Buckland Weekly #22 - How To Avoid Getting Into Trouble

As always these notes are based on my own experience of China and should not be taken as an official statement of Buckland's position.

Not Getting Into Trouble

Mostly staying out of trouble is just a matter of using some common sense, but in this document, just to be sure, I'll mention a few things that could potentially lead to difficulties. If it all seems a bit obvious, that's good because it means that you already have the right idea. You would be surprised at how often people come with the wrong idea.

Visitors on Campus

Your apartment may be on campus. This is quite common and it has some advantages and some disadvantages. One of the disadvantages is a lack of privacy. If you have come to China as a couple then you will be sharing an apartment but should still be aware that students are always about - behave accordingly. It's very different if you are here alone. You may well form a relationship while you are here. It happens. You must be discrete. Remember that visitors to apartments on campus, even just having a friend over for coffee, ought to be cleared with the school first. As with any country, schools don't like strangers wandering about. Having someone stay overnight may not be allowed at all so check out with other teachers what the rules are and follow them. Just remember that it's all about the safety and the security of the students. The plus side is that it also gives you safety and security.

PDA

Some places, like Yangshuo, are a little more relaxed and western than others because of the number of foreigners but away from those places, in cities with fewer visitors, you may well notice that public displays of affection are rarely seen. This is cultural and should be respected and copied. Hugging and kissing, even holding hands, isn't commonly seen. It isn't likely that anyone will actually say anything but it might get people looking at you.

Inappropriate Dress

How you dress in the classroom is quite important. The simplest advice is to start out in your most formal clothes for the first week and look at how the other teachers there dress. From the second week you can adopt the same dress style that they do. Remember that it's easy to go to a less formal dress code from a more formal one but hard the other way. If you go in to school in jeans and a T-shirt in the first week but find that every other teacher is in a suit, then you have already made a bad impression that will be difficult to recover.

Generally schools expect you to dress smartly and professionally. You don't usually need to be very formal but proper trousers and a good shirt give a good impression.

It is possible, though not likely, that some schools will have specific dress codes or even ask teachers to wear a provided uniform. (I have only once come across this.) There isn't a lot you can do about this except follow their regulations. They may be prepared to make an exception for you, but they may not.

Drunkenness or Drugs

These are two very big issues that will cause problems. No one will mind you going out and having a drink outside school hours. China has a very social culture and you will probably be invited to eat and drink with other teachers. You will also want to go out with your friends. However, it's important to never turn up drunk or hung-over to class. This should be obvious but when you are out of your own culture it's easy to get caught up in the moment and drink too much. Most of us have done it. Just be careful when you have school tomorrow.

As for drugs, all I can say is “don't.” At best it would get you into trouble with the school and depending on the situation it could get you thrown out of China or even into jail. The Chinese authorities have very strict laws about drugs.

Smoking

It's less of a problem now than it once was but there is something of a double standard when it comes to smoking in public. As with the PDAs, you shouldn't judge by what you see in Yangshuo because it isn't typical. Typically, elsewhere, you will see that men smoke at anytime and anywhere but you won't often see women smoking in public. Nowadays, among younger adults, in bars or coffee shops, you will see it but in public buildings or in the street, it is rare. It won't cause any problems but it is against the social norm. Smoking is allowed in most places and I sometimes see male teachers smoking in school offices but I have literally never seen a woman teacher smoking at school.

Lateness

The school expects you to be in class before the start of each lesson. If you live on campus this isn't a problem as the time from your apartment to the classroom is a couple of minutes. However one of the disadvantages of living off campus is that you could be quite a distance from the school. I was a forty minute bus ride from one of my schools. You are still expected to be on time. Clearly there might be something unexpected that delays you and you should inform the school by phone if that happens but if you are regularly late, even by a couple of minutes, then you will get in trouble.

Inappropriate classroom behaviour

China doesn't have the strict regulations that England or America have regarding teacher student interactions. (Remember in England a teacher cannot give a student a pat on the back for work well done or even be alone in a classroom with a student. Touching a student in any way at all is only allowed in order to prevent immediate physical danger – for example if he is about to fall from a window. America has, I believe, similar laws.) It's not as strict here but it's better to act as if it were.

It's hard to pin down exactly what kind of classroom behaviour is inappropriate. As a general rule of thumb work on the principle that if it would get you in trouble at home, it could get you in trouble here, and always try to behave as professionally as you can.

Lack of Preparation

The school can ask to see your lesson plans. If your lessons are going well and everything is fine they probably won't but if you are struggling or they feel your classes are not up to standard, they might. If you can't show them a lesson plan they will, possibly rightly, assume that it's because you didn't make one. If you have been a teacher before, or have been working here for some time, you may well be able to walk into a classroom with your plan just in your head and teach a great lesson. I have a number of lessons that I have taught so often I could do them without a moment's thought before the lesson begins. I still print them out and take them to school with me. There is always the chance that someone will want to see them. 

Also keep them filed. They might ask to see the ones for lessons that have already been done. Again they probably won't but they might.

Unless you do already have a lot of experience, don't try to teach without preparing. There will be more about how to prepare and the documents you need during orientation but at the absolute minimum you should write out a running order for your lesson and details of any tasks or activities that you want to use.

