The activities employed in this teaching approach have two features: 1) students need to attend to meaning in order to answer the question correctly; and 2) there is only one correct answer. The activities can be organized in various forms:

Example 1:

Use the given verbs to fill in the blanks with correct verb forms.

In order to complete this activity, students have to comprehend the meaning of both the verbs and the texts, especially temporal adverbials (e.g. “yesterday”, “last night”).

Example 2:

Read the schedule that shows what John did last week. Please answer the questions:

What did John do last Friday?

Did John clean the house last Wednesday?

Students have to understand the meaning of questions and stimulus (schedule in this example), and their answers must correspond to the information given in the schedule. So, there is only one correct answer and the answer is already known to students as long as they refer to the schedule. In addition to schedule, a story, a particular situation, a planner can be used as stimulus as well.

Benati, A. G., & Lee, J. F. (2008). Grammar Acquisition and Processing Instruction: Secondary and Cumulative Effects (p. 100). Bristol; Buffalo: Multilingual Matters.

Brandl, K. (2008). Communicative Language Teaching in Action: Putting Principles to Work (pp. 185-186). N.J.: Pearson Prentice Hall.