english club

5 Interesting Tips for What to Do in Your English Club

Wednesday, October 28th, 2009 | Learning English at LCI | No Comments

So, you have started your successful English Club and need some ideas to keep it interesting, dynamic and welcoming?  Read on to find 5 tips to make your English Club excel and be a great complement to your ESL lessons:

1.    Define a warm-up time
It’s the same as what teachers do. You begin class with a funny conversation or activity. It is the time you establish to wake everyone up and help them focus on what is coming.  The activities will depend on your club’s focus, whether it is more academic or social.  If you focus on the attendees, think of what will keep them interested and motivated for the activities that will come next. The warm-up should serve as an introduction to the main activity or the reason you’re meeting on that particular day.

2.    Organize the meetings
The club can be organized in many ways.  You can center your activities on one area, like conversation or reading, or devote each week to a different one, sorting out topics and skills.  Each member can plan an activity related to the week’s topic or each one can be in charge of a week’s session.  There should always be a meeting leader, who will guide the activities and will have the opportunity to practice his or her leadership and creative skills.

3.    Have a back-up plan
In case the leader cannot make it, you must have a back-up plan.  The leader should call someone in case he or she cannot attend, and should give instructions as to what to do, but if this doesn’t happen, be prepared!  You can have discussion questions prepared, or learn 15 new words from the dictionary and use them in sentences, or play a game of cards, or any other game, in English. For example, you can have a game of Monopoly, Life, or any other board game in English on hand, in case you have a last minute change of plans.

4.    Create a suggestion box
Encourage members to leave suggestions every week. It will enrich the meetings and people will feel very comfortable and motivated if they are heard.

5.    Plan excursions
So much fun! Once a month is a good parameter.  Excursions are a joyful and interesting way to bond.  Go watch a movie, play a sport, volunteer, do a back yard sale, have a picnic, go dancing, have dinner together, or visit a tourist attraction.  No matter what you do, always speak in English

No matter what it is you do, the important thing is to keep your club’s goal in mind: you are getting together to have a good time AND to put everything you’re learning in your ESL lessons to good use in real life settings.

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Want to Practice Your English? Start an English Club

Tuesday, October 27th, 2009 | Learning English at LCI | No Comments

An English Club is a gathering where ESL students can practice English in a casual atmosphere.  Practicing during ESL classes is vital; however, it is not real life.  During class, you focus on something specific, like vocabulary or pronunciation, you have papers and books to help you and everything is fresh in your mind.  In an English Club, you can practice all the skills in a real life environment.  You will have to really speak clearly and listen carefully to understand others.  At an English Club, you can make really good friends who will increase your confidence, and you will feel more comfortable speaking the language among people you trust.

Here we offer some tips on how to start a successful and fun English Club:

1.    Post a sign-up ad at your school’s bulletin board.  Give your email so that the students can contact you and offer interesting ideas.  Ask them to write down phone number and email so that you can contact them about time and place for the meetings.

2.    Ask for help.  Every member should contribute to the club, and you can ask a native English speaker to join the meetings, maybe a teacher, who will find the experience interesting as a curriculum enhancer.

3.    Plan an introductory meeting to meet each other and to talk about expectations and ideas.  To make it worthy, the meetings should have around 6 to 10 students.  These can be organized in many ways, maybe each participant can lead during one week, and you can plan based on topics or skills.

4.    Define the rules and routines beforehand so that everyone knows what to expect and how to behave.  You should have an ‘English only’ policy, decide whether food and drinks are allowed or not, and what topics and behaviors are off limits.

5.    Define the schedule for the meetings.  Will you be meeting once a week for about two hours, or more?  Think about the best time of day; it may vary every week depending on the place and activity planned.  Take breaks during holiday season and invite new people about every three months, but always maintain the club’s identity intact.

6.    Define who can attend the English Club.  Virtually anyone can be a part of an English Club, it depends on your preference, but if we follow the belief that variety brings richness, you should try to allow all kinds of people with all kinds of experiences in.  The club must have members with varied language abilities so that everyone can learn something from each other.

7.    Vary the meeting places to make the club even more dynamic and to change the atmosphere.  You can meet at school one week and later plan to meet at members’ homes to make it more casual; you can play music, watch a movie and feel at ease.  From time to time you can meet at a restaurant or café, to experience a new and challenging environment, or in the outdoors, where you can match your topics to nature characteristics like the weather, kinds of vegetation, types of fauna around, picnics or fun outdoor activities.

An English Club is the perfect complement to your ESL classes, a great way to not only practice your English skills, but also meet new people and hang out with your friends.

If you liked this article, tell all your friends about it. They’ll thank you for it. If you have a blog or website, you can link to it or even post it to your own site (don’t forget to mention www.englishlci.com as the original source.

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