Roleplay in teaching - advantages - disadvantages

Roleplay in teaching

Advantages – disadvantages

How to angle it in a way that embraces all levels

To which extent does the pupil benefit from this type of activity and to which extent is this controlled by the pupil’s knowledge?


INTRODUCTION

In this assignment I will discuss if role-play, as an activity in an English class of ten year old learners, is a good tool for all levels, or something only the high or medium levelled students will benefit from. First I will give an explanation to what role-play is and what it can be used for, followed by a short overview of the school and the class, in which I am the contact teacher. Thirdly, I will present the paragraphs from the The Norwegian Knowledge Promotion Reform in English for class 5-7 and the aims for fifth graders in English at Tomter School, fall 2012, which is incorporated in the learning strategy I chose to use, before, under and after the practice period. Fourthly, the teaching plan will be presented. Fifthly, give my evaluation of the students and their development. This will be tailed by a discussion, where I will enlighten the value of role-play in this class, and finally, in my conclusion, sum up and give an answer to whether this kind of action is suitable and educational for fifth graders.

ROLEPLAY

Roleplay can be an imitation of reality that is taken from any part of society, in which each participant is given a role to play. Students or others, who have chosen this type of activity to interact, are given some information associated to the description of the role: fears, intentions, accountabilities, sentiments, etc. Then they get a general description of the situation, and the problem/task that each one of them faces, is given. For instance, everyday situations teaching languages, handling conflicts, training for a job interview and so on. The participants are told or given their role descriptions and then play out their roles interacting with one another (forskning.no).

It can also be a game where one is given a part/role to act out and a leader who gives the plot. The first known role players, where those who played miniature games using tin soldiers, creating large historic battles from war history, like the ones Napoleon and Caesar fought (forskning.no). Today it can be used in any part of society and be about whatever one wants. An example is “On the run”, a role-play about refugees and their encounters with soldiers, guards at the border, police and bureaucrats. The Youth Organization of the Red Cross is organizing this, aiming young people all over Norway and Denmark. Their goal is to prevent racism through increasing the awareness of what refugees go through. It was created by a Danish teacher, Steen Cnops Rasmussen. “On the run” has been used for over ten years in Norway and over twenty thousand has participated (local.rodekors.no).

TOMTER SKOLE

The school in Tomter is one of three elementary schools in the municipality Hobøl. Tomter is a small village near the border of Akershus County.

The school is a first to seventh grade school with approximately one hundred and seventy students and 29 employees. It was modernized in 2004, and is seen as a modern school, where most classrooms have Smart boards and Whiteboards. In addition, one finds a small library, a computer room and a class set of laptops in the building.

The school’s value platform is to be learning, to be inclusive and future-oriented. This is not something that is just said or written down, but is followed up every day, all year around.

Their service declaration is targeting students and parents/guardians: An active learner, where arrangements are made to ensure that all students experience coping. Professional skills, knowledge, social skills and attitudes will always be in focus. (hobol.kommune.no).

FIFTH GRADE

The practice period over six weeks, was spent in this class. Fifth grade consists of twenty three learners. The students can be divided into smaller groups after their skills. Six student are very strong, ten are medium skilled, four are weak; two students have recently moved to Norway. The remaining student has an individual plan and is followed by an assistant most of the time.


THE NORWEGIAN KNOWLEDGE PROMOTION REFORM IN ENGLISH FOR

CLASSES 5-7 AND THE AIMS FOR FIFTH GRADE AT TOMTER SCHOOL, FALL 2012

In the paragraphs below one will find the knowledge goals this teaching program encompasses (PEDLEX Norsk Skoleinformasjon 2012 - Kunnskapsløftet).

Language learning

 Identify and use different verbal, everyday situations to extend one’s own knowledge of English

 Give examples of dissimilar ways to learn English words and expressions

 Use digital and other tools in one’s own language learning

 Identify some linguistic similarities and differences between English and the native language

 Use basic concepts og grammar and text structuring

 Describe one’s own efforts learning English

Communications

 To master a vocabulary that covers everyday situations

 Use basic rules and patterns for pronunciation, intonation, spelling, grammar and various sentence types

 To express oneself in a way that one can get help to understand and be understood

 Participate in conversations related to everyday situations

 Use polite expressions and situation related expressions adapted to different contexts

 Use listening, speaking, reading and writing strategies appropriate to the purpose

 Give a brief oral and written presentation of a topic

 Write texts that narrate, describe or convey messages

 Be able to express oneself about the currency, weights and measures

Culture, society and literature

 Compare living and social norms in different cultures in English-speaking countries and in Norway

 To be able to tell something about some persons, places and events in English-speaking countries

 Be able to express one’s own reaction to films, photos and music

The aims in English at Tomter school for September, October, November and December

The school uses Stairs textbook and workbook.

