ES 1.1 - Task 4: Active Learning
- Sara Spano
- 14 ott 2020
- Tempo di lettura: 19 min
Aggiornamento: 22 feb 2021
Active learning occurs when the learner takes some responsibility for the development of the activity, emphasising that a sense of ownership and personal involvement is the key to successful learning. Unless the work that pupils do is seen to be important to them and to have purpose and unless their ideas, contributions and findings are valued, little of benefit is learned. (Capel, Leask & Younie, 2019).
The term "active learning" refers to all the methods that require students to fully participate in their learning by thinking, discussing, investigating, and creating. It can involve reading, writing, listening, talking or working with tools, equipments and materials. Active learning is discussion, practice, review, application, problem solving, exploring new concepts in groups, etc...
In active learning classrooms, students may be asked to practice skills, solve problems, struggle with complex questions, propose solutions, and explain ideas in their own words through writing and discussion. It is learning by doing, in contrast with passively receiving information.
Research into why active learning works
Research indicates that active learning methods are especially effective for student learning, compared to classes that primarily consist of lecturing.
When given the opportunity to actively engage with the information they’re learning, students perform better. Active learning nurtures the brain, giving it an extended opportunity to connect new and old information, correct previous misconceptions, and reconsider existing thoughts or opinions.
According to a study into learning-centered approaches to education, students learn more when they participate in the process of learning.
Active learning encourages the brain to activate cognitive and sensory networks, which helps process and store new information. (O' Brien, Millis & Cohen, 1997)
Claire Hoogendoorn (2015) wrote a good introductory article on the neuroscience of active learning. She summarised several studies, writing,
[…] learning is enhanced when multiple neural pathways are activated at the same time.
In plain terms, the more we can activate students’ brains in different ways, the more they learn. This means that engaging as many sensory, cognitive, emotional, and social processes in students will increase their learning potential.
Moreover, research suggests that learner attention starts to fade every 10–20 minutes during lectures — which means teachers are constantly fighting to keep attention. Incorporating regular, varied active learning moments is a great solution to recapture an audience.
Why use active learning?
Reinforces important material, concepts, and skills.
Provides more frequent and immediate feedback to students.
Provides students with an opportunity to think about, talk about, and process course material.
Creates personal connections to the material for students, which increases their motivation to learn.
Enables to work with a range of pupils and opportunities for all members of the class to contribute and respond.
Encourages mutual respect and appreciation of the viewpoint of others.
Allows students to practice important skills, such as collaboration, through pair and group work.
Encourages autonomous learning and problem-solving skills, important to both academic and vocationally-based work.
Builds personal satisfaction and self-esteem through conversations with other students.
Creates a sense of community in the classroom through increased student-student and teacher-student interaction.
Enables teachers to spend more time with groups or individuals, which allows better-quality formative assessments and feedback.
Enhances teacher's support to pupils with special educational needs.
(Capel, Leask & Younie, 2019; Cornell University, 2020)
Passive learning vs. Active learning Teaching that remains a one-way transfer of information from instructor to student is now a widely-criticized pedagogical model, accepted as being a poor way to motivate students to learn. Therefore, more and more instructors are incorporating some active learning approaches into their teaching.
What keeps teachers from relying on active learning more often?
It takes more class time, so teachers can’t cover as much material in one class.
Planning active learning exercises takes more prep work, which teachers can’t always spare.
Many teachers have done well as lecturers so far, so they are less inclined to change their current teaching methods.
Teachers lack the support, materials, and budget from their academic institution to try new teaching methods.
Large class sizes prevent the realistic implementation of many active learning strategies.
Ultimately, and unfortunately, implementing more active learning can feel like a hassle.
TEACHING STYLES
There is a vast variety of approaches that teachers use in classrooms. In 1987, Barnes developed a model of three basic teaching styles which consists of closed, framed and negotiated style. While the closed teaching style is the most authoritative and the teacher has full control of the decisions made, in the negotiated style pupils are expected to be actively involved in planning and evaluating. The framed teaching style links these two, which means that the teacher still has a certain amount of control over the topic, but pupils are invited to actively participate.
A helpful way to frame the styles that teachers employ is to look at it from the point of view of how much “say” the learner has and how much “say” the teacher has in terms of the decisions being made in the learning context.
