Interactive methods

The fact that the English language is a language of the international comunication is  undisputed. It has become a necessity for each educated person. The language of the Internet, tourism, computer games, chats, music has become a vital part of our learners' life. And this fact produces special demands to the teacher of a foreign language. Perhaps for this reason, he should not only know the subject absolutely, but also live the life of his students.

The modern school faces the annoying fact: in the conditions of traditional forms and methods of training schoolchildren only receive the information passively, and they are not able to get it independently and to apply their knowledge. At the present stage our school often comes on a position of extreme, destructive individualism, forming the schoolleavers who are not ready to life, and especially to fruitful work in a team where he should live and work. Pupils are not capable to co-operate, as they can’t do it and they can’t do it because they have not been taught. It should be admitted here that any teacher cannot operate with corresponding knowledge to facilitate training and to improve level of  the competence of pupils without having passed school of modern teachers preliminary. And nowadays pedagogical stuff is working on approbation of interactive methods in educational institutions both in Ukraine and abroad. Today such kind of training is called learner-centered. It is concentrated on the person’s self-evaluation, his spirituality and independence. It aims to form a man as a unique person, as a self-creator  and the creator of the circumstances. Social cultural dialogue should be defining basis of its understanding, acceptance and recognition for learner-centered training in system "teacher-child". Interactive methods of training are actively developed recently and they assist it actively. They can be useful and perspective for the teacher and for pupils thanks to independent activity and group interaction which were put into their essence.

The purpose of my pedagogical activity is to create a situation of success for development of the creative personality of a child, to give possibility to each pupil to feel pleasure of achievement, help the child to grow up in conditions of success which is accompanied by feeling of satisfaction from activity therefore it is a feeling of competence. And if we want to involve a person into the educational process and reach greatest pupil’s interest in training, we are obliged to help him to see the importance of himself and motives of his own activity. In my opinion introduction of interactive methods of training in practice is the guarantee of efficiency of educational activity on which development of born inclinations of pupils depends.

What are the advantages of interactive methods? First of all it is the increasing productivity of process of mastering the information. According to the American scientists’ researches learners get only 5 % of information during the lecture, while reading they get 10 %, working with video / audiomaterials they get 20 %, during demonstration - 30 %, during discussion - 50 %, during practice - 75 % and when the pupil learns others or applies his skills and  knowledge at once he can get about 90 % of information. As we can see, passive methods of training (when learners only assimilates and recreates the information) have the lowest efficiency than active and interactive.

During interactive training the learner becomes not an object but a  subject of training, he feels himself an active participant of events and he forms and develops himself (it is especially important for senior pupils). It provides learners with internal motivation of training which assists its efficiency and interest in the course of training increases. Interactive methods of training is a part of learner-centered training. They contribute into socialisation of the person, his or her self-evaluation as a part of a team, his social role and potential. Interactive methods of training have made a number of interesting ruleswhich were unfamiliar to schoolchildren before and I try to make them obligatory for each lesson. For example: each thought is important; be not afraid to express; all of us are partners; we discuss what has been told but not a person; consider, formulate, state; speak accurately, clearly, beautifully; listen, express and listen; substantiate only well-founded proofs; be able to agree and disagree; each role is important.

"Easy" in form, interactive training is extremely difficult for the teacher, after all to achieve discipline and attention for the account "sit still!" is impossible. Besides, in the work I plan introduction of these methods carefully, I try to do it gradually. It is better to prepare some interactive detailed lessons a month, than often spend hastily prepared "games". My rule is also that all pupils should be involved into work in this or that measure. Really, competent pupils, and also pupils with high contact  level will show the higher activity, than closed and incompetent ones. Nevertheless it is necessary to do their advance payments to work constantly, create situations of success. It is necessary to supervise process, achievement of objects in view constantly and in case of failure look through strategy and work tactics, search and correct lacks.

In practice I use such methods of interactive training (which can be divided into two big groups: group and face-to-face ones. The first group provides interaction of participants in small groups (in practice from 2 to 6 persons), the second one - the general work and mutual learning of all class):.

