Skip to main content

An example of intensive question-answer work for near beginners

File this under nuts and bolts techniques for language teachers. This is mainly aimed at inexperienced teachers, but be useful for fine tuning the practice of experienced practitioners. Apologies if it seems obvious!

This may be of particular use to any teachers who have not, for whatever reason, had a grounding in question-answer technique. The term "circling" is sometimes used in north America.

I'm going to show you an extract from one of my parallel reading texts for near beginners, then give a detailed breakdown of questions I would use with it. Let be clear on the aims of this: to develop alert listening, improve comprehension, practise vocabulary and syntax, give pupils a chance to develop early oral skills (accurate pronunciation, phrase and short sentence level proficiency).

Question types used: true/false (yes/no), either/or, correct false sentences, choice of options, open ended.
Techniques used: whole class repetition, group repetition, individual repetition, use of brightest pupil, hands up, no hands up. (I am not so keen on random selectors as they can slow the pace down.)

Here's the extract from a text I wrote earlier today. Best to display it on the board so all students are looking up and to the front.
 
Ma mère s’appelle Kate. Elle a 38 ans. Elle est assez petite. Elle a de longs cheveux châtain et les yeux bruns. Elle habite avec moi, mon papa David et mon frère Michael. On a un chat tigré qui s’appelle Raoul. Ma mère aime les livres, la télé, faire les magasins et des promenades à la campagne. Elle est membre d’une chorale aussi. Elle adore la cuisine italienne, mais elle n’aime pas faire la cuisine à la maison. Mon papa fait ça d’habitude.

Here is a possible sequence. Remember you can use a range of the techniques mentioned above. Expected answers are in brackets.

C'est la mère ou le père? (la mère)
Elle s'appelle Kate ou Anne? (get pupils to use elle s'appelle - seems artificial but provides more practice)
Elle s'appelle Anne, non? (Non, elle...)
OK - elle s'appelle Anne. (NON! Elle...)
Répétez: elle s'appelle Kate. (Elle...)
Elle a trente-huit ans? Oui ou non? (Oui)
Elle a trente-sept ans? (Non)
Quel âge elle a? (Use this order to avoid phonetic confusion of a-t-elle; it's natural anyway)
Elle a quel âge? (maybe go to good pupil for this one)
Elle est grande, non? (Non, elle est...)
Elle est grande ou petite?
Elle a les cheveux longs ou courts? (use gesture) (Longs)
Répétez: elle a les cheveux longs (Elle a...) (Use whole class, small group or individual repetition. if an individual struggles, go to quicker one, then back to slower one later)
Elle a les cheveux châtain. Vrai ou faux? (vrai)
Répétez: elle a les cheveux châtain (do it at least three times)
Elle a les cheveux blonds, non? (Non, elle a...)
OK, elle a les cheveux blonds. (NON, elle a...)
Elle a les cheveux blonds, bruns ou violets? (Elle a...)

You could have a little release of tension at that point. Maybe get a good student to read the first couple of lines to see how well pronunciation is embedded. Or how about whole class reading from board. Maybe get pairs to make false statements to each other, or get partners to read to each other and correct each other's pronunciation.

You could then, if the class is still alert enough, do similar questioning on the next chunk.

You can see that there is an awful lot you can do with a very short piece of text. If well managed, this type of question-answer drilling can, in the long run, build up quick responses, sound comprehension and good retention of vocabulary and syntax. Although artificial in its nature, this type of communication does provide meaningful input and can be fun to do if the teacher uses their acting skills to make it so.

Weaknesses of it? Some might argue that it is not authentic communication, too teacher-centred, too demanding of attention, too dull, based on an ill-conceived methodology. I can only say in response that I know, after many years experience, that it worked with the students I taught as one part of a much broader diet of activity.



Comments

Popular posts from this blog

What is the natural order hypothesis?

The natural order hypothesis states that all learners acquire the grammatical structures of a language in roughly the same order. This applies to both first and second language acquisition. This order is not dependent on the ease with which a particular language feature can be taught; in English, some features, such as third-person "-s" ("he runs") are easy to teach in a classroom setting, but are not typically fully acquired until the later stages of language acquisition. The hypothesis was based on morpheme studies by Heidi Dulay and Marina Burt, which found that certain morphemes were predictably learned before others during the course of second language acquisition. The hypothesis was picked up by Stephen Krashen who incorporated it in his very well known input model of second language learning. Furthermore, according to the natural order hypothesis, the order of acquisition remains the same regardless of the teacher's explicit instruction; in other words,

What is skill acquisition theory?

For this post, I am drawing on a section from the excellent book by Rod Ellis and Natsuko Shintani called Exploring Language Pedagogy through Second Language Acquisition Research (Routledge, 2014). Skill acquisition is one of several competing theories of how we learn new languages. It’s a theory based on the idea that skilled behaviour in any area can become routinised and even automatic under certain conditions through repeated pairing of stimuli and responses. When put like that, it looks a bit like the behaviourist view of stimulus-response learning which went out of fashion from the late 1950s. Skill acquisition draws on John Anderson’s ACT theory, which he called a cognitivist stimulus-response theory. ACT stands for Adaptive Control of Thought.  ACT theory distinguishes declarative knowledge (knowledge of facts and concepts, such as the fact that adjectives agree) from procedural knowledge (knowing how to do things in certain situations, such as understand and speak a language).

La retraite à 60 ans

Suite à mon post récent sur les acquis sociaux..... L'âge légal de la retraite est une chose. Je voudrais bien savoir à quel âge les gens prennent leur retraite en pratique - l'âge réel de la retraite, si vous voulez. J'ai entendu prétendre qu'il y a peu de différence à cet égard entre la France et le Royaume-Uni. Manifestation à Marseille en 2008 pour le maintien de la retraite à 60 ans © AFP/Michel Gangne Six Français sur dix sont d’accord avec le PS qui défend la retraite à 60 ans (BVA) Cécile Quéguiner Plus de la moitié des Français jugent que le gouvernement a " tort de vouloir aller vite dans la réforme " et estiment que le PS a " raison de défendre l’âge légal de départ en retraite à 60 ans ". Résultat d’un sondage BVA/Absoluce pour Les Échos et France Info , paru ce matin. Une majorité de Français (58%) estiment que la position du Parti socialiste , qui défend le maintien de l’âge légal de départ à la retraite à 60 ans,