Teenagers and discussions

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nouamaneer

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Jan 1, 2011
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Hello,

I really find it difficult to choose a topic of interest to my teenage students. They are a lot difficult to please, if not impossible and when I throw the ball in their field top pick a topic, they just mirror it.

I wanna know if there are topics that proved to be highly motivating to teenage students discussion?

Thanks,
 

emsr2d2

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Hello,

I really find it difficult to choose a topic of interest to my teenage students. They are [STRIKE]a lot[/STRIKE] very difficult, if not impossible, to please, [STRIKE]if not impossible,[/STRIKE] and when I throw the ball in their field top pick a topic, they just mirror it (I don't know what you mean by "mirroring a ball you threw in their field).

I [STRIKE]wanna[/STRIKE] want to know if there are topics that [STRIKE]proved[/STRIKE] teachers have found to be highly motivating to teenage students' discussions?

Thanks.

Teenagers are notoriously difficult to please generally!! It really depends on their personalities. If they're very trendy kids, then you should be on fairly safe ground with fashion, music, films etc. If they're very serious and studious, then politics might be the way to go. Are they interested in the planet and the environment? Have you tried listening in on the conversations they have as a group when they don't know you're listening? That should give you an idea what they talk about in their free time.

Failing that, just write topics on pieces of paper, put them in a bag and get them to pull the bits of paper out and discuss. As soon as it's clear that they're bored or they really have nothing to say, fine, it's time for the next piece of paper.

I found with a 14 year old student that getting him to use his imagination always helped. I asked him, for example "If you could have any superpower in the world, what would it be, and why?" and "Imagine that you are any character from history or fiction and as that character, you are president of the world! What changes would you make?"

As an aside, as this forum is read by students and teachers alike, it's important that the teachers stick with correct written English at all times so that students don't pick up bad habits. That's why I made some corrections in red to your post. We discourage any kind of textspeak so please try to avoid "wanna", "gonna" etc. Thanks.
 

billod

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Nov 3, 2011
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Whatever the topic you got, If your students have a passion about english , it will be fine, There is not intersting topic since they have to learn it! , it will be better to remind sudents the reason why they want to learn. And i know you already know it:-(
But it's true, if they feel your course as a 'duty', It can't be fun (of course, some of them will enjoy it!)
 

catalian

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Nov 7, 2011
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English
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UK
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Spain
I know exactly what you mean. But let's not forget what the objective of class discussion is. Our aim is to help our students practise their English in "real" situations, we are not trying to save the world, solve the world's economic crisis or design a better education system.
I am fortunate in that I have small groups (4-8) students and I know them quite well. Something that often works well is role-playing because it allows them to be someone else and the comments are not necessarily their own but those of their "character" in the role play. This gives them an opportunity to participate without exposing their own identity to us the teachers. Quite often my students are happy to be their father, grandmother, school teacher, shop keeper, president or even another person in the class.
 
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