my mELTing pot

A blog for the multicultural English Language Teacher

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I broke 3 shovels doing this.

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Countable and mass nouns – “5 things” mobile activity

This is a great way to liven up a lesson or unit on countable and mass nouns. 

My small group and I meet after their workday once a week for 90 minutes. It was the third lesson on this topic, and the it had been spent on practice and recalling the “rules” we learned from the previous week (i.e. “many + count” or “much + mass”).

Admittedly it was a LOT of information (though all useful and necessary) and I wanted to do something light and fun for the last 5-10 minutes of the class.

I split the group into teams of two and explained the straightforward task to them:

You and your teammate must find and photograph (with their phone) 5 countable objects and 5 mass/uncountable objects. The first team to complete this task correctly WINS.

The two teams took VERY different approaches with one team determined to find everything they needed in our small conference room while the other team could be found running around the entire office.

The students were then asked to present their photos to the other team(s) in order to “prove” they’d actually found countable and uncountable things.

This activity is a great alternative to “brainstorm and write down 5 countable and 5 uncountable nouns.” It gets the students moving (yes, even adult business English students enjoyed this!) and gives them an opportunity to go on a mini scavenger hunt and to use their phones.

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Welcome to my blog!

Dear reader: welcome! 

I’m starting this blog in order to better organize my thoughts and activities and share them with the wider world of ELT. In doing so, I hope to open a dialogue of collaboration, cooperation, and development. 

I’ve been teaching English to adults in many shapes and forms since June 2013. I consider myself to be an open and friendly teacher with strong listening and clarification skills. I’ve warned my students many times not to challenge me at Taboo! :) 

Whether you’re just getting started (or thinking about it!), a tenured expert, or somewhere in the middle (like me!), hopefully you can find something you like here. And if not, hopefully we can work on something together. 

Happy teaching!