Teaching Tip 2: Reading Aloud

How:

1. Pick a student and ask him/her to read the instructions for Activity 1/2/3 or whatever. "Marco, please read the instructions for Activity 2 for us".
   
   
2. Pick a different student each time.

Why:

1. It saves you doing it.
   
   
2. You can check pronunciation.
   
   
3. The other students may well understand the instructions better when read by another student.
   
   
4. The students are more likely to listen to another student than to you.
   
   
5. If they all read the instructions silently they will all finish at different times. If they listen to someone reading the instructions out loud they all finish at the same time.

Extra Info:

Getting students to read aloud used to be unpopular because the powers that be said that it was unrealistic as we never do it in real life - you read books silently, don’t you? Things have changed since then as it has since been argued that we do do it, e.g. "hey, listen to this, it says in the paper here that Prince Charles is already, secretly, married to Camilla! Listen - 'Prince Charles allegedly married Camilla Parker Bowles in a secret ceremony at Windsor Castle yesterday. The ceremony was attended only by the prince’s closest family and friends. A palace spokesman denied the rumour, saying that...'"

© Liz Regan 2003