All about me (chapter one)

 Get to know Stairs – speak

 Talk about yourself – write

 Descriptions, questions – read and listen

 Poems – dialogue

 Stories about families – grammar

 Question words


Hobbies (chapter two)

Speak

 Retell stories

   Write

 Mind map, key words, diagram

Read and listen

 Photo album and a football story

Grammar

 What do you like doing

 Can you? Can/can’t


THE TEACHING PLAN

This teaching plan was chosen because it was supposed to embrace all levels, where each student experienced mastery. Another reason to why a role-play was selected is the fact that it can be applied all through the year and emphasizes on different areas of society, mentioned in the book, English Teaching Strategies (Drew and Sørheim, 2011 p. 56-59). The focus is on that they should be able to speak and use the language in an English-speaking country. Stairs textbook is followed, and role-play is used to practice what they have learned.

The role-playing game takes place in an English shopping street consisting of a grocery store, a clothes store, a kiosk, a bookstore and a pet shop. In addition one can also find a ticket office, a pharmacy, a bank and a medical office. Who is trading and who is shopping changes each time they play. The rule is that those who are selling/offering their services do not speak any other language than English. To be able to shop one must use English. No other instructions were given in advance and it was not designed special role characters for the game.

The class has English on Monday (45 min.), Tuesday (60 min. x 2, for a short period) and Friday (45 min). On Monday the goals for the week are reviewed. The students explain what they think the goals are and the teacher explains further, if necessary. The pages from Stairs textbook are read and new words are practiced. They either read out loud in class, in groups or pairs. Vocabulary, grammar and punctuation are a natural continuation of this, and finally, at the end of the session, the hour is summarized: What have we learned? The pupils give the answers.

On Tuesday, in the first session, the homework is revised. Then the students work with new verbs for the week. Subsequently, they practice them together with question words, courtesy phrases, etc. used in the role-playing game. If time, words and phrases from previous weeks are run-through.

In the second session the role-play take place. The sellers, pharmacist and doctor are chosen. It is important that they use whole sentences and not only single words. The teacher walks around making sure that they are using English and that they use what they practiced earlier.

On Friday, the week is summarized, where the students can come with feedback and ideas for the role-play. Here they can make suggestions for improvements and other things they think belong in an English shopping street. In addition, the focus in this session is on English query and courtesy phrases, vocabulary and grammar.

As mentioned earlier, Stairs 5 textbook, chapters one and two is the source for the shopping street. These two chapters and part of chapter three is what they are meant to have worked with from September and throughout the year. Here one must add that the vocabulary used in, for example, a grocery store or a bookstore are words the children are supposed to know from earlier on. Never the less, this is repeated so everyone has the opportunity to be an active part in the role-play the class plays every week.

This is a nice and fun way to practice English, and it results in that students feel much safer when they use the language in an English-speaking country or in studies later on in life. The activity can easily be transferred to, a place where they must ask for directions to the train station, a bus stop, a church, the town hall, the airport, etc., to buy tickets to a flight with a destination in England, Canada, Australia og the U.S.A and so on. It can also be used in other areas of society, such as applying for a job, sending a letter or package.

Another way to use this is to pretend being on a bus, the task might be practicing adjectives, where one student is the bus driver and the others are travelers. Everyone can play different types of persons: one is very positive; another is extremely negative, a third is angry or maybe wants to argue over the price of the ticket and so forth (look at the picture to the left). That said, one’s imagination is the only limit to what this type of activity can be used for.

In the beginning one must be careful when one corrects the students. As long as they speak English, in full sentences and get what they ask for, no corrections should be made. Eventually, when they feel safer, the teacher can start correcting pronunciation and word phrases etc. The important thing here is to get them to speak English independently.

Additional exercises that the class started in connection with role-playing games, was singing English songs and rehearse English rhymes. This is an excellent way to practice intonation, pronunciation and rhythm. If the material is unknown, the teacher goes through it in forehand, but many times they already know the songs. The texts are found on bbc.uk (bbc.uk) and one also finds links to YouTube, where the songs and rhymes are presented. On the same site there are many tasks for students at any age, which is both fun and educational (BBC.uk).

Assessment

On Friday, every week, the class has a test, where all subjects are represented. In the English section, as in all other subjects, the emphasis is on the weekly goals. Previous goals from earlier weeks might also be included, at least in the language subjects. The tests are corrected and commented by the teacher and sent home for the signature of the parent or guardian.

After each chapter in Stairs textbook, a larger test is given to the children and also other types of assessments is used to find out what they have achieved. The teacher also has a conversation with each student, where accomplishments are praised and problem areas are discussed.