Bad Language or Rudeness

We all have bad days but in China, even more than at home, it's important to maintain your politeness when dealing with others, no matter how frustrating you find it. Losing your temper and swearing or being rude, even shouting or just raising your voice, causes a loss of face both for you and for the person you are dealing with. You may feel that your voice isn't being heard, that no one is understanding your point. It may even be true. There are often cross-cultural misunderstandings. However, you need to just keep on trying to explain your point of view calmly.

As I said at the start, most of this should be obvious and it can all be summed up as being professional in your attitude and behaviour. We have a saying in England for telling someone things they already know. We say (and I have no idea why) that it is “teaching your grandmother to suck eggs”. Apologies if this has sounded like that, but all these things do occasionally bear repeating.

Buckland Weekly #21 - Some Thoughts On Classroom Management

Classroom Management

So, you have completed your orientation, settled in at your school and turned up for your class. What can you expect, and more to the point, what can't you expect? What issues are likely to come up in class that will make class management more difficult than you expected?

Missing or broken equipment

Most Chinese classrooms are equipped with computers but you cannot always be certain that they will be working. If you want to create computer-based lessons that's great but always have a backup plan in case the computer isn't working. It's true wherever you teach – whether in China or anyother country – you should not count on all equipment always working. Always have a non-technology plan in reserve just in case.

Difficulties in producing handouts

You could have twenty-classes of eighty students in a week – that's 1600 students. If you want to give two handouts to each student that would be 3200 pieces of paper. That's clearly not practical. You need to keep handouts to a minimum and keep them reusable. The other problem is photocopying. If you are lucky your school may have free copying facilities providing you only want sensible amounts but that isn't always the case. You may have to go to commercial copy shops and copy things for yourself. While copying is very cheap, it soon adds up if you do a lot of it.

I have never seen a laminator in China so don't count on that being an option. It is possible to laminate with wide strips of sellotape but it is time-consuming and not very easy. My tip is to photocopy enough to give one copy per group for one class and then seal them in plastic wallets (you can buy them in most stationery shops), hand them out and collect them back in. Print a couple of extra copies because some will get damaged or not returned.

Physical layout

Classrooms may be laid out in various ways but however they are organised the problem remains that there are a lot of students in a fairly small space. The most common layout of the desks is in rows facing forward but it does vary. Sometimes they will be laid out so that organising students into groups is easy, sometimes it won't. As you have only forty minutes and MUST leave everything as it was at the start there is no time to change things around. It can be a challenge but you have to work with what you are given. If you have completed any kind of teacher training at home you will have learned that you should mix up the groups, arrange them differently so that they speak to different people, perhaps group them according to ability.

That's not really an option here. You are more or less forced to group students simply with the other students sitting near to them. Anything else takes too long to explain and too long to organise. I just walk around the class indicating with my arms and saying “Group1, Group 2 etc.”

Environmental issues.

Depending where you are based you may find classrooms too hot or too cold or too noisy. This is the same for everyone and there is nothing that you can do about it. Just try to be patient and remember the old saying that what can't be changed must be endured. One thing about noise is that often it will be coming from outside the school. Last year one of my schools was next door to a building site and the noise reached very high levels. Again, there is nothing you can do about this. What it does mean is that you need to make extra efforts to keep the noise level INSIDE the classroom, the talking and shouting from the students, to a minimum. If you are aware that there is a noise problem (as I was on the second day of the building work) have some activities that the students can work on with little input from you. It isn't ideal as this is supposed to be an Oral English class but it is better than nothing.

All these issues will impact greatly on your lesson planning and on the range of possible activities.

Activities that involve a lot of motion around the classroom – such as the mingling activities typically used in language teaching in the west – are best avoided or adjusted. One way to adjust them is to make sure that they require only six or eight people and then break the class into appropriately sized groups. Then, effectively, they can mingle without leaving their seats. Activities that involve a student from each group coming to the front (vocabulary races, pictionary etc) can be easily organised.

Finally there is the issue of discipline.

Discipline

For the most part classes here are reasonably well-behaved and disciplined but they are still children and like children everywhere they might misbehave. We'll look later at what you can do if you are unlucky enough to have a particularly badly-behaved class but first let's look at some of the low level problems you will meet from time to time.

Sometimes you may find students sleeping in class. They aren't being disrespectful to you. Students here work very long days and they are, especially in the mornings, often tired. What you do about it is up to you. I have had teachers advise me to just let them sleep because if they are asleep they are quiet. That doesn't sit well with me as I believe I should be trying to reach everyone in the class. I generally wake them up and then if they fall asleep again ask their nearest classmate to keep waking them up.

You will also find students doing various things they shouldn't be – playing with their phones, reading books or magazines or – most often – doing another teacher's homework. Generally I confiscate whatever the offending item is and return it at the end of the lesson. I don't make a big fuss about it because that just loses time and makes the students embarrassed and resentful. Simply take it and give it back later. If in one lesson I confiscate multiple items from one student, I sometimes tell them that one more thing and they will have to go to their class teacher (home room teacher) to get it all back. I have very rarely had to actually do that.

