1. Reading words

The teacher has based this presentation on the students' own choice of vocabulary, derived from their own 'inner worlds'. She is thus tapping not only intellectual but also personal emotional associations with the vocabulary; such associations, it has been shown by research, have a clear positive effect on retention, as well as on immediate attention, general motivation, and - her main objective - ability to read the material.

Certainly the use of items suggested by the learners themselves can contribute to the effectiveness of any kind of presentation; however, this idea may be more difficult to implement in large classes, or where classroom relationships are more formal.

2. Learning a dialogue

The aim of this presentation is to get students to learn the dialogue by heart for further practice. The writer describes a systematic procedure involving initial clear presentation of the target text by the teacher, followed by varied and numerous repetitions. The resulting preliminary rote learning of the words of the dialogue would probably be satisfactory. But nothing is done to make sure the dialogue is meaningful and interesting to the students. As it stands, the method of teaching does not provide for cognitive or affective 'depth': it fails to engage the students' intellectual or emotional faculties in any way. It is important to emphasize learners' understanding of the meaning of the dialogue from the beginning, not just their learning by heart of the words, and to find ways of stimulating their interest in it, through the content of the text itself, the teacher's presentation of it, visual illustration, or various other means.

3. Accusations

The first two examples were accounts of systematic presentations of planned material. This, in contrast, describes an activity improvised by a resourceful teacher with a sense of humour and a friendly relationship with the class, who exploits a specific real-time event to teach a language function (accusation, reproach), with its typical grammar and intonation patterns.

The presentation seems likely to produce good perception and initial learning: not because of any carefully planned process, but because of the heightened attention and motivation caused by the humour (rooted in the temporary legitimizing of normally 'taboo' verbal aggression) and by the fact that many of the actual texts are personally relevant to the learners (compare with Presentation 1 above).

4. Dramatic soliloquy

This classroom event is recalled from the point of view of the student, and it was obviously successful in attracting the students' attention, getting them to perceive the material and imprinting it very quickly on their short-term (indeed, long-term!) memory - all these, probably, being part of the teacher's objectives. As to understanding: if the class was native English-speaking then one would assume that the teacher's acting and use of props was probably sufficient to cover this aspect also; foreign language learners would presumably need a little more clarification.

Not everyone, it must be said, has the dramatic ability of the teacher described; the applicability of this example for many of us may be limited! However, if you can act, or have video material available, dramatic presentations can be very effective.

Guidelines on giving effective explanations and instructions