Work in pairs. Pupils work in pairs, carrying out a problem. Pair work demands exchange of opinions and allows to do quickly exercises which are time consuming or impossible in usual conditions (to discuss events, piece of art, general information, summarise a lesson, event, etc., interview the partner). After that one of the partners reports before a class on results.

Work in threesome. Actually it is the complicated work in pairs. It is better to spend a discussion, exchange opinions, summarise or allocate different thoughts using this method. Changeable threesomes. This method a little more difficult: all threesomes of a class receive the same  problem, and after discussion all the members of groups change acquaint members of other groups with their thoughts and ideas.

2+2=4. Two pairs separately work over exercise throughout certain time (2-3 minutes), it is necessary reach the common decision, then they unite and share the ideas. As well as in pairs, it is necessary to find consensus. After that it is possible either unite the four at the eight, or to pass to group discussion.

Work in small groups. The most essential here is a cast: "speaker" - a head of a group (watches the discussion, speaks about the problem , defines the lecturer, does advance payments for group to work), "secretary" (conducts records of results of work, helps at summarising and their exclamation), "intermediary" (watches time, does advance payments for group to work), "lecturer" (accurately comes up with idea of group, reports on results of group work). It is possible to allocate the  expert group of stronger pupils. They work independently, and review and supplement the information at the announcement of results.

Aquarium. In this method one microgroup works separately, in the class centre, states result after discussion, and members of other groups listen, without interfering. After that groups of an external circle discuss performance of a group and their own achievements.

They were examples of group methods of work.

Face-to-face methods:

The big circle. Pupils sit in a circle and pass their opinion on a certain question one by one. Discussion lasts, while there are students who wish to express. The teacher can say some words after discussion.

Microphone. It is a version of the big circle. Pupils quickly say their opinion on a problem one by one transferring each other mental "microphone".

Not finished sentences. It’s a complicated variant of the big circle: an  answer of a pupil is a continuation of not finished sentence of type "it is possible to draw such a conclusion...", "I have understood that..."

Brain storm. It is a well-known technique, the point of which consists in a rule that all pupils state everything, even illogical thoughts concerning a problem one by one. All stated is not to be criticised and it is not discussed to the termination of statements.

The analysis of a dilemma (problem). Pupils in a circle discuss a certain dilemma (it’s easier) or a problem (it is more difficult, as it is multivariate). Everyone tells variants which are made owing to a choice. It is better to give a problem of a choice with personal sense (for example, "Is it necessary to pay taxes if the government is not able to distribute them correctly?").

Mosaic. It is a method which unites both group, and face-to-face work. Small groups work over different problems then are reformed so that in each neogenic group there were experts from each aspect of a problem.

 Interactive technologies are not a final goal. It is necessary to supervise process, achievement of objects in view constantly (they should be formulated accurately and supervised easily), in case of failure it is necessary to look through strategy and work tactics in order to search and correct mistakes. It is necessary to unite mutual learning with other methods of work - the independent search, traditional methods.

There is a number of typical problems which the most part of pupils faces while introducting interactive methods. The main problem I can define is that the pupil often have no their own thought and if they do they are afraid to state it openly, to all the class. The pupils explain it in such a way: "We are seldom asked for our own thought", "Is my thought valuable?", "What if it does not coincide with a mind of the teacher or collective?", "It contradicts the thought of the pupil which has authority on this subject in the class " etc.

Schoolchildren are often not able to listen to others, estimate their thoughts and decisions objectively. The pupil are not ready to change their opinions in the course of discussion and make a compromise. It is difficult for pupils to be mobile, to change conditions and work methods. Quite often there are difficulties in small groups well: leaders try to "pull" group, and bad students become passive at once. Under condition of skilful introduction interactive methods of training allow to make all pupils of a class to work, interact with a team, make them habitual to carry out a discussion of the offered themes, assist manufacturing of socially important habits of work in collective.

