Ambiguity is the mother of…production. Maximising production in class.

The beginning of this particular story was at best inconspicuous. We were finishing the food unit and to celebrate that, I decided to have a little party at the end of the final lesson. The parents were asked for permission, they approved of our food and at the end of the lesson, we got up, made a train, choo-chooed to the bathroom to wash the hands and then we just had fun. As luck would have it, one of the items on our ‘menu’ were the animal biscuits. Unfortunately (or, actually, very very fortunately) some of these animal-shaped biscuits were beyond recognition and it was not long before the kids started to ask questions and discuss what these mis-shapes could be…Naturally, some of it was in L1 but, amazingly enough, a lot happened in English, too. And this was the first time when I realized that ambiguity is the mother of production. Then I just had to figure out what to do with that next. Here are a few ideas…

Stencils and inkblots can be one of the ways of getting started. Stencils can be easily found on the internet (if you google for example ‘animals stencils) but they can also be drawn and cut out of cardboard. Inkblots can easily made at home or in class. The idea has been also used in some of the songs by Super Simple Songs such as Knock, knock, Who are are You? (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4jxcWlq3CBg) or games such as Fruit Guessing Game (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVE9pYdwX-I&t=45s) so this can be the first step, too!

Then, there are also jigsaw puzzles and half-pictures. Existing jigsaw puzzles depicting the key vocabulary will be the resource that first spring to mind but these might not be very easy to get and very often consist of very small pieces. English classroom jigsaw puzzles can be easily produced by photocopying the flashcards and cutting them up, into two or three pieces if the students are quite young. There will be another advantage of using the coursebook flashcards as students will be familiar with the images and that is going to make the task achievable. To make them more durable, they can be laminated before cutting. In class, the teacher can be showing only one of the pieces and encouraging the children to guess the word, before the students are asked to find the other missing pieces and putting the picture together.

One of the resources that is very useful and very easy to make and, I think, needs to have its place on a shelf in the VYL classroom is, what I call, a funky envelope. I have taken the idea from one of the older coursebooks I Spy which contained a template for a page with a keyhole that children could cut out and move against a picture and guess what they can see. I made it into an envelope made out of 2 A4 pieces cardboard stapled together, with different shapes cut out in one of them. I put inside the flashcards that we are using at the moment and then the fun begins. It is very easy to make and easy to manipulate, too.

Whereas the funky envelope is usually used with the familiar images and flashcards, the post-it notes activity work better with unfamiliar pictures. A similar approach is used in the song What is it? (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_sdGxUxz_4&t=114s) and some of the flashcard games on different platforms but it can be easily recreated in the classroom. Any poster, illustration in the coursebook, drawing or photograph can be used for that and the parts of these, covered by the teacher with post-it notes before the lesson can be used in a prediction game.

Equally fun will be a magic bag and some realia. Ideally, of course, they will be relevant to the topic of the unit ie plastic or real fruit, toys, plastic animals, school objects but I also like to throw in some unexpected distractor such as a plastic dinosaur among all the fruit. The teacher can either put only one of these in the bag and ask the students to guess the word, taking turns or guessing together. They can also fish out one of the objects and try to guess what it is, without taking it out of the bag.

A few tips

• Make sure the kids have the language to participate in the activities ie introduce and practise the key vocabulary beforehand.
• Introduce and practise the key question, too. ‘What is it?’ and ‘It’s…’ and ‘It’s not..’
• Later on, consider introducing more advanced structures, too, such as ‘I think it is..’ or ‘It looks like…’ and ‘It is like…’. Providing these will be a good long-term plan and it will equip the students (and the teacher!) with the tool to clarify any confusion in the future.
• Remember that saying what things are not is even more fun and important as guessing what they are. Don’t miss this chance to be creative and to produce even more language!

Happy teaching!