Family Tree is an ideal and fun activity for students to practice family relations and working within that semantic field. The basic idea is that you give your students a series of statements about a family such as, "Joe is Mary's brother" and, "Frank is Julie's...
Content and Language Integrated Learning in TEFL
CLIL stands for Content and Language Integrated Learning and it is based on the idea that subjects like geography, physics, history, etc. can be taught and learned in a language which is not the student’s mother tongue. (CLIL is also known as CBI or Content Based...
Roots and English Words
A root is the very simplest form of a word without any affixes or changes. It cannot be made any smaller and is sometimes known as the base word. For example, take the word important. This consists of 3 parts: im (a prefix) + port (the root) + ant (a suffix]) So the...
Grammar Practice Activities (book)
Grammar Practice Activities by Penny Ur is, as the subtitle reads, a Practical Guide for Teachers. This invaluable book is divided into two parts: Part One provides a clear and concise introduction to teaching grammar in the foreign language classroom, plus a...
Teaching English in Belgium
TEFL in Belgium Belgium is a founding member of the European Union and hosts its headquarters. It is a country of 11 million inhabitants which is bordered by the Netherlands, Germany, Luxembourg and France. It is also across the North Sea from the United Kingdom....
Affixes in English
An affix is a morpheme that is attached to a root (or stem) of a word to form another word. For example, take the word reason and add two affixes: un + reason + able Prefixes and suffixes are common types of affixes. A prefix is an affix which is placed before a...
Teaching English in Russia
The following two stories come from two American ICAL students who worked at the American Home in Russia. They offer a glimpse of life living and working overseas. The following two stories come from two American ICAL students who worked at the American Home in...
Teaching English in Angola
Angola is a poor country in southern Africa. After independence from Portugal in 1975 it entered a civil war which lasted several decades and cost millions of lives and refugees. The war officially ended in 2002 and since then the country is seen as developing fast...
Guess Who – ice breaker activity
Guess Who is a simple ice breaker which can be used on the first day of class. There's little preparation and it can easily develop into a chat or discussion with more advanced classes. All you need to prepare this activity are small strips of paper; say two for each...
Teaching English in Tunisia
Tunisia is a former French colony where traditionally students are taught in Arabic in primary school, then in French in secondary school and at university, with English lessons starting in year five of primary school and carrying on throughout secondary school for...