Saturday, April 12, 2014

Communication modes

The Arabic classes that I teach meet 3 times a week.  Each class meeting I try to design my activities so that I apply the three modes of communications.  I start my class by engaging the students with a conversation with each other.  Then check their vocabulary or grammar comprehension with simple matching, or putting a check next to the correct expression.  Then I put a question on the board that prompts them to have a conversation with each other by responding to the question and then practice asking each other the same question or similar ones.  Each chapter in the book has a story.  So everyone gets a chance to read part of the story.  I separate the students in breakout rooms so they work in groups.  They either answer question about the story that I have prepared or they form some questions about the story themselves.  The work can be saved from each room.  Then when we come back to the main room, each group will present their work and we all discuss them one by one.
With these kind of activities, I believe I implement the interpretative, interpersonal and presentational and presentational modes. 
I can improve or extend this activity by asking the groups to create a similar story which they either present verbally to the class or in a written form.  They can record themselves in a video or they can create a skit to act out the story.

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