Announcement

You’ve all heard of National Geographic – the magazine, the channel, the explorers. Perhaps you’ve also heard that your colleagues are teaching English with materials from National Geographic.

In the first post of this series, introducing the concept of global competence, we established the central ideas behind it and why these are important when designing tasks with a cultural component. This post looks at a practical activity which embraces global competence and can be easily incorporated into your classroom practice.

Practical ideas for teaching levels B1-C1

During lockdown, learners have had to be more self-sufficient, take responsibility for their learning, and manage their own time. They have had no choice but to work out problems on their own with no classmate and no teacher nearby to ask.

Your concern is well-founded.  Vocabulary items need to be selected, contextualized during presentation, practiced repeatedly and recycled whenever possible.

SELECTION:  Your teachers need to have selection criteria for those vocabulary items they set for their students to learn.  To name some, we consider  ‘high frequency’ (How often is the word used?), ‘receptive or active vocabulary’ (Are vocabulary items to be comprehended only or both comprehended and used?), and ‘appropriateness’ for learners’ age and level.

ΑΠΑΝΤΗΣΗ: Πράγματι η συνέντευξη και για την υποψήφια, αλλά και για τον/την υπεύθυνο είναι μία «τέχνη». Ό,σο περισσότερο εμπειρία έχει ο/η υπεύθυνος, τόσο ευκολότερη γίνεται η συνέντευξη, γιατί ξέρει τι ερωτήσεις να απευθύνει και που να εστιάσει. Επίσης, δεν σπαταλάει το χρόνο του/της και εκμαιεύει τις απαντήσεις που τον/την ενδιαφέρουν. 

ANSWER:  To promote selective reading and fact finding for elementary and pre-intermediate learners,  you can create information-centered tasks in which your learners will read with the purpose of fact gathering.  Hence, they will scan for specific information in order to complete the task you design for them. 

Here are some guidelines for and an example of "Writing Search Tasks":

WHAT? 

A. Well written tasks which will serve as a 'structured guide' for the learners' information search and note-taking.

Σε οποιαδήποτε επιχειρηματική συναλλαγή, ο οικονομικός παράγοντας παίζει σημαντικό ρόλο και πολλές φορές τον πρώτο. Όλοι οι επιχειρηματίες θα προτιμούσαν, αν μπορούσαν, να αγοράζουν τις πρώτες ύλες σε μία φθηνότερη τιμή και να προσφέρουν τις υπηρεσίες τους σε μία ακριβότερη.

Με αυτή τη λογική, ίσως ακούγεται παράδοξη η επιλογή της φράσης “που αγαπάμε να μισούμε” για αυτόν τον μήνα. Πρόκειται για το…

“Κάνε μου καλύτερη τιμή”

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