Length of a Lesson

Beginning
1. Pre-beginning
  1. Fluid Boundaries
    1. You may come in a little late.
      1. You may leave the door open so as not to create a feeling of lateness in students.
        You may not say ‘Hello!’ in a clear and definite way.
        you may hand something out to students instead so that they look at the text and not at you
        You may draw attention to what is left on the blackboard from the last class and discuss what mystery lies behind it.
        You may start up a conversation with one or two students rather than with the whole group.
  2. Clear Boundaries
    1. Engage the students in eye conteact
      1. Shake hands
        Ask students to stand up
        Shut the door
        Greet the class and expect a greeting in return
        Call the register
        Have a procedure for late students (e.g. asking for an apology and a reason for lateness or conversely expecting a quiet, unobtrusive tiptoe to a chair)
        introduce yourself and the first activity
2. Two Procedures
  1. tight schedule
    1. having students hand in their homework
      1. checking past homework
        calling roll or asking students to get out certain books.
        Socialising later in the lesson
  2. Linking back to a past lesson to review things
    1. explaining the aim of the current lesson and how it fits into the lesson and course
      1. zooming in immediately on the main work of the lesson, for example, ‘Here is your task. Please get into groups now. You have 15 minutes to complete stages 1, 2 and 3.’
3. Atmosphere Care.
  1. Subjetive
    1. If you like students to be quiet and concentrated, you might say, ‘With your eyes shut, listen to the sounds and name them mentally in English or do some guided visualisation exercises, like the Spiral concentration created by Clem Laroy (1992)
      1. If you like students to be lively and eager to participate, you may tend to choose team games as starters.
        • If you need to make a friendly atmosphere, you will tend to socialise, asking students how they got on in the last lesson or whether they have been watching the sport recently.
4. Start
  1. Teacher's start
    1. Tell students the topic of the lesson and asked them to recall individually, in pairs or in groups, in note form on paper, everything they know about the topic
      1. To pool ways of learning vocabulary, ways of studying for an exam, and how students make use of teacher comments on homework.
        give clear guidance to the students on what is expected of them and why
  2. Students' start
    1. start greeting their neighbours and asking them questions in English at the sight of the teacher in the doorway
      1. give their neighbours an oral summary of something read for homework
        test their neighbours on a list of words from the last lesson
        prepare six to ten review questions to ask the whole class.
Middle
1. Threads
  1. ‘little and often’
    1. An animal a day
      1. each class will consist of several 10–30 minute activities that gradually build up over time.
      2. These threads do not necessarily have a connection to other activities in the same class but do with activities in subsequent classes.
      3. This way of working will minimise planning time and will give the variety and pace necessary to keep students interested and moving along. It will be especially useful with classes who find it difficult to concentrate on one thing for long periods
2. Middles
  1. Good for wellmotivated students who can concentrate for long periods
    1. Meeting the stimulus
      1. Students first encounter the stimulus.
        Not revealing all the stimulus immediately
        Give place for predicting and speculating, matching, sorting and reordering.
    2. Analysis
      1. studying the stimulus to see what is in it once it has been totally revealed or pieced together
        students comment on the stimulus and compare it with their speculations
    3. Personalisation
      1. establishing a link between the students and the stimulus.
        students can write or speak about how the stimulus is similar to or different from them, what the stimulus reminds them of, if they have ever ..., what they would do if
    4. Alteration and transfer
      1. material flexibly,
        making new things from the stimulus, reducing or expanding it, thinking of parallels, opposites or reversals.
    5. Creation
      1. using the stimulus as a springboard to new skills or new products
        role plays or letter writing activities connected with the stimulus.
3. Generalisable procedures for texts
  1. applied to short texts.
    1. expansion, reduction, media transfer, matching, selection and ranking, comparison and contrast, reconstruction, reformulation, interpretation, creation, analysis, project work
4. Break time
  1. Rounding off activities
    1. They signal the end of a chunk of work and can be used to review what’s just been done, as a bridge to the next block of work.
      1. Ask the students to write down four new words they think they will forget.
      2. Tell the students what is coming up in the next part of the lesson and ask them what they know about it already.
End
1. It needs to start long before the bell goes or finishing time arrives
  1. review the lesson
  2. give back old homework or set and explain new homework
  3. write dialogue journals
  4. make plans for the next lesson
  5. tidy up the classroom for the next teacher

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Length of a Lesson

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	Created by Luisa María Paternina Bertel about 7 years ago