Mosston and Ashworth (2002) describe this as a continuum, in which
the left-hand side (closed style) shows the teacher making all the decisions about what is to be learned, how it will be learned and how this will be achieved. In this sense the teaching style is formal and authoritative. […]
Towards the right-hand side (negotiated style) the learner has increasing amounts of control to the point where, at the extreme right-hand side, they decide what they will learn and how they will go about it: this learner-initiated approach affords pupils a greater amount of intellectual freedom, creativity and enquiry.
(Capel, Leask & Younie, 2019).
Mosston and Ashworth’s continuum of teaching styles offers a very detailed chart thanks to which teaching styles can be easily understood.
DART: Directed Activities Related to Text
DART are ways of engaging students in active reading, writing and listening in order to foster their understanding of a text and their ability to reflect. These strategies can involve not only the use of textbooks, but also a variety of written and visual materials, including resources downloaded from the internet. DART are devised to ensure that pupils interact with a text. Interaction includes, for example, underlining certain types of word, listing important words, drawing diagrams or reformulating. For a concrete example, see section 5 of "Learning Activities".
Pupils often feel that, if they read a text, they are learning and do not always appreciate that they have to work to gain understanding. Students need to do something with the material in order to understand it. It is important that they:
are asked to read selectively - the length of the reading should be appropriate;
understand why they are reading and what they are expected to get out of it;
know what they are supposed to do while reading, what to focus on, what to write down or record;
know what they are going to do with the results of their reading (for example, write, draw, summarise, reformulate, precise, talk to others, talk to the teacher, make research, etc...).
There are many ways of interrogating the material in order to assist with learning and understanding, such as getting an overview, reformulating ideas, reporting back, etc...
For more detailed information about this, see Unit 5.2 of Learning to teach in the secondary school: a companion to school experience by Capel, Leask & Younie (2019).
LEARNING ACTIVITIES
1. ACTIVITIES TO IMPROVE PARAPHRASING SKILLS
TABOO
If you want your students to memorise vocabulary in a fun, unforgettable way and to improve their conversational skills, this activity is right what you are looking for.
It is very simple: divide students in small groups; one student takes the teacher’s list and has to explain the concept without saying the words listed, nor miming.
BACK TO THE BOARD
If you would like to include miming to your active learning games, you may prefer this activity to the one above.
The teacher writes a word or sentence on the board and students have to mime it to each other. They might not practise their paraphrasing skills, but they will certainly memorise the vocabulary.
YOU’VE BEEN BLOOPED
This game is very fun and useful to improve conversational skills, similarly to the ones above.
The word “blooped” has no meaning, so the goal of this game is for students to find out what it refers to in that context by asking the interlocutor strategic questions, such as “Have you ever blooped in public?” or “Do you bloop during the day or at night?”.
2. ROLE-PLAY ACTIVITIES
AT THE TIME OF THE CRIME I WAS…
This activity focusses on the appropriate use of past tenses.
PREPARATION
Prepare a brief scenario of a crime, saying simply ‘There has been a murder in an airport', or 'There has been a robbery in a department store', but do not give any details.
Place in an envelope details of where exactly the crime took place.
ACTIVITY
Practise the vocabulary you will need, such as the places around the airport (information desk, newsagent, checkin, duty-free, cafeteria, lift, Gate no. 4, etc.), or the departments in the department store.
Practise asking 'Where were you at the time of the crime?'
Pupils have to respond by saying 'I was in . .. at the time of the crime.'
Then ask again 'What were you doing at the time of the crime?', to which pupils have to respond differently with sentences such as 'I was buying a newspaper.'
Ask each pupil to write down about four sentences saying where they were and what they were doing. Tell them that they have to make their story sound as convincing as possible.
More advanced pupils can mention an alibi and use third-person verbs, for example 'I was with my friend, who was buying a drink.
Then you can act as the detective by interviewing pupils, asking them to read out their sentences. You can either interview all pupils or pick pupils randomly, or you can state a characteristic that will eliminate some pupils. When you've finished, open the envelope with the details of the crime. If there is only one pupil who has mentioned that place, he/she is automatically the criminal. If there is more than one pupil, then all the pupils who mentioned that place have to come out to the front. You then interview these pupils again and the class has to decide which one has the least convincing story and is therefore the criminal. If you are worried that no pupil will mention the place in the envelope, you can cheat by preparing several envelopes in your bag, although you tell the pupils there's only one. Just make sure you have a way of pulling the correct envelope out of your bag!
