After having success with this warm-up activity in my theater classes, I adapted it for my beginner-level English classes, knowing my students would appreciate the opportunity to move around. The activity allows students to create their own physical interpretation of a vocabulary word, which increases their ability to remember it (Asher 1996). I introduce the activity with a class and then use it frequently as a warm-up to review vocabulary. The activity requires little preparation and few materials: just something to play music with and cards for introducing vocabulary terms. Best of all, the activity incorporates movement in a way that is easy for students to understand.

INTRODUCING  PHYSICAL VOCABULARY

The entire class walks in a circle throughout the activity. Each student changes the nature of his or her walk (rhythm, gait, pace, etc.) in response to vocabulary prompts.

The activity is best suited to beginner classes in which students are learning basic vocabulary, but both older and younger students enjoy the activity. And, while the activity is easiest to use in classes with fewer than 30 students, it can be adapted to larger classes by having one group walk at a time, with the other groups taking turns calling out the prompts.

Because this type of physical activity may be unusual for some students, allow them to acclimate to using movement in the classroom. I recommend using music.

Moving to music comes naturally to most learners. Try to play four or five genres with different tempos; choices can range from somnolent background music to something more energetic, like punk rock or heavy metal. You don’t need to play an entire song—just enough to allow the students to react to it. For this activity, lyrics are not important, as students will be responding only to the music.

The Free Music Archive (freemusicarchive. org) has music in nearly every genre imaginable, available for play or download.

PART 1: WALK, LISTEN, AND SHOW

Arrange the desks or chairs in a large circle, or, if the classroom is small, push them to the walls to make space in the middle of the classroom. Keep in mind that the students will have to return to their seats during the class, so the desks should be out of the way but still accessible.

Write the words walk, listen, and show on the board. Ask the students what walk and listen mean. If they can’t explain, ask them to show each action by pointing to the word show on the board. If no one knows these words, demonstrate each of them yourself while repeating the word. To check comprehension, repeat the word and ask students to demonstrate (that is, “show”) the meaning. Encourage students to “show” you the word rather than calling out a translation.

After students understand the concept, ask them to form a circle in the middle of the room. Say “Walk,” point to the word walk on the board, and motion for the students to walk in a circle. Then say “Listen,” point to the word listen, and play a relaxing song.

Now, ask the students to “show.” Demonstrate by joining the circle and walking with the rhythm of the music, swaying, using your hands or doing anything you like, but continue to walk in a circle. Encourage the students to do the same. After they have found their rhythm, change the genre of music and encourage the students to move differently. Start from slower selections and move to faster tempos.

While there may be a little embarrassment at first, students should overcome their hesitation when they realize they are moving more as a group responding to the music than as individuals. Adolescents, in particular, may be reluctant to “show” the music. You can deal with this reluctance by asking students a few days before about their favorite music. Usually when they hear familiar selections, they are more inclined to “show” the music.

It is best to limit this activity to around five songs; about 30 seconds per song is sufficient. After students have “shown” you a sufficient variety of music, have them return to their seats.

PART 2: WALK, LISTEN, SHOW, AND SAY

One way to transition to the language function of this activity is by using weather- related adjectives (e.g., hot, cold, windy, rainy, stormy, snowy). Introduce these terms by using labeled pictures on cards. (If you are not a great artist, clip pictures out of a magazine and add your own labels.)

With students seated, show them a card, point to the picture, say the word (for example, “cold”), and then point to the word show on the board. Show “cold” to students by wrapping your arms around your body and shivering. Say the word while you show it.

Present more cards, again saying each word and pantomiming an action; then go back to your card for cold and ask the students to show the word. Let them look at the picture and react. They don’t have to repeat the word yet. Continue in this way until the students have “shown” all the adjectives.

Return to the board and write say. Hold up the cold card again, say “Cold,” and then point to the word say and repeat “Cold.” Gesture for students to say it as well. Then point to show again and pantomime shivering. Gesture for students to do the same. Start from the beginning with the cards. Go through them one at a time. This time, students say the word and show it. If students forget to “say” or “show,” point to those words on the board.

Because one goal of this activity is to allow students to find their own physical understanding of the adjectives, encourage them to show the words in their own way. If you have a particularly expressive class, consider letting them show all the words without help after you provide the first example.

PART 3: BRINGING IT ALL TOGETHER

After students have demonstrated their understanding, have them return to the middle of the classroom. Point to the word walk on the board and pantomime the action so students will know to walk in a circle.

