesson successful. That applies to the attitude of the teacher, the presentation of the material, and the execution. Interestingly enough, not necessarily the child or the material. When the activities are interesting in and of themselves, then the class is structurally fun. In that case the content doesn't necessarily have to be.

The answer is have fun on the way - or charm. Don't be afraid to digress a bit. Listen to Ken's story about his beetle in the middle of class. Don't be afraid to run into a wall (pretend to run into a wall) when Ken won't stop. Break into song. Pretend you're a bus driver swerving away from a deer if you're teaching them "I want to be a bus driver." Children (people for that matter) want to be led, not dragged.

When I design a game or activity the bulk of the burden lies in "how am I going to sell this activity?" How am I going to get the students to say the target language 100 times and come back and do it again next class? Usually, the answer is keep it simple. Some of the best and most popular games are the most simple; Checkers, Scrabble, Tic-Tac-Toe, Tag, Hang-man, Dodge-ball, Chutes and Ladders... When you are choosing or designing an activity or game please keep that in mind. You can always go back and add more later. But, not if it fails the first time. Also, ask yourself if the activity is interesting. It doesn't have to be a circus all the time but if it's not interesting, it's... boring. Is the information students are gathering / discussing/ learning about interesting to them? There is a time for learning for learning's sake but if it's always merely constructive for learning, you're going to have a hard time motivating some of the students.

Each teacher is different and teaching styles need to match the teacher. I can go on and on with endless examples of things that work for me, but those are things that work for me. You need to find some things that work for you. If you have the resources, spend time with children. Don't try to teach them, try to learn from them. See what things children like to do with you or what things you do they find interesting. Then apply those to your teaching methodology to make learning fun and effective.

Watch other teachers, parents, anyone and see what things work for them when they are around children. If you simply try to copy someone else you'll generally find yourself flat on your face. Don't try to mimic, but think about how you can incorporate similar things that will work for you. If you can learn from others and build yourself, you'll find yourself in a very powerful position.

Above all, have fun yourself and teach hard!

Happy teaching,
Mark

Notes

Photo provided under Creative Commons Licence by Genki David via flickr

Further Reading ...

Colloquial English : Body Idioms

This next article in our Language Snippets section looks at another group of English idioms. Like the previous articles in the series, it outlines an activity which you could use as a filler with more advanced classes.

A lot of English idioms are based on parts of the body. Here are some examples :

It cost an arm and a leg : It was very expensive.
They don’t see eye to eye : They don’t agree with each other
She’s got a nose for a bargain : She’s very good at finding ......
I was on my knees by the end of the day : I was very tired

There's no elbow-room : There isn't enough space

We did it by the skin of our teeth : We only just succeeded, we almost failed
He doesn’t have a leg to stand on : There’s no justification for what he did or says
I really put my foot in it : I said something by mistake that I shouldn’t have said
She gave him the cold shoulder : She rejected him; she ignored him.
He’s pulling your leg : He’s pretending something is true when it isn’t, as a joke
The car is on its last legs : It’s old and will soon be unusable
He welcomed us with open arms : He was very pleased to accept our help.
We soon lost heart: We became demotivated

.... and there are many more. Here’s one way you might present these in the classroom with a group of upper intermediate or advanced students.

• Create a worksheet with a diagram of the human body (or a photo of a person) in the middle. Choose eight or nine idioms you want to teach and type them around it, but with the body words gapped. Make sure the context makes the meaning fairly clear. A line connects each idiom with the relevant part of the body in the diagram. If you think extra clarification is necessary, add the first letter of each word – this will help students distinguish between mouth and teeth, for example.
• The students read the idioms, look at the diagram and try and work out the missing words. While they work, put a list of the meanings of the idioms on the board. Students then match them, and write the meanings in the spaces under the sentences. They could then highlight the idioms themselves to make them stand out.

What are the pros and cons of teaching idiomatic language like this to our learners? See : 

My Teacher is an Old Cow - Teaching figurative language, should we or shouldn't we?

Further reading 

Gairns and Redman, Working with Words, CUP

(Don't forget that Amazon often have both new and used copies of the books you want at prices much lower than those shown here. Click on the link to check.)

