Thread: Interview a Farang

This is a suggestion of an activity for your class.
I have 14 mathayom classes, Mat 3 and 4. They are broken into their groups based on their test scores and such, thus my 301 and 401 classes are generally willing to be challenged more than the 06 and 07s. Someone suggested that I get some of the students to go out and record an interview with a farang somewhere in town. We are 3 hours north of Chiang Mai but there is a small flow of farang into town. I decided to ask my 301 and 2 and 401 and 2s to try this. I gave them very basic instruction. Form teams, write a list of questions and find someone to interview. For the most part, I got what I expected, poor sound, and nervous students. What surprised me was how some of the teams approached the project. They came back with subtitles, background music, other titles, special effects and sound effects. Frankly many were marvelous and I even gave a few Oscar type awards.
If you are looking for projects, I highly recommend this. It has been so popular, my 403 class started making videos and I never even assigned it to them.
I kept the instructions as simple as possible to give them the opportunity to use their heads and show their creativity. I was not disappointed.

This is the classic Thai English teacher assignment. But yeah it works. I liked to brings my friends to class on a rainy day and have the Ss prepared to ask questions.

I figured it must be as I was interviewed by a student in Laos a few weeks ago for the same purpose. It was new to me as this whole teaching thing is new.

The streets are always full of Thai school kids wanting to do their questionnaire. Too bad the querys are so dumb .. do you like Thai food? Why did you come to Thailand. I know I know the questions are thought up by the Ss and that's lovely. But the kids would get more out of the exchange if the respondent was somewhat interested in answering. And since the tourist, or whomever, gets asked everyday he's probably bored with it.

They should ask that which is sorta taboo in Thailand, your family, your education, your job details. Farang have no problem with this. It'd be good the kids know that.

I had no idea what my kids were capable of so I kept the instructions as simple as possible. Though interviews may be common down in Metropolis, Smallville here hadn't done them before, at least not in recent history. The purpose of the assignment was to give them a reason to speak English to someone other than their teacher. I gave them minimal instruction (due date, assigned teams, each team member must ask at least one question, have a plan and a script, interview must be recorded in video (they didn't know what Record meant but did understand Video)) This allowed them to be either simple or creative, depending on what they had in mind. Some had fun with it and others did only because I told them to. As far as I can tell, the students are not given many challenges in their daily school lives and I thought this was a safe way to let them express themselves a bit. Outside school, unless you are working for Mickey D's or KFC, most jobs give you minimal instruction and you are judged by how well you do the basics and how much you are willing to go beyond. Those that go beyond get promoted.

Another way to approach it is to bring the foreigners to your school. Many volunteer organisation exists, we have 4 just in Nongkhai. If you approach them they will often have native speakers who will come for a day, a week etc. I have had more than 20 volunteers this term from Spain, America, China all who come and give the students a chance to practise speaking.