I can assert that pupils will get the habit of discussion only under condition of introduction of interactive methods of training; they will develop their ability to accept the common decisions; improve their ability to communicate, report; the level of pupils’ perception of a foreign language will qualitatively change - it will get personal sense, instead of "learn, "remember" the matter will be  to"consider”, "apply".

In my opinion, the teacher of a foreign language should try to make the lesson interesting, emotional, but in the same time as effective as possible. The success depends on many factors - from the teacher’s level of possession of a foreign language, his/her general erudition, ability to understand the pupils and communicate with them correctly, and also from personal qualities of the teacher. I.e. it is necessary to be the creative and interesting person and then pupils will try to resemble the teacher, imitate him and study a subject with the increased interest. For this reason it is necessary for teachers to search for new forms and work methods, ways and tutorials.

Considering the increasing development of IT, I consider it is necessary to embody new information technology, to meet modern requirements. Binary lessons of English language and computer science can become an example of using such technologies; other school disciplines can also be united into one lesson with English by means of computers.

As for the projects, this  technique has recently been more and more widespread in teaching of English language. An overall objective of this technique is attraction of children to research activity. The method of projects allows to use and  develop various creative abilities of pupils. Pupils start carrying out projects with great satisfaction from the very beginning, but at this stage their knowledge is not yet enough to present the project, therefore the method of projects starts to work most successfully at the level of the sixth and seventh grades as then pupils have already sufficient level of language competence and habits and abilities which are necessary to perform this form of work. Working out and presenting projects is very popular among pupils of the senior classes.

Lessons - discussions, lessons - conferences, lessons - seminars are very popular among pupils of 8th-11th forms. The preparation technique to such to lessons is, certainly, very different. So, discussions can be spent absolutely without any preparation, arise spontaneously, while lesson - seminar or lesson - conference demands long and hard work on a subject. But all these lessons have very powerful result not only in language studying, but also in educational work. It becomes especially appreciable, when such important for young people topics, as generation gap, relationships with friends; favourite styles of music, youth movements, problems of AIDS etc are paid attention to. I consider it is necessary to spend a so-called method of brainstorming during carrying out such lessons when pupils are given the description of a problem or phenomenon and they have to make a decision in  a short period of time. This Method is used successfully while carrying out the corresponding lessons in the 10th and 11^th forms.

And I am sure that there is no best technique for development of pupils’ creative abilities than role-playing games. Throughout lessons, especially on initial grade level, it is hard to overestimate a role of any game. It can be not only a role play, but also business or sports game. Children can be anybody in their dreams, anywhere and whenever. It is only necessary for them not to be disturbed. In most cases they become authors of ideas and co-authors actually to the text which is used during the lesson. Schoolchildren in primary school like to imagine themselves as heroes of fairy tales or cartoon films. During such lessons there is a possibility for them to act as their favourite characters. They go on a trip which can sometimes be dangerous, sometimes cheerful, but always - interesting and informative. Other, more "serious" roles are offered to pupils of secondary school. They can imagine themselves journalists, tourists who visit other country, pupils of the British schools, etc.

As it is very important nowadays to develop pupils’ ability to learn independently it is necessary to allow them to find more possibilities to get  necessary information, using their own sources: the Internet, libraries, articles from encyclopedias etc. Writing of reports on different subjects becomes the invariable assistant at presenting of the given problem. They can be issued in different ways, but one requirement is constant - the abstract should contain the checked up, true information which is issued correctly from the point of view of grammar, spelling and punctuation.

All in all, using interactive methods of training makes it impossible to stand on a  position "I’m a teacher (that means I am more important), and you are pupils (that means you are less important)". Division into castes remained in the past, and today we are led by mutual learning - teachers and students.

Interaction in training is easy to explain with such a  verbal construction  deduced by experience of teachers and psychologists still in antique times:

What I hear, I forget;
 What I see and  hear, - I remember a little;
 What I hear,  see and  discuss, - I begin to understand;
 When I hear,  see,  discuss and do - I get habits;
 When I transfer knowledge to another - I become a master.