Now, instead of playing music, you can hold the cards up and call out each word while pointing to show on the board. As students walk in a circle, they must “show” the adjective. Most of them will naturally incorporate this into their walk, but if they are having a difficult time, demonstrate how their walk would adjust to the adjective.

If you feel comfortable, give a theatrical performance of someone walking in a frigid blizzard for cold, but allow students to interpret the other adjectives on their own. Instruct students to say the words as they show them by pointing to say on the board again if necessary. Remember to reorder your cards so you are not reading them in the same order every time.

After students feel comfortable with the activity, you can change the length of the pause between cards so that students have to quickly change the way they are walking. You could also call out two adjectives at once so that the students have to try to show them simultaneously (which is always funny).

Initially, this activity can be limited by students’ experience. That is why I recommend starting with the simple weather vocabulary. Students may have never experienced cold weather, but they usually know how to show it. They may not have any idea how to show concepts such as “humid” even if they understand them. In exploring these concepts by relating them to known vocabulary, students find ways to respond to vocabulary that is more complex. Humid, for example, could be shown as a combination of wet and hot, once those terms are understood.

After the initial class, I continue to use this activity as a warm-up to review the previous lesson’s vocabulary. If the class learns other weather adjectives, the students find ways to show the new words like misty or icy.

The activity helps students explore and personalize many beginner vocabulary sets. For example, “feelings” vocabulary sets are also easily shown. The reason I don’t start with feelings is that the whole body reacts to weather, but when I have started with feelings, students have had a hard time giving more than facial expressions. For “rooms in the house” vocabulary, students can show what they do in each room, and the same approach can be used for “places around town.” Rather than physically reacting to a command (“Stand up,” “Sit down,” etc.), students are reacting to their interpretation of a concept. As a result, vocabulary sets related to family members, food items, clothing, and even colors can be used (see the suggestions below).

As a warm-up, this activity serves the functions of refreshing students’ knowledge of a word and allowing them to have fun interacting with it. Encourage them to interpret each term for themselves when they “show” it. If students feel that they are only copying the teacher or other students, the activity ceases to be enjoyable. As long as students feel free to react personally to the word, they will continue to enjoy the activity.

SELECTED PHYSICAL VOCABULARY TOPICS

1. Clothing. Sweaters are heavy; formal clothes are stiff; casual clothes are loose; footwear changes the way students walk (everyone loves showing high heels or a “slippers shuffle”). With less obvious articles of clothing like hats and socks, students can pantomime putting them on or adjusting them.
2. Family members. Students usually agree on universals such as mothers hold babies, sons jump around, daughters skip, fathers have a dignified walk, grandparents hobble, and aunts and uncles take on idiosyncratic actions (ask students about their aunts and uncles to discover these characteristics).
3. Rooms in a house. This topic is usually appropriate to include after students have learned common action terms such as eat, sleep, drink, read, and watch TV. Students pantomime each action depending on what they usually do in each room: they watch TV in the living room, eat in the dining room, and sleep in their bedroom. The garage usually suggests a driving pantomime; for basements, students start at full height and “walk downstairs,” bending their knees as they go.
4. Colors. It is important to have already studied feelings before using colors in this activity because the two are linked. Students determine for themselves how certain colors make them feel. I ask them this and write feelings on the board next to each color in a mind- map cloud. After we have explored the emotional range of each color, students walk and show these colors.
5. Food. Students respond to food items usually by showing a pleased or disgusted overall appearance, varying in terms of severity. I introduce the scale of preference (hate, dislike, like, love, etc.) as part of this lesson, and students explore in advance ways of showing varying degrees of preference for food items.

REFERENCE

Asher, J. 1996. Learning another language through actions. 5th ed. Los Gatos, CA: Sky Oak Productions.

Jonathan Maiullo began teaching English to Sudanese and Afghan refugees while an undergraduate at Michigan State University. As a Master’s International student, he volunteered as an English teacher-trainer in Yeghegnadzor, Armenia, with the Peace Corps.

He has since worked as an actor for an international EFL theater troupe based in Buenos Aires, and most recently, he was an English Language Fellow in Asunción, Paraguay

Going public with our research is an important part of the research process. Besides the intrinsic value of sharing our experience and our insights with a community of peers, in higher education, publishing is vital for job security and promotion. Despite these forces encouraging us to publish, few academics actually do.

