Why Should We Use Realia In Class 31392j

should we use REALIA in class ? Realia usage and class implementation prof. Sandu Robert

Outline 

Realia Definition

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Why Should We Use Realia?

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How can we decide if materials are appropriate?

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Using Realia: For Young Learners For Learning Vocabulary/Grammar In a role play With Reading Instruction

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Implementation Ways to Bring Real Life into the Classroom Activities Involving Realia New Uses For Realia Quick Ideas

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Virtual Realia

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Tips& Warnings

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Advantages of Using Realia

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Disadvantages of Using Realia

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Conclusion

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References

Realia Definitions If you’re thinking the word ‘realia’ sounds vaguely Latin, then you’d be correct. In the classroom, the word realia means using real items found in everyday life as an aid to teaching English. Using realia helps to make English lessons memorable by creating a link between the objects and the word or phrase they represent.  Realia are physical objects that are related to the target culture.  Realia refers to objects or items from real life , which are used in the classroom to illustrate and teach vocabulary or to serve as an aid to facilitate language acquisition and production.  Realia are objects from real life used in classroom instruction by educators to improve students' understanding of other cultures and real life situations. 

Realia Definitions  (in

language teaching) Actual objects and items which are brought into a classroom as examples or as aids to be talked or written about and used in teaching. (Longman Dictionary of Language Teaching & Applied Linguistics. Richards, Platt, & Platt. 1992. Essex.)

 Anything

which has a purpose outside of the ESL classroom and can be brought into the classroom. (Realia: Bringing the Real World into the Classroom.Dickens, Robertson, Hofmann.1995. Victoria, BC.)

 Objects

of any origin used to illustrate vocabulary and structure in the L2. (Celce-Murcia & Hilles, 1988)

 Concrete

objects and the paraphernalia of everyday life. (Zukowski-Faust, 1997)

EXAMPLES

Why should We use Realia? Kinesthetic learning is the type of learning that students will most effectively acquire, mostly because they will have hands-on experience.  The use of realia brings a welcome change in the class, a break from typical class activities like reading and writing.  They are often more interesting than material from text books and can be on subjects that will really engage the students.  Students will be expected to use real material when they leave your classes. 

Why Should We Use Realia?  The

unexpectedness of having to suddenly interact with real objects will force the students to pay attention to the topic of discussion ; it will create excitement, and they’ll have fun.  Students have the chance to practice real life situations like using maps and asking for directions in a foreign language, but with the guidance of someone who speaks fluently and will help them get it right. Once they go outside the school enviromnent, they will feel more confident in speaking English.  Students will clearly understand the reason they’re learning a particular component. Instead of wondering when and where they might have use for a particular language element, they’ll know the reason.

How can we decide if materials are appropriate?

 Decide

if the topic matter is appropriate for your students, if you can ask them or find out what their interests are.  Look at how much new vocabulary and grammar structures are in the materials. If students are to cope with real material, they may have to learn to deal with topics with a lot of alien vocabulary.

Searching for Appropriate Realia One solution for English teachers is to keep their eyes open for useful realia such as magazines, menus, newspapers, ments, maps and voting brochures. Teachers must develop an awareness of what can be utilized in a classroom. This involves both becoming more creative as materials designers and also more sensitive to the target culture and to the culture of the students.

Common Realia for Different Levels Beginners • Television timetables • Cinema timetables • Train timetables • Restaurant menus • Postcards (Writing) • Utility bills • Application forms • Recipes

Intermedi ate • Teenage magazines Surveys & teenage issues • Newspaper articles from tabloid newspapers • Instruction manuals • Adverts & flyers

Advance d • General newspaper article • Magazine articles • Academic material • At advanced level you can choose nearly anything, because they should have developed strategies to cope with unknown

Using Realia for Young Learners 

If you are going to teach English to young children, realia is a must. Young children are at the perfect age to learn a language and as visual learners, you should try to tap into their natural creativity. Bring in fruit, vegetables and lots of toys. Children love to role-play and enjoy playing games, so ask them to move animals onto tables, under tables, or around the farmyard. Make up simple stories using toy animals or puppets, and children will enjoy their English lessons, and be motivated to learn.

Activity Time

When ı grow up...

I want to be a doctor. I want to be a teacher. I want to be a rock star.

You are going to tell us what you are and WHY…Have Fun!!!

Choose the things that fit you, to dress up…..

Don’t be shy ; at the end when you are ready…

Like your dream!

