Instructions

FREE SAMPLE (Click Here)!

Welcome to CLB Dictation Tripytchs, a crazy jigsaw activity that’s the way to go in teaching ESL learners how to get the hang of the language in a fun and super intense way, yet inspired by various CLB 2010 sample tasks. (For those needing to create rubrics for portfolio artefacts, please see the resources in the appendix.) Here’s exactly how it works:

STEP 1: Find the four pages/sheets that follow—first, the Teacher’s Copy (or, cheat sheet), with the names of the three original groupings at the top. Then you will find a Student Handout for each of the three groups with their particular group name at the top, followed by three columns of conversation. Only one column is complete for each Student Handout; the rest of the columns will be completed through the jigsaw-dictation activity.

STEP 2: Elicit what students know about the topic. Then introduce them to the names of the 3 groups. Distribute the Student Handouts as evenly as possible and get the students to acknowledge their groups by show of hands before breaking out by their groups, according to the name at the top of their particular Student Handout.

STEP 3: Instruct each group to focus only on their particular column that is complete. They should work together with their group members on vocabulary, expressions, and pronunciation. They are NOT to fill in the other columns on their own. They may use their dictionaries or ask for clarification on idioms, pronunciation, etc. Once they’ve figured out their column, they should work in pairs (or threes if necessary) to practice the dialogue.

STEP 4: To complete the jigsaw activity, bring all three groups back together and regroup with at least one representative from each of the original groups. The representative from each original group will give dictation of their column to members of their new group. They are NOT to copy; it is a listening/dictation exercise. They may check their work with each other’s Student Handouts visually once the dictation is done.

STEP 5: Students are now to find a partner they have not worked with yet to practice the dialogue. They should repeat with at least two partners. Finally, the teacher will invite volunteer pairs to perform each of the columns in front of the class, providing corrections on pronunciation or explanations as they arise.

STEP 6: Super fun extension activity—because the columns roughly paraphrase each other, students can practice the conversation by alternating randomly among the columns as they go along. For example, Student A can begin with the first line of column 1, but Student B can reply from the second line of column 3, and Student A can follow up with the third line of column 2, and so on. Each line of each column has been numbered thus to facilitate the activity: 1A, 2B, 3A, 4B, 5A, etc. This way, pinballing down the columns, they will learn and practice at least three ways of saying the same thing in response to any one statement or question.

Another extension activity could involve writing their own conversation in pairs on a similar topic, and then performing it to the class.

The simple template would go thus:

1A:

2B:

3A:

4B:

5A:

6B:

7A:

8B:

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