Needs Analysis & Brainstorming Phrases

Needs analysis and phrases for group brainstorming review

Interview your partner and make notes in the gaps provided (for your teacher to read when they collect the completed forms). Please ask full questions and ask about as much detail as possible, but only write brief notes (not full sentences). To provide equal practice for each of you, each person should ask two questions before switching roles (e.g. the last question that their partner asked, then one new one).

Information

Name of interviewee

Education/ Studies (English and other things – present, past and future)

Work (present, past and future)

Hobbies/ Interests (academic and non-academic)

Ideas/ Opinions

At least three topics that you might be interested in giving your final presentation on (a five to seven minute joint presentation connected to current affairs – meaning news – or academic topics, in front of this group of people)

The best ways of preparing to give a presentation (= the stages of preparing and practising before giving a presentation)

The best ways to improve your English outside the classroom, especially for academic presentations and discussions (extra practice, self-study, access to good models, etc)

Brainstorm ideas for the last three boxes above, doing the first as a class and then the others in pairs.

Work together to brainstorm answers to one of the questions above, with the aim of coming up with between two and four good ideas, with a few examples of and/ or arguments for each thing.

 

Stage 1 – Asking for ideas (when brainstorming together) 

Write down any ideas you can think of as a list or mind map, organising as you go along but not editing your ideas at this stage. 

Useful phrases for asking for ideas when brainstorming “Can we write anything else here/ in this category?” “Any more ideas?”/ “I think we need three or four more.”l  “Let’s just get all our ideas down and discuss them later.”l  “That’s probably not true, but let’s write it down for now anyway.”

 

Stage 2 – Organising the ideas/ Putting the ideas into order/ Putting the ideas into categories

Try to group your ideas together, adding any more that come up as you are doing so. 

Useful phrases for grouping ideas “I think these two are linked (to each other) by…” “We can put these together because…” “These are similar in terms of…” “There is a connection between these two in that…” “Maybe we should move this one over here” “What category can we put these in?”/ “What other things fit into this category?” “I think these two are related.” “These are both/ all kinds of…” “Another example of that is…”

 

Stage 3 – Editing down the ideas/ Choosing the best ideas/ Getting rid of weak ideas

Circle the best ideas and cross off the worst ones (individual ideas or whole categories), trying to get down to between two and four categories with between two and four examples of each. 

Useful phrases for editing down your ideasl  “This one is probably best because…” “I’d choose this one because…” “This one doesn’t seem to link to any of the others.” “This one isn’t very convincing.” “This one doesn’t fit in with any of the others.” “These two are too similar.” “I think this is true, but I can’t explain why.” “Can I cross this one off?”/ “We can cross off this one because…” “I think we can eliminate this one because…” “This one doesn’t make sense.” “This one is a bit weak.”

 

Stage 4 – Adding support for your ideas

Add details to each of the things that you have chosen, changing your mind about what you will include if there are ideas which you can’t come up with enough good support for. 

Useful phrases for adding support to your ideasl  “A good example of this is…” “The best argument for this is…” “The proof for this is…” “If they are not convinced, we can say that…” “We can support this one by saying…” “Someone once said…”l  “There’s a proverb which goes…” “In my experience,…” “I have found that…”

 

Stage 5 – Anticipating the other side’s counterarguments

How could someone argue against your ideas and how could you counter that? Brainstorm ideas to improve on your mind map above.

Useful phrases for anticipating counterargumentsl  “If they say…, we can argue that…”/ “They might say…, but we can argue that…” “If they point out that…, the best counterargument is…” “If they notice the weakness in this argument, we can say…” “If I was them, I’d say…”

Change pairs and try to persuade your new partner(s) that your ideas would be better than their ideas.

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Without looking back at the previous page, brainstorm at least three phrases to do each of these things. Phrases which weren’t on the previous page which also have the same function are good too.

Stage 1 – Asking for ideas (when brainstorming together)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stage 2 – Organising the ideas/ Putting the ideas into order/ Putting the ideas into categories

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stage 3 – Editing down the ideas/ Choosing the best ideas/ Getting rid of weak ideas

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stage 4 – Adding support for your ideas

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stage 5 – Anticipating the other side’s counterarguments

 

 

 

 

 

Use these keywords to help with the previous task.

Stage 1 – Asking for ideas (when brainstorming together)

else

morelateranyway

Stage 2 – Organising the ideas/ Putting them into order/ categories

linkedtogethersimilarconnectionmovecategoryrelatedkindsanother

Stage 3 – Editing down the ideas/ Choosing the best ideas/ Getting rid of weak ideas

best

choose

link

convincing

fit

too

explain

cross

eliminate

sense

weak

Stage 4 – Adding support for your ideas

example

argument

proof

convinced

supportonceproverb

experience

found

Stage 5 – Anticipating the other side’s counterarguments

argue

counterargument

weakness

I’d

Check your answers with the first brainstorming worksheet, then test each other in pairs:

• Read out a phrase with the word in bold missing then give hints until they guess.
• Read out just the key word and help your partner make the phrase.
• Read out just the category and help them come up with at least three suitable phrases.