Lateness, especially in the first class in the afternoon, can be quite common. Again, there are various things you can do. They key is to do whatever you find least disruptive to the lesson. I usually ask the students why they are late (“Sleeping” is by far the most common answer) and then let them join the class. Then I make sure that they next few questions are directed at them. Other teachers will make them stand at the side until there is a convenient place for them to join the class.

I have heard of teachers making them do a task, answer a question or even sing a song but this, in my opinion, is not a good idea. It disrupts the lesson and just causes further problems with the student.

By far the most common problem is just noise level. It will, unchecked, creep up to a point where teaching becomes impossible. You need to be clear from the first lesson that this isn't allowed. They don't do it for their Chinese teachers, there is no reason they should do it for you. There are various ways to deal with it. You can learn the Chinese for “be quiet” (An jing). You can ask the class monitor to tell them to be quiet. You can individually tell the noisiest students to be quiet. I find it effective just to stop speaking and stand at the front, possibly looking directly at the worst offenders. One thing you shouldn't do is start shouting at them. You can't make things quieter by shouting. Also you should not make threats that you aren't able to carry out or aren't prepared to carry out. Don't threaten to give homework to noisy students unless you are going to do it and definitely don't threaten to take them to their class teacher unless you are going to do it. They will very quickly catch on if you are often making empty gestures.

One final issue of classroom behaviour, though not of discipline as such, is that often, if you ask a question to the whole class no one will answer – even if it is an easy question that you know they can all do. Similarly, asking a question to an individual student might get a blank look or a shake of the head. This is because, even if they know the answer, they are afraid that they will look foolish and lose face if they get it wrong. From the very start I make it clear that I don't mind wrong answers. I won't be angry or annoyed, I will just help them find the right answer. They can take some convincing but when they eventually learn that this is what you will do things usually get better. It's also useful to let them work in groups and then ask the group for an answer as that way there is a collective responsibility for the answer and no individual feels embarrassed if it is wrong. 

Very occasionally you may have more serious issues to deal with – fighting, for example. The best way to deal with things that are serious is to either send the class monitor to find a Chinese teacher or put the class monitor in charge and take the students to the office. This is really a last resort though and should only be used for serious problems that you can't deal with in class. Problems that you deal with but nevertheless think are serious enough to need further action, you should report to their Chinese English teacher or the head of your department. Get the class monitor to write down the names of the students so that you can do this. There is no guarantee that anything will happen but usually the schools will take some action, even if it is only to warn the students not to do it again.

So, in general

Keep smiling/ don't let yourself get angry (though I do sometimes pretend to be angry)

Be confident. Speak loudly and clearly but DON'T shout.

Be patient. Just standing and waiting can be effective.

If it's possible separate students who are causing problems.

You can make persistent offenders stand at the front or the back of the classroom.

Don't send students out of the classroom. Schools often don't like this and there is no guarantee they

will still be there at the end of the lesson.

Take only very serious offenders to the office.

Only get a Chinese teacher as a last resort.

Don't threaten punishments you can't or won't follow through on.

Some tips for classroom management

Finally, here are a couple of short tips that might help. Students will often misbehave because they can't understand what is happening or what you want them to do. So you need to make everything as clear as you can.

Use short simple activities for lower level classes.

Plan in advance how you will explain, what you will say and what you will write on the board.

Always write instructions on the board as well as repeating them.

Don't check understanding by asking “do you understand?” (The answer will always be “yes”, whether they understand or not.) use concept questions instead (How many words do you need to

find? What kind of words do we want?)

Speak slowly and clearly. Repeat at least three times.

Always walk around the class and check if the students are on task. If more than one group has the

same misunderstanding stop and go through the instructions again. Help groups with the task if they

need it.

Buckland Weekly #20 - What Makes a Good Activity?

There are all sorts of things you can do in your lessons and some activities work better than others. What exactly makes a good activity? Well, before you can answer it you need to keep a few things in mind:

you are working in a class that could contain eighty students;

your job is to teach “oral English” - writing, reading and grammar are incidental;

the class may have very mixed levels.

So keeping that in mind, what's the answer?

Let's start with a list and then consider it point by point.

• Involves whole class
• clear instructions/ demonstration
• has a point and a completion
• relevant to study
• appropriate for age and level
• reviewed at end
• not too complicated or too simple
• not too vague
• can be done by both weak and strong students
• achievable
• timed
• new

Involves the whole class.

This can be difficult to achieve with such large classes. I have observed teachers who have got it spectacularly wrong. If your lesson is, for example, about food, you can certainly elicit from a few students the answer to “What is your favourite food?” as a starting point for the lesson but if you ask all eighty students the same question not only will it waste half of your lesson but most of the students are doing nothing at all for most of the time. What has been a forty minute lesson from your point of view has been a thirty second lesson from any individual students point of view.

The way round this is to divide the class into groups and then make sure each group is getting a chance to participate in the activity – as well as designing your activity so that everyone in the group can do something.

Clear Instructions and Demonstration

This was discussed in the last post but bears repeating. Make your instructions as simple as possible. Write them as well as speaking them and if at all possible demonstrate the activity as well as describing it. Get a couple of the strongest students to come out and demonstrate or demonstrate with one of the students yourself.

