RU F23 ADV Find someone who (hobbies)

Class theme/topics discussed: we discussed a lot of different things! If generalized – hobbies.

Goals of the class: to encourage Ss to talk as much as possible during class, to introduce a new student to the class and motivate him to participate in the discussion actively.

How did you structure the class? We started from discussing our weekends and had a couple of mini-discussions that stemmed from the Ss’ answers about what they did at the weekend. Then I handed each of them a handout with a task “Find someone who…” (attached below) and so the rest of the hour we spent on this task. Essentially, there were 15 criteria like “Find someone who is really good at cooking / who enjoys going camping / who is keen on dancing” etc. They had to converse with each other, find the people who would reply positively to the questions and write their names down. Also, they had to ask each other 2-3 additional questions no matter if their speaking partner replied with a yes, or with a no.

What technology, media or props did you use? (Internet resources, handouts, etc.)

Whiteboard, handouts

What worked well in this class? What did not work?

The Ss really enjoyed the whole activity. They were speaking all the time and everything they were saying was in Russian! I heard them laughing every now and again and at the end of the class 2 out of 5 Ss were actually really surprised that it was time to wrap things up. All of them seemed to have really enjoyed the CC.

How could this class be improved/ modified? I think I would tell them to stand up before the start of the activity. I was planning to, but because my class is relatively small (5 people), they just did not see any point in standing up – they just talked to the person next to them before switching to someone else. It was also okay, especially given that we spent almost the whole hour on this activity, but I think that standing would make it even more entertaining.