Info-Gap: Must-Have Tool for the Proficiency Based Classroom
To get students speaking more in class with a purpose, info-gap activities are an easy tool. Info-gap activities require students to communicate with each other to solve a problem or complete a task. In these activities, students must collaborate to give and receive all of the information needed to achieve the activity’s goal. No one student has all the required inofrmation, hence the “gap” that can only be overcome by speaking with other students. These activities create a purpose, a scaffolded structure, authentic feeling scenarios, and leave students feeling accomplished after completing a communicative task. There are many reasons to use info-gap activities in the proficiency based classroom. Here are a few:
1. It's student centered- These activities allow students to talk talk talk for more extended periods of time. They also allow students to pretend to be someone else, while they are role playing, which may prompt them to use vocabulary they wouldn't normally use.
2. It's scaffolded- Instead of just asking students to talk about a topic open-ended, these tasks have students work within a structure, with a model, and so they help students step-up to a level of performance they might not achieve on their own.
3. There is an objective- Students are often given a scenario and task in an info-gap activity, and this make students feel like they are speaking and working with a purpose.
4. There are many right answers- Unlike some activities where there is one right answer, info-gap activities often offer students the opportunity to complete the task in more than one day, naturally differentiating for different skill levels.
There are more benefits to info-gap activities, these are just a few. Check out some examples of info gap activities here
