DIY activities

Earlier I didn’t know this word and wasn’t aware of what it meant till two years ago. I often met this word in some educational journals and on YouTube channel, but I did not pay attention to this abbreviation. But one my colleague said that she had been using DIY activities for three years at her English lessons. I was explained that this abbreviation meant “DO IT YOURSELF”, and DIY activities were such activities when students do some activities by themselves in the classroom. Because of DIY activities we can observe students eager participations at works, also by using these activities you can turn your lesson into funny and interesting process.

Two years ago, I began to use DIY activities at my English lessons very actively and successfully I can say. By that period of time I was teaching at primary school, students of this age are too active and it is difficult to keep them concentrated at the lesson theme, also teacher should remember that students of primary school are open to new knowledges and grasp what teacher said quickly. That’s why I recommend teachers time after time, during each lesson to use one or two, but no more, DIY activities. For example, the theme of lesson is to teach them to write accurately and without mistakes. You can just give them instructions to write the words on their copy-book, but it can be boring. Here, you can use DIY activity “Sight Word Practice”, students should write new words on the plate with kitchen salt! It is very funny and great process, that my students asked me to use it always during the lessons.

The one more DIY activity, which I use very frequently is “Part of speech Grammar Game”. This is another idea to try if you want your classroom activities become more exciting. First of all, teacher should prepare a lot of sticks of eye-creams or just buy it from special shops. Divide them to “Nouns”, “Verbs” and “Adjectives”, and write on them relevant words. Then teacher should have three mugs. At each mug you ought to write “Noun”, “Verb” and “Adjective”. And put into them corresponding sticks. Ask your students come up to you and choose three sticks, after they should make up full sentences with the help of these words. You can play this in two parts.

There are a plenty of DIY activities, and teachers choose them according to the interests and ages of their students. DIY activities are very cool for teaching English!

Akku Mursalimova

Nur-Sultan, 37 school-lyceum

English teacher