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SCHOOL CAN BE FUN!
READING
WARMER
Write
The perfect school
on the board as a title.
Underneath that, write
They don’t have to study
. As a
class, brainstorm a list of more characteristics of a perfect
school, e.g.
They don’t have to do tests; they don’t have
to wear a uniform; they don’t have to do homework; they
can choose their own subjects.
In the Speaking section
at the end of this unit, the students
will have to make a
presentation on their perfect school.
BACKGROUND INFORMATION
In a traditional classroom, the teacher often stands at
the board and lectures while the students take notes.
In a flipped classroom
however, students learn about
the lesson
content at home through videos, slide
presentations, podcasts, etc. and class time is freed
up to spend on practice. People often say that Alison
King’s journal article ‘From
Sage on the Stage to Guide
on the Side’ in 1993 inspired the move towards the
Flipped Classroom. In her work, King suggested that
teachers should move away from being transmitters of
information: moving from the Sage (or wise person) on
the Stage towards the role of
Facilitator or the Guide on
the Side. Another important contributor is Salman Khan,
founder of the Khan Academy, which is a free education
platform where students can watch more than 6,500
different video tutorials at their own pace. In ELT (English
Language Teaching), the students could watch a video
tutorial about
have to/don’t have to
at
home so that in
class, they can spend more time using the language to
talk about their perfect school.
1
Ask the students to look at the photo of the classroom
and ask ‘What’s different about this photo?’ (
it’s upside
down
) Next, ask them to read the title and ask ‘What’s a
flipped classroom?’ Invite suggestions. Next, ask them to
read the first paragraph to check their ideas. Then, ask
them in pairs to talk together about whether a flipped
classroom is a good idea.
