Although gentle rain outside greeted the members of the Fukuoka Study Group Meeting recently, it was HOT in the conference room, because the all teachers who attended were very Enthusiastic and energetic!
Opening Song
We started with a fun and active song, “I’m a Little Witch”, as the teachers practiced the Halloween (HW) characters’ actions. The familiar song, “The Birthday Song” from Let’s Go 1, was arranged for Halloween.
After the song, everyone greeted each other in a lively way, pretending to be one of the characters.
Practice Key 1
At this meeting, we demonstrated how to introduce the Past Tense and showed how important it is for conversation. The sentence patterns were “What did you do yesterday?” “I ate a banana,” etc.
We introduce the vocabulary first. When the students begin to learn the Past Tense verbs, you should choose those which are used in our daily life. For example, eat – ate, go-went. Next we taught the Answer form and then the Question form. These are the basic steps of the MAT METHOD. After we introduce the vocabulary, Q & A forms, they were drilled many times. We used Learning Activities, such as SSP, the Spin game and the relay game, which is explained below:
Make two groups. The first player asks the question, “What did you do yesterday?” Next player takes a verb card (the cards are on the table), and answers the question. They go on like this. The team that finishes first is the winner. The students (teachers) were very excited doing this activity.
Practice Key 2
We demonstrated how to introduce the Yes-No question form. It is easy to introduce these phrases using the MAT METHOD.
It’s Your Turn
The teachers made two groups and practiced how to introduce the Past Tense with each other. They worked hard to learn how to do it easily.
Halloween Ideas
After a short break, Yukari sensei introduced some fun Halloween activities.
◆“Let’s go Trick or Treating!” (Find Your Partner)
Level: Elementary School Students
Materials: Halloween character cards (two sets of ghosts, witches, black cats, etc )
Language: “Are you ～?” “Yes, I am. / No, I’m not.” “Let’s go Trick or Treating!” “OK!”
1. Give the students one card each.
2. When the teacher says “Happy Halloween!”, the students start moving and make pairs.
3. They do janken saying “Are you, are you, 1,2,3” and winners can ask the question
“Are you ～?”.
4. When he/she finds someone with the same card, the winner says “Let’s go Trick or
Treating!” and loser answers “OK! ”
5. They go to the front and sit down.
6. After all the pairs sit down, each pair goes to the teacher and says, “Trick or Treat?”
7. The teacher says, “Treat!” and gives them some candy.
The teachers were as happy as little children to get the candy!
◆ “Did you ～ on Halloween night?” (Guessing Game)
Level: Upper graders of Elementary School, Junior High students
Materials: Halloween character cards two sets of action cards a table
Language: “Did you ～ on Halloween night?” “Yes, I did. / No, I didn’t.”
1. Students are divided into two groups. The two groups sit facing each other.
2. The leaders do janken saying “Did you, did you, 1,2 3” and decide which team goes first.
3. Teacher puts the character cards one each (face up) in front of the winner team students.
4. While all the students sing “Eency Weency Spider”, the winner team members passes the action cards (face down).
4. When the teacher says “Stop”, the winner team students take a card each and check their actions.
5. The loser team students talk and decide who did which action, and put their action cards next to the character cards.
6.They ask winner team students, ” ○○, did you go to school on Halloween night?”
7. The winner team students answer “Yes, I did./ No, I didn’t.” Then the teams take turns.
8. The team that guesses more right actions is winner.
One of the teams got three right answers, but the other got none, which made everyone laugh. It was a fun time.
◆Find the Differences (Worksheet)
Level: Kindergartners, Elementary School students
Materials: worksheets, pencils, timer
Language: “Did you ～ on Halloween night?” “Yes, I did. / No, I didn’t.”
1. Give the worksheet to each student.
2. They start looking for the differences at the same time.
3. When they finish, they say “I’m finished.”
4. The teacher checks the timer and tells each student the time it took to finish.
After most of the students finish, check the answers together.
Sudoku worksheets (not the number Sudoku, but the letters “B-A-T-S”) were also used. The
teachers said it was good for their brain training.
◆Charades
We didn’t have enough time, so we did it quickly. The teachers performed well and we had a lot of fun. As many noun cards were added, it was difficult even for the teachers.
◆Makoto showed how to make the Halloween craft.
Materials: Paper cup, straw, vinyl bag (small) and some stickers (HW characters, eyes, mouth etc.)
How to:
First, put the vinyl bag into a paper cup and blow into the straw.
Take a look at the photo to see what happens!
Click How to make the Halloween craft.doc
Storytelling (original version)
Makoto told a cute Halloween story using prepositions and pictures he drew himself. The “Kamishibai” frame was handmade, also. Teachers interacted to the story with gestures and
said the lines of the story.
The teachers looked very happy and satisfied after the workshop.
They have already reserved for the next FSG which will be on December 1st.
The topics will be “Teaching Comparison” and “Christmas Ideas”
Date: December 1st (sun)
Time: 13:30-16:30 (Doors open 13:15-)
Place: Masatomo Bldg. 4F
Fee: 3000 yen
Capacity: 25 people
Deadline: November 24 (sun)
After the FSG, we are going to have Bonenkai.
We will announce it in detail later.
Fukuoka IIEEC Sakamoto