Another Day in the Life of ...: Teaching in Bangkok, Thailand

Barry O’Leary taught in Bangkok for seven months. Despite slaving away for the ‘Sister from Hell’, he will always remember the joys of teaching Thai kids.

6. 45 am. Where am I? Bangkok. What day is it? Tuesday, better get up. After breakfast in my flat provided by the school, I walk in. It’s only two minutes away.

As I turn the corner of my road I see the familiar traffic jam of parents dropping the kids off. I stop at the front gate to greet a fellow teacher. I place my hands together under my chin and bow.
‘Saawat dee Krap’ I’m finally comfortable with the ‘wai’ used to greet people. I sign in and then wait in the playground with the kids.
‘Do we have swimming today Mr Barry?’
‘Yes Nam, don’t worry.’ The rest of the kids cheer. Swimming is the highlight of their week. I catch up with the other teachers and we wait for the kids to sing the national anthem and then walk to class, ensuring the kids are well behaved for when they walk past the head sister. She stands at the top of the stairs, dressed in white like an angel, but she’s far from that. The kids bow as they go past her, more in fear than anything else.

I am free for one hour so I prepare my day. Sister is keen on everyone being up to date with lesson plans, which are vital for student development. Today I’m only teaching three hours, but during the week I have 22 contact hours which includes swimming and dance lessons. Today is Maths, Swimming and Art. I’m teaching English through subjects rather than direct English.

As I enter the class the students stand up to greet me. Now normally two things happen - if the Thai teacher is in the room they sit down and listen to me, if not then a riot can start. Luckily Miss Nitaya is there so they behave moderately and my lesson goes to plan.

Everyday I take the kids down to the dining hall with the other 3,000 students and make sure they finish their lunch before they head out to sweat their food away in the playground. You can imagine the noise in there with so many kids. Luckily there is a separate room for the teachers where I eat my meal, provided by the school. Today is phad thai, my favourite. To take away the spice I have an ice-cream whilst keeping an eye on the kids and stopping the occasional ninja fight amongst the boys. Now it’s back up for the afternoon.

Swimming as usual starts well. I co-ordinate the kids with another teacher and they practise various styles. Now games. This normally results in me dragging round ten kids on my back as they try to drown me. All good fun though.

At 4.45pm I’m free to go, a long day. In the evening I play football with the locals in a sports centre and then eat with other teachers in one of the many local restaurants. After chilling in my flat playing my guitar or reading, I’m asleep under my mosquito net at 11pm ready for another early start the next day.

Practising Questions : Lateral Thinking Problems

Lateral Thinking puzzles were first invented by the psychologist Dr Edward de Bono (1). They consist of a simple situation which at first sight seems strange, but actually has a very simple explanation, and were intended to encourage creative (or “lateral”) thinking. You tell the students the situation and they can then ask Yes/No questions about it until they understand what happened. In particular, it’s a great way of practising simple past and past continuous questions, but at a higher level students also have the chance to incorporate and practise the past perfect and other structures. Here are two such situations :

1. A man was lying dead in a field with a bag beside him. How did he die?
2. A woman walked into a bar and asked for a glass of water. The barman pulled out a gun and pointed it at her. The woman said “Thank you” and left. Why?

(Answers later!)

The sort of questions that the students might ask include (for the first situation) : Was there anything in the bag? (Yes) Did the thing in the bag kill him? (No, but it didn't save him either) Was it a snake? (No) Was the man carrying the bag when he came into the field? (Yes) Did he walk into the field? (No) Did he arrive by car? (No) Was there anyone else in the field? (No) Did somebody shoot him? (No) Was he alive when he first came into the field? (Only for a fraction of a second) and so on. As you can see, it’s not always necessary (or possible) to answer only Yes or No. Students do sometimes need a bit more help if the activity is to stay pacy. The important thing is that you don’t answer “give-away” questions like What was in the bag?
The problem with this activity is that after asking a few “obvious” questions, the students tend to dry up, and the whole point of these puzzles is that they don’t have obvious answers. The activity therefore has to be set up carefully so that students understand what they have to do.

Here’s the activity sequence which I use in the classroom.