I WAS JUST…
This activity is similar to the snake on the bus conversations but practises the language of pleading, convincing and making excuses. First practise the sorts of structures that pupild are likely to need, such as saying sorry, you did not mean to, if only you understood the problems I've got, etc. Then give them the cue cards and ask them to prepare a conversation.
PARENT/TEENAGER ROW
Card one: You are a parent who is furious because your son/daughter has arrived home late and did not bother to phone you.
Card two: You are a teenager who has arrived home late because…
MOTORIST/TRAFFIC WARDEN
Card one: You are parked on a double yellow line (because you are getting tablets for your mother who will die if she does not get them immediately).
Card two: You are a traffic warden who is tired of lazy motorists parking on double yellow lines.
OTHER SCENARIOS
Store detective/shoplifter.
Police officer/drug user.
Referee/footballer who is being sent off.
Train ticket inspector/passenger without a ticket.
Motorist who has just reversed into another motorist.
WRITING A SCRIPT
Similar to the ones above, this activity can be used in many contexts and offer an extra challenge: the students can be the ones writing the script. Topics which lend themselves well to pupils performing dialogues or conversations include:
1 Cafe/restaurant scenes - food, opinions, complaints.
2 Shopping scenes - food, clothes, complaints
3 Hotel, campsite, youth hostel - booking, complaints.
4 Bag snatching.
5 Hijacking, kidnapping.
6 Road accident.
GROUP SIZE
A group of more than four usually becomes unmanageable and tends to leave some pupils with little to do, so organise groups of two, three or four. Insist that everyone must have a part.
WRITING THE SCRIPT
Give pupils a definite time limit and clear instructions about what the scene is to be about. Insist that all members of the group write out all parts of the script so that they are all involved in writing it, no matter how big or small their individual part is. This stops a lazy pupil from simply writing out his/her own tiny part. Remind pupils that you will be taking in their books and giving marks for their script. Make sure that they have access to appropriate vocabulary lists. Encourage pupils to keep more or less to the language that you have been practising as otherwise it becomes very difficult for the rest of the class to follow and they are likely to lose interest.
ACTING
This activity follows on from the previous.
BRINGING IN PROPS
If pupils write their script in one lesson and act out their scenes in the next lesson, this will enable them to bring in props for the actual performance. A gap between the writing and the performance will also allow you to take in their books and correct them. Allow pupils some time at the beginning of the next lesson to rehearse their script again. Whether you allow them to read from their books or learn their part off by heart will depend on how much time you have to spend on the activity.
ENCOURAGING PARTICIPATION
Make sure pupils know you expect them all to participate. You can make the activity part of a speaking assessment, if you feel that pupils are not taking it seriously. Show that you will not tolerate any rudeness from the audience.
USING THE VIDEO CAMERA
You can use a video camera to record the final version and this can help to motivate pupils to perform as well as possible, although it may inhibit some pupils so you will have to use your judgement. However, do not tie yourself up with the videoing as you need to be in control of the class. Use a pupil instead.
EVALUATION
You can run the activity as a competition with marks for each group. The judge could be another teacher or pupils can judge.To organise pupil judging, decide what the scoring system is. Then ask all pupils who would give one point to raise their hands, then two, etc. and add up the score. You could give one score for words and one for acting skills/costume.
IN 10 YEARS’ TIME
While the previous activities mainly focus on the use of past or present tenses, to help pupils practise future tenses, sentence structure and vocabulary, you can start with a series of questions which they can answer by manipulating the question sentence.
You can choose whether the students shall answer the questions in a personal way (so true to them) or impersonating a character, for example an old farmer or a famous ballet dancer.
Questions can be:
In 10 years' time
1 how old will you be?
2 will you be studying working?
3 what will you be studying or what will you be doing as a job?
4 will you be living with your parents or independently?
5 will you be living in this country or abroad?
6 will you have children?
7 what will you be doing in your free time?
