TeachingEnglish
      Discover your stars for today

      A simple activity to try is to print out flash cards for the astrological signs. Then print out the "advice" from one of the many offered in papers or magazines. Ask the students what is their birthdate, then give each the appropriate "advice" printed out. Ask them to read it aloud and make comments. This is suitable for small groups.

      Peak, (Australia)

      Average: 3.7 (53 votes)

      Comments

      Mahdi's picture
      Mahdi
      Submitted on 23 October, 2008 - 17:33
      Hello , It's good to start with an activity ,the most important thing is that you can give the students a chance to read and talk .Thanks .

       

      Rania Jabr's picture
      Rania Jabr
      Submitted on 10 November, 2008 - 07:08
      I do the same activity with my students. But as a second stage, I give them brief descriptions of the character profile of each sun sign and have them in groups sit according to their own sun sign. The discussion that follows deals with areas of similarities and differences in personality traits among members of the same sign, even differences between genders falling under the same sign. It is amazing that students are very interested in this area and that they have a lot to talk about. This discussion also generates a lot of vocabulary items, adjectives describing personality traits for example. Rania
      Judith_Mader's picture
      Judith_Mader
      Submitted on 10 January, 2009 - 18:38

      I like this as well and have found it generally gets students talking, whether they take it seriously or not.  however I did once have problems with two students in one class independently of each other who refused to say when their birthday was because of their beliefs - they were Jehovah's witnesses. Although the class reacted very well to this and the course proceeded smoothly and amicably after this, I felt it was an awkward incident, especially as I was a young and inexperienced teacher! After that I usually asked if everyone was happy to talk about the subject of birthdays and star signs.

      Just a comment

      Judith

      Wanisa Ali's picture
      Wanisa Ali
      Submitted on 21 March, 2009 - 22:34

      Dear Mahdi.

      I think to help students to read and talk you have to teach them using communicative approach to enable them to communicate each other easily and to improve their language and confidence of themselves step by step to grasp the target language as well as you like .

      Thanks a lot.

      Wanisa Ali