New activity and methodology books
First Impressions looks at some new photocopiable resource books and a new methodology book about vocabulary.
As we start our new series of articles on creating your own classroom materials, and are about to launch a competition in which we ask you to write an activity for the magazine, it feels appropriate to be looking at three new photocopiable resource books. These books contain some great examples of inventive activities, presented on a single page, that are easy to photocopy and that feature clear step-by-step teaching notes.
The three books are from the Cambridge Copy Collection (Cambridge University Press) and are aimed primarily at teachers working with teenagers. In fact, the first book is called Teen World. The book’s author is Joanna Budden, who you may remember was a regular contributor to our very own biTs magazine a few years ago.
The book is divided into 17 units, each focussing on a different topic of interest to teenagers. Within each unit there’s a different activity for elementary, intermediate and upper-intermediate levels. The focus is very much on speaking activities and encouraging real communication between students and the teacher.
Themes include technology, music, humour, sport, relationships, and the environment. The environment unit, for example, starts with a recycling board game for elementary level in which students race each other to put items in the correct recycling bin. The intermediate activity is an ecological footprint questionnaire, and the upper-intermediate activity is a role play. Each activity has a language focus so teachers can easily link an activity to what they’re doing in class.
Teen World includes units related to music, TV and film, but if you want more activities on these topics then try Film, TV and Music by Olha Madylus, which contains over 40 activities specifically designed for teenagers. Based on the theory of multiple intelligences, the activities are designed to tap into the different types of intelligences, so that individual students can bring their own particular strengths to their language learning. The main activities in the book incorporate several different intelligences and styles of learning, while many of the follow-up activities allow students to choose an activity that appeals to their individual style. The idea is that all students will gain a sense of achievement from the activities.
The third new title is Pairwork and Groupwork by Meredith Levy and Nicholas Murgatroyd. The book has a similar format to the others. There’s a map of the book, an introduction, and then 17 units on a range of topics, each unit consisting of an activity for each level. In all the activities, students work independently in pairs or groups and are encouraged to communicate naturally and spontaneously to complete the tasks. There’s a major focus on speaking and listening, and activity types include board and card games, role plays, quizzes, surveys, problem-solving activities, story-telling and group presentations.
All of these Cambridge Copy books are published in black-and-white in an A4 spiral-bound format, making it easy to place them in the photocopy machine. If you want to know more, you can download samples from the Cambridge website (www.cambridge.org/elt/ccc).
Users of Get Real, the Helbling course for teenagers, will be happy to know that there are two new photocopiable activity books available with a DVD. Each DVD contains 20 minutes of interviews and documentaries aimed at teenagers and young adults. It’s produced in a TV magazine style with a presenter introducing topics such as fashion, part-time jobs and survival. There’s a visit to Manchester and another to an Indian restaurant in London. Each activity book contains photocopiable activities to be done before, during and after watching the films. The book also includes teaching notes, an answer key and transcripts.
Helbling has also just produced interactive versions of the Get Real books for use with an interactive whiteboard or a computer. Each interactive book includes the Student’s book plus listenings, a CD-ROM, a Test Builder CD-ROM and the new DVD.
The introduction of interactive student books is an example of how publishing is changing. But the world of publishing itself is constantly changing as companies acquire other companies or are themselves acquired. In a recent press release, it was announced that “Cengage Learning, one of the world’s leading providers of print and digital information services for the educational and library reference markets, has completed the acquisition of Marshall Cavendish’s ELT business. The acquired assets will be integrated with Cengage Learning’s Heinle ELT business in their EMEA publishing group.” If you find that all a bit confusing then maybe you should get hold of a book that Heinle ELT has just published: Vocabulary Matrix: Understanding, Learning, Teaching by Michael McCarthy, Anne O’Keeffe and Steven Walsh.
This book is a guide to the methodology of vocabulary instruction for all language teachers, but particularly teachers who are just starting out. Supported by corpus-based evidence and real classroom data, the book explores what words mean, how they relate to other words and how they function in different ways within society. In the introduction to the books, the authors explain the importance of understanding words: “As teachers, words are our medium and they are our message. Even at the most elementary level of teaching, words are our starting point. Therefore, it is fundamentally important to stop and think about what words are, what they mean, how they relate to other words and how they function in different ways in society.”
The book has 10 chapters, among them “Collocations”, “The grammar of words”, “Idioms”, “Words in text and discourse” and “Words in the mind”. Each chapter is divided into three parts: (A) What do we know about this? (B) What are the problems for learners? and (C) How do we teach it? At the end of each chapter there’s a 10-question review section. Review commentaries and answer key help with self-study and review.
Heinle ELT is rapidly making a name for itself in the world of English language teaching so we wish everyone there and at Marshall Cavendish ELT much success in the future.
Links to Web sites
Cambridge University Press
Helbling Languages
Heinle ELT