Teach English in Yongle Zhen - Hanzhong Shi

In this essay, I will explain the ESA teaching method in depth and explain why it is so important, providing examples of activities which are relevant to each stage. All students require motivation, exposure to the language being learnt, and the opportunity to use the language practically. To achieve this, the factors ‘Engage’, ‘Study’, and ‘Activate’ will need to be demonstrated and used by teachers. This is known as the ‘ESA’ method. ‘ESA’ is particularly effective for trainee/new teachers, as it is well structured and relatively easy to follow, while at the same time allowing a high level of flexibility in lesson design. The ‘Engage’ phase of a lesson is where the teacher will strive to gain the interest of the students and make them feel involved in the lesson. This in turn will result in the students finding the lesson a lot more stimulating and fun, so helping them to maintain focus and achieve maximum progress. The main aim here is to get students thinking and speaking in English as much as possible, before moving on to the next phase. Examples of activities/materials which can be used in order to “engage” the students and make them feel fully ‘involved’ include: Games, pictures, music and sound effects, and stories. Alongside the use of these concrete materials is the strategy of elicitation. Elicitation is the process of asking thought provoking questions, and many people consider it as one of the most important features of an ESA lesson. Elicitation techniques are commonly described as ‘strategies which can be used by teachers in order to evoke responses from students’. These strategies can be used to find out what stage students have reached in their learning and what their next steps should be. They also take learners through a process of listening to and discovering a language by responding to questions and physical prompts. Elicitation provides students with the opportunity to speak, which both increases student talk time and also reduces teacher talk time, resulting in a far greater level of ‘student discovery’. There are a vast amount of elicitation techniques which may be used within a lesson. Examples include:- * Brainstorming – asking students to share current vocabulary knowledge around a given topic by perhaps showing them a picture and asking them to name everything they can within it. * Asking for a question- the teacher gives an answer and asks the students to provide the question, e.g. The teacher saying, “My favourite type of food is pizza.” should elicit the question “What is your favourite food?” * Using real objects- in order to elicit the word ‘pen’ for example, the teacher can simply hold up a real pen to the students and ask the simple question “What is this?” Using a variety of elicitation techniques in a lesson will prevent the session from becoming boring and predictable. Although it is often associated primarily with the “Engage” section of a lesson, it is a technique that may be used at any stage throughout a learning session. The ‘Study’ phase of a lesson is where students focus on the structure of the language being taught and learn how it is constructed. This stage usually starts with elicitation, followed by a presentation of the language point and a drill in order to ensure correct pronunciation. Once the language point has been established, exercises will be given to the students in order to check their understanding and to strengthen their skills in the material being taught. The teacher should always review the answers given to these exercises and correct any errors which have been made, in a constructive and helpful way. Examples of activities which could be used in the ‘Study’ phase, include: Worksheets, unscrambling words, gap fill sheets, and analysis of texts or dialogues. The ‘Activate’ phase of a lesson is where the students are encouraged to experiment with the language which they know and put it into use. The language should be used as freely and communicatively as possible, for maximum effect. The teacher should place more of a focus on fluency here rather than accuracy and should not restrict language usage in any way. Examples of activities for the ‘Activate’ phase, include: Role plays, communication games, debates and discussions, etc. In order to provide a balanced range of activities and tasks, all three ‘ESA’ components should be evident in a lesson. There are three different types of ‘ESA’ lessons. These are ‘Straight arrow’, ‘Boomerang’, and ‘Patchwork’. A ‘Straight arrow’ lesson follows the standard order of engage, study, then activate. A ‘Boomerang’ lesson differs slightly to the general formula, in that it provides more options. For example, you could choose to engage, activate, study, and then activate once more. A ‘Patchwork’ lesson is commonly incorporated when the lesson is not so straight forward as a lesson which utilises the other two methods. Several mini sequences are often required, which lead to a whole eventually. For example, you could choose to engage, activate, activate, study, activate, engage, study, and finally activate once more. ‘Patchwork’ lessons provide a higher level of flexibility, and also provide a perfect balance between ‘Study’ and ‘Activate’. Under the ESA model, teachers decide which type of ‘ESA’ structure to use, depending on what works best for their students. However all lessons will begin with the ‘Engage’ phase, and end with an ‘Activate’ phase. So in conclusion, the ‘ESA’ method is very viable and important for a number of different reasons. It enables lessons to be clearly structured and it is a prime way of motivating students, exposing them to the language being taught and providing them with ample opportunities to use it. In so doing, students enjoy and achieve in their language learning.