Has A Point and A Completion

I don't like poorly defined open ended activities. Let me give an example. Imagine your lesson is about shopping and you have done some kind of warm up and introduced the sentences and vocabulary needed and you are no ready to get them producing the language. Putting them in pairs and saying “one of you is a shopkeeper and one of you is a customer, practice buying and selling”. is a terrible activity. There isn't a specific point to it and they have no way of knowing when they have finished. Instead, set it up this way, Put them in groups of six and making three shopkeepers and three customers. Then giving each customer an amount of money and a (different) shopping list and each shopkeeper a (different) list of stock and prices. tell them that the customers must buy everything as cheaply as possible and the shopkeepers must sell as much as possible. Now the activity has been specifically defined and it has an end point – when every customer has bought everything on his or her list.

Relevant To Study/ Appropriate for Age and Level

Think about your class. Back in England I taught adult asylum seekers who needed topics such as how to speak to their lawyer or doctor. Those would be irrelevant in my Chinese classes. Use topics and activities that relate to the lives of your students.

Reviewed At End

You should always try to include a review phase in your activities. This can be done as you are walking round but I prefer to always ask a few review questions at the end. I review as I monitor but I also always keep in mind which groups have done especially well on the task and then ask them some questions from the front so that the whole class can hear the modelled answers. For example in the shopping task mentioned above I might ask the customers how much they paid for a particular item or the shopkeepers how much money they made.

Not Too Complicated or Too Simple

This doesn't just mean that every student can do it. It's more that an activity that is too simple won't engage the students and one that is too hard will initially engage them but might come to bore them as they find it too complicated to complete. I enjoy doing cryptic crosswords but not when they are so easy I can dash them off in ten minutes or so hard that I can't even get started with a single clue.

Not Too Vague

This is really just a repeat of the point about activities having a point and a completion. I have sometimes seen teachers give the instruction “Now just talk about...” which is about as vague as you can get and still BE an instruction. Remember students need to know fairly specifically what they are to do. It's unreasonable to expect them to work from such vague guidance.

Can Be Done By Both Weak And Strong Students

This can actually be rather tricky as your classes will almost always be of very mixed levels. I try, especially in discussion tasks, to make my tasks doable by people working at their own level. Sometimes I have a simpler and a harder version of the task but this inevitable seems to lead to the problem of everyone wanting to try the harder version even when they clearly won't be able t do it.

Achievable and Timed

These were both discussed in the last post – just make sure that any activity can actually be done and set a time limit for each one.

New

This has been suggested to me at various times and while I think it's good to keep activities fresh it's also good to re-use activities that the students enjoy. By all means try to put a fresh spin on things but don't be afraid of using crowd-pleasing favourites... just don't repeat exactly the same ones every week.

Buckland Weekly #19 - Questions to ask when planning your lesson

Way back when I used to work in an office environment as a computer analyst we often got sent on courses for things like time-management, personal development and such. Inevitably, especially in the time-management courses, the trainer would write SMART in capitals on the board and proceed to explain how all our targets needed to be Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time-Limited. (Occasionally some of the letters would stand for something else, depending on who was doing the training.) That was usually the tipping point for me, where I found myself doodling elaborate geometric patterns over my notebook instead of listening to yet another variation on flogging a dead horse. People do seem to like to apply simplistic notions to complicated situations.

All the same, you should think about some of the underlying concepts even if you don't need to bother yourself with trite acronyms to do it. It applies especially when you are planning a lesson. There are key questions you need to ask for each activity you plan.

The first, most obvious, and most easily overlooked is this.

Can it be done?

I once observed a lesson where the teacher was doing a reasonably standard activity. He had split the class (a small group of about twenty) into groups and written on the board “Animal, Food, Country, Colour, Job” and given each group a different letter. They had to find a word for each heading starting with that letter. One group had the letter “F”. I stood at the back with another observer trying to come up with colours starting with “F”. We managed “fawn”, “fuschia” and “firetruck red” but this was a beginners class who could hardly be expected to know the first two and the last one was just being silly.

The teacher hadn't really though through the question of whether the task could be done at all by that level of student.

The second question is one that everybody thinks about but that most inexperienced teachers get wrong.

How long will it take?

Estimating how long a task will take is not as easy as you might expect. It only comes with experience and it depends on various factors such as the level of the class, the size of the class, the physical layout of the classroom, the interests of the students, whether it's a familiar or unfamiliar type of task... among many others. One way to make an estimate is to give the task to someone else (say another teacher) and see how long it takes them, then add on extra time because your students won't be as proficient, add on more time for how long it will take to set up, add on more time for how long it will take to feedback and check. Occasionally (as discussed in an earlier post) teachers overestimate the time needed but most of the time they underestimate. If you haven't taught before you will certainly underestimate. A task you think should take five minutes might end up taking the whole 45 minute lesson if you aren't careful.

A large part of the problem is that teachers underestimate the answer to the next question.

How will I set it up and how long will it take?

Instructions MUST be given in language at a level lower than the task itself. You can't begin the task until the students understand what the task is. Digressing for a moment, I was once teaching in England and the students were doing an external exam. These were low level students. They had been in college for a year but were still beginners. There was a question on the paper that showed a map of part of a city and said “If you were standing on the bridge what would you be able to see?” A second conditional sentence was something that hadn't been covered yet in their lessons so the students struggled to work out what was required. *

Don't underestimate how long it will take to set up an activity. If possible demonstrate it rather than explaining it. If explanation is needed, plan in advance exactly what you will say and exactly what you will write on the board. Use the simplest language possible... then simplify it some more. Practice. You might feel silly speaking the instructions aloud in your empty apartment but it will pay off when you get to the classroom. Give your instructions to a colleague and see if they understand them.