Reports from all over the world reveal that the publication rate among scholars is low. Academics in South Africa and Australia, for example, publish an average of 0.4 articles per year (Gevers 2006; McGrail, Rickard, and Jones 2006). The importance of publication compared to the relatively small numbers of teachers and scholars who publish, however, is an issue not only for tenure-track professors at universities; kindergarten through twelfth-grade (K–12) teachers of English as a foreign language (EFL), EFL administrators, and TESOL (Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages) professionals have experience and ideas that could be more broadly shared in outlets from newsletters to academic research journals.

Researchers have identified a number of explanations for why publication rates are so low, including time constraints, inadequate skills, and lack of institutional support. Among academics for whom English is an additional language, the challenges of writing for publication are even more complex (Benfield and Feak 2006; Uzuner 2008). English as an additional language (EAL) students and academics face difficulties because of unfamiliarity with genre patterns and the structure of articles in English journals that are generated in cultural contexts different from their own (Hyland 2003). EAL scholars must learn the unwritten “rules of the [publishing] game” as it is played in academic journals of the English-speaking world (Gosden 1992, 136).

The purpose of this article is to provide an introduction to identifying the hidden rules and explicating the sometimes intimidating world of publishing. It focuses on the journal article genre, but the insights and advice are useful for teachers and scholars both inside and outside the university. For example, K–12 teachers who wish to share lessons from their classroom experience or EFL administrators who want to publish their observations and practical solutions will find helpful suggestions. The article presents a tool for teaching about publishing in a way that can benefit teachers and scholars who are interested in getting their ideas into print. It will assist younger academics who have never published before and will serve as a refresher course for senior academics who have already published. The article begins with an overview of the literature on obstacles to writing that academics face. We then offer ten practical tips for overcoming these barriers in order to get articles published.

(Download the attached PDF to read the full article.)

Level

High-Intermediate to Advanced

Language Focus

Speaking, listening (primary focus); reading (secondary focus)

Goals

Students will increase their speaking and listening skills through role-play activities centered on deforestation.

Materials

• Teacher: whiteboard/chalkboard, markers or chalk, a timing device, a world map for reference.
• Students: pencils or pens, notebooks or writing paper.

Preparation

This week’s Teacher’s Corner is a role-play. Each of the three roles has a different agenda and goal on whether forests should be protected or cut down for profit.

1. Read through all the materials carefully.
2. For large classes, consider having students work in pairs or small groups. To encourage speaking and communication, having students work in pairs or small groups is recommended.
3. Prior to class, read the Voice of America article Deforestation Decreased Over the Past 10 Years and listen to the audio version of the story as well.
4. Print enough role-play cards for each student (or pairs/groups) found in Appendix 1.
5. If needed, print copies of the VOA Article “Deforestation Decreased Over the Past 10 Years” for students to read after you play the audio in class. If possible, show the article to students using a classroom projector instead of printing copies, and save a tree!
6. If possible, give the role-play cards to students before the class. This provides them time to research information online that may be helpful in their role-play.

Procedures

Part 1 – Pre-Role-Play

1. Begin the class with a brainstorm activity. Write the word trees on the board and ask students “What makes trees important in our lives?” Have the students do a think, pair, share.
1. Think – after asking the students, “What makes trees important in our lives?” give them several minutes to brainstorm some reasons why trees are important. Have them list these ideas on a sheet of paper.
2. Pair – once students have generated a list, have them find a partner and share their lists.
3. Share – elicit ideas from the pairs of students and list their reasons for the importance of trees.
2. Next, play the Voice of America article “Deforestation Decreased Over the Past 10 Years” audio file for the students. For the first play of the audio, allow students to just listen.
1. Check student comprehension by asking:
• What is deforestation? – The cutting down of trees.
• Has deforestation increased or decreased during the last decade? - Decreased
3. Play the audio again, but this time, ask students to take notes to answer the following questions. If needed, write the questions on the board as students listen to the audio:
1. Which countries reduced their deforestation rates? – Brazil and Indonesia
2. Which countries began tree planting programs? – China, India, Vietnam, United States
3. Which parts of the world lost the most trees over the last 10 years? – Africa, South America
• If a map is available, show the places after each question is answered.
4. Ask the students again, “What is deforestation?” and elicit answers from the class. Ask, “Can cutting down trees be good?” and again elicit answers from the class.
1. Note – students may say that cutting down trees is always bad. The goal of these questions is to encourage them to think critically about the issue of deforestation and why it may happen, so ask follow-up questions to get them to think beyond good and bad.
5. Ask the students two final questions: “If we cut down trees, what can we do with the trees?” and “If we cut down trees, what can we do with the land?”
1. Have the students work in pairs to think about and answer these questions. Give them several minutes to brainstorm answers to these questions. When the pairs of students have brainstormed ideas, have them work with another pair and share their ideas as a group. After several minutes, bring the class back together and elicit some answers from the class.
• There is no correct answer to these questions. The goal is to encourage them to think about the economic reasons deforestation may occur. For example, if trees are cut down, wood can be used to build homes or the land can be used for farming.

