Archive for the ‘Present continuous/ present simple’ Category

… are exactly the same as Xmas ESL ideas 2007 (haven’t written any special lessons on seasonal shopping in a worldwide depression yet, although I could use my grandfather’s story about his pet rabbit being served up for an East End Xmas lunch if I did), but at least that means this year I can get all the links out of the way in one post and so not repeat the TEFL equivalent of 6 weeks of nonstop Xmas carols like we had here in 2007. And here all the articles, teaching ideas and photocopiable worksheets are- a veritable Xmas feast, stuffed stocking etc etc to bring seasonal cheer to the last few weeks before the holiday without the need for sipping brandy between classes:

Articles and teaching ideas

Christmas vocabulary you can mime

Combining Xmas with a young learner syllabus

Doing something with Xmas songs

Putting the grammar back into Christmas

Games and other photocopiable worksheets

Future Perfect New Year predictions

New Year action and state verbs

New Year resolutions adverbs of frequency - going to for plans and learner training

Xmas first conditional superstitions bluff game - a classic, hopefully not ruined in my version

Christmas Adverbs of Frequency- Present Simple and lots of lovely (not stereotyped) cultural information

Christmas traditions passives bluff game

Xmas guess the country modals of deduction

Christmas Present Simple and Continuous mimes- contrasting routines and things happening now, with lots of nice Chrimbo vocab

Christmas Past Tense mimes - Past continuous when they finish miming and then tense review as they talk about their own experiences of those things

Will for future predictions Xmas

Xmas trivia number pairwork - good for Business English, Technical English and other ESP classes

Business English Christmas cards Do’s and Don’ts - imperatives and important cultural information

Describing Xmas foods bluff game - good for students who want to explain food from their own country to foreign guests, e.g. Business English students who often entertain clients

Going to Xmas mimes - for predictions with present evidence

Xmas party negotiations - the best ever game for the language of meetings and negotiations, as there is a clear winner, and some good Xmas vocab

Video Worksheets

Friends Series One New Year episode

Edward Scissor Hands- cute, seasonal, the easiest film in the English language, and full of lots of lovely reference expressions

The Life of Brian - as mentioned on a recent Dave’s ESL Cafe thread, only for veeeery high level and open-minded students

Xmas Song worksheets

Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer

The Christmas Song (”Chesnuts roasting on an open fire” etc)

White Xmas song correct the mistakes

15 fun ways of using pre-school storybooks

15 ways of preparing for ELT management

15 variations on a grammar auction

15 common complaints about TEFL workshops (and how to respond to them)

15 things to find out about a TEFL certificate course

15 criteria of a good needs analysis

How’s that for a minimalist blog post! To make up for the lack of text, here are even more links:

157 articles and worksheets of mine on UsingEnglish.com

onestopenglish.com (the Macmillan website, where you usually have to pay to see most of my stuff but which has some kind of special offer on at the moment)

New stuff in August, for those who have recently joined us (welcome!)

And brand new worksheets etc actually on TEFLtastic:

Business English rotating revision board game

Complaints sentence expansion game

Dealing with complaints guess the situation

Dealing with complaints pairwork- Amusing and odd excuses

Email and internet abbreviations

Email language definitions game

Email rules business meeting

Formal and informal email errors

Telephone and email spot the difference pairwork

“Punishment“- Passive voice and tense review

Table manners Present Simple and Continuous mimes

Describing people workshop

English for Telephoning/ Negotiating double book review

As mentioned in a comment or two below (and in every other sentence in my real life conversation), I am off on my reasonably well deserved hols from Friday and won’t even be looking at a computer screen for the next 10 days. For those of you who can’t live without an opinionated TEFL rant until I get back, I’m sure there must be something in my 458 posts over the last 14 months that you must have missed, so have a little trawl through the archives here- I’m sure there must be something there to entertain and/ or offend you!

For those of you still here for the serious stuff that I was supposed to have set this blog up for, here are the links to bits and pieces I have been involved in elsewhere in the world on TEFL. The top two are my own particular favourites from the last few months:

15 ways to help your students forget

15 ways to help your students dream in English

15 games for the language of describing people

15 real life situations for the language of describing people

15 typical textbook activities you can personalize

15 difficulties in teaching the language of describing people

15 ways to write a TEFL review

Office vocabulary compound noun stress

Why does my teacher make us work in pairs?

Talking about your job and company first class

Business English prepositions

Present Simple/ Continuous and Tense Review Guessing Game

Complaints prepositions practice

More Xmas links, should you be a glutton for merriment (including one that says “Focus: Fluency speaking, advanced vocab, conversation, destroying students’ enjoyment of Christmas”, which is nice)

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Sorry that it’s all worksheets worksheets worksheets recently, but what can I say- that’s exactly how I’m starting to feel writing them all…

http://www.tefl.net/alexcase/worksheets-ielts-speaking-sports-verbs-play-do-go-go-to/

http://www.tefl.net/alexcase/worksheets-ielts-speaking-subject-questions/

http://www.tefl.net/alexcase/worksheets-ielts-speaking-tense-review/

http://www.tefl.net/alexcase/worksheets-ielts-speaking-work-prepostions-nounprep-collocations/

As well as practising the exam, the worksheets are all designed to fit in with the syllabus of Face2Face Pre-Intermediate, which is a textbook I hate much less than any other I’ve used recently!