Two other important questions go together.

What can go wrong?/What's my fallback position?

All sorts of things can go wrong even in the most meticulously planned lesson. Equipment failure; students don't understand the task; task is to complicated or too simple; students just not into it. You need to plan each activity keeping the potential problems in mind and think about what you will do about them if they occur. And you need to be prepared to improvise when something totally unexpected happens. I keep a few simple tasks in mind to substitute whenever something like this happens but occasionally something will happen that you just don't know how to deal with. In one lesson last year I found myself completely unable to teach because the noise from the nearby building site was so loud that I couldn't hear the students and they couldn't hear me or each other. In another just last week the day was hot so all the windows were open but the wind got up and all the windows started banging back and forward and the students wanted them open but I had to insist on closing them both for safety and to be able to continue the lesson. There is always something you didn't think of.

Finally there is the most important question of all and the one you should ask yourself as often as possible.

Why?

Whenever you put something on your lesson plan ask yourself why you are doing it. If the answer is “to use up ten minutes of the lesson” then take it off and think of something else. Everything in your lesson should be done for a reason. It might be checking existing knowledge, developing vocabulary, demonstrating a particular language point, practising social interactions or any one of a thousand things but it must HAVE a purpose. Activity for its own sake should be avoided.

Those are some of the questions you should ask yourself when planning your lesson. You don't need to worry about SMART targets but you do need to think about what you are doing and why you are doing it. In the beginning you will get it wrong but the more you think about what you are doing, the easier it will become to actually do it.

In the next post I will look at the features that make an activity good (and by implication the ones that make it bad.)

* Not to mention the conceptual difficulty of the question. Would “people” be an acceptable answer. What about “the sky” or “my shoes”? The question wanted the names of other things identified on the map but that was in no way clear.

Buckland Weekly #18- Warm Up Activities : Word Race Games

Kids in a Chinese classroom can be very competitive. OK, that should be “most kids” - there are always some who don't want to join in and will be competitive only to the extent of competing with similar-minded kids in their efforts to do absolutely nothing in class. But, as I said, most kids are competitive and devising games where they can express that usually results in a noisy – but effective – lesson.

I often use variations on games where the class is divided into groups, they do a little brainstorming, and then one student from each group comes to the board (all at the same time) and writes the results. You can devise your own games that are similar but let me run through a couple of typical activities that make regular appearances as warm-ups in my lessons. The purpose of these activities is to ensure that the students have the vocabulary for more communicative activities later in the lesson. The first one is described in detail, the others are variations on a theme.

1.

Let's say the lesson is about jobs. I will break the class into about ten groups. This number works in my classroom because there is a big board across the whole front wall and while it is crowded for ten people to work there simultaneously – it is doable and it makes thengs a bit more hectic and a bit more fun.

Then I tell the groups that they have two minutes to list as many jobs as they can think of ON PAPER. As they are working I walk around and give each group a piece of chalk, at the same time checking that they are on task and helping if they aren't. We have done this activity so often they know what is coming and start arguing over the chalk – sometimes because they all want to come to the board , but ore often because none of them do.

By the time I am back at the front the two minutes is almost up and I quickly divide the board into numbered columns, one for each group. AT my signalo ne member from each group runs to the board with the paper and starts writing. It can get a bit chaotic and sometimes two people come. If no one comes from one of the groups I go to them, put the chalk in someone's hand and send him or her to the board.

I give them only one minute to write (getting the whole class to countdown when we reach ten seconds.)

Then I score it. One suggestion that I have seen for scoring is that you give one point for any answer that no other team has. To me this has two disadvantages – first of all it isn't rewarding the work of a group who tried hard and came up with ten answers which other groups aslo came up with. It's demoralising to work hard and still score zero. On a more practical level it becomes very difficult to mark when you have more than three or four groups. My way is quick and easy. I give two points for a correct word correctly spelled and one for a correct word incorrectly spelled. If they have come up with a more obscure job and got a word that could mean it but isn't right (say meat-seller instead of butcher) they also get one point. A word that is wrong gets no points.

As I mark I pause to explain any unusual words they have come up with, give corrected spellings or correct words and discuss any points that are interesting. For example, with “jobs” someone always puts “student” and I explain that this is no points because student isn't a job because no one pays you to be a student.

I write the scores at the top of e column and we have rounds of applause for the winners (and everybody else).

2.

Not all groups need necessarily be writing the same list. In my seasons lesson I allocate group one “words about summer”, group two “words about spring” and so on.

3.

A quicker variation that I use starts off the same way, with groups brainstorming but then, instead of having them come to the board I ask each group in turn to give me one word, which I write on the board. If the group fails to give me a word in five seconds or if they give me a word that's already on the board, they are out. Last group standing is the winner. When we have a winner I then let the whole class shout out more words to add to the list. (Remember the objective here is to make sure they have the vocabulary for whatever task comes next.)

4.