• Stage A : Explain the first situation above and the activity, and let students ask whatever questions they come up with.
• Stage B : Tell them they’re going to hear a tape of two native speakers playing the same game- you can script this yourself and record it with a colleague. They should listen and find out what the answer is.
• Stage C : In pairs, they try and remember and write down some of the questions that were asked on the tape. When they’ve done all they remember, replay the tape pausing after each question to ask and write on the board what the speaker said.
• Stage D : Explain the second situation above. In pairs they have a few minutes to plan four or five questions to ask. While they work, the teacher circulates, correcting and helping as necessary but not answering the questions.
• Stage E : The students ask the questions. If you have a large class, they can be divided into groups and one student in each group given the answer. With smaller classes it can be done in teacher/class format.
• Stage F : When they run out of questions, ask them to recap on everything they’ve learnt so far before putting them back into pairs and asking them to write some more questions. If they seem really stuck, give them a clue – for instance, the woman wanted the water because she had a problem. This immediately gives them a new direction for their questions.

The activity goes on until either they guess the answer, or they seem to have had enough. If that happens, the teacher can give one or two more obvious clues so that within a couple of questions, they’ve solved it.

Oh yes – the answers. In the first situation, the man jumped out of a plane but his parachute didn’t open, and in the second, the woman had hiccups.

Notes
1. Dr de Bono’s personal website can be found here : http://www.edwarddebono.com/Default.php

2. For some more examples of lateral thinking problems (and their answers!), try here : http://www.increasebrainpower.com/brainteasersriddles.html

Photo provided under Creative Commons Licence by Material Girl via flickr


 For some great teaching ideas...

Gerngross, Puchta and Thornbury, Teaching Grammar Creatively, CUP

ESL Exams: A Teacher's Guide

If they intend to study or work using English, or sometimes just for their own personal satisfaction, students often want to take some sort of internationally accredited exam. But which one? Keith Taylor takes a look at some of the exams on offer.

It's the end of another class, and one student has stayed behind. No problem, you think, maybe an easy grammar question, or a comment on how they enjoyed the class (or not!)... or maybe it's a question about an ESL exam. "What's the difference between TOEFL and TOEIC?" "Should I take the FCE?" "Who recognizes IELTS?" So if you don’t know your BEC from your KET, or your CAE from your CELS, here's a brief guide to the most popular ESL exams.

ESL exams fall broadly into three main categories: General English, Business English and Academic English.

General English

Probably the most popular in this category are the Cambridge ESOL exams. One and a half million people in 135 countries take Cambridge exams every year. There are five General English exams, sometimes referred to as the "Cambridge Main Suite."

The first two levels are the KET (Key English Test) and the PET (Preliminary English Test). The KET and PET have reading and writing, listening, and speaking components, and are most often used to assess progress or to prepare for the next exam in the series. The PET is also recognized by some employers and universities. KET and PET have two pass grades, Pass with merit and Pass.

Next up from the PET is the FCE (First Certificate in English). The FCE has five sections, reading, writing, use of English, listening and speaking. It is widely recognized by employers and educational institutions and so is very popular with students who want to study or work abroad.

Many universities and employers, however, prefer the CAE (Certificate in Advanced English), which is the next level up. This exam shows that a student is capable of following a university course or can function in a range of business contexts.

After the CAE comes the CPE (Certificate of Proficiency in English), the highest level in the series. Students who pass this exam have the ability to function effectively in almost every English speaking context. The CPE is also a typical requirement for non-native speakers who want to train as English teachers. Students typically need 3 years of study after passing the FCE to reach this level (depending, of course, on how often they study and other factors).

FCE, CAE and CPE have five grades, A-E, of which A-C are passes.

Cambridge also has a series of General English exams for Young Learners aged between 7 and 12 (YLE). There are three exams in the series, Starters, Movers and Flyers. They are taken mainly as a means of measuring progress, and also as preparation for the KET and PET. There is no pass or fail - students are awarded up to five "shields" for each component (reading and writing, listening, speaking).

Other General English exams

Cambridge also offers CELS (Certificates in English Language Skills). These are individual exams in each of the four skills (reading, writing, listening, speaking). Students can choose which of the exams they want to take, according to their strengths and requirements.

