Total Physical Response (TPR) is a teaching approach developed by Dr. James Asher (British Council). ProLiteracy explains that "students are not required to speak. The tutor models the commands and continually repeats and reviews them until the students can carry out the commands with no difficulty. Students are more likely to be and feel successful when the tutor provides constant support and modelling and eliminates the pressure on students to speak the new words" (P. 1). TPR is a teaching technique that is most impactful during the early years of a student's education or with students new to English instruction.
The ProLiteracy Information Centre has a more extensive explanation of how to use TPR. You can use TPR before or during a lesson to teach basic commands such as stand up or sit down. The teacher says the word and then gestures to the student to action it out. There is also a video on The Teacher Toolkit of a bilingual teacher, Michael Rowland, using TPR with his third grade students. You can use the 502 words that can be learned by TPR as a way to select the words.
