Humanising Language Teaching
Year 5; Issue 2; March 03

Before Class: prepare a list of about 20 international English words that your beginner students are sure to know e.g. taxi, computer, hamburger (See below for fuller list)
Aim: make beginners aware that they can generate their own chunks, show them how much English they already know
Time: 25 minutes

Procedure:

1. :Write the list of internatonal words on the board or brainstorm and get as many from the students as possible

2. As an example get the students to expand one of the words into a chunk. (For taxi students have suggested black taxi, yellow taxi, taxi driver)

3. Give students time in pairs or groups to come up with possibilities for the other words

4. Finally check and pool their suggestions and write on board as necessary.

Text: the following list of English words are usually known by most groups of beginners: taxi, jumbo jet, police, bus, satellite, helicopter, cassette, telephone, television, computer, video, camera, photograph, film, calculator, tennis, football, hamburger, sandwich, pizza, hot dog, restaurant, supermarket, cinema

Variation: It's also possible to get the student to suggest ways of reducing words so burger instead of hamburger, phone instead of telephone.

Rationale: This gives the students an early introduction to the importance of chunks. It also gives them a chance to display their knowledge of the world e.g. yellow taxis in New York, black taxis in London, Taxi driver is the title of a famous movie etc..