If you have a smaller class and enough space for it another variation (that can become to hectic to manage if you aren't careful) is to get one person from each group to write one word on the board then run back to the desk and give the chalk to someone else in the group to come and write one word... and so on.

5.

A slightly different variant is to make it into an alphabet race.

Write the letters A-Z on the board leaving space to write a word after each one.

Give the groups two minutes to think of a job (or whatever the topic is) beginning with each letter. Then go group to group asking for a job. You can either ask in alphabetical order (“Group one, do you know a job that starts with the letter 'A'?”) or just allow any job for a letter not yet done. Write them on the board as you go.

Note: - If you are going to use this variant make sure before you start that you have a complete list on your lesson plan. It can be hard to think of a job beginning with X on the spur of the moment.

Essentially all these are the same activity but with slight variations in the procedure but they all have the same advantages. They involve the whole class. They are quick to organise. They set up the necessary vocabulary for what you have planned next.

Buckland Weekly #17 : Feeling Prepared? Well Don't

Given the recent lack of posts this would probably be better titled Buckland Intermittently. I'll try to do better.

As always this post represents the views of the author and not any official view of the company.

So you're ready.

You read books and internet articles.

You are prepared for things to be different.

You are looking forward to a great adventure.

Maybe you even learned a little Chinese to prepare yourself.

In short, you are ready. China is waiting.

Well let's try a little quiz. Try answering these questions. It's easy. They are all Yes or No.

Have you ever lived alone in another country for six months or more?

Have you ever lived somewhere where you are immediately and obviously identifiable as foreign?

Have you ever lived somewhere where you have no language in common with anyone else?

Have you ever been in a situation where you need help for something as simple as buying milk?

Have you ever been in a situation where total strangers think its OK to stare at you, photograph you or even walk up and touch you?

Have you ever lived surrounded by people with whom you have no common cultural reference points – where you don't know the same movies, books, music, sports teams – anything?

If you answered “Yes” to most of the above, then congratulations, you may actually be prepared, but the more times you answered “no” the less prepared you really are. If you answered “no” to all of them then, sorry, you aren't prepared at all. The reality is that you are entering a situation that can't be prepared for unless you have actually done it before.

You will find small things frustrating. You will feel helpless as a newborn baby.

You have a headache. How do you tell the pharmacist that you want Ibuprofen? How do you know that what he gave you is what you wanted? How do you read the all-important dosage and side-effects leaflet. I once tried to buy a tube of antiseptic for a cut and ended up with burn ointment.

You go the park and sit quietly reading your book only to be interrupted every five minutes by people coming to stand and stare at you. The bolder ones come and try to talk to you but exhaust their English and your Chinese in two sentences then just stand there. You end up staying in your room all the time because it's just easier.

You try to have a conversation with a colleague who nods enthusiastically only for you to gradually realise that while he understands the words you are saying he has no idea what you are actually talking about because he doesn't know what Downton Abbey is or why you think it is important.

You are asked to go to KTV with other teachers (even though karaoke is the last thing you feel like doing) but they won't take “no” for an answer and you end up going and feeling miserable because you don't want to sing and you don't want to drink and nobody gets why you feel that way.

You try to explain why all this is so frustrating to you but absolutely no one understands your problem. They just tell you that people are curious about the foreigner who has come to live among them.

As I say, small things. The trouble is that a lot of small things can end up indistinguishable from one very big thing if you let them. And there is almost nothing you can do to prevent those feelings. When I say you will find things frustrating, I mean it literally. It's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when. The only question is how long you can hold out for before it all becomes too much.

So, what should you do? It's not an easy question.

First of all you need to learn two things – how to separate the important stuff from the trivial stuff and how to let the trivial stuff go. Look again at those examples. Only the headache problem is important at all because you don't want to take the wrong kind of medicine. Imagine going to the pharmacy to buy Imodium and accidentally ending up with a laxative because your desperate mime has been misinterpreted.

As for the other things they are all, in themselves, trivial. Yes, it's annoying when people stare at you because you come from a culture where that would be indescribably rude. It isn't like that here. Of course they are staring at you because you are different but there is a different sense of personal space here so it doesn't feel rude to the people doing it. Of course it would be nice (for me) to discuss the latest episodes of Doctor Who with someone who knows what Daleks and Sontarans are but it isn't likely to happen. I've met the occasional student who has seen TV shows that I like but it's rare.

When they try to get you to go to KTV or to school dinners they are trying to help but it feels intrusive - as if you are being forced into things against your will, as if you have no control, no say in what is happening. From their point of view they are just trying to include you and culturally refusing an invitation here is a bigger deal than it would be back home because it can cause a loss of face for the person inviting you. Giving,accepting and refusing invitations here can be a complicated business. 

I'd advise you, after the orientation program to make sure you stay in touch with other teachers. Wechat is a good way. You can have free phone conversations for as long as you like. I have a friend who, while he is still in China, now works for a different company. We talk on the phone most days. I talk to him far more than I talk to my Chinese girlfriend. That's because casual passing references to obscure bits of British TV will be understood. Or, for example, if I refer to the Daily Mail or the Daily Telegraph a Chinese colleague will probably get that they are newspapers but my friend will understand the differences between them without needing a long explanation.

