PRACTICAL IDEAS

Adding further interest to

language exercises
Simon Mumford offers some ways of adding more interest to gap-fills and other exercises.

M
any language tasks are used say whether or not they are in the • Read each sentence three times,
both for teaching and testing, correct order. Alternatively, ask once with the correct answer, and
e.g. fill in the blanks, multiple students to say whether they are in twice with wrong words. Ask the
choice, reading comprehension correct order (big, bigger, biggest), class to vote on which one they
questions, and matching exercises. reverse order (Wednesday, Tuesday, think sounds right.
There is clearly a difference, however, Monday) or no order (morning,
between lessons and exams. In exams, evening, afternoon). • It is important to ensure that
it is essential that students work students have some idea of the
alone without support or distraction, Fill in the blanks meaning of the target words and
but such an approach is not usually are not just guessing randomly.
appropriate for classwork. When these In this exercise, students fill in blanks Some abstract words can be
tasks are used for teaching, innovative in sentences, choosing words from a illustrated with diagrams in a
approaches can increase motivation given list. pre-activity before students use the
and help students to overcome the words in a blank-filling exercise,
challenges presented. This article • Students close their books. Read as below.
lists some common exercise types out each sentence, ignoring the
and offers some alternative ways of blank, and ask students to say Match each word with one of the
dealing with them. where they think the blank is. Then diagrams below.
ask them to guess what kind of
Grouping and Ordering word is missing (noun, verb etc). Find a word that means ...
In this exercise, students group or • Read out the sentences with the In this exercise, students are given a
order vocabulary items. For example, correct answer. Students listen word and asked to find a synonym in a
divide the following list into three with their books closed, and try to reading text.
groups: jobs, animals, places: doctor, identify the target word for each
horse, teacher, shop, cat, park, mouse, sentence. This may be related to • Give extra support, e.g. paragraph
pilot, farmer, fox, airport, stadium. the theme of the lesson, or perhaps number, position in paragraph,
a word that is more difficult or less first letter, and so on. The more
• Read out three words and ask well-known than the other words information given, the easier the
students to identify the odd word, in the sentence. Then students task, e.g. “find a three syllable
eg mouse, park, fox. open their books and fill in the word at the beginning of the
answers from memory. paragraph three which means
• Read out three words and ask the
students whether they are all from predict reveal substitute component expand imply
the same group or not, e.g. shop,
teacher, farmer (no); shop, airport,
stadium (yes). Students can also
say whether the words come from
one, two or three groups, e.g.
mouse, fox, horse (1), mouse, park,
teacher (3).

• Ordering can be used with

different language points, e.g. read
key: a. component, b. expand, c. predict (think about the future), d. reveal (something
out three items (seven, twenty-
unknown is made known), e. imply (say something indirectly), f. substitute
one, fifteen) and ask students to

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PRACTICAL IDEAS

hard” is easier than “find a word 1 Write purchase and erase rc and • Give students clues for an
which means hard”. ase, leaving pu__h___. exercise, e.g. if the answers are a,
c, d, b, d in that order, clues could
2 Rewrite p and h upside-down, be:
• Words can be described in many so that they look like b and y,
ways: number of letters, position making bu__ y__. • the answer to the first question
in the sentence, and in terms is not b
of sound, e.g. a word that is the interaction = conversation
• the third and fifth questions
second word in the sentence which
1 Write inter action and erase int, have the same answer
means..., a seven letter word which
means..., a long word that sounds leaving ___er action. • c follows a
like ‘a fish in sea’ which means 2 Move the c to the front of the
‘working well’ (efficiency!). word, leaving c ___er a_tion. • there is only one c and b

