Adjective Lesson Plan: Teaching with PPP
It is important that advanced students’ vocabulary continuously progresses. This teaching plan explains how to teach new adjectives.
Date: 14 July 2013
Class Level: Level 7 – Advanced Students
Length of Lesson:1 hour 5 minutes
Lesson Type & Subject:Vocabulary: adjectives.
Materials Needed: Pictures of weather, realia (abnormally large fruit/object, flower) and worksheet.
Lesson Objective: Students will learn about new adjectives and incorporate them. Descriptions of verbs will be verbal and non-verbal (writing).
Assumptions:Students have a good understanding of adjectives and how to order them in a sentence.
But students repetitively describe nouns with the same adjectives (describing something as “amazing” or “beautiful” frequently, without being aware of other adjectives like spectacular and gorgeous).
Anticipated Problems & Solutions:
Problem:Committing new adjectives to memory.
Solution:Adjective drill – incorporating different nouns to describe.
Problem:Students are struggling with sentence structure.
Solution:Explain where the adjective is placed in a sentence. Give examples; SS repeat.
Problem:Pronunciation of words.
Solution:Pronunciation drill.
Strategy 1:
Interaction Patterns: T>S & S>T
Timing: 20 minutes.
Purpose of Procedure: To interest students; pre-teach new adjectives. Connect adjectives with nouns. Describe pictures and objects for a clearer meaning. Practice new vocabulary with guidance of the teacher.
Presentation:
* Introduce the topic in an interesting fashion and illustrate how students can apply it in their lives. Advanced adjectives that can be discussed: “stunning”, “gorgeous”, “spectacular”, “huge” and “immense”. * Hand out objects like flowers, an abnormally large fruit etc. * Cover the new adjectives, compare them with similar adjectives that they already know.
* Teach necessary grammar and structures required to describe nouns. “The adjective is said before the noun.” * Elicit the names of the objects and model the use of adjectives, describing these objects. “This is a large apple.” “This is a gorgeous flower”. Students repeat and agree or disagree. * Introduce pictures of other objects like the weather. Elicit what the picture is depicting e.g. “sunset” or “rainstorm”. Model some basic sentences using the new adjectives, so that the meaning is clear. “What a stunning sunset!” “It is a spectacular rainbow.” “The immense cloud is covering the sky”. Ss repeat.
Strategy 2:
Interaction Patterns: T>S & S>T & S>S
Timing: 25 minutes.
Purpose of Procedure: Confirm new vocabulary through practice; identify written vocabulary.
* In pairs, SS complete a fill-in-the-blanks (with options) exercise. The exercise is a conversation, with blank spaces that students need to fill in, requiring the language that was learnt in class. They will have a list of adjectives that they can use. E.g. “She has a _______ smile.”. * Students compare answers by answering them out loud: “The first answer is stunning.” * Game: Two teams are created. Each team is given a noun, and each team gets five minutes to write a list of sentences with adjectives describing that noun. The lists are compared when the time is up. The team with the most adjectives wins.
Strategy 3:
Interaction Patterns: T>S & S>S
Timing:20 min.
Purpose of Procedure: Students produce vocabulary independently and advanced adjectives are reinforced.
Production:
1. Students see photos of famous sights – the Egyptian pyramids, the Louvre, the Eiffel Tower etc. Elicit where these sights are found and why they were built – teacher assists students if they have never seen or heard about a site before.
2. Students choose their favourite sites. They shortly discuss why they like that particular site, using advanced adjectives to describe what they look like.
