Teaching English Toolbox - OPEN ACCESS SANDBOX
Learner Engagement
Canva: A cute cat teaching some mice who are totally excited about learning
Here are some questions to think about.
- How are you engaging all your learners in your classroom and not just the superstars?
- Some people would argue that if you have to take the pre-prescribed materials (coursebooks) and make them exciting through gamification or fancy instructional design, then you are not really teaching your learners or engaging them in meaningful content - how can you provide engaging content in a way that is simple for your planning?
- How can you choose engaging content for a whole class or have systems in place whereby content is different for individuals (though perhaps the skills taught are similar for all)?
- What techniques do you know (e.g. mini whiteboards or Class Dojo) that get all learners involved? Are they really effective?
- Sturtevant, J. A. (2017). Hacking engagement again: 50 teacher tools that will make students love your class.
- Hunton, J. (2014). Fun learning activities for modern foreign languages: A complete toolkit for ensuring engagement, progress and achievement. Crown House Publishing.
- Try searching under "increasing learner engagement in the foreign language classroom" to find many more ideas.