What can go wrong?

No matter what kind of system one has and no matter how good it is, there will always be something that does not go quite as it should. One has to be guarding, especially the role-play, like a hawk, so things do not slip out. In an activity of this size, where the whole class is participating, it can end in a mess and nonsense if one does not have a good structure, where everyone knows what to do/be.

At this school there is a system for structuring the class, called Tomter standard, a log form of conduct and order. If someone does not follow the standard, it will be commented and written down. After each week the log is sent home for signing.

EVALUATION

The strong students in this class perform well in all subjects. In august, English was their weakest subject, but this is about to change. Weekly tests focusing on goals and chapter tests are showing improvement.

The medium strong students are those who have one maybe two subjects they perform very well in and at least one where the performance is lower. Usually it concerns Mathematic or English. These students are improving too, but at a slower speed. As far as one can judge, this has to do with gaps in their knowledge from earlier on. As a result, new goals are much harder achieved. If they do not comprehend everything that is said and done in class, it may cause a less positive experience in the subject. The times where they are reminded about tests all week (the weekly tests are on Fridays), they perform better. However, there are still major variables from one test to another.

The foreign students started at a Norwegian school in august and are still struggling with the language. They have a school day where most of the focus is on Norwegian and Mathematic, but they still participate as much as they can in other subjects. They are weak in English, but have improved their skills during the months passed.

The weak students lack most of the “foundation” in English. Two of them are slowly improving, not because of role-play, but for the reason that they have been given different kind of tasks that focuses on the problem areas. The other two misses almost everything concerning English. Here one has to start learning the language all over again. The weekly tests show that these two students have learned very little. Other types of tasks are given to

The last student, who has an assistant with her most of the time, knows very little English. She does not have this subject included in her school day, but she enjoys being a participant in the role-play. She uses the few English words she knows and gets what she is asking for. As long as she enjoys the activity she will be a part of this.

DISCUSSION

One should think that with all lessons and practices towards role-play gaming, everyone would befit from it, but the evaluation and tests proved otherwise. What could have been done differently to include the weaker students? All the pupils loved playing it, or, at least, that is the information given. It is a fact that role-plays is a popular and good way to practice, for example, languages, or is it? What are the advantages and disadvantages?

To take the last question first: What are the advantages?

In the book by Drew and Sørheim (2011), referred to earlier in this paper, the advantages are many:

• More confidence when one speaks English

• An enjoyable and active way to learn

• Communication skills

• Interpersonal skills

• Grammar skills

• Developing a word bank

What are the disadvantages especially for a weak student?

• One does not understand everything the other students are saying which creates a very stressful situation

• If someone is shy or is scared of being embarrassed, one will frequently try to avoid speaking out loud

• The focus will be on what one does not know and then, not be very receptive to learning

• If this situation is allowed to continue each week, where one rarely experience mastery, the student will almost definitely develop a dislike for the subject

How can one angle it in a way that embraces all levels? To which extent does a pupil benefit from this type of activity and to which extent is this controlled by the pupil’s knowledge?

As stated in Gunn Imsens book, Lærerens verden (2010, 10.3 p. 306), is the principle of individualized teaching a part of the Norwegian curriculum, but this principle is perhaps an ideal target, where all instruction should be adapted to the individual student. In the real world this would possibly not be doable. However, it could be done if the class was divided into groups after which level they belonged to. Imsen has called it differentiation measures. She further explains that this means differential treatment of the individuals, but in a positive sense. However, it is not possible to practice this in the activity used in class. It would be very difficult to control a classroom with several role-plays going on at the same time. One way of doing it would be to let one group play while the other students watched and let the audience review what they had seen. Done this way, both the watching students and the performing students would learn from it.

Another way of interacting in a role-play is using role cards. The difference between the role-play activity mentioned in the book by Drew and Sørheim (2011) and the role-playing game that was used in class, was that their role characters were more set, meaning that their characters knew more what to do in the game in terms of a clearer definition of what each individual should do and what mood the person would have. In the class activity they only knew it was about an English shopping street and that someone should sell products or offer their services, while the others were to buy goods and services.

When teaching such young students there had probably been an advantage that they were given a role character, where the teacher had listed suggestions of what they could say and do, and that they were able to practice a little before the event started. Yes, they had practiced and rehearsed a lot in advance, but when being so young, it is more difficult to find something to say when they are in the middle of the game. It is possible that even the weaker students would have benefitted more if it had been done in this manner.