Pitman, part of the British City and Guilds Group, is another examining body with a series of General English exams. The International ESOL covers listening, reading and writing, and the International Spoken ESOL is a one to one structured interview. Both have six levels, from basic to advanced.

Business English

Every year four and a half million people take the TOEIC (Test of English for International Communication), run by the Educational Testing Service (ETS). The TOEIC is a multiple choice exam in two sections, listening and reading, each scored out of 445, giving a total of 990. Many companies and government agencies use TOEIC as a criterion for recruiting or promoting staff, or for sending staff abroad. Some universities also use TOEIC, requiring their business school students to achieve a particular score prior to graduation, for example.

Cambridge also has a series of business exams called the BEC (Business English Certificate). BEC comes in three levels, Preliminary, Vantage and Higher. The types of exam task are similar to those in the Cambridge Main Suite, but test language ability in a business context. They are recognized by many employers worldwide, and students take them to demonstrate language skills required for international business. There are two pass grades for BEC, Pass with merit and Pass.

Other Business English exams

Cambridge offers BULATS (The Business Language Testing Service). BULATS is designed specifically for companies and organizations to test the language ability of employees who need English in their work, and for students and employees on language and business courses.

Pitman has a three-level series of exams called English for Business Communications, which tests business writing ability, and English for Office Skills, a two-level series designed to test the ability to carry out office-related tasks where accuracy in writing and following instructions is important.

Academic English

A common question from students is "What's the difference between TOEIC and TOEFL?" Well, both are run by ETS, but whereas TOEIC evaluates language skills for the workplace, TOEFL evaluates language skills in an academic context. It is therefore used primarily as a prerequisite for admission to universities and colleges. More than 5000 colleges and universities in 90 countries recognize the exam. During 2005 and 2006, TOEFL is phasing in a new internet-based test (iBT), which will replace the current computer-based and paper-based exams. The iBT has 4 sections, reading, listening, speaking and writing, each with a score of 30, giving a total score of 120. This is likely to cause some confusion for a while, as most students and universities are used to working with the paper-based total of 677, or the computer-based total of 300!

Cambridge also has an academic exam, the IELTS (International English Language Testing System), which they jointly manage with the British Council and IDP:IELTS Australia. IELTS is recognized by universities and colleges, as well as employers, immigration authorities and professional bodies. The exam has listening, reading, writing and speaking components. For the reading and writing, students can choose between an academic and a general option. IELTS is scored on a scale of 1-9.

Comparing levels

One of the most common questions from students is how exams in the different categories compare to each other. Is the FCE equivalent to one of the BEC exams? If I have the CAE, what TOEFL score can I expect? Luckily, we have a reference guide to help us here, called the "Common European Framework of Reference for Languages" (CEF). The CEF divides language learners into six levels, and enables us to compare all the ESL exams according to these levels.

The six levels are A1 (Breakthrough), A2 (Waystage), B1 (Threshold), B2 (Vantage), C1 (Effective Operational Proficiency), and C2 (Mastery).

Here's a quick comparison of exams at the different levels. Bear in mind that this is a general guide only -- students' scores in different exams will of course depend on many factors, such as preparation time and motivation!

• A1: YLE Movers, Pitman ESOL Basic, IELTS score 1-2.
• A2: KET, YLE Flyers, Pitman ESOL Elementary, TOEIC score 246-380, TOEFL iBT score 32-42, IELTS score 3.
• B1: PET, TOEIC score 381-540, BEC Preliminary, TOEFL iBT score 43-61, IELTS score 3.5-4.5.
• B2: FCE, Pitman ESOL Intermediate, TOEIC score 541-700, BEC Vantage, TOEFL iBT score 62-91, IELTS score 5-6.
• C1: CAE, Pitman ESOL Higher Intermediate, TOEIC score 701-910, BEC Higher, TOEFL iBT score 92-112, IELTS score 6.5-7.
• C2: CPE, Pitman ESOL Advanced, TOEIC score 911-990, TOEFL iBT score 113-120, IELTS score 7.5-9.

