How to Teach 'Going'To'

Once you start teaching, choosing a suitable approach is one of the challenges you will certainly face. I have been teaching for two years now and I have tried out many different strategies for teaching 'going to'. I would like to share my view of how 'going to' can be taught.

I tried this activity out a week ago with a group of eleven-year-olds, and they liked it. My goal was to engage them as much as I could, and, guiding them through the activity, teach them 'going to' for plans and intentions.

Activity goals: presenting 'going to' (the focus is on the affirmative form, along with the use of this grammar item) , revising days of the week

Timing: app. 20 munutes

Material: board, chalk , possibly a picture of a boy

Age: 11

Procedure:

The teacher draws a figure of a boy on the board, or shows a picture of one (it can be a stick man) and gives him a name (John, for example) . The teacher then introduces John to the class: "This is my friend John. He is a pupil, he is eleven years old and he has got a week off. John is very happy and has made some plans for the following week." The teacher writes the following construction on the board:

John's plan:

- I am going to play in the park next week.

- I am going to visit my grandmother next week.

The teacher now elicits more possibilities for the plan and the students are encouraged to use the new construction for completing John's plan. After adding five or six more sentences to the list, the students are asked to do a follow-up exercise.

The exercise: The students have to write seven sentences, including seven days of the week, and plan John's week off. The teacher writes a sentence on the board and provides an example.

On Monday, John is going to play in the garden.

Each student should now write his/her own list of the things John is going to do. Constant repetition of the 'going to' form, as well as repeating that all these things are parts of a plan should make the students aware both of the form and use of this grammar item.

Finally, the teacher nominates several students to read what they have written, thus correcting possible mistakes.

As for the interrogative and negative form, my original intention was to introduce them during the same lesson, but then I realized that it was too much for them. This activity proved to be just enough. After this, we moved to another activity, and continued with 'going to' the next time we met.

This activity was a success in the classroom I tried it out in. I hope that it will also be a success for many other teachers who can build it up and modify it for their classroom needs. :)