Hàng Ngày

These lessons have worked really well for me. Give them a try if you think they would work for you too! Let me know if you want the full lesson plans or associated texts and files. Good luck!

The First Day

Paul and Simon came to the rescue on this one: the name cards with four numbers in each of the corners indicating numbers that were significant to the students was a big success. I used it for both my second and third year students. I began the class by introducing myself and allowing the students to ask any questions about me that they wanted. This is usually pretty popular, and although the second years were quite shy at first, they eventually opened up and I ultimately was drawing pictures of my family tree and the St. Louis arch. Following this we played the game and students had a chance to get up, walk around, and talk to their peers. Next I wrote on the board: ‘why we want to learn English’, and ‘topics that we want to discuss in class.’ I had students talk about this in groups and after they had a few minutes I asked them to report back to me and I wrote everything on the board. At the end of class I collected all of the papers that they had used to write down these goals and interests and used them in creating the syllabus. Last but certainly not least, I taught them the words to the song “Make New Friends,” and tried to get them to sing it in a round. This worked fairly well, although the first reaction of the second year students was to break out the paper and pencil and try to write down the words as if it was dictation. I did not expect this, and consequently had to modify my plan and say each line slowly and clearly so that they could write it down word for word. I wish I had had the words to give them on the spot, but instead I gave them a copy on the following day. Vietnamese students in particular really like music, and it’s a good way to break the ice in general (if you don’t mind singing alone for the students).

Debate: Tourism in Your City

This activity was really popular with my third year students (intermediate English level). We spent a total of four periods on this activity and probably could have spent the whole week’s worth of time (5 periods). I began by giving students this scenario:

Exercise: Long Xuyen, The Next Tourist Paradise?

A company called Tourism Vietnam is planning to invest a large amount of money to turn your town into a major center for tourists. They have made plans to manufacture a number of hotels and other tourist infrastructure in your town. As well as the hotels, they have also made plans to radically improve the night life in your town by opening a string of clubs and bars. They hope that by the year 2008 Long Xuyen will be a major competitor within the tourist industry in Vietnam.

Group 1

You are representatives of Tourism Vietnam your aim is to promote the plans of your company and to convince the class that tourism is the best solution for Long Xuyen. Points to concentrate on:

• The great tourist attractions that are in Long Xuyen
• The increase in jobs that will come with the increase in investment
• The money that the tourists will bring into the local economy
• The progress and development of your city which will result in it becoming more important in not only the Mekong Delta, but also Vietnam as well
• Better for the young people of your city because there will be much more investment in leisure industries

Group 2

You are the representatives of the residents of Long Xuyen and are in opposition to the plans of Tourism Vietnam. Your aim is to convince the class that this is a bad idea for Long Xuyen. Points to consider:

• Environmental issues – tourists will cause more pollution
• Troublemakers – many tourists have no respect for the places they visit and are only interested in getting drunk and causing trouble.
• The rise in tourism will bring about radical changes and will result in the traditional way of life in Long Xuyen being lost. Perhaps forever.
• Rather than promoting the position of Long Xuyen, this move will make Long Xuyen the laughing stock of all of Vietnam.

Students were given about 10 minutes to discuss as a group and then were asked to report their arguments to the other team. After each team made opening statements, they each had time to formulate 3 questions to ask the other team. I think that this was not necessary, but I like the process of trying to ask questions that are relevant and focused: it’s a good exercise. After the questions, each team had 5 minutes to regroup and formulate a rebuttal statement. I would probably give them more like 10 minutes to do this if I did it again, and then give them 3 minutes each to present their statements to the other team. Also, instead of me calling the winner, it would be good to get one of the stronger students to moderate next time (or perhaps a student who listens and understands well but is generally shy to speak in class). Overall though, students really liked this exercise and had a lot to say.

Global Cost of Living Survey

For my second year students’ unit on cities, I thought that it would be interesting to have them learn about the cost of living of different cities around the world in comparison to Vietnam. After a brief internet search, I stumbled upon the Mercer Human Resource Consulting Global Cost of Living Survey. http://www.finfacts.com/costofliving.htm I changed the text a little bit, taking excerpts about the most expensive city, the cheapest city, and cities in Vietnam and Asia. I constructed a text with the addition of my own knowledge of comparative prices in Vietnamese cities. I made a chart for the students to fill out with such basic items as a liter of gasoline, a small bottle of water, and a bowl of Vietnamese noodle soup. Each item had two blank columns: one for the city and one for the countryside.

In class, after introducing the concept of “Cost of Living” and necessary vocabulary, I asked my students to fill out the first column (countryside) of the chart with information that they already knew. They also added some of their own products. I then read the text that I had written out loud to them and asked them to take notes on the information that they heard. After reading twice we reviewed the information as a class so that the students could complete the second column of their charts. Then they had to work with their partners again to create a report similar to the one that I had read about the cost of living in the countryside. A few groups presented their reports to the class. This worked really well, was appropriate for my intermediate level students, and kept them engaged. (They LOVE talking about money!)

Create your own Family!

I decided that for my second year students I wanted to put a new spin on the same old “talk about your family” lesson plan. When class began I wrote the word family on the board and asked students to think of members who might live in a household (vocab word) together. I then had them count off by fours and divided my 30-some-odd class into four “families.” The families had to decide which members they all were, their ages, occupations, and relationships.

Next we had a little bit of practice with the present continuous (which my students have trouble with). I wrote on the board “It is 7 am on Friday,” and asked them “What are you doing now?” I elicited a few sentences from students to model the concept then wrote a few on the board. When they understood, I told them to discuss as a family what each member might be doing on Friday at 7 am. Then I repeated this process for 7 pm and 12 pm, for more practice.

For the next step, I had the students line up in two parallel lines facing each other (probably not a necessary step, but good to get them up out of their chairs). I told them that they had to introduce themselves to the person across from them and decide how they knew each other. They then had to talk about their “families” and go around introducing their new friends to their families.

For the last step, students returned to their families and told their families about their new friends, how they had met, and their families. I used the concept of “gossip” to make this more engaging for the students. This lesson overall was pretty good, but a little bit too long (1 hour and 20 minutes). If you have a 45 minute to one hour class it would be perfect. Plus now I have four ready-made groups for future activities (“Find your families for the next activity!”)