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Lecture 12

Pairwork and groupwork

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To introduce teachers to pairwork and groupwork and to show the advantages of working in pairs and groups.

To show teachers how to organize pair and groupwork effectively and how to deal with initial problems that may arise.

To show how pair and groupwork can be used for various classroom activities.

Aims of this lesson

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Teachers to bring in examples of some of the activities listed:

Pattern practicePracticing short dialoguesReading a text and answering

questionsShort writing exercises Discussions, grammar exercises

Preparation

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Teachers understand what pairwork and groupwork involve:

In pairwork, the teacher divides the whole class into pairs. Every student works with his or her partner, and all the pairs work at the same time.

In groupwork, the teacher divides the class into small groups to work together ( usually four or five students in each group). As in pairwork, all the groups work at the same time.

Introduction

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You will demonstrate three activities: the first two are examples of pairwork and

third is an examples of groupwork. The purpose of these activities is to give

teachers the experience of doing language practice in pairs and groups, as a basis for later discussion.They do not necessarily show exactly what teachers would do in their own classes.

Pair and group activities

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Explain that it is an example of pairwork used for controlled oral practice; it practice vocabulary and conditional structures.

A. Work in pairs. Ask and answer the questions. What happens if… a) you eat unripe fruit? b) you eat too much food? c)you leave ice in the sun? d) you drive over broken glass? e) you sit in the sun too long?

Example – Activity-1

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1. Ask the two questions to the whole class, to show how the activity works. ( more than one answer is possible: e.g.

(a) you’ll be sick. (b) You will get a stomach ache: / you’ll get fat.

2) Divide teachers into pairs to ask and answer the other questions.

3) When most pairs have finished, go through the answers together.

4) Ask some pairs to tell you the questions they thought of themselves.

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Explain that is an example of a reading activity done in pairs. Students work together to try to understand the text.

Work in pairs.Can you answer these questions? - What is acid rain? - How is it caused? - What damage does it do?

Example – Activity-2

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2. Read the text and find the answers.3.Underline all the words in the text which

you do not understand. With your partner, try to guess what they

mean.1) Briefly explain what teachers have to do.

Then divide them into pairs to do the activity.

2) When most pairs have finished, Discuss.

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Throughout Europe, and also in other areas of the world such as India, China and parts of America, forests are being destroyed. According to one prediction, 90% of

Germany ‘s forests will have vanished by the end of the century. This destruction is caused by air pollution. Power stations and cars are mainly responsible- they emit gases into the air which, after a series of chemical changes, turn into toxic acids.

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These acids fall as ‘acid rain’, raising the level of acidity in the soil, in lakes and in rivers to dangerous levels, and destroying not only trees but also fish and other wildlife. The industrialized world is slowly waking up to the fact that urgent action is needed to reduce air pollution, otherwise our environment will be damaged beyond repair.

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Explain that it is an example of a discussion activity done in groups.This is much freer activity, and aims to develop fluency in speaking. Work in group:

Example – Activity-3

Nurse DoctorTeacherFarm workerTaxi driverengineer

1. Which of these people earns the most money in your country?2. Who do you think should earn the most money?Who should earn more, and who should earn less?

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For certain types of activity, pairwork and groupwork have a number of advantages over working with the whole class together.

What are the advantages of using pairwork and groupwork?

What problems might thee be?

Discussion: advantages and problems

advantages problems

more language practiceStudents are more involved.Students feel secure.Students help each other.

NoiseStudents make mistakesDifficult control

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Discuss the advantages first:1. More language practice: Pairwork and groupwork

give students far more chance to speak English.2. Students are more involved: working in pairs

or groups encourages students to be more involved and to concentrate on the task.

3. Students feel secure:students feel less anxiety when they are working ‘privately’ than they are ‘on show’ in front of the whole class.pairwork and groupwork can help shy students who would never say anything in a whole –class activity.

How would you overcome the problems

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4) Students help each other: pairwork and groupwork encourage students to share ideas and knowledge. In a reading activity students can help each other to explore the meaning of a text, and give each other new ideas.

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1. Noise: obviously, pairwork and groupwork in a large class will be noisy, and this cannot be helped. but:

- usually the students themselves are not disturbed by the noise; it is more noticeable to the teacher standing at the side or to someone in the next room.

- the noise created by pairwork and groupwork is usually ‘good’ noise-students using English, or engaged in a learning task.

overcoming problems

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2)Students make mistakes: during a pair or group work activity, the teacher can not control all the language used, and should not try to do so. When doing controlled language practice in pairs or groups, the number of mistakes can be reduced:

- by giving enough preparation.The activity can be done with the whole class first, and then pairwork used for the final stage. - by checking afterwards. The teacher can ask

some pairs or groups what they said, and then correct mistakes if necessary.

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3) Difficult control class: the teacher has less control over what students are doing in pairwork and groupwork than in a normal class. To stop activities getting out of control,

It is important to: - give clear instructions about when to start, what to do , and when stop. -give clearly defined tasks which do not

continue for too long: - set up a routine, so that students accept the

idea of working in pairs or groups, and know exactly what to do.

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Pattern practice: this can be done in pairs in the same way as the likes/ dislikes’ activity you demonstrated. Any controlled oral practice can be done first with the whole class, and then in pairs.

Practicing short dialogues: acting out short dialogue can very easily be done in pairs, with little chance of students making mistakes. It can be done first with pairs of students in front of the class, and then with all the students working in pairs at the same time.

Activities in class

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Reading a text and answering questions: students can discuss questions in pairs or groups and then read the text: or they can read the text silently, and then ask and answer questions in pairs or groups. This is a good way of involving the whole class in answering questions.

Short writing exercise: students can sit in froups and decide together what to write –one student acts as ‘ secretary’. This can be difficult to organize, but in a large class it has the advantage that students correct each others’ mistakes and the teacher only has a few papers to mark at the end.

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Discussions: it is important to define the discussion clearly, and to ask each group to report their conclusions afterwards.

Grammar exercises: students can do grammar exercises orally in pairs; the teacher goes through the answers afterwards with the whole class, and students write the exercise foe homework. This more interesting and productive than students doing exercises alone, in silence.