- Giving clear instructions is a vital skill for every teacher.
- Secondly, the use of instructions in English should be maximized in English lessons.
The articles in this unit consists of classroom phrases that the students will quickly learn and understand.
The phrases are recorded with pauses. So you just press the button and make your students say the phrases after the recording with pauses.
| Instructions and classroom phrases | Very basic phrases for beginners |
| Phrases for intermediate beginners to use in a lesson | |
| Phrases for pair and group work as well as station work and co-operative work | |
| Class phrases with rising intonation and positive feedback phrases |
Some ideas on teacher talking time (TTT) versus student talking time (STT)
In CLT we teachers need to observe ‘teacher talking time’ (TTT) in the sense that we do not talk too much and unnecessarily steal talking and practice time from our students (STT). The TTT-STT ratio depends on what we are doing in the class and the proficiency level of the students.
Maximize the use of English in your class and and organize the lessons so that the students talk a lot in pairs and groups!
The younger and weaker the students are the more they need the teacher’s assistance. In my opinion the ideal in a good class in the senior high is aroung 10 % for TTT and in the junior high about 20 %. In elementary level classes the percentage is much bigger.
However, there are lots of situations when the teacher has to talk and with a little bit of training the students can be taught the basic phrases used during lessons. As a result the teacher can avoid using the mother tongue in these situations. Especially teachers who are beginning their career might find these phrases useful.
The phrases in the unit cover some of the basic situations in an English lesson:
- Giving short or detailed instructions and feedback
- Asking questions or explaining about the goals for the lesson
- Asking for clarifications, praising the students
- Starting or wrapping up pair, group or any other kind of work in class
- Introducing rising and falling intonation patterns
Some very basic instructions and phrases during a lesson
Hello, everybody. / Hi, everyone! Please come in now. Stand up, please! Good morning, everyone! Good morning, boys and girls! Good afternoon everybody! My name is Mike Jones. I’m your new teacher in English.
Good morning, Mr Jones / Good afternoon, Miss Johnson / Good evening, Mrs Jacksonl!
Sit down, please! / Please take out your textbooks, workbooks and pencil cases./ It is so nice to see you again. / How are you today?
Fine, thanks. / Very well, thank you.
Is everybody here today? / Is anyone absent? / Where’s Henry this morning? /Sorry, we don’t know. / He’s ill, down with the flu. Oh, I’m sorry to hear that./ It’s time to start. / Are you ready?
Now, say these words after me./ Well done! / Very good, thank you! / Open your books at page 5. / Unit 1. / Look at me, a page like this. / Please, what was the page again? / Is it this page?/
Let’s listen to the text. / Sarah, can you translate the first sentence, please. / Yes sure, it’s an easy sentence. Err, Susan/Sammy, the next sentence, please. / Any questions? / Not really, this is an easy sentence too.
Let’s read the text aloud. / Read after me, please. / Read after the CD. / Can we read in pairs this time?/ I think it would be nice./ That’s a good idea! Let’s try it. / Read with your partner./ Raise your hands if you like the idea./ OK, let’s do it./Then look at my questions and answer them in pairs. / We are ready. / What do we do next?