• In a longer text, give a list 3 Add onv and s, making • Write answers on the board and
of words for students to find conversa tion. tell the class that all are right
synonyms for. Tell students that except for one; their task is to
each answer starts with the last similar = same find the wrong answer and correct
letter of the previous answer, it. Alternatively, give some other
1 Write similar and erase iilr,
e.g. Find words that mean ‘party’, combination, e.g. one / two / three
leaving s_m__a.
‘however’, ‘think’ and ‘trying’. are right, or two / three are wrong.
Answers: celebration, nevertheless, 2 Move the a so that it is between s
suppose, effort. Thus, each correct and m, leaving sam. • Change the order of the questions
answer is a clue to the next so that the answers are in
answer. 3 Add e, making same. alphabetical order, and write the
order of questions on the board,
Matching exercises Find the odd one out e.g. 2, 5, 1, 4, 3 and tell the class
this. However, students still
In this exercise, students match In this exercise, in each group of four have to think because there may
items from two lists, one of target words, students find the one that be two of one letter and none
words and the other, synonyms or has a different meaning, for example of another letter. Thus, many
definitions. predictable, expected, unusual, combinations are possible, e.g. a,
normal. a, b, c, d, or a, a, c, d, d or a, c, c,
• After matching words and d, d etc.
definitions, write the target words • Read the list aloud, but say the
on the board, ask students to odd word slightly differently, Reading comprehension
close their books, and read out e.g. change the volume, speed,
key words from the definitions at intonation or emphasis. Try not to There are two types of this exercise:
random. Students should be able make the difference too obvious, first, open answer, for which students
to identify the word. For example, so students have to think a bit. have to write a sentence; and second,
protect is defined as to keep After checking students have multiple choice.
someone or something safe from correctly identified the odd words,
harm, damage, or loss, therefore let them practise in pairs, with • For an open answer reading
any one of the words keep, safe, one reading the words, and the comprehension, before the text
harm, damage, and loss should other, with book closed, deciding is read, put all the questions and
elicit protect. which is the odd one out. answers on the board at random,
but omit the last three words of
• After the exercise, you can Multiple choice each. Ask students to match the
strengthen the association questions and answers, and then
between words as follows. On This is a very common exercise type predict the missing three words.
the board, transform the words that has plenty of scope for creative Then students read the passage, do
into their synonyms, explaining approaches. the questions and check whether
what you are doing at each stage. their matches and predictions
Then, ask students to make up • Write the answers to the exercise were right. Here is an example
their own transformations, and on the board, but in random order, a question and answer with the
encourage them to be creative. e.g. d, b, a, b, c. There is a good last three words in brackets:
Here are some examples: chance that students who finish the Why did she ask the
exercise with these answers but in taxi (driver to wait)?
purchase = buy a different order have successfully Because she wasn’t sure the
completed the exercise. (address was right).

22 Modern English Teacher April 2014 Volume 23 No. 2

 PRACTICAL IDEAS

• For multiple choice, for each speech: He asked me thinking and problem-solving. Some
question, give a clue question ‘Where were you yesterday?’. of these approaches are also suitable
that will guide students to the He __ ___ where ___ ___ been for group work, further increasing
answer, e.g. What does x mean? ___ ____ before. (He asked me their appeal.
(where x is a word in the text where I had been the day before.)
which is important to understand
to find the answer), or Which word • Instead of a sentence with blanks, Simon Mumford
in the text means the same as x? give the first letter of each word.
(drawing attention to a word in the The clue for the sentence above
text and the question which are would be HAMWIHBTDB. If you
synonymous), or some other clue have five questions, you could
question. However, to add interest, have five such answers consisting
write the clue questions in a of first letters of words. Students
random order on the board, and have to match each one with the
ask students to match them with appropriate question, and then
the actual questions in the task work out which word each letter
before they start on the exercise. stands for.

Rewrites Conclusion
Simon Mumford has been
A common grammar task is to asks Inevitably, language learning involves teaching for 27 years and currently
students to paraphrase sentences the frequent use of standard activities teaches EAP at Izmir University
using specified structures, such as such as gap-filling, multiple choice, of Economics. He is particularly
passive, conditionals or reported and matching. While the repeated use interested in classroom activity
speech. of such tasks can be demotivating, design and has written many
interest can be increased through articles in this area. He was
• Give the paraphrased version innovative approaches which offer awarded the Aston University MSc.
but with some words blanked extra support. Such common learning TESOL in 2003.
out, and ask students to find tasks can be the starting point for
the missing words, for example: motivating activities which combine Email: [email protected]
Change into reported language knowledge with logical

April 2014 Volume 23 No. 2 www.onlineMET.com 23