Part 2 – Role-Play
The role-play can be played with three students, each student playing a unique role. However, to encourage more collaboration and speaking opportunities, have pairs or small groups of students take on each role.

1. Place students into pairs or small groups. These pairs/small groups will work together and get a single roleplay card, of either A, B, or C. They will work with two other groups to make a unit.
2. Combine the pairs/small groups into units of three pairs/small groups each.
3. Provide each pair/small group a role-play card. Each pair/small group should keep their role a secret from the other pairs/small groups in the unit.
1. Provide the students time to work in their pairs/small groups to think about their role.
2. Circulate around the room and help students brainstorm ideas by asking them what is important for their role. What goal does their role have? What is the best way to convince the other pairs/small groups to share their opinion?
4.  Begin the role-play with Group A. They should start with a brief introduction to the other groups and then allow the other groups to introduce themselves.
1. Encourage students to role-play! This means they should avoid just reading their cards to the other pairs/small groups. One way to encourage this is to have students put their role cards away after the brainstorming period in step #8!
5. Give the students 10-15 minutes to role-play the discussion. Circulate around the room and check with each unit to ensure that all pairs/small groups are getting speaking time.
1. If time permits after the debate ends, have the pairs/small groups take on new roles and then form new units with other pairs/small groups. By switching roles, the students can practice understanding different sides of a discussion.
6. End the role play by having Group A of each unit announce their decision to the class. Will they limit deforestation or continue cutting down trees? Encourage them to explain how they reached their decision.
7. This activity can be followed up with a homework writing assignment. Have each group write a report of the meeting to their bosses:
1. Group A – Write a report to deliver to the President. Give the President advice on whether the Forestania should continue deforestation or save the trees.
2. Group B – Write a report to supporters of Speak for the Trees International and describe the meeting. Was it a success? If so, why? Was it not successful? If so, why?
3. Group C – Write a report to the business that Northington Business Advisors supports. Was the meeting a success? If so, why? Was it unsuccessful? If so, why?

For more information on incorporating environmental issues into your class, check out the following resources:

Going Green: Merging Environmental Education and Language Instruction

Integrating Environmental Education into a Genre-Based EFL Writing Class

Strange Weather: Climate Change Activities for the English

Low-Intermediate to Advanced

Reading, writing (primary focus); speaking (secondary focus)

Students will increase their reading and writing abilities through engagement with news articles and current events. Students will also practice speaking as they report their news stories in class.

• Teacher: whiteboard/chalkboard, markers or chalk, world map, a timing device, a small box/hat/container for drawing numbers randomly.
• Students: pencils or pens, notebooks or writing paper.

Preparation

One way to incorporate world affairs into classroom practice is through classroom games centered on world news and current events.

This week’s Teacher’s Corner is about fantasy politics.* In this game, students select countries to be on their team. Each week, students will need to check English language news websites or newspapers to find stories that feature their countries. Each time one of a student’s countries is featured in the news, he/she receives points. At the end of each week, students will report their scores to the class. The student with the most points wins!

1.     Read through all the materials carefully.

2.     Hang a map of the world in the classroom, or bring a map to class each time fantasy politics is played.

3.     This activity encourages students to pay attention to and read news stories. Prior to using the activity in class, it is recommended that you compile a list of possible sources to be used in the activity. For lower level students, the activity could be focused on a specific news website such as Voice of America’s Learning English.

4.     In the game, students will be creating lists of countries that they will follow on the news. Decide how many countries you would like to make available to students. Make sure the number of countries is divisible by the number of students. For example, in a class of 10 students, you can offer a list of 60 countries or 5 per student or per team and 10 countries that are kept in reserve. These reserve countries will allow students to remove countries from their list and add new countries at the end of each week. This option (to remove/add teams) adds and element of strategy to the game and can allow poorly performing teams to make changes to their list.

