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In this unit we learned various approaches, methods, and techniques for teaching English. There are a few methods that are quite common to this day, such as grammar-translation, task-based learning, and presentation, practice and production. There is no "best" method, but some reasons why a teacher would choose one method over the other is if it is suited for the language level of the class, the teacher's personality, the class dynamic, and personal preference. No matter which you choose or if you're choosing multiple in one lesson, no matter what there should be at least some input from the teacher, students should feel comfortable, students should have ample time to discover language themselves and to communicate in English, and students should have the opportunity to use the language in a real-world context.
The method that is seen as being suited for new teachers and that allows for all of the above points, is Engage, Study, Activate. There is the "straight-arrow" ESA lesson which is just Engage, Study, Activate in that order, which can be good for younger learners because they can predict what's coming next, but can get a little boring for higher-level students, and even for the teacher as well. Then there is the "boomerang" ESA lesson (E, A1, S, A2), which allows the teacher to access knowledge gaps in the first activity, address them in the study stage, and then assess if they've learned in the second activity.
The purpose of the "engage" stage is to get every student in the class to start thinking and speaking in English, because up until this part of the day they probably haven't had to use English at all. This stage doesn't necessarily need to link to what content will be covered in the lesson that day. Examples of "engage" activities would be elicitation techniques like introduction prompts and list-generating. Or, they can be more discussion-based like choosing a topic to talk about or prompting a discussion with a photo/video.
If the objective of the lesson is for students to learn vocabulary for vacation or taking a trip, I might ask in the class before this one that for next time they bring in a family photo of a trip they want on, or bring a picture of a place they'd like to go, and they can get in pairs and discuss what they liked/didn't like about the trip, why they want to go there, etc. Then we can have a larger class discussion where everyone either needs to volunteer to share or ask the volunteer a question.
The "study" stage is where the teaching of the vocabulary or grammar takes place, or correcting the gaps, and for them to demonstrate that they understand what they've just learned. This is an appropriate time to practice pronunciation with drilling, to correct errors (that are relevant to the lesson), to assess if they understand the meaning of the vocabulary, to practice spelling, etc. This can be done through worksheets or activities like word scramble, word search, gap-fills, hangman, and matching.
If again they are learning vocabulary for going on vacation, I would have a matching activity with sentences that are missing the vocab, and a list of the vocab words to fill-in the sentence. Then I would have a "hidden object" picture game where they have to identify the hidden objects in the picture that are vacation related.
The "Activate" stage is to get students to apply what they've learned in a real-life situation. I would have the students think about what type of trip they'd like to go on and write a check-list of things to do before going on a trip and things to pack. They share their lists with a partner. Some volunteer pairs would discuss their partners list, rather than their own, so that they really have to listen and learn from each other. Then they would role play, where one is a travel agent and one is the person wanting to book a trip, and the traveler has to describe the types of things they would like to do in an ideal trip (see exotic animals, go swimming, go hiking), and the travel agent can tell them about a place they should go, based on what they want to do.
We also learned about giving feedback, and how giving praise and acknowledging when they are right is just as important as correcting them when there is an error. The students need to know when they are making repeated errors to avoid it being ingrained. However, sometimes they have just made a mistake, and the teacher should always let the student try to work out the mistake for themselves first, and if that doesn't work, to have other students in the class help out. The student should only give the answer as a last resort. When figuring out the mistake, the student needs to know that an error has been made, where the error was made, and what type of error it was.
Teachers should only make corrections in the study or activate parts of the lesson, and never in the engage part. We want students to feel comfortable using language freely in the engage section. Teachers should also avoid over-correcting, because this will hinder class participation and make them not feel comfortable or confident.