Using Realia for Learning Vocabulary/Grammar  It

is unrealistic to bring real objects into your classroom for every single word that you wish to teach and some words will lend themselves better than others to using realia. , realia can be used indirectly as a tool for teaching grammar; for example, items of food and drink are perfect for teaching uncountable and

Using Realia with Reading Instruction Bad Kitty Gets a Bath by Nick Bruel Another installment of "Bad Kitty," Bruel offers us an insightful and hysterical look at how to give a cat a bath. The Introduction reminds us of what happens when we have asked Kitty to do things that Kitty did not want to do...such as eat vegetables...before beginning the saga. The pictures are definitely worth a thousand words, especially with the expressions on Kitty's face! Examples of Realia: *sponge *brush *towel *stuffed animal (cat) *soap or shampoo *band-aids *"tub" (to serve as bathtub) Suggested Themes: humor inference (using the pictures to have students predict Kitty's feelings) prediction/connections (reading strategies) cats

Using Realia in Role-play

Don’t stop at using realia to learn vocabulary or grammar. Use objects in roleplays to make the situation more realistic. This could be something as simple as a mobile phone or your train tickets. Using realia is only limited by your imagination: here are some ideas on how to use realia in your lessons.  Use your country’s flag and a map to show students where you live and to help them learn the names of foreign countries. 

Timetables, tickets and pedestrian maps of London are great for practising role-play scenarios such as asking for directions, or buying tickets.

Implementation Ways To Bring Real Life Into The Classroom We may teach a subject with flashcards or picture. However, if we bring realia students will be surprised and thrilled and will never forget this lesson. This is what the use of realia in the classroom is all about: the use of real life objects that students can touch, feel, and even smell to effectively teach language components. Here are some ways to take full advantage of the possibilities offered by the use of realia in the classroom.

Ways To Bring Real Life Into The Classroom 5 o’clock tea  This

is by far the best way to teach table manners,  requests, or expressions related to ordering or serving tea, coffee, or any meal in a home setting. For the following dialogue:  - Would you like some tea?  - No, thank you.  - What would you like?  - I’d like some coffee, please.  - With milk and sugar?  - Just black coffee.  Simply

bring a children’s tea complete with tea cups, saucers, spoons, teapot and/or coffee pot, sugar bowl, creamer, biscuits, etc... and have students practice offering and serving each other coffee or tea. You can make it as simple or as complete as you wish, or as time allows.

Ways To Bring Real Life Into The Classroom Eating out  Obtain or Design and print out a menu with the food you'd like to teach including starters, main courses, and desserts.  Have one student play the role of waiter and take orders, while the other students order their meals. Then have students switch roles. Students may ask the waiter for a missing item like a spoon, fork, or napkin.

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Ways To Bring Real Life Into The Classroom Location, location, location! To teach prepositions of place  take common classroom objects like pens, pencils, books, balls etc…  Place them on or under desks, and around the classroom; then have students simply tell you where each item is, or take turns asking each other where their own personal items are.  Also for teaching “this”, “that”, “these”, and “those”, as the perspective of having items near and far from you clearly illustrates the differences between the  demonstrative pronouns . 

Ways To Bring Real Life Into The Classroom

Tell me about your family  Real family photos

are

great for not only learning about relationships but also physical descriptions. Have students bring one family photo each and describe family . Students may also take turns asking classmates questions. 

Ways To Bring Real Life Into The Classroom

Let’s have a fashion show Children love to play dress up, and what a better way for them to learn items of clothing and  colors   than put them on and strut around the classroom to show off their unique style?

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Adult learners can also model the clothing they’re wearing.

Ways To Bring Real Life Into The Classroom

Celebrate the holidays 

Learning English is not only about learning to speak in a foreign language. Students should learn about cultural elements as well. Special holidays like Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas offer unique learning opportunities. To teach students about Halloween, plan a celebration complete with pumpkin carving, costume contest, and typical games like bobbing for apples. Give your students the chance to experience the holidays and not just read about them.

Ways To Bring Real Life Into The Classroom The Job Interview  Do

you have students who will be  applying for jobs in English? Try to get your hands on some real job applications and have students practice filling them out in class. You may also conduct job interviews using real life interview questions.  not only teach them the vocabulary they should know, give students the boost of confidence they need.

Activities Involving Realia

Identity envelopes Get three or four envelopes and fill them with bits and bobs you find around the house such as foreign currency, shop receipts, postcards, photos, buttons, etc. Put students into groups and ask them to have a good look at the objects and to decide who they belong to.  They should be able to build up the identity of a character from the objects.  You could say they are all suspects from a crime and they have to decide who did it, or simply create the characters to use in a role play.

Activities Involving Realia Recycling race

(Depending on the recycling facilities in your area you will need to adapt the task accordingly) For this you just need a bag of rubbish (clean items out first) that you are about to recycle like tetrabriks, glass jars, cereal boxes, tins, old newspapers etc.  Ask students what all the objects are and which container they’d put them in to recycle them.  Draw a picture of each of the possible containers and get students to come and choose an item and tell the class where they’d put it to recycle it and why.  You could make this into a team race by giving each team the mission of collecting all the items for their container one by one. You could then use the recyclable material to make a poster with your students about recycling.  

Activities Involving Realia

Island survival  Bring in a selection of items such as a coat hanger, a corkscrew, a packet of dental floss, a clothes peg, a plastic bag, a wooden spoon, some swimming goggles, elastic bands etc.  Put the students into groups and tell them they have been ship wrecked on a desert island with their group. Luckily there are some random items on the island they can use to help them survive.  Reveal the items one by one and elicit vocabulary. Then tell students they have ten minutes to think about how they are going to use the items to help them survive. At the end, listen to each group’s ideas and vote on which group you think would survive the longest.

