EDPJ5013

WK. 5 LESSON PLANNING

Teaching Practice – Teaching Talk
We are going to watch the first group do their teaching practice. Please prepare to give
some feedback on one of the following criteria:

 Appropriacy of aim(s)

 Appropriacy of activity

 Appropriacy of teacher talk

 Classroom management (e.g. effective use of Zoom, monitoring, feedback)

Task 1 – Procedure of a lesson plan
• You will be given a procedure and some materials from a British Council lesson plan about WH questions in
the past simple tense.

1. What do you think is the main aim of this lesson?

2. What level of English learner do you think that this lesson is suitable for?

3. Are the procedure and the materials clear?

4. Are the activities in the lesson plan interesting and motivating?

Task 1 – Procedure of a lesson plan
• You will be given a procedure and some materials from a British Council lesson plan about WH questions in
the past simple tense.

5. What problems do you anticipate that teachers or learners could have with these activities? (Try out
activity 3). (Whole class discussion)

6. Would you make any changes to this lesson plan? Would you add anything? If so, what?

7. Which aspects of the past simple can learners have difficulties with?  

8. The lesson plans you have seen in this tutorial teach the simple past through talking about the very recent
past (i.e., the weekend and yesterday). Can you think of any other contexts/situations that you could use to
teach the past simple?
Task 1 – Procedure of a lesson plan
1. What do you think is the main aim of this lesson?

• To be able to ask and answer “Wh questions” about the past

Task 1 – Procedure of a lesson plan
2. What level of English learner do you think that this lesson is suitable for?

 suitable as practice or revision for learners who have already learnt the structure of WH questions.

 Anywhere from elementary to lower intermediate, or maybe, maybe even intermediate, if the focus is on revision and
accuracy.

 The teacher would need to decide whether to place the emphasis on fluency or accuracy, depending on the level and
needs of the learners.

 Note – the focus of this lesson is on USE of the language rather than learning grammar rules. There is a distinction
between learning a grammar rule and being able to apply it in actual spoken language use.

 To really be able to actually use language the same grammar points are likely to need to be revisited at different levels of
proficiency.
Task 1 – Procedure of a lesson plan
3. Are the procedure and the materials clear?

• Any questions?
Task 1 – Procedure of a lesson plan
4. Are the activities in the lesson plan interesting and motivating?

• The interaction patterns involved in the activities are varied and engaging:

• Task 1 - information gap (pairs)

• Task 2 - information gap (mingling)

• Task 3 - game.

• The actual topic of the lesson (what someone does in a day) is not very interesting.

• We don’t know who Danny is in activity 2 so there is no reason to care about what he does in his day. Nonetheless, talking
about daily activities is a common way that past tense is practiced in the classroom – particularly at lower levels. Maybe
because the activities seem fun, it may not matter so much that the topic of the lesson is not so interesting.
Task 1 – Procedure of a lesson plan
5. What problems do you anticipate that teachers or learners could have with these activities?

 Activity 1

• Instructions: need to be careful that students don’t write answers on the same page as the questions, and

that they don’t show each other their questions.

 Activity 2

• Instructions: same issue – students might just show each other the answers rather than actually asking

the questions
Task 1 – Procedure of a lesson plan
5. What problems do you anticipate that teachers or learners could have with these activities?

 Activity 3

 Instructions are quite complicated

 Teachers/learners need to be prepared, as otherwise they may run out of things to say about their day

 Needs to be clear that the questions learners ask have to be ‘wh questions’

 Giving feedback – how will the teacher deal with feedback – immediate or delayed (i.e., monitoring, taking notes,

and writing on whiteboard) – the activities seem to promote fluency – if desirable, how can accuracy be built into

the lesson?

• An overall point seems to be that the instructions for the activities are quite complicated; could L1 be necessary?
Task 1 – Procedure of a lesson plan
6. Would you make any changes to this lesson plan? Would you add anything? If so, what?

 In the lead-in, after the learners have unjumbled the questions, the teacher could ask some of the

learners the questions and get their real answers – this is a kind of personalization.

 In activity 2, the story about Danny’s day could be changed to a more interesting story about

someone’s day that the students know (e.g., a celebrity).

Task 1 – Procedure of a lesson plan
6. Would you make any changes to this lesson plan? Would you add anything? If so, what?

• Things that could be added, either as part of the lesson or as homework:

 A reading text that is a recount of a past event

 A handout of grammar rules

 Grammar exercises (e.g., gap fill)

 A writing task about a past event – if very lower level, what they did on the weekend. If higher level,

recount of a more interesting recent event, such as a school excursion, or a holiday.

Task 1 – Procedure of a lesson plan
7. Which aspects of the past simple can learners have difficulties with?  

- Using present verb forms instead of past

- Agreement in use of singular/plural was/were.

- Rules for pronunciation of regular past tense endings /t/ /d/ /Id/

- Irregular verbs (e.g., He goed)

- Use of not with past forms (She not made a cake).

- Using a past verb form in negative sentences or questions (e.g., I didn’t went, did you went?)
Task 1 – Procedure of a lesson plan
8. The lesson plans you have seen in this tutorial teach the simple past through talking about the very
recent past (i.e., the weekend and yesterday). Can you think of any other contexts/situations that
you could use to teach the past simple?

- Biographies of famous people

- Autobiographies (students’ own life)

- Recounts of interesting historical or current affairs events

- Stories (e.g., fairytales etc)

- Past experiences (e.g., last holiday, embarrassing experience etc.).