Filed under: Reading | Tags: English With Jennifer, giving directions, Jennifer Lebedev, JenniferESL, life skills, map reading, practical skills
As follow-up to my previous entry, I’d like to offer one more activity to teach real life skills to ESL students: map reading.
Level: Low Intermediate
STEP 1 – Get copies of real street maps for your city or town. The number of maps will dictate how many small groups there will be. Pass out the maps, one to each group.
STEP 2 – Give them a starting point and name a destination, for example, from the school to city hall. Use exact addresses if possible. Students must plot a course, writing down the directions as if they were driving.
STEP 3 – Compare their directions to directions provided from an online source such as Google Maps or MapQuest.com. Ideally, the students should access these sites themselves and make the comparison. Another possibility is for you to print out copies ahead of time and pass them out at this point.
Have them repeat this exercise for a number of destinations as time allows.