Specific Grammar Points A Tie and Prepositions. Show the students how to tie a tie.  'Put the tie round your neck.   Cross the ends in front of you, then pull the smaller end under,  Then  over, then under again, over again,  then up, behind the knot, through the knot,  then down.  Pull the knot up.'

Free Speaking Activities Discussion and a Microphone  This is suggested by television programme hosts, who control conversations by the use of the microphone. Put students in groups, and give one student the microphone.  Say a group of six students are talking about 'holidays', the person with the microphone can move around the group giving different people the chance to speak, ensuring everyone gets an equal chance to contribute.

New Uses for Realia  Classroom

aids are all around us, but sometimes we need to think about the best ways to use an object. 'Mapping' the use of an object onto a language point, or finding a language related use of  an object are two ways of using realia in class. Have look around the staffroom. The teaching aids you need may be closer than you think.

Quick Ideas  Take

along a hat, scarf, gloves, to introduce winter/winter activities.  Teaching business English? Make use of mobile phones to create realistic telephone conversations. Use diaries, to schedule meetings, and plan events.

Virtual Realia Virtual realia: (in language teaching) digitized objects and items from the target culture which are brought into the classroom as examples or aids and used to stimulate spoken or written language production.  It is a collection of linguistic and nonlinguistic authentic materials which have been compiled, scanned, and posted on WWW server.  It benefits especially those international teachers who are less mobile or unable to collect their own materials.

Virtual Realia Can virtual realia still be considered realia? The larger question regarding authenticity of which realia is a part paints a confused and contradictory picture at best. What does seem clear, however, is that authenticity is a relative matter and that different aspects of it can be present in varying degrees (Taylor, 1994).

Virtual Realia 

But virtual realia isn't really the object at all; it's just a digitized image of the item.Foreign language practitioners do accept modifications of realia items such as the lamination of authentic materials onto a card (Zukowski-Faust, 1997). Wood (1980) even presents the postage stamp as a cultural artifact that may be easily photographed and enlarged to facilitate its use and discussion in class.

The Advantages of Using Realia  As

English teachers, the use of realia is only limited by your imagination. It is possible to use realia to teach almost any subject. Using realia stimulates the mind, and is one way of encouraging creativity by involving the senses. Realia saves time, as recognition of an object is immediate and so cuts out the need for lengthy explanations and drawing funny pictures on the board. Elicitation becomes much easier and holding up the object with a raised eyebrow will usually result in the desired word being spoken.  Realia breathes life into new vocabulary, and the chances of your students ing the new words you have taught them increases.

The Advantages of Using Realia Using realia in the English class proves a positive and rewarding experience since it  makes lessons more interesting and enjoyable  is a link between language learning and sociocultural learning  brings English classes nearer to the English speaking countries  helps students to discover and process new input  is a good complement to the usual reading materials

Advantages of Using Realia  Accessible  Relevant  Visually

interesting and captures the attention of the learner  Provides a focus away from the written word or the 1:1 interaction – it’s like a ‘third person’ that can be spoken about (without consideration to feelings, social conventions etc)  Useful to help your students grasp the cultural differences or learn practical skills.

Disadvantages Real

objects may not a cultural distinction. Activities with real objects might lose the class path. Spending too much time in one activity with real objects in the class.

Conclusion You will have probably realized by now that including realia in the classroom involves a great deal of preparation in some cases. Is it really worth you time? The answer is, yes. Absolutely! And your student’s faces will be living proof.

References 

Harmer, Jeremy. The Practice of English Language Teaching with DVD (4th Edition) (Longman Handbooks for Language Teachers). Pearson Longman ELT. pp. 177.  ISBN 978-1-4058-5311-8.

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Jean-Pierre Berwald. 1987. Teaching Foreign Languages with Realia and other Authentic Materials. Eric. Center for applied linguistics. Washington.

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Simon Mumford. Using Creative Thinking to Find New Uses for Realia . Izmir University of Economics Turkey.

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Penny Ur. Grammar Practice Activities. Cambridge University Press. 1988

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http://authenticteaching.wordpress.com/2011/05/13/business-english-realia/

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http://busyteacher.org/

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http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/realia

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http://www.ehow.com/how_4549705_use-realia-esl-lessons.html

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http://elementaryreadingrealia.blogspot.com/

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Realia_(education)

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http://iteslj.org/Articles/Smith-Realia.html

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http://www.jamesabela.co.uk/advanced/realia.html

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http://www.learner.org/libraries/tfl/key_.html

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http://oupeltglobalblog.com/tag/realia/ 

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http://www.stephenhenryconsulting.com/letter/dr_lozanov.php

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http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/language-assistant/teaching-tips/realia

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http://www.usingenglish.com/weblog/archives/000228.html

Thank You.

© Prof. Sandu Robert