USING AUTHENTIC MATERIALS Ketevan Barkhudanashvili

May,2013, Telavi

Using marriage chart for multiculturalism

THE ADVANTAGES OF THE CHART

The issue of getting married was authentic and relevant to the student

It was interesting for them to read the American point of view because it gave the flavor of something different, exotic and related to the culture of the country the language of which they are learning.

The format as well as the relevant issue encouraged critical thinking

AUTHENTIC MATERIALS FOR HEROES

At this lesson I used the pictures of the king Tamar and the text about her; students discussed what they knew about her

Then I asked if they could think of a similar hero from the British history; students struggled to remember the name though they named all the important events from Elizabeth’s life.

For Elizabeth I I used the video(from YouTube) and a text(from internet)

Finally students worked together and compared these two heroes using the Venn diagram

THE VENN DIAGRAM FOR COMPARISON

THE ADVANTAGES

The materials were authentic and relevant to the students;

The topic boosted their background knowledge, encouraging them to use what they already knew from other courses e.g. history;

Encouraged critical thinking i.e. students had to compare these two historical figures, find and discuss similarities and differences between them

Procedure

Students looked at the pictures and named the things they saw

Help them with new vocabulary by pointing at the picture and saying the word

Read the passages with pauses, asking the questions like “Why does the boy/tree/man say that?”, “What does it tell us about the boy’s, man’s/tree’s character?’’

At the end of the reading the question like “Who do you associate the characters with?’’

Advantages

The authentic material from literature; Relevant issue encouraged the critical

thinking;  Encourages the intensive reading; Illustrated text also increased the students’

interest; Reading between the paragraphs,

questioning and predictions supported the lively discussion and critical thinking;

References

Shel Silverstein, The giving tree, Harper Collins Publishers;

http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/articles/using-authentic-materials

http://www.eslbase.com/articles/authentic-materials-2

THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION