The development of international relations in recent years has increased the demand for the lawyers who can work in international spheres with good level of acquisition of English. Therefore, great importance is payed to the process of teaching legal English in other words, the ways of interaction between the teacher and the students [1].
There are certain difficulties in the process of working with legal terminology in terms of organization. Sometimes lesson may seem to be boring for students, and as a result, incomprehensible. The task of the teacher in this stage is to make legal terms understandable for students and to make the lessons more informative and interesting. Different kinds of warmers, activities and games can help students to enhance new vocabulary and simplify the process of explanation for teachers.
Activities have a great educational value and can be used in the classroom to make learners use the language instead of just thinking about learning the correct forms. They usually encourage learners to cooperate, interact, to be creative and spontaneous in using the language in a meaningful way. Learners want to take part in activities; to play games and are generally quite competitive. In order for them to take part they must be able to understand and communicate in the target language. They also encourage learners to keep interested in the work and a teacher can use them to create contexts in which the language is useful. When studying legal terminology, teacher can use game elements, and it will be encouraging the interests of students to participate in these games. The game does not have to cover the whole time of the lesson or a significant part of it.
Great productivity may be achieved when different mini-games associated with the implementation of individual entertaining tasks are used. An example of such games could be a competition to solve a crossword puzzle made up of legal terms. Crossword is a very effective means of learning terminology. A more difficult task is to create crossword puzzles. Compiling a crossword puzzle can be recommended as a homework for students, followed by a check-decision in class. When using this technique, students are given a «How to make a crossword» memo. In a game form, you can implement this method of training as a legal dictation. To do this, it is enough to use mutual verification and introduce elements of competition, evaluating the inspectors. After completing the assignment, you can ask the students to check the workbooks from each other. The student, checking the work, will be actively involved in the process of repeating the material studied and systematizes his own knowledge. The application of legal dictation helps in the assimilation of the classification of concepts or phenomena on specific grounds, gives the opportunity to induce children to the activity in learning. Educational (didactic) games are based on some abstract rules. In lessons dedicated to law, you can use games of various forms and themes: the intellectual game-quiz «Forms of the state», the business game «Participants of the criminal process», etc. When such games are used correctly it will lead to the increase the efficiency of the assimilation of legal information, contribute to the development of cognitive processes. Business game with the simulation of the legal situation.
Practice shows that the complexity of learning games is largely due to the ease with which the teacher and students can carry out outside of the game (competition, travel, imitation of business forms of speech and behavior) to the detriment of the content of educational material. So that during the game the content does not change, the teacher is required to prepare well for her and prepare students for non-standard individual and collective work, for work in small groups. Games contribute to the emergence of new skills and abilities and allow you to apply the problem to yourself, to understand it in general. Students are introduced to common human values, teaching behavioral patterns inherent in the rule of law. The external form of the problem under consideration is simulated: roles, vocabulary of a professional nature, mandatory attributes. After conducting games, students will better understand how civil society functions. Knowledge in the field of law is necessary for students as the main form of behavior in different life situations that have legal meaning, and therefore, it is necessary to use teaching methods, which are guidelines for the application of legal knowledge in real life.
The educational game, created on the basis of assigning participants to certain social roles, is called role-playing. A role-playing model can design pupils in certain roles as players; schoolchildren — the «participants» of the events, for the role-playing game «become other people», making attempts to present all their emotions, experiences, feelings. The structure of role-playing games can be constructed in different ways. In the lesson of law, it is logical to use the following scheme: problem statement, problems, questions — possible ways to solve them — offering answers — checking the correctness of the decision — using the knowledge gained. Examples of role-playing imitations: «Interrogation of victims», games «Oral statements about crimes», «Receptions to legal advice», «Concluding marriage contracts», «Hiring», etc. The use of game elements in the study of legal terms is unthinkable without visualizing the concepts being studied: writing the terms themselves, their definitions, meaningful content, examples, visual images, symbolizing this concept or illustrating its honest cases. To create a multilateral visual-figurative support for each legal term, effectively use ICT capabilities.
Teacher can also conduct a quiz and in this process he/she should divide the class into two teams, display tasks on the screen. During the lesson-quiz team show presentations prepared as homework. For greater dynamics of gaming activities, you should use interactive elements: 1) multimedia presentations; 2) flash movies; 3) computer tests; 4) exercise equipment. It follows from the above that it is necessary to use various techniques and methods, in particular, elements of various games, such as forms of education, in order to effectively acquire legal knowledge in the classroom.
Activities namely «Brainstorm round a word», «Categories», «Changing sentences», «Correcting mistakes», «Jumbled sentences», «Odd one out» can be used in explaining or reviewing the topic. Now we will analyze them how to use them during the lessons.
Brainstorm round a word. Procedure: Take a word the group has recently learnt, and ask the students to suggest all the words they associate with it. Write each suggestion on the board with a line joining it to the original word, in a circle, so that you can get a «sunray» effect. If the original word was «law», for example, you might get: criminal, civil, company, maritime, land, employment, family, immigration, intellectual property.
Categories. Procedure: Ask the students to draw two or three columns on paper, and give them a category heading for each. For example, criminal law, civil law, tort law, employment law. Then ask students to write series of words which can fit into one of the categories. For example, the headings «employment law» and «law of tort», and the items employer, employee, staff, remuneration, invoices; damage, liable, compensate, negligence, defamation may be written.
Correcting mistakes. Procedure: teacher writes a few sentences on the board that have deliberate mistakes in them. If you wish, tell the students in advance how many mistakes there are in each sentence. With their help correct them. For example, «An ownor is a person or organized that has the legal right to pocess something» (correct version «An owner is a person or organization that has the legal right to possess something»).
Odd one out. Procedure: write six words on the board from one lexical set. For example:
Balance, charges, withdraw, deposit, overdraft, sick pay
Ask students which word does not belong to the others. Challenge students to argue why this word is «odd one out».
References:
- Botalov A. V. Normative legal acts and documents as the basis of the modern legal system of Russia / Russian justice. — № 1. — 2006. P. 22.
- Tserenova O. A. Technology game forms of learning. — Access mode:: http://si-sv.com/publ/6–1-0–300
- Penny Ur, Andrew Wright. Five-minute activities. –CUP, 1992. 105 P.
