Guided Discovery Worksheet

(TESOL Ideas--Clarification Stage,  Any Grammar Point)

Sample: drive, docs, pub

Before I begin, a quick point of clarification.  This post is about a guided discovery worksheet, and not a guided discovery lesson.

In my experience, I've heard the term "guided discovery" used in two ways in TESOL staffrooms.  One use of "guided discovery" is to refer to any sort of inductive language lesson.  And in many of my past posts on this blog, I've used that meaning--see HERE, HERE, HERE, HERE and HERE.

However, there's another meaning of "guided discovery" which is more specific.  This second meaning refers to giving students a worksheet during the clarification stage of the grammar lesson instead of doing a teacher-fronted clarification.  This blog post is about the second meaning.

With a guided discovery worksheet, the grammar is put into context for the students as usual using some sort of model text.  The students process the model text as usual (gist question, specific information question).  And then, once the students have processed the model text for meaning, a sentence (or sentences) containing the target language point is highlighted.

At this point, we go into the clarification stage.  Butt instead of a teacher-led clarification, the students are given a worksheet with guiding questions on the worksheet.  The students work through the worksheet by themselves or in pairs while the teacher monitors.  Then, after the worksheet has been completed, the teacher confirms the answers in all class feedback.

An example of a guided discovery worksheet I created is here.  

(I had previously posted this worksheet here.  It is meant as a follow up to the dictogloss posted here.)

On the google drive file, the first sheet is the dictogloss that the teacher does to provide the model text.  But then the second and third sheet are what is given to the students.

As discussed in a previous post, the clarification stage should cover meaning, form and pronunciation, and so these can all be put on the guided discovery worksheet.  

In my guided discovery worksheet, Exercises A,B,C and D cover meaning.  Exercise E covers form.  And Exercise F covers pronunciation.  

However... take note that my sample worksheet is probably not ideal.  I was recently talking to an experienced CELTA instructor, and he gave me some advice on guided discovery worksheets.

First of all, guided discovery worksheets should only be one sheet of paper--single side.  If students have to the backside of the paper, the guided discovery is too long.

Secondly, although meaning, form and pronunciation should all be covered, there should be only one exercise each.  (In my guided discovery worksheet, I had four activities covering meaning, but this is too many.)

And speaking of this CELTA trainer, here is some other tidbits I got from him:

* It's often good to have the students do the guided discovery in pairs, so that they can help teach each other.  (For controlled practice activities, we like to have the students try to do the activities individually, and then check their answers with a partner afterwards.  But the guided discovery isn't considered a practice activity, it's still part of the teaching phase, so it's good to have students learning collaboratively.)

* The teacher should closely monitor the students during the guided discovery worksheet.  If the students are struggling with the guided discovery worksheet, then the worksheet should be abandoned, and the clarification stage can go back to a teacher-centered clarification.  But this does not mean that the teacher needs to plan two clarification stages.  The prompts that are used for the guided discovery worksheet can still be used in a teacher centered clarification stage.

* It is possible to do pronunciation on a guided discovery worksheet--things like phonetic script or word stress can be expressed in written form.  But pronunciation can never be completely taught by a worksheet.  It always has to be supplemented by oral drilling after the worksheet has been completed.

It is also possible to leave pronunciation off of the guided discovery worksheet entirely, and just do pronunciation only by drilling.

I think that's everything I have to say about guided discovery worksheets.  I've linked to the Google Drive version of my worksheet above, but I'll also copy and paste it below.  Although please note that some of the formatting will be a little off, and  the timelines don't copy and paste.

Worksheet: past perfect

A. Yesterday morning, my alarm went off at 6 AM, and I woke up.  I got out of bed and drank the coffee that I had made the night before. 

1) When did I get out of bed?

2) When did I drink the coffee?

3) When did I make the coffee?

4) Put these events in the order they happened in time:

____ got out of bed

____ drank the coffee

____ had made (the coffee)

B. Choose the correct timeline for this sentence:  I got out of bed and drank the coffee that I had made the night before

1)2)

3)4)

C. “had made coffee” is in the past perfect tense.  Choose the correct rule for the past perfect?

1. The past perfect is used to show that something happened a long time ago.

2. The past perfect is used  to show that something happened before now.

3. The past perfect is used to show that something happened before the time in the past that is being talked about.

4. The past perfect is used to show that something happened after the past simple.

D.   Look at the three sentences.  When should you not use the past perfect?  1 and 3 are incorrect.  2 and 4 are correct.  

1. Yesterday morning, my alarm had gone off at 6 AM, and I woke up. (incorrect)

2. Yesterday morning, my alarm went off at 6 AM, and I woke up. (correct)

3.  I had gotten out of bed and drank the coffee that I had made the night before. (incorrect)

4. Yesterday morning, my alarm went off at 6 AM, and I woke up. (correct)

Circle the correct answer:

You should not use the past perfect when:

1. The order of the verbs and the order of the time is the same

2. The order of the verbs and the order of the time is different

E. Look at table showing past perfect verbs from the story.  Write the form above the column:

had	made
’d	bought
’d	washed
had	written
had	started

F. In the sentence, “that I had made the night before”, what is the correct pronunciation of “had”?

1). /hæd/

2). /həd/