Page 36 - ELG1903 Mar-Apr Issue 464

RESOURCES .

TED TALKS

Chris Burkhard gives a Ted Talk
on the joys of cold-water surfi ng

High impact at lower
High impact at lower levelslevels

Interested in using authentic videos with lower level learners?
– Lewis Lansford explains how.

t’s a great time to be an English In a beginner-level class, you could just play personality? Is it confident? Shy? Funny?
learner, with easy access to a the soundtrack of the video as Tom makes Serious? Watching the video first, without
seemingly endless supply of free, music, and ask learners what they hear: a the sound, can get students thinking about
Thigh-quality English language input trumpet, a drum, applause – it sounds like what they’re going to hear, and make
through online videos, social media, podcasts live jazz. But when you play the video again listening easier.
and blogs. Most teachers understand that with the image, you reveal that Tom has made
using authentic materials – anything all of the sounds with his mouth. This can Choose videos where the
produced for a purpose other than teaching bring a lot of language into the classroom, 4 pictures and words support
English – can capture and hold learners’ even when students haven’t listen to a single each other
attention and motivate them to improve. spoken word. This sort of exercise is especially
Take TED Talks, for example. A fantastic useful at lower levels, because the listening Pictures can make the content more
range of freely available, relatively short itself isn’t just easy, it’s actually fun. accessible to learners, especially at lower
videos (from four to 18 minutes) about some levels. In Magical houses, made of bamboo,
of the most-discussed topics in the world Elora Hardy describes a house she designed,
today – big ideas that learners want to talk Set the level of the lesson while showing pictures. As she names each
about. On top of that, they feature a wide 2 with the task feature of the house – ‘big curving roofs,’ ‘tall
variety of English speakers with a range of first windows’ and even a ‘tented bed’ – we see a
and second-language English accents. They Focus on the level of the classroom activity, picture of it. This allows learners to see what
also model good presentation skills. not the level of the input. Set a task that is she’s describing and thereby get the meaning
But unfiltered, ungraded content like challenging enough to provide a learning of her words, even if they’ve never heard
this can be hard to understand. Speakers opportunity, but not so difficult that them before.
often talk quickly and use grammar and learners fail.
vocabulary that learners haven’t yet mastered. For example, rather than have learners try Find videos where the
Working with such material successfully in to comprehend individual words or sentences,
the classroom requires more than just playing play a short excerpt and ask students to say 5 unexpected happens
the video and asking a few comprehension or suggest something about the context, the Many people watch online videos for
questions, especially at lower levels. topic or speaker. You could watch two or entertainment, and pressing entertaining
three short excerpts and compare the three
Here are a fi ve tips for using videos speakers’ voices, and so on. material into the service of language learning
is a win-win: learners develop their skills, and
such as TED Talks successfully in a everyone has fun.
low-level class.
Use the pictures – they’re Matt Mills’ talk Image recognition that
3 full of language triggers augmented reality takes surprising,
Listen to everything – not just sometimes funny turns – many of them visual
1 spoken language Video images can carry a lot of language, – making learners curious to know what’s
even with sound switched off. Mark going on. Without understanding everything,
Audio material that doesn’t include speech Bezos’ talk A life lesson from a volunteer students can visually absorb some of the
can also be useful. Tom Thum’s TED Talk firefighter is a great example. Play the content, thereby giving them something
The orchestra in my mouth, for example, has first minute or so without the sound off to talk about.
a long passage with no speech, just Tom and ask learners what they can see. He’s Using authentic video in the classroom
performing music. clearly a firefighter, but what about his is an effective way to engage learners and

36 March/April 2019