Three ways to use pictures in class
занимательные факты на тему

Pictures give students information which does not require translation. Pictures can avoid long explanations in words which students would not understand.

But pictures can also communicate incomplete information and so they also leave space for the students' imagination and creativity.

Collect full length pictures of people from a clothes catalogue. Cut off the heads and mount them on small cards. Cut off the feet (and shoes) and do the same. Give a collection of cards to a group of students. Ask them to try to match the heads and feet. Ask them to try to explain the matches they have made.


He's wearing a rain hat so I think he's wearing rain shoes.
She's wearing diamond earrings so I think she's wearing smart shoes.

Choose a picture of a person (man or woman) going to work. After discussing the picture, encourage the class to give a name to the individual. Write the name on the board and make further notes of answers to the following questions. Is he or she married? Has he or she got any children? How many? What did he or she have for breakfast? Where is he or she going? What is he or she going to do?

Gradually build up a story about the person in the picture. Let the class tell the story, sentence by sentence. Make sure all the students participate. Regularly return to the beginning of the story asking new students to retell the story.

Eventually you will have a story, created by the class, which all the students will be able to tell.