8 where will you be going on holiday?
9 will you stay in touch with your current friends?
10 will you be rich/happy/hardworking?
This activity can be either oral or written and could be used with more advanced pupils to practise structures such as ‘I'll probably be…’; ’It's likely/unlikely that…’ and tenses such as the future perfect and the future perfect continuous.
WHAT WILL YOUR TOWN/YOUR HOUSE/YOUR SCHOOL BE LIKE IN 50 YEARS’ TIME?
This activity could be started as a series of questions to answer, with the option for more able pupils to add in their own detail later on.
You might use this activity to practise the same sort of vocabulary as the ideal house/town /school or you could use more vocabulary about the environment. For example, will there be solar panels on your house/school in 50 years’ time?
3. FASHION PARADE
Pupils prepare a fashion parade with a commentary. You will need one lesson in which they prepare the work and then the second lesson when they bring in the clothes they want to wear in the fashion parade. If it goes well you may wish to repeat the parade for a parallel class or for a VIP, such as a senior member of staff. With additional practice this can be a good item to present to a wider audience such as parents or parents of prospective pupils to the school, as everyone can enjoy the visual aspect of the activity even if they do not understand the language.
PREPARATION
Pupils will need access to appropriate vocabulary, such as describing the models: 'Here we have ... wearing ...', and a wider range of vocabulary for clothes and accessories than the average textbook will have. Access to a clothing catalogue can be useful here.
LESSON 1
Pupils work in groups of two, three or four. They need to decide who will be the model or models and what clothes they are going to wear. They must then write the commentary, decide who is going to narrate which bit and practise their script. Insist that everyone in the group must participate, either as a model or as a narrator. Try to get round the groups effectively to check their scripts. Make sure they write a list of who is bringing what for next lesson. As well as clothes, they may wish to bring in some suitable music.
LESSON 2
Decide on a venue for this lesson. You may be able to use a drama room. Otherwise clear appropriate space in the classroom. Allow pupils some organisational time at the beginning of the lesson to get changed and practise their script. Then do the fashion parade. To avoid argument, you can number the groups and pull numbers out of a hat to decide the order they go in. Insist on good behaviour from the audience. You can run it as a competition with marks for each group. The judge could be another teacher or pupils can judge. To organise pupil judging, decide what the scoring system is, out of three or out of five. Then ask all pupils who would give one point to raise their hands, then two, etc. and add up the score.
4. BINGO
This game can be used in many contexts: from grammar to vocabulary, from functional language to poetry, etc…
CONVERSATIONAL BINGO
Students write 3 sentences using the target language (for example, functional language for suggestions). The teacher sets the context (for example, plan the weekend with a 15€ budget), some students make suggestions and others answer if they agree or not and why.
The first person to use all 3 sentences wins.
POETRY BINGO
This game is very useful because the students have to be able to identify different forms and patterns, as well as literary devices, in order to mark the correct spot on the Bingo card.
What to do:
Give students a game board with different forms of poetry in the boxes.
Play different clips of songs (or read poems from the textbook) that have the forms of poetry listed and have students determine which poetry forms/pattern the song (or poem) is an example of and then mark it if they have it. Play until one student gets a “Bingo”.
The same rules apply for literary devices: students read a poem from the textbook or handout and they will then have to find the literary devices mentioned in the bingo board.
The first person to find them all (and prove it, of course) wins.
5. DART - DEVELOPING QUESTIONS ON MAGAZINE OR NEWSPAPER ARTICLES
MAGAZINES
Reading and understanding articles in the target language is very important in helping to build up pupils’ vocabulary and their ability to cope with the unknown.
This is a frequent component of examinations. With this kind of text, you can decide to make students read for gist, detail, or specific information.
PROS AND CONS
The advantage of using target language magazines is that the materials you choose can be of particular interest or relevance to your pupils, in contrast to what can be found on textbooks.
The disadvantage is that you have to write the comprehension exercises yourself.
WHICH PAGES TO USE?
Short articles on new film or music releases, or on details of celebrities' personal lives are often of interest to pupils, but all sorts of things can be exploited, even the advertisements.
TYPES OF QUESTION THAT CAN BE USED
General questions in the target language or in the mother tongue (only when all pupils speak the same language).
