RLOPCUkraineBlog: English Club

A Picture Tells a Thousand Stories

My primary assignment at Ivan Franko State University Zhytomyr (http://zu.edu.ua/) is to work with the Pedagogical Department to improve the training of future English teachers. I have been observing the fine teachers here at the university as well as teaching my own classes. Another part of my assignment is to organize an English Club for the students. This may sound like a fun, easy task but putting together a club in Ukraine never is simple. There are always grand plans for forming clubs that will help students improve their language skills while simultaneously having fun and breaking down cultural barriers. But after the initial burst of activity interest begins to lag. Many times students are just too busy to participate. But mainly, it is very difficult to get students to commit to planning and leading these clubs. The key is to hook students early and get them focused on making the club their own. So far, I have done a "Speed Dating" (see below) event where students were lined up across from each other and asked to discuss a simple question ("What is your favorite food?", for example). After one minute they stopped, shared out, and one side of the line moved one chair to the left. I then asked another question and each person had to speak with a new partner. This was a good way to practice fluency while allowing students to get to better know each other.

The most recent event was structured around a Norman Rockwell Painting. (http://www.arts-wallpapers.com/galleries/norman-rockwell-paintings/imagepages/image16.htm) The students had to look at the picture and brainstorm the "What's", the "Who's", the "Where's", etc. As a class we complied a list of terms followed by the students choosing a character. Next each student had to write down what that character was thinking. This challenged the class to think more in conversational rather than academic terms. After sharing out, students got into groups of threes, chose a different character from the picture, and wrote a fuller, more complete dialogue. Finally, they acted out the dialogue in front of the class. How did they do? See one of the performances below: