Monday 19 March 2012

Are Task based Lessons Boring?

This week we had a module on communicative classrooms. The teaching in the module and the ideas that were contributed to the discussion were helpful. They will inspire new ideas on information gaps, authentic activities and task based lessons for my classroom.  I am always trying to adjust things in my class to be more relevant; if I learn new things I like to change things up and try it. Some things work some don't. So I have been trying to do task based lessons and use more authentic materials in my class. Interestingly, unlike what the module said, I have found lesson planning easier with task based lessons. The one problem I have run into is that my students don't always seem interested in the material, now this may be just what it appears to be but it makes me wonder. If I put myself in their shoes would I find filling in forms, reading instructions, writing notes to school teachers and the like boring. I think I might. When I ask them what they enjoy about English class and where they learn the most, they say they really enjoy reading fiction stories, they find they learn a lot, connect with the story and they are even motivated to reread it at home. Of course there is nothing wrong with stories, in fact there are lots of communicative ways to use a good story(group discussions, retelling the story, looking up new vocabulary, etc). As good as the stories are I also want the student to enjoy the authentic tasks as well. Maybe there are some ideas you have for me to make the tasks more interesting. I hope some of you will interact with me on this and let me know what you have done or expect to do to ensure the students have more interest in authentic materials.
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2 comments:

  1. Kaleigh20 March 2012 at 09:25

    Hi Cindy! I'm glad to hear that some of the ideas that came up in this module and through our discussion are useful to you in your own teaching, and that you are already incorporating some ideas! That's great!

    that's interesting that you think some of these tasks may be considered boring. I agree that filling out a form may not be the most exciting task, but if students have to do this out of the classroom, and it's a task that they are struggling with, then I definitely think it would be very important to incorporate in the class. However, if you like fun activities, and you know your students do to, then can you think of fun ways to introduce and teach these skills, like setting up role plays, doing collaborative activities, or incorporating chants, visuals, videos, and other interactive strategies? This might help keep the classroom as a fun learning environment, but still help students to focus on developing their skills towards important communicative tasks.

    Thanks!

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  2. Cindy26 March 2012 at 14:06

    Thanks for the reply Kaliegh. I like your ideas on keeping tasks from being boring. I think you are right; sometimes a task that is real they may find boring or I may think it is boring for them, but if they need it in the real world they will appreciate the fact that they learned how to do the task in a classroom before they needed it out there. Also I was thinking if the students have more input into the material that is chosen I will have less trouble with them not liking the task because they have chosen it.

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