Interactive techniques of teaching english in secondary schools. Table of Contents Introduction

Symbol Shadows

1. Write the quotation by Rabrindinath Tagore “What you are you do not see, what you see is your shadow.” on the board. Discuss it briefly with your students. Then draw a symbolic representation of your own ‘shadow’ on the board - various symbols that in some way represent you and things/people that are important to you. When you have drawn your shadow explain the symbols to your students.

2. Ask them to draw their own shadows. When they have done that, if you have a small class, ask them one by one to explain their shadow to everyone else. If your class has more than around a dozen students, divide the class into groups of between six and a dozen to do the cams. If you remain in whole-class formation, make sure the explanations are directed towards everyone in the class, not just you. If you have groups, monitor them discreetly, again making sure the explanations are directed towards their colleagues rather than you.

3. As a follow-up task, either in class or for homework, ask your students to write up the explanation of their symbols.

Here is an example of shadows done by a student with her own explanation of the symbols:

It is a sort of box because I’m very closed in myself, and with a locker because I do not let everybody in. In it there is a book, a radio/tape recorder and a TV, it is mainly what I spend my days doing when I am not at school or studying. There are also faces of boys and girls: these are my friends, and they are in a little box apart because I do not reveal myself to them, I do not have as many close friends as I would like.

Beatriz