Participation

What and why?

Particularly in large classes, some students may seem reluctant to participate orally and contribute to the lessons. There may be a number of reasons for this. There may, for example, be a number of negative factors such as being afraid to make mistakes in front of others, feeling that they will appear stupid, fearing that they will be corrected, or otherwise lacking in confidence in front of a large group. On the other hand, many students naturally say very little. They may feel that they learn best through listening and observing - silence is their preferred LEARNING STRATEGY. Before you insist on students participating orally in the lesson, it is best therefore to think about why they are not participating. What may seem a problem to you may not, in fact, be a problem to them. It is important to respect the personal preferences that different students may have. There are, however, a number of things that you can do to improve the chances of students participating.

Practical ideas

• If there are one or two students that are persistently quiet, you could talk to them after a lesson to find out what they think about it. Alternatively, you could make up a questionnaire which all students can answer.
• If possible, try to arrange the seating so that all the students can see you clearly and so that they can see each other. A horseshoe arrangement or circle is best, or try and push the desks together into pairs or groups.
• Accept that some students are quiet and may feel happier contributing in a less obvious way - perhaps by producing exercises and puzzles for a class EXERCISE BOX, or helping to organise the PARCEL OF ENGLISH, or bringing in pictures and 'realia' for other activities.
• Some students may dominate the class by being over-noisy or always answering questions first. If this is a problem, you could divide the class into four quarters and say that you will accept an answer from each group in turn.
• Some students may be reluctant to 'act out' in class. They may prefer to record a conversation on cassette at home for you to listen to later. Don't force students to speak out loud if they are not willing or ready.
• Make sure that the students understand that many of the activities in CEWw are open-ended so that a variety of answers are acceptable and 'right'. It is what they think that is important.
• Encourage students to understand the importance of everyone's contribution in GROUPWORK and that the work that the quiet students do often supports the work of the more dominant ones. Allow students to work at their own PACE (see also TASKS IN BLOCKS). This will give the more apprehensive students an opportunity to work without pressure.
• The DECIDE ... EXERCISES also allow students freedom to choose what they prefer to do. Give the quieter students encouragement while they work, to build up confidence.
• You could make a particular point of praising weaker or quieter students and of accepting what they say (even if this contains many errors) in an effort to build up their confidence.