Conducting a ‘Running Dictation’ Online

Challenge – A ‘running dictation’ is a useful way for learners to improve listening skills, memorise text, and speak clearly with correct pronunciation. Whilst it is an easy activity to set up in a physical classroom, it’s harder to recreate in an online setting. This online version achieves most of these criteria by using movement

Using Google Forms to Facilitate a Speaking Activity

Challenge – Speaking activities online have a tendency to be stilted. Students can find it unnatural and awkward to converse. Equally, it is difficult for the teacher to provide prompts as students are in break-out rooms. Tools Used – Zoom Breakout Rooms, Google Forms Activity Outline In this example learners were asked to have a

Using Zoom Breakout Rooms to Facilitate Online Mingling

Challenge – Mingling can be difficult in the online environment.  Sometimes learners have little control over who they speak to, for example when making breakout rooms, the teacher or the computer decides on the groupings.  The solution presented here is to use the ‘Let participants choose room’ function and a speaking exercise.  This will enable

Allowing Learners To Choose Discussion Topic With Zoom Breakout Rooms

Challenge – Some topics can be personally challenging for learners to discuss in the lesson and it can be difficult online to create a situation where learners control discussion choice.  The solution presented here is to rename breakout rooms with topics and use the ‘Let participants choose room’ function so learners can choose what they

Teaching New Vocabulary By Using Padlet To Move Images and Text.

Challenge – It is easy to get stuck in a rut when teaching vocabulary online. It is difficult to recreate matching activities, or any ‘hands on’ activity, which in the physical classroom would make a more dynamic and engaging atmosphere.  The solution presented here is to use Padlet in order to move images around the

Webquest (Version 2 – Group Work / Pair Work)

Challenge – Pair activity online seemed somewhat cumbersome at the beginning. One activity which lent itself to teamwork was a webquest used to introduce the lesson topic. The resources available online are perhaps too broad and had copious amounts of information (Wikipedia or Google). It can be difficult to sift through the amount of data

Randomly Generating Vocabulary for Practice

Challenge – In the physical classroom the teacher will often use sets of vocabulary cards in various contexts to enable the learners to practice a specific set of vocabulary. They are quick to produce and provide a randomly generated (shuffled) order which is useful for helping learners to apply their learning. Online it is possible