Monday, May 16, 2011

Resources to Help You Learn English Grammar

Gram­mar is one of the key require­ments for learn­ing Eng­lish. This arti­cle gives you some insight into the kind of resources that you might use for this pur­pose. You can then expand on the resources that have been discussed.


Using resources to teach Eng­lish grammar

When you are teach­ing the lan­guage, it is impor­tant to con­sider all the avenues that are open to you. There are some really great resources that are pro­vided at the British Coun­cil as well as the Amer­i­can Con­sulate. You can also use the inter­net to access some impor­tant tools for your task. Broadly speak­ing these are some of the resources that are avail­able to you

1. Nov­els and plays: You should expose your stu­dents to a wide range of nov­els and plays. Apart from the clas­sics such as Jane Austen and Charles Dick­ens, you should try to use mod­ern writ­ers as well. Harry Porter is a great resource for younger stu­dents. Get the stu­dents to select the mate­ri­als that have spe­cific inter­est for them. In that sense, they can learn Eng­lish whilst enjoy­ing the experience.

2. Inter­ac­tive CD-ROMs and cas­settes: The use of inter­ac­tive cas­settes and other forms of media has grown in stature as we become aware of mod­ern learn­ing tech­niques. Remem­ber that the younger gen­er­a­tion is already con­ver­sant with these tools when they play video games. You are merely giv­ing them the oppor­tu­nity to become bet­ter at a lan­guage using the tools that they rou­tinely work with.

3. Videos and tele­vi­sion: The power of visual images can­not be under­es­ti­mated when learn­ing a new lan­guage. Some view­ers spend an aver­age of five hours a day on tele­vi­sion. That time is well spent if they are learn­ing Eng­lish in the process. Make sure that your stu­dents get access to infor­ma­tive tele­vi­sion pro­grams from time to time.

4. Blogs: Many of the inter­na­tional uni­ver­si­ties such as the Uni­ver­sity of Liv­er­pool are effec­tively using the inter­net to com­mu­ni­cate with their stu­dents. You can set up a blog which will help your stu­dents to prac­tice their writ­ing skills. At the same time you can give them feed­back on how well they are doing through this medium.

5. Illus­trated Comics: This is an inno­v­a­tive way to get your stu­dents to study the lan­guage in an enjoy­able for­mat. Some of the great French comics have been suc­cess­fully trans­lated into Eng­lish. Why not use Tin-Tin to get your stu­dents to prac­tice their gram­mar? You might even get them to do the work in their leisure time.

The resources for teach­ing Eng­lish gram­mar are in no way exhaus­tive. You will need to find a set of mate­ri­als that helps you in your work. At the same time you have to main­tain inter­est in the class­room. These mate­ri­als can help you to achieve this objec­tive through the vari­ety of ways in which the infor­ma­tion is pre­sented. You will also be using mod­ern tech­nol­ogy to ensure that you are lead­ing the class effec­tively. Those are the min­i­mum stan­dards that are expected in this con­text as you expand the edu­ca­tional hori­zons of your students.

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