Important for communicative language teaching Beginning teachers find them difficult (for students and to manage) Activities are often eliminated – especially because they often fall at the end of chapters
See if students can come up with the features of each: Guided Practice vs. Communicative Task teacher-controlled vs. learner-controlled pedagogical vs. real life, authentic analytic (one thing at a time) vs. synthetic/holistic (many things at once) closed (one right answer) vs. open (no single answer) focus on accuracy (getting it right) vs. focus on fluency (getting message through)
Jigsaw is linked to a website on jigsaw as it’s really not clearly defined in the online book.
Extended discourse, information gap, uncertainty, goal oriented, real time processing
As a group discuss both benefits and challenges of group work.
Task = (1) a classroom activity or exercise that has (a) an objective attainable only by the interaction among participants, (b) a mechanism for structuring and sequencing interaction, and (c) a focus on meaning exchange; (2) a language learning endeavor that requires learners to comprehend, manipulate, and/or produce the target language as they perform some set of workplans
Make the goal clear from the beginning. Involve all participants equally. Make sure students are adequately prepared. Provide clear instructions and examples. Make an effort to mix groups. Assign activities that are relevant and interesting to students. Circulate, circulate, circulate. Teach group interaction skills. Hold group accountable for completing task on time.