True/false statements.
Multiple-choice questions.
Table to fill in, perhaps with personal and professional details for someone famous, for example favourite colour, films made.
A summary (or sentences) about the article with gaps in it. For less advanced pupils, provide a list of words that can go into the gaps.
Who says…? This is particularly appropriate where a number of people are giving their opinion on an issue.
Writing a summary of the news item or article.
Rewriting as full sentences information which has been given in note form, such as a portrait of a star giving details such as age and place of birth.
Matching two halves of a sentence to reflect the sense of the article for example He was born in . . . New York. His mother was. .. a cleaner. You can put in more second halves of the sentence than you actually need as distractors.
Match a theme/word/sentence to a paragraph of the text.
Find a word in the text with the same meaning/the opposite meaning.
NEWSPAPERS
Nowadays you can easily find newspaper articles online, but if you want to add an extra vibe (and challenge for yourself to find the right shop), you can actually purchase some up-to-date foreign papers to use in class. This can be useful not only to practice reading and listening skills, but also discuss current affairs in an engaging way.
Some activities:
Pupils match up headlines and pictures. This can involve either very different topics or similar topics.
Pupils match up headlines and articles.
Pupils have the headlines in front of them. You then read out the first few lines of an article and pupils have to decide which headline you are referring to.
Pupils are given a number of and they have to say which one they would use as their main headline and why ('because it is scandalous'). You can discuss whether their main headline would vary according to what sort of newspaper it is (intellectual or popular) or whether it is a daily or a weekly or whether it is a local or a national paper.
Use headlines to analyse the type of language and abbreviations that they contain.
If your pupils have access to the Internet, you can ask them to bring in yesterday's headlines and explain in a couple of sentences what they are about.
As pupils become more advanced, they will be expected to understand a wider range of newspaper and magazine articles and be up-to-date with current affairs. Some articles in textbooks can date very quickly and teachers are left finding their own more recent articles and having to think of ways of exploiting them.
These are some of the question techniques that are used by exam boards:
True/false (and correct the false sentences)
True/false/can't tell
Gap-filling with a) the exact number of words needed provided; b) with the correct words and distractors provided; c) with no words provided;
Multiple-choice questions
A table to fill in with details from the text
Matching beginnings and ends of sentences with the exact number of sentences or with distractors
Questions in the mother tongue (only when all pupils speak the same language)
Questions in the target language
Writing a summary of the news item or article in the target language or in their mother tongue (only when all pupils speak the same language).
Translation of extracts from the article into the pupils' mother tongue (only when all pupils speak the same language).
What these numbers refer to.
Who these names refer to.
Who these statements refer to.
Finish the end of the sentence in your own words in the target language.
Explain the meaning of these phrases in your own words in the target language. Other exercises include:
Rewriting the article in a different tense (the article is about something that is going to happen and then pupils write about it as if it has happened.
Re-writing as full sentences information which has been given in note form, such as a portrait of a star giving details such as age and place of birth.
Match a theme/word/sentence to a paragraph of the text.
OTHER FUN ACTIVITIES
6. TIC-TAC-TOE
Tic-Tac-Toe is a quick and fun way to review several grammar forms, such as irregular verbs, verbs followed by infinitive or gerund, adverbs, etc…
You need two teams of 1-4 to play this game, one team plays as Xs, the other as Os.
Draw a Tic-Tac-Toe grid on the board and write in each square one of the items to be reviewed.
Give students specific instructions, such as “Give me the past tense and a sentence” or “What’s the question?”.
Teams, in turns, choose a square. After consulting with the team a player makes a sentence using the chosen word in the correct form. If the sentence is correct, place an X or O in the square depending on the team. If the sentence is wrong the square stays in play.
The winner is the team which manages to connect three Xs or Os in a row – either horizontally, vertically or diagonally.
7. EXPERT GROUPS
Group your students into 4 equal “Expert Groups” (e.g. Group A, Group B, etc.).
Each of these groups will have to cover a unique topic or have a unique task to accomplish.
For example, you could divide a reading selection from a textbook into 4 equal parts.
The students in these groups are responsible for becoming “experts” in their topic of study.
After the “experts” have gathered to learn their assigned topics in-depth, they can then be dispersed into numbered groups, which will contain one “expert” from each group.