A daily chat with someone who understands what you are talking about can go a long way to ease your frustrations.

But what if you still find things building up inside until you feel like a pressure cooker that's about to explode?

Don't let it get that far. In orientation you'll get plenty of ways to contact me. If I'm not here – if I've returned to England – there will probably be someone like me. When you feel things beginning to get you down contact someone at the office. Explain the problem. Just talking about it might help.  

Buckland Weekly #16: Warm Up Activities - Variations on Hangman

Well, it's that time of year again when we are all returning for the new semester, refreshed and eager after our spring break. (Or possibly depressed and hung-over but let's not dwell on the negatives.) The new teachers have completed orientation and are scattering to their new lives in China, the old teachers are renewing their familiarity with the Chinese way of life and teaching and one teacher (Hi, James) is managing the neat trick of being both an old teacher and a new teacher at the same time.

So a warm welcome or welcome back to all of you.

I thought I'd start this term's blogging by going back to basics for a while and talking about types of activities. There's nothing in here that experienced teachers won't already know so if you wish to skip it and do something more interesting instead, that's OK with me.

Still here?

OK. I want to start with warm-up activities. We'll cover a number of different ones over the weeks but I want to start with the easiest and most well-known – hangman.

Everybody knows how to play _ _ _ _ _ _ _.

You start with the blanks and as the students guess the letters you either fill them in if they are right or add lines to the drawing of a hanged man until it's completed and they lose. 

Of course it doesn't need to be a hanged man that you draw. It can be anything that is relevant to your topic. If you are doing a topic about houses and homes you can, line by line, draw a house.

Altermatively you can start with the completed picture and remove pieces until it has gone, as in this very simple "flower pot" diagram from a lesson about flowers and gardens. (And, as you have doubtless already worked out, you don't need to be a great artist to do it.)

One of my favourites is from my lesson about being castaway on a desert island, where the last two pictures are substantially different from the ones that go before.

There are other things you can do. For example you can give different teams a different word (with the same number of letters, of course) and have a race as in this example where each correct guess will move one of the cars towards the finish line. In this variant, as in others, you can use cut out racing cars to move along the board.

You can make a different game of it too as in the example on the left below from my Aliens Stole My Grandmother lesson where each wrong guess moves the spaceship closer to my grandmother and if it gets to her they will take her away. I use a picture of my real grandmother. And then I follow it up with my grandfather and my parents.

The other picture below is another race variant where superman is trying to catch Lois before she falls to the ground. Wrong guesses move Lois and right guesses move Superman. Again you can work with cutouts for this.

You are limited only by your imagination.

This kind of game is a great way to generate the vocabulary you are going to use in the later parts of the lesson. It's quick to set up, easy to play and fun. It looks as if it's only suitable for younger students but I've played variations with older students too and they usually get into it with just as much enthusiasm as the younger ones.

There are a couple of tips for the organisation. I find it useful to choose the student to give me the next letter by throwing a sponge ball around the class. It's lively and it gets the students interested. Also, when getting started use very simple language and write on the board. I usually pick one student and say “Choose a letter. Which letter do you want A, B, C, D.” Sometimes, if you say things like “I'd like you to give me a letter.” some students don't really know what you mean. Keep it simple.

And have fun.

Lesson Plan: Christmas Part 1

Lesson Level: Junior Duration: 40 Minutes

Lesson Title: Christmas Shopping

Grammar and Vocabulary

Present, gift, wrapping paper, turkey, Christmas tree, decorations, buy, spend

Lesson Objectives

Students will learn a little about western Christmas traditions.

Students will discuss what presents to buy for various people.

Students will practice shopping dialogues.

Students will learn the difference between “buy” and “spend”.

Materials Required

A picture of a family at Christmas OR pictures of the individual family members.

Preparation

Prepare the pictures.

Procedure

1

Write “Shopping” on the board.

Elicit what students understand by shopping – when they go shopping, what they buy and so on.

Tell students that next week is Christmas and change the heading to Christmas shopping.

2

Put students in groups.

Write on the board.

Is there anything special that you have to buy at Christmas?

Make a list.

Give students just one minute to think of things.

Get feedback and write on board. If available use different colours to write food words and other words.

Ask students if they can tell you what the different colours mean.

If students don't come up with enough words add more of your own from this list.

(Present, gift, wrapping paper, turkey, Christmas tree, decorations, Christmas Cards, sprouts)

3. Give each group the picture of the family.

Write on board.

At Christmas we buy presents for our friends and family.

Look at this family.

Answer these questions.

What would you buy for each person?

How much would you spend?

Why did you choose each gift?

Make sure students understand the difference between “buy” and “spend”.

Monitor and assist as needed.

Get feedback from different groups.

4 Extension task.

See notes.

Give each group a copy of the extension task. Monitor and assist as necessary.

Go through the answers on the board.

Notes

Christmas In England

Christmas in England lasts for three days.

December 24th is called Christmas Eve. Children hang up stockings for presents and go to bed early. Some children leave mince pies out for Santa.

December 25th is called Christmas Day, Children are very excited. They get up early and open all their presents. Everyone eats turkey for lunch. (They usually have sprouts too, even though nobody really likes them!)

December 26th is called Boxing Day and people usually visit their families or stay at home to rest because they ate too much on Christmas Day.

