I'd also like to share a few ideas on doing gap-fills.
I'd also like to share a few ideas on doing gap-fills. I've found them on the web, but my colleagues and I have already triedthese out. They work well and the SS love them!
1. Round the room Gapfill
Divide the text into paragraphs / sentences and post round the room. Learners write the gap numbers (e.g. 1 – 10) on a piece of paper and walk around the room, doing the task as an open cloze, writing down the words they think should go in the gap – either in English or their own language. Partial feedback – dictate the answers out of order and learners write them down next to their original answers. Learners go back to the round the room text and check their ideas. Full feedback.
2.Shouting Banana Dictation
Divide the target text into two halves, ideally on a sentence by sentence basis to ensure that learners take turns during the rest of the activity. Divide the class into two groups. Group A gets one half and group B gets the other. Ask each group stand / sit on opposite sides of the room, so that each member of group A is facing a partner in group B. Learners take turns to read one sentence from their half of the text, saying Banana where there is a gap, and their partner has to guess what the word should be. Feedback.
3.Running Banana Dictation Gapfill
The teacher posts the gapped text outside the classroom (next to the DoS office is always a favourite). Learners pair up and run, read, relate and write, but – instead of relaying the “banana”, they have to say what they think should go in the gap. Feedback – Learners swap their written texts with each other and compare them with an original ungapped version, assigning marks for transcription accuracy and correct gapped words.
4.Who Wants to be a Millionaire?
www.tes.co.uk has a version, as do http://jc-schools.net/tutorials/ppt-games/ and http://www.primaryresources.co.uk/index.htm, which has a blank template and various pre-made versions relating to the UK primary curriculum.
Effectively mimicking the style and format of the highly popular quiz show, learners are given different multiple choice options for each question, correct answers bringing them closer to the one million pound prize!
5.Banana Dictation Word Grab.
Put the target words if from an open cloze, or all of the possible words if adapting a multiple choice version, round the room / school / hidden in the DoS office. The teacher then reads out the gapped text as per a banana dictation. When learners think they know the correct word for the gap, they grab the word as quickly as they can. This can be done in teams or on an individual basis. The teacher continues repeating the dictation until all the words have been grabbed.
6.Reverse Gapfill
This one needs a little bit of pre-preparation and would be easier to work with an Interactive Whiteboard / projector and subsequent powerpoint slides.
Basically, you start with a complete text, but then slowly remove words from the text (it can be random, but it works more effectively if you start removing words from the beginning, thus corresponding with the stage of copying that the learners are at). By the end of the first stage, you should have a blank, or nearly blank board. At which point, you can put the learners into two groups, divide the board in two and get each group to put the whole thing back again.
Full feedback – compare with the original.
http://jc-schools.net/tutorials/ppt-games/
1. Round the room Gapfill
Divide the text into paragraphs / sentences and post round the room. Learners write the gap numbers (e.g. 1 – 10) on a piece of paper and walk around the room, doing the task as an open cloze, writing down the words they think should go in the gap – either in English or their own language. Partial feedback – dictate the answers out of order and learners write them down next to their original answers. Learners go back to the round the room text and check their ideas. Full feedback.
2.Shouting Banana Dictation
Divide the target text into two halves, ideally on a sentence by sentence basis to ensure that learners take turns during the rest of the activity. Divide the class into two groups. Group A gets one half and group B gets the other. Ask each group stand / sit on opposite sides of the room, so that each member of group A is facing a partner in group B. Learners take turns to read one sentence from their half of the text, saying Banana where there is a gap, and their partner has to guess what the word should be. Feedback.
3.Running Banana Dictation Gapfill
The teacher posts the gapped text outside the classroom (next to the DoS office is always a favourite). Learners pair up and run, read, relate and write, but – instead of relaying the “banana”, they have to say what they think should go in the gap. Feedback – Learners swap their written texts with each other and compare them with an original ungapped version, assigning marks for transcription accuracy and correct gapped words.
4.Who Wants to be a Millionaire?
www.tes.co.uk has a version, as do http://jc-schools.net/tutorials/ppt-games/ and http://www.primaryresources.co.uk/index.htm, which has a blank template and various pre-made versions relating to the UK primary curriculum.
Effectively mimicking the style and format of the highly popular quiz show, learners are given different multiple choice options for each question, correct answers bringing them closer to the one million pound prize!
5.Banana Dictation Word Grab.
Put the target words if from an open cloze, or all of the possible words if adapting a multiple choice version, round the room / school / hidden in the DoS office. The teacher then reads out the gapped text as per a banana dictation. When learners think they know the correct word for the gap, they grab the word as quickly as they can. This can be done in teams or on an individual basis. The teacher continues repeating the dictation until all the words have been grabbed.
6.Reverse Gapfill
This one needs a little bit of pre-preparation and would be easier to work with an Interactive Whiteboard / projector and subsequent powerpoint slides.
Basically, you start with a complete text, but then slowly remove words from the text (it can be random, but it works more effectively if you start removing words from the beginning, thus corresponding with the stage of copying that the learners are at). By the end of the first stage, you should have a blank, or nearly blank board. At which point, you can put the learners into two groups, divide the board in two and get each group to put the whole thing back again.
Full feedback – compare with the original.
http://jc-schools.net/tutorials/ppt-games/
WOW, thank you so much! They are great ideas, Ruslon! I will study each of them and get back to you with feedback once I have tried them! :)
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing. That's a great compilation :-)
ReplyDeleteSlightly on a tangent, but it reminds me of getting students to have a 'banana conversation' as a warm-up. They were low level students in Japan who were generally very shy to speak. They have to communicate for 1-2 minutes only using the word 'banana' and gestures. The focus is to work on intonation, expression and non-verbal cues. Afterwards, they try to guess what the other person was trying to say to them.
It's lots of fun, breaks the ice especially with new students, and shows them how much they can actually communicate with very limited language.
Phil Brown that makes me think of this Ewan Macgreggor commercial from a while ago:
ReplyDeleteyoutube.com - Ewan commercial~luv it