In this class there are 5 foreign students, two Indian, one Bosnian and two Icelandic. Unlike the Norwegian students, these five have problems understanding some concepts. They read well, but slower than their classmates and do they always understand everything they read? Most likely not. They are learning English, but all translation is in Norwegian and Norwegian phrases and concepts are used. One must be aware of this problem and explain further where necessary.

In the book, Den felleskulturelle skolen, by An-Magritt Hauge (2009), chapters six and seven: Internasjonalisering av opplæringen and Det flerkulturelle perspektivet i fagene (pages 158-219), it is emphasized the importance for foreign students of being included in the community and also get identity verification, while the ethnic students experience a perspective extension.

One of the questions which have been made visible by UDI in the multicultural pedagogy is: “Are pupils from ethnic minority backgrounds included in teaching and in the school subjects “we”? (UDI, 2003: 51). All students should be able to recognize and identify with the content of their school. Therefore it is important to be conscious of these students, their origin and include something familiar to them in the teaching plan, that is, to have a more international flavoured teaching.

When working in a multicultural school one must have a diverse perspective and through this, one can develop students’ ability to reciprocity, that is, to be able to put themselves in the situation of others, and to have empathy and compassion. Then ethnocentrism from the majority group of students would possibly be avoided, meaning that they would not have themselves, their culture and people in the centre (Hauge, 2009, p. 158, 159 og 184).

In the activity which was used in class (the English shopping street), one could perhaps have included an Indian store, where the items might have been Indian food, spices etc. A Bosnian fast food place or restaurant, that served Bosnian specialities and an Icelandic store, where they sold Icelandic quality products like knitted garments or a travel agent who had specialized in trips to Iceland with hot springs, fishing, horseback riding on Icelandic horses, hiking and biking through the country. By using this, the foreign students would have felt more mastery and possibly also learned the ethnic students something about their countries.



Also interesting, one finds that the book, The Practice of English Language Teaching, chapter five: Describing learners, by Jeremy Harmer (2012, page 81- 83) clarifies the importance of selecting the right tools for the right age, when practising English. Dealing with fifth graders, the best tool, as stated by Harmer, is playing different types of games/activities. They are easily bored, meaning that, no matter what game they play or activity they are doing, it needs a time frame of less than 15 minutes. Harmer also emphasizes the need for several activities to be able to vary.

On page 83, in the same book (Harmer 2012), one also finds a description of the environment young children should have, to respond well when in a learning situation. The writer is describing a bright classroom with windows, enough space to move around and, maybe the most important, it should be joyful and feel safe. This, he says, is the best platform for young children to acquire what is expected of them.

The classroom of the fifth graders has most of this present, regarding brightness, windows and space. However, they also need a safe learning environment, and the children are not always nice to one another. Here it has become a negative culture, with exaggerations and outright lies towards one another. Repeatedly, this has been raised in class by both the main teacher and the principal. To eliminate this kind of behaviour one has to use an inflexible plan and structure of the school day. This contributes to a smaller range of games and activities, which can be played out.

Does this exclude role-play activities? Not necessarily, nonetheless, the kind of role-play a teacher chose must be controllable, in the sense that the children cannot act freely in, for example, an English shopping street, but be relegated to playing characters determined by the teacher. Role-play cards, as mentioned earlier, is then a good option. It will undoubtedly be quite time consuming making the first time, on the other hand, once this is done, the cards can be reused.

This will also rule out too many errors when speaking English. In Lightbown and Spadas book, How Languages are learned (2012, p. 190-193), it is identified that children participating in a free intermingling game, reproduce other children’s mistakes, when the other children are higher leveled, and that teachers perhaps should rephrase student errors instead of simply correcting. The latter may result in a refusal from the student in attending another game, because of the embarrassment of being corrected while classmates listen. It also has the benefit of not disturbing the communication in the classroom.


CONCLUSION

To conclude from the above is quite simple. The mistakes that were made when the role-play, an English shopping street was acted out in class, is evident. Here the teacher should have controlled the activity more and created the role cards. In this way, the game would have been more disciplined and many errors not occurred, both in terms of pronunciation and improper use of words or grammatical time. The weaker students may have learned much more than they did, if the activity had been organized in this manner. The foreign students should also been more involved in the activity, perhaps, as suggested earlier in this paper, by using shops or travel agencies that sold items or trips to the country they originally came from.

Regardless of age, race, culture or origin, to be able to master something is of great importance. A teacher can be the one who contributes to the joy of mastering, if the right tools and methods are used. Mistakes might happen, but they can be corrected. Being a teacher does not exempt one from making mistakes and sometimes an apology is needed. To treat others with the same respect one wish to be treated oneself is a guideline when one has to do with people. It does not matter whether it is children or adults. They all have the same right to be treated in a friendly and courteous manner.





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