What can you remember?

On your OWN paper write down which of these things we do on each day.

December 24^th December 25^th December 26^th

hang up stockings, unwrap presents, stay at home to rest, visit families, go to bed early,

get up early, leave mince pies, eat turkey and sprouts, Christmas Day, Christmas Eve,

Boxing Day

Lesson Plan : Hobbies (for all levels)

This lesson plan does not follow the usual format. That's because I am teaching the same topic to all my classes this week regardless of the level or age. To that end I'm just listing a number of activities and describing them and will pick and choose between them according to the class that I am teaching.

Topic: My Hobbies

1. Introduction.
   Write several of your own hobbies on the board (mine are “writing poetry”, “travelling”, “reading comics”, :collecting books”)
   Explain them if necessary.
   For each one write a sentence “I like __________ because_________.
   Toss the ball from student to student asking them to make similar sentences.

2. Game.
   For this game you will need a dice and thirty cards containing the name of a hobby in both English and the students' first language.
   My list of hobbies is Acting, Writing, Playing computer games, Cooking, Drawing, Origami, Painting, Playing Piano, Playing Violin, Reading, Playing Ping Pong, Skateboard, Basketball, Cycling,Gardening, Photography, Running, KTV (Chinese Karaoke), Shopping, Tai Chi, Listening To Music, Playing Chess, Dancing, Flying a kite, Climbing, Walking the dog, Horse riding, Watching TV, Going to the Cinema, Playing guitar.
   (Pictures may be used but this can make the drawing task too easy.)
   Write on the board

1,2 Draw it
3,4 Act it
5,6 Answer Yes/no questions.
Class must guess the activity.
Choose a student to begin, roll the dice and choose a card, The student who guess correctly has the next turn.

3. Song.
   This is a song that I have written for use with the class. Guitar chords are included¹. Write a list of the people in the song on the board. Get students to copy the list. Sing the song. For each person they must listen for and write that person's hobby.
   Feedback the answers.

4. Dialogue. Requires recorded dialogue and equipment to play back.
   This dialogue is from Practical Oral English. It should be recorded in advance to play to the class. As they listen they should make a list of all the hobbies mentioned.
   Ask questions about the hobbies and other elements of the dialogue.

5. Put class into groups of four. Put these questions on the board.
   1. What is your favourite hobby?
   2. When do you do it?
   3.Where do you do it.
   For stronger groups add questions
   4. Why do you like it?
   5.Do you need anything special to do it?
   Students survey own group and write answers for each group member.
   Feedback from each group.

Notes.

1.

D                                                       G    A   D

I wish I could play football like my brother does

D                                                G    A   D

I wish that I could cook like my mother does

D                                                       G  A   D

I wish I could do gardening like my father does

D                                                G  A  D

And I wish I could sing like my sister does

A                                          E

I have so many friends and family, it's true

A                                                  E

And I wish that I could do all the things they can do

A                                           E

They all seem to be so much better than me

A                           E            D      E

Why's everybody better than I can be?

I wish I could draw like my best friend Ben

Play basketball and score in every game like Ken

I wish I could play piano like my cousin Fred

Or just play chess like his brother Jed

Chorus

I wish I could take a picture as well as John

Play computer games to compete with Ron

I wish I could skateboard with my pal Mac

Or play ping-pong as well as Jim or Jack

Chorus

I wish I could write a story like Peter can

Or run a hundred metres as fast as Dan

I wish that I could fly a kite as well Kate

Or play a game of volleyball with Billy and his mates

Chorus

I guess I'll just be happy that I can write a song

And pick up a guitar and sing and play along

And as for all the other things my friends can do

I'll try not to be jealous so I won't blue.

Chorus

2. Dialogue

Billy	My cousin Harry is coming to visit next week.
Sarah	Have I met him before?
Billy	Yes, he visited two years ago. Do you remember him?
Sarah	I think so. Is he the one with all the hobbies?
Billy	Yes. He has so many hobbies that he always seems to be doing something.
Sarah	I remember that he likes to play football.
Billy	Yes. He plays every Saturday morning for a local team. And he practises on Sunday afternoon.
Sarah	Doesn't he also play the guitar?
Billy	Yes, and the violin and piano. He's in two different bands. he plays with a rock band on Tuesdays and with a classical group on Wednesdays.
Sarah	What else does he do?
Billy	He's in an art club. He goes every Monday night and paints and draws pictures. He's very good. He paints lots of landscapes. He can also do portraits of people.
Sarah	Anything else?
Billy	When he has spare time he likes to read books. He says he can read a whole book in just two hours.
Sarah	Last time he was here he taught me to play chess. Does he still play?
Billy	His chess club is Friday and right after that's finished he goes to the park to do Tai Chi for an hour.
Sarah	What does he do on Thursdays
Billy	That depends. Sometimes he goes to the cinema. He likes to watch foreign movies, especially French ones. Sometimes he stays at home and writes poetry. He published a book last year.
Sarah	Wow. You must be really proud of your cousin. He's good at everything.
Billy	Well, maybe. But I wish he wouldn't visit us.
Sarah	Why?
Billy	Because when he's here my parents want me to be as good as he is and I'm not. It's really hard when you have a superman for a cousin.