5.     For large classes, consider having students work in pairs or small groups. To encourage speaking and communication, having students work in pairs or small groups is recommended.

6.     Create small slips of papers with letters on them. There should be enough slips of paper for the total number of players or teams that will play. These slips of paper will be used for a random drawing.

7.     If possible, hang a large sheet of paper on the classroom wall. This sheet should list the students (or pairs/small groups) with their countries and the number of weeks in the game. For an example score sheet, see Appendix 1.

8.     To prevent teams from being imbalanced, such as one team having many nations from the same region, create different rules. For example: teams are not allowed to have more than two nations from: Asia, Africa, Europe, North America and must have at least one country from: Oceania (e.g. Australia, Fiji, New Zealand) and South America.

* The name fantasy politics comes from a popular hobby of sports fans in the United States. Each year, fans of American football will play fantasy football. At the beginning of the season (seasons are 15 weeks long), each player selects real American football players to be on their “fantasy team.” Then, fantasy football players watch the week’s football games and are awarded points based on how well their team members performed in real-life games. At the end of each week, players are allowed, and even encouraged, to make changes to their teams or trade with other fantasy football players to try and improve their team.

Part 1 – Pre-Draft Day

1.     Before draft day (the day the countries are selected), explain to students the idea of Fantasy Politics. This will provide them time to think about countries they may want to select.

2.     Explain the point structure of the game to the students. For points, there are two options; decide which version of the game is best for your students.

a.     Basic Game – In the basic game, each time a country is mentioned in the news players/teams are awarded two points.

• To get these points, students must document where and when their countries were in the news; this requires they write down the newspaper/website name, the date, and the title of the news story.

b.     Advanced Game – In the advanced game, players/teams are awarded three points each time their country is mentioned in a positive news story, such as a story about a scientific achievement or economic growth. If a player’s country is mentioned in a negative news story, such as involvement in conflict, they receive only one point.

c.     IMPORTANT – Inform students that news stories are only worth points if they occur during the current week of the game. Old news stories cannot be counted. For example, if the game begins January 1^st only news stories from January 1^st – 7^th are counted in the Week 1 scores. This ensures the students are reading current events.

3.     Allow students the chance to form teams or place them into teams. Give them time to work as a team and decide which countries they may want to select.

4.     Provide students with three or four days advanced notice so that they have time to begin checking news stories and thinking about which countries they would like on their team.

Part 2 – Draft Day

5.     Begin class looking at the world map and giving teams a few moments to consider the countries they may want to select.

6.     To make the country selection process fair, assign each team a letter and add that letter on a slip of paper to a random drawing. Mix the slips of papers well and then select the slips of paper from the drawing. The team whose letter is drawn first will choose first in the round. The team whose letter is selected last will choose a team last in this round. Each team selects one country per round. To keep the selection process from taking too long, set a timer so each team has a limited time to decide which country to select.

7.     Rounds will continue until a specific number of countries have been selected.

a.     For example, if 5 teams are playing and each is allowed to select 5 countries, there will be five rounds of country selection for a total of 25 countries.

8.     To make selection fair, the game uses a serpentine selection. In serpentine selection, the team that goes last in a round selects first the next round.

a.     For example, in a random drawing, the teams are selected in the order of: B, D, A, C, E.

b.     In round one, the order of selection is in that order of: B, D, A, C, E.

c.     In round two, the order is reversed and teams select in the order of: E, C, A, D, B.

Part 3 – The Following Weeks

9.     Over the weeks that fantasy politics is played, teams are responsible for keeping up on the news that features the countries on their team.

10.  Allocate time in class to review the points the teams earn each week. This should be done at the end of the week or as early as possible the following week so teams can make changes to their teams.

11.  Student teams are encouraged to make trades with one another and change their countries if they wish. This adds an element of strategy to the game. If one team has a country frequently in the news, they could accept offers from other teams to trade. Other teams may need to be willing to trade more than one of their countries to get a country they really want!

12.  One suggested option for the game is to keep a reserve of countries by having more countries than teams are allowed to initially select. For example, in a game of fantasy politics with 5 student teams who are allowed to select 5 countries (for a total of 25), it would be best to have at least 35 countries available. This way, if teams have countries on their list that are not in the news, they can drop that country and pick another from the reserve list. Be sure to warn students that just because a country is not in the news this week doesn’t mean it won’t be in the news the following week, so they must choose carefully!