Get to know your teacher!

Preparation

This activity gives learners a chance to find about you, their new teacher, and it also gives you a valuable opportunity to assess their level. It can also be a useful and productive class if you ever find yourself substituting a class at short notice.

You will need the following materials: 

• strips of scrap paper
• coloured pens
• large A3 paper

Procedure

• Divide your class into small groups of between three and six learners, depending on how big your class is. Give each group a pile of strips of paper (approximately 15 strips).
• Tell the class that they are going to write about you and they need to find out as much information as possible for their piece of writing. The groups work together to prepare questions for you on the strips of paper. You should sit in the middle of the groups and have something to lean on.
• Tell the class you will answer their questions by writing your reply on the strip of paper if their questions are written correctly. If there are mistakes in the questions, you will circle the mistake and give the question back to the group to correct. The group can then re-submit the question to you. Set a time limit for learners to write the questions, give them to you, wait for you to reply and so on. Ten or fifteen minutes should be enough for this stage. If there are a lot of small groups, you could give each group a different time limit so that not all of them are giving you their questions at the same time.
• When all the groups have had time to collect between ten and fifteen questions with answers, tell your learners that they are now going to use this information to write one or two short paragraphs about you in their groups. If you like, ask them to write a rough draft, before copying a final draft onto A3 paper.
• When all the groups have finished they should take it in turns to stick their A3 paper on the board and ask one of the group members to read it to the class. The rest of the class should come and sit close to the board now so they can all see the writing.  Now, each group has a chance to correct one mistake that they find in the text with a coloured pen. Award points to the groups for each mistake they find and correct. Ensure you are fair by going in order and giving each group a chance at correcting an error when it's their turn.
• The winning group is the one who has corrected the most mistakes. You can also give marks for the quality and quantity of work each group produces to add to each group's total.
• For homework, learners can write a similar paragraph about themselves, which can be displayed around the classroom.