How to teach gerunds

It depends a little bit what you mean - the gerund has a lot of uses, all of which would be taught at different levels and in different ways :

• As a noun describing various activities : He teaches swimming; Today we're going to do some listening. including in compound nouns a listening lesson, a swimming pool
• As a complement of BE : The part of my job I hate most is dealing with customer complaints.
• As the subject of the sentence : Using the computer gives me headaches, Running relaxes me, Doing aerobics keeps you fit..
• After prepositions : Thank you for coming today; I look forward to seeing you again
• Used after other verbs : I try to avoid travelling in the rush hour, I don't remember asking David to the party! ) and after various expressions like It's no good ... It's not worth ... : It's no good asking John - he won't know. It's not worth going now - everything will have finished.

Each of these uses would be taught one at a time, at different levels and in different ways. What level are your students and which use(s) were you thinking of ?

Susan,
You explanations were wonderful! Thank you so much. Very clear, concise examples. I feel more certain that gerunds, although, they look like verbs to know make the agent respond to them in any manner. They are there to complement the main verbs.

Let me know if i have this right. Again, thank you!