TeachingEnglish
Introducing a tense - Present Progressive
Submitted by ehrcic on 23 January, 2010 - 09:07
Hi there,
I want to introduce the Present Progressive to my class. Can you help me?
I prefer to use the Context "Harry Potter". What do you think about that?
I want them to act as magicians.
Oh my god it's my exam and it's the first time I don't know how to introduce a new grammar. They expect me to do something really extraordinary.
Can you please help me?
Yours sincerely
Ramona
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I'm not really sure that you have a small class of students. All the students I teach are either individual classes or mini groups of 2-4 persons. So when we start studying the Present progressive, we make up different fun versions of what their friends and family might be doing at the moment and as soon as we complete the task we start calling everybody we have on our lists asking:"What are you doing? Are you sleepwalking at the moment? ..."and it's usually much fun. And of course depending on the age of the students you can use different features like Harry Potter or Spiderman. It's always hilarious and effective.
I don't know what's the first language of your students, but you're right in worrying about how to introduce this subject. I can't get why, but this tense is pretty difficult for many of my students, and what wonders me is the fact that the Present Progressive structure is exactly the same in Portuguese, the mother language of my students!
I think that it's really important to introduce this tense orally only. Make your students listen to a lot of examples, for instance, show them pictures of people doing different things - but your students may have already studied all these things previously, of course, so that the vocabulary is familiar and just the tense is new - and say "She is brushing her teeth", "He is playing football". After you have said many sentences, you can start asking "Is she cooking? No? Oh, you're right, she isn't cooking! What is she doing?". Do that till your students get bored! Give them the pictures and ask them "John, what's going on in the picture you've got?" Make all of them speak! Then, write some of the sentences on the board. Direct their attention to the structure: "What verb is this? Oh, yes, it's verb "to be". And this? It's verb "to cook". What have I added to all the verbs that are not verb to be? -ING! So, if I say "She is walking", how can I fill in this blank "I _____ walking"? And "They ____ walking"? So, what's the rule in the affirmative form? Subject + verb to be + main verb with ING! So, what are you doing right now? YOU ARE LEARNING PRESENT PROGRESSIVE!
:)
With a view to dealing with a lesson on Grammar it is better to present items in terms of structures and context.The context first.As in this case a picture of a sea side,beach can be given with the following characteristics:some boys are playing with a ball,one boy riding a pony,while men are seen swimming,a few children making a sandcastle,et al.
Mime can be introduced,such as bathing,cycling etc.with a set of cue-cards.Set of small cards with people doing easily identifiable tasks can be given.Oral and then they can be given tasks on writing.For example, -ing form of the verbs---and then give sentences to complete with a picture of a fair,for example,e.g.
1. Some boys are riding a merry-go-round.
2. A magician is showing magic.
3. They are enjoying the shooting game. Ask ss to write true sentences of the day they are doing this lesson.
What I normally do to present the present continuous is to get a big poster with many people doing many activities. Make sure to label the names of each person for easy reference. Place it on one side of the board. Write the names of the people on the board in one column and the activities in another column. Have the ss look at the poster an match the people with the actions. Then, write on the board "What ___ _______ doing at this moment?
Start asking the ss. Don`t expect them to give you the whole answer, but as they tell you the action, start writing the information using present continuous. Write two or three then continue asking but guide them to give you the whole answer. Make sure you use different people so ss can see the difference with the verb to be. In no time you`ll have them using the present continuous.
After that, you can write some sentences where ss have to complete them. eg: Karla and Cinty ____ ______(do) their homework. To check that ss understood.
And I would finish by doing what one person has already suggested. Have the ss talk about what their family members and friends are doing in this moment.
This has worked for me many times so I hope that it works for you. Bye