Learning historical facts in English or making scientific experiments resembles the real life situation. To make our lesson more enjoyable and effective the good solution would be to use the internet and various materials like games, stories, songs, etc that are specially created to simplify including various elements into our teaching program. As we all know children love to play the computer games so this method seems very attractive for them, it adresses their needs as well.
In my article I want to show and describe step by step how to incorporate elements of other school subjects into English language teaching.
HISTORY IN ENGLISH - The CELTS
- First of all, you can ask your students if they know who were the Celts. You can use some pictures and then tell a little story about them. Ask your students to turn on the computers and go to the web site about the Celts
Here is the link to the Celts history: http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/celts/factfile/
2. To warm students up ask them to create and build a Hillfort for the Celts.Students love this type of tasks.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/celts/activities/buildahillfort.shtml
3. It is time for the story. Before listening to the story you have to introduce the new vocabulary like : wise, foretell, god, godess ,Iron Age. mistletoe
the story: http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/celts/activities/druid.shtml
4. After listening to the story ask your students to decide what will happen next and create their own Celtic cartoon
http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/celts/activities/cartoonmaker.shtml
5. Together with the students watch all the cartoons. Tell the students to vote for the best cartoon and place the best one for example on your BLOG, it will be a reward for their hard work.
As you can see the aim of these lesson tips is to introduce history in fun and accesible way for kids, they become encourage to learn when they see how funny and relaxing it can be . This is one of many ideas that you can use to liven up your English classes.
I would like to give you some other ideas so I decided to include few links that might inspire you:
- http://www.bbc.co.uk/apps/ifl/wales/gigaquiz?infile=celts&path=education/celts
Test about the Celts- you can give it as a homework
- http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/victorians/flash/start_flash.shtml
I love this one about children in Victorian Britain
- http://www.bbc.co.uk/education/dynamo/lab/quiz/quiz1a.htm
It's like the mini version of TV show quiz :)
- http://www.bbc.co.uk/education/dynamo/history/stepback.shtml
Great cartoon story about the people that lived 100 years ago
The internet is a great source and easy access to various materials.It's a great facilitator in ELT! Don't be affraid to use it with your students!