During this time, “experts” will present to the other members of the group.
Why this activity is effective:
Less Overwhelming- The students can focus their learning on one aspect of a topic, which allows for greater understanding of a concept.
Student Accountability- The students understand that they will be responsible for presenting this information to another group of students.
Responsive to Student Learning- As you observe these groups in action, you will quickly see who is and is not “getting it.” If you see students struggling to present the information in their “Numbered Groups,” then you can always have the “Expert Groups” reconvene.
8. MISCONCEPTION CHECK
When previewing the previous lesson, the teacher gives a false piece of information.
The students have to find the mistake and correct the teacher.
ICT ACTIVITIES
9. MOBILE PHONES
You will need two mobile phones, but one only needs be used to receive the call.
You can liven up the presentation of new work or act out a listening exercise by using mobile phones to simulate a telephone conversation, rather than merely reading it out. You can do this simply as a demonstration if you have the opportunity to team teach with a colleague or a language assistant.
Alternatively you can involve pupils, preferably in the role of the client or the part of the dialogue that they are likely to need to say in real life or in the examination situation.
Topics which can be enhanced in this way include:
-phoning for a pizza or phoning for a Chinese takeaway,
-booking a hotel, campsite,
-arranging to meet a friend.
SOMETHING EXTRA
Although you may not consider it entirely relevant to your examination work, pupils are often very interested in learning some of the text-messaging abbreviations that are commonly used. You can show them some examples of messages and even ask them to make some up, using the abbreviations.
10. KAHOOT! and QUIZLET
KAHOOT!
Kahoot! is a game-based learning platform, used as educational technology. Its learning games, "Kahoots", are user-generated multiple-choice quizzes that can be accessed via a web browser or the Kahoot app. Kahoot! can be used to review students' knowledge, for formative assessment, or as a break from traditional classroom activities.
Kahoot! also includes trivia quizzes. You can make distance learning awesome by hosting a live Kahoot via video or you can play in class by hosting on a big screen. Questions and answer alternatives are displayed on a shared screen while students answer on their devices.
Creating a game of Kahoot! is very simple. You can create one from scratch, use the platform’s question bank to mix and match questions, edit a template, or reuse existing games, for example, one of the premium Kahoots created and verified by teachers. The format and number of questions is up to you. You can add videos, images and diagrams to your questions to amplify engagement.
After a game, encourage players to create and share their own kahoots! With one of our premium plans for schools or business, you can co-create games with your colleagues and save time on finding relevant kahoots for your class or training session.
QUIZLET
Similar to Kahoot!, but with more functionalities, Quizlet is a web-based tool that allows users to create study tools such as interactive flashcards, tests, and study games. With Quizlet, students can choose their own “Study Mode.” This allows activity content to be migrated from flashcards to matching games to other types of study games easily and responsively.
REFERENCE LIST
BOOKS
Capel, Leask & Younie (2019). Learning to teach in the secondary school: A companion to school experience (8th ed.). London: ROUTLEDGE.
Griffith, N. (2005). 100 ideas for teaching languages (1st ed.). London: Continuum.
Grunert O'Brien, Millis & Cohen (1997). The Course Syllabus: A Learning-Centered Approach
(2nd ed.). Hoboken: Wiley.
LINKS
Smart Sparrow (2018). Keep Learners At The Center Of The Design Process.
Retrieved on October 14th, 2020 from https://www.smartsparrow.com/what-is-active-learning/
Hoogendoorn, C. (2015). The Neuroscience of Active Learning. Retrieved on October 14th, 2020 from https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/writingacrossthecurriculum/2015/10/15/the-neuroscience-of-active-learning/
Cornell University (2020). Active Learning. Retrieved on October 14th, 2020 from
Tic Tac Toe. Retrieved on October 14th, 2020 from
Poetry Bingo. Retrieved on October 14th, 2020 from
Expert Groups: A Cooperative Learning Strategy {Post 1 of 5}. Retrieved on October 14th, 2020 from https://teacherthrive.com/expert-groups-cooperative-learning/
What is Kahoot!?. Retrieved on October 14th, 2020 from
Quizlet. Retrieved on October 14th, 2020 from
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