Straight-Arrow ESA Lesson The most common application of the ESA method, teachers simply start with the engage phase and end with the activate phase. An example lesson plan of a Straight-Arrow ESA lesson Level Elementary Teaching Aids Worksheets Name cards Learner Objectives Students should be able to identify and use comparative adjectives in sentences by the end of the lesson. Teacher Objectives Improve my boardwork, elicitation and refine my teaching style. Anticipated Problems for Students Pronunciation Confusion between “-er” and “more” comparative adjectives. Solution Drilling and thorough explanation of the grammar. Anticipated Problems for Teachers Losing track of the sequence of the lesson plan and time. Solution Have the lesson plan next to me at all times. Always check the time. Phase Procedure Timing Interaction Engage Use pictures to elicit adjectives based on appearance. As students say adjectives, write the opposites. E.g. tall-short, fat-thin, young-old, etc. List around 10-12 words on the board. Explain that adjectives can be used to describe appearances and then give an example of a comparative adjective. 10 minutes S -> T
Select two students with one being taller than the other and write a gapfill sentence on the whiteboard. E.g. Tom is taller than Emily. Elicit the opposite: Emily is shorter than Tom. Study Activity #1 Create three columns and write the list of adjectives in the first column. Ask students for the comparative forms of the adjectives and write them down in the second column. In the third column, explain how to create the comparative form by writing (adjective + er) or (more + adjective) Activity #2 Hand out the first worksheet that has a chart of adjectives and comparative adjectives and ask students to fill in the missing words. Activity #3 Hand out the second worksheet that has gap fill exercises. E.g. This brown cat is ________ than the white cat. 20 minutes S -> T Activate Activity #1 Each student gets a card with a random name and fact. Each student gets a fact sheet headed with 10-15 minutes S – > T S – > S
“name” and “fact”. Teach students how to ask these questions. 1. What is your name? 2. What is your fact? Students go around the class and ask their classmates these questions, filling in the sheet as they go. Activity #2 Once they have asked everyone and filled in the information on their fact sheet, students will create sentences about their classmates using comparative adjectives. Students will then stand up and say some of their sentences to the class. Boomerang ESA Lesson The structure of a Boomerang lesson is Engage-Activate-Study-Activate (EASA). Unlike a Straight-Arrow lesson, a Boomerang lesson dives straight into the activate phase of the lesson before the study phase, then finishing by reactivating the students. During the initial activate phase, students will most likely be unable to use the language correctly. They will make mistakes with grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation, which will reveal gaps in the students’ knowledge. Once the students have learned the new topic, they will then do the activity again, filling in any gaps they may have had at the beginning of the lesson. An example boomerang lesson Engage: Discussion of different jobs and occupations. Activate: Role-play as different types of people e.g lawyer, police officer, firefighter, etc.