There is of course much more information about these exams on the Cambridge ESOL, TOEIC, TOEFL and Pitman websites -- you will find the links at this ESL exams resource.


Keith Taylor is the founder of http://www.eslbase.com, providing free resources, information and advice for TEFL teachers, as well as the latest job opportunities and a directory of TEFL courses worldwide. He also maintains the eslbase language exchange, an easy way to practise any language online.
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Acknowledgements

• Article Source: EzineArticles.com
• Photo provided under Creative Commons Licence by sashamd via flickr

Further Reading ...

Practising Listening

There are two possible approaches to dealing with listening in the classroom. The first, which I’ll call practising listening, is based on the idea that if students are constantly exposed to the spoken language, their comprehension will naturally, though gradually, improve. The second – let’s call it teaching listening - suggests that we need to take a more active approach to improving listening abilities, by focusing on the specific problems that the students have and planning listening activities which will help to resolve them.

When we think about a “listening lesson” we are probably thinking of the second approach. What your objectives are for this type of lesson, how it should be staged and what activity types you should use, will be the topic of another article. Here, however, I’d like to look in detail at the first type of activity : practising listening.

Every time the teacher speaks in English in the classroom - whether to give instructions, to explain a grammar point, or just to chat as the class starts to arrive - the students are in effect practising listening. This opportunity for constant exposure to the spoken language is one of the main arguments for using English rather than the L1 in the classroom - although, as the article Teacher Talking Time : Part One discussed, there may also be arguments against it.

Teacher talk may also be built into the lesson in a more conscious attempt to provide listening practice, and the third part of the Teacher Talking Time series suggested a number of ways that this can be done. Notice however that in all these activities, the students’ task is simply to listen for the gist of the conversation and to respond in some way. The activities may teach strategies to cope with non-comprehension, such as asking for explanation, but do not attempt to improve the students’ comprehension itself. It is the exposure in its own right which is seen as valuable.

Teacher Talk Listenings tend to be quite short, and are often broken up into even shorter chunks – as in interactive story-telling (described in TTT3) or TPR - described in the article Receptive Practice Activities. What about using longer stretches of recorded material for listening practice?

One of the problems here is time – with course time limited and a full syllabus to get through, we often don’t have the space for this sort of unfocused practice. It can however be usefully done for homework. I ask my lower level students to buy a simplified reader with an accompanying tape, and my more advanced level students to choose a DVD with an English soundtrack and subtitles, to work on one section at a time as the course progresses. The sections, which may be a chapter or sub-section of the book or a scene from the film, shouldn’t last longer than about two minutes. The students first listen to the tape/soundtrack without reference to the text/subtitles, and try to understand as much as possible. They then repeat the section while at the same time following the text/subtitles to see if their understanding was correct . On the third listening, they pause to check any unknown words or to replay phrases which they found particularly unclear. They then listen to the same section a final time, this time without the text/subtitles, concentrating on “hearing” the words they know are there.

If they are using this technique students must realise that the text is only as an aid to hearing the words. If they understand simply because they have seen the written form, they are not practising listening at all, but reading. The written form is used to give them confidence and to help them relate the sounds they hear to the words they know must be there. They also need to realise that to be successful, this technique has to be used frequently – the whole premise behind the “practising listening” approach is that gradual improvement results from constant exposure.

If there is time, this technique can of course also be used in class. It is, in any case, useful to use it once at the beginning of the course to demonstrate the technique, but it can also be used regularly:

• In classes where for some reason you cannot ask students to buy extra material
• In classes where you are looking for a fairly relaxed activity to provide variety of focus – perhaps as the day’s final activity in an all-day intensive course, or in a one-to one-lesson where you and the student know each other inside out and are running out of things to talk about.
• In any class where listening is a prime objective – whether because of the students’ specific communicative needs, or because it is a major weakness – and you want to dedicate extra time to the skill.

Practising listening does not, however, replace the need to teach listening, which will probably take up most of the time dedicated to listening in the classroom. In the next two articles in this series we’ll look at what a "teaching listening" approach might involve, and the objectives, stages and activities that might be included in a lesson aiming to attack listening problems more explicitly and more actively.

Notes

Photo provided under Creative Commons Licence by Susan NYC via flickr