Children with limited language expression and comprehension abilities are at risk for academic failure, particularly in literacy acquisition. In addition, these children often have poor social outcomes, including difficulty forming friendships, social exclusion, withdrawal, and victimization. The academic and social difficulties that these…

Four activities for language learning are presented, including: class completion of incomplete dialogues excerpted from major literary works; games for learning vocabulary and civilization using words beginning with the same letter; a lesson using cartoons to elicit description and dialogues; and a unit on appropriate and inappropriate…

Ways to improve the role-playing conversations found in most second language textbooks are outlined. It is argued that the conversations are often restrictive, dull, and repetitive, and students respond to them in kind. The teacher can make the target language used more interesting by creating new characters, situations, settings, or objectives.…

The methods by which Spanish verbal routines may be taught to second language learners are discussed. Verbal routines are fixed phrases shared by competent language speakers to handle communicative interactions appropriately and effectively. Five activities for teaching a wide range of verbal routines used for the performance of different language…

A guide to the use of and rationale for dialogue journal writing for promoting the writing development of limited English proficient students is organized in question-answer format. It answers questions often asked by teachers about dialogue journal writing: What is a dialogue journal? What are the benefits to students and teachers? How much time…

A discussion of the use of dialogues in second language instruction focuses on uses of the techniques that are more appropriate than those used in the era of audio-lingual methodology. It is argued that during this period, dialogues were overused. Techniques are offered for use of dialogues to develop learners' listening and speaking skills.…

A dialogue journal is a written conversation in which a student and teacher communicate regularly over a period of a semester or a school year. The student may write as much as he chooses on any topic, and the teacher responds, introduces new topics, offers observations, clarifies, and asks and answers questions. Teachers use dialogue journals to…

A study of the effects of the complexity of scenarios used in the Strategic Interaction Method of second language instruction had four scenarios of varying complexity performed by four university classes of students of English as a second language at varying levels. Indicators of complexity included the degree of verbalness, contextual constraint,…

The photographic narrative of O. Henry's classic short story, "The Gift of the Magi," is designed for use in teaching English as a Second Language. It is accompanied by an audiocassette recording (not included here). An introductory section offers teachers suggestions for classroom use of the materials. The story is told in a series of…

The manual is meant to accompany and supplement the basic manual and to serve as support to the audio component of "Spanish for Agricultural Purposes," a one-semester course for North American agriculture specialists preparing to work in Latin America, consists of exercises to supplement readings presented in the course's basic manual and to…

A practicum project to develop instructional materials and related class activities for students of English as a second language (ESL) is described. The context in which the project took place is the ESL instruction of Japanese students with minimal English skills and low motivation in an American community college in Japan. The materials consist…

A language guide to Temne is designed for Peace Corps volunteers serving in Sierra Leone. It contains introductory sections about the Temnes and Temne phonology and orthography, teacher notes on the use of the manual, and 12 lessons. Each lesson consists of a dialogue or narrative, notes on classroom presentation, vocabulary and useful phrases,…

This set of instructional materials on introductory Bambara, a language spoken in Mali, is designed for Peace Corps volunteers using the language in that country. The materials consist of twenty units on topics of personal communication and grammar. Most units contain a proverb, pattern drills, major dialogues containing the unit's new material,…

This guide describes activities used by language teachers in developing students' oral communication skills. Activities are presented for instruction in English as a Second Language as well as other second languages. Ideas are organized in 4 parts, with 14 subsections: fluency (conversation, fluency and interaction, group work, dialogues and role…

Instructional materials for telephone usage instruction address both personal and job-related telephone use needs. Six units are included on these topics: (1) telephone buttons and sounds, telephone book use, American names, telephone numbers, and taking messages; (2) greetings, information seeking, and carrying on a dialogue; (3) taking a message…