Teacher Training Department

CELTA - Day 16
Date 24__/8__/_2015_

LANGUAGE RELATED SKILLS ASSIGNMENT

Name:_____Vladislav Miransky
Due:_24/8/2015
In this assignment you will be exploring the area of:
- teaching skills through the use of authentic materials
The purpose of this assignment is:
To encourage trainees to evaluate materials from a teaching and learning
perspective
To encourage trainees to select and evaluate appropriate authentic materials
to supplement a coursebook and to design a skills lesson
Assessment criteria (from Cambridge ESOL Syllabus)

Successful candidates can demonstrate their learning by:

Correctly using terminology that relates to language skills and sub-skills;

Relating task design to language skills development;
Finding, selecting and referencing information from one or more sources
using written language that is clear, accurate and appropriate to the task
+-800 words.

Each assignment may

be submitted twice
PASS
1.
RESUBMIT

COMMENTS

PASS on
2. Resubmission
FAIL

FIRST MARKER

SECOND MARKER

Context

You are going to design a lesson based on an authentic text for use with the level you
are teaching at the moment.

ASSIGNMENT
1) Select an authentic text which you think will interest the students in the level
youve selected - this can be a brochure, text from the internet, etc.
2) Complete a lesson plan to describe how you would explore the text with the
group your 40 minute lesson must develop one of the following receptive
skills: reading/listening and either speaking or writing. You will need to
attach the lesson plan and the materials to this assignment.
3) This is a skills assignment so the only language work you should include in
the plan/lesson is pre-teaching vocabulary.
4) Before you teach the lesson, complete the Commentary section to provide a
clear rationale for choosing this text to use with these students. In addition,
use the Rationale column to briefly outline why each stage is relevant. Make
reference to reading youve done in this area.
5) After you have taught the lesson, go back to the assignment and add
comments on each stage: How did it go? What would you change (if
anything), if you were to teach the lesson again?
6) Please give details (author, title, publisher, year) of at least one source (book,
article) that you have used for this assignment, e.g. Learning Teaching . You
must provide quotes to support your discussion of each stage.
Title: Learning Teaching The Essential Guide to English Language
Teaching 3rd Edition
Author: James Scrivner
Publisher: Macmillan Books for Teachers
Year: 2011

When you quote authors, remember to identify the page, e.g. Reading for gist is
blah, blah, blah (Scrivener, 1983: 53)

Level: Upper Intermediate

Source of authentic materials:
http:tribecafilm.com
Commentary (150 words)
a) Learners in this particular group are quite sophisticated. I thought that the
topic of foreign film festivals would interest them for many reasons. Firstly,
Sophia has expressed an interest in documentary film in previous lessons.
When I did a lesson about TV programs, many of the students related their
knowledge of film. The lesson before included a live listening about a Russian
film called The Russian Ark, which also generated a lot of interest. I have
also talked to some of the students individually and they told me that they
often watch subtitled movies so I deduced that they are interested in films
from other countries
b) Students had to do a matching exercise for pre-teaching lexis, which would
engage their deduction abilities. I noticed other teachers doing matching
exercises and the students, I think, really enjoyed them and liked the sense of
communal participation as well as using their deductive skills from context.
The second task required that the students read the text and answer
comprehension questions associated with the reading for detail stage. I
reasoned that the students liked a challenge. I have noticed that in many of
the classes, some students seemed a bit bored because the material didnt
challenge them enough. Of course, there are various levels of proficiency in
this class, but I thought I would write questions that were two-fold. The first
question would be found literally in the text and the next question would call
fro some kind of inference on the part of the student. I thought that this would
spur on a lot of conversation between the students and that stronger students
may see this as an opportunity to show how much they know and help the
weaker students.
c) I have to admit that I did have certain students in mind specifically. Sophia
seemed to fit my profile of someone who might go to a film festival. She
seems very cultured. Of course Carlos, I felt might have a strong interest in
foreign films and festivals. Antonio, from previous lessons seemed to display a
rather thorough knowledge of film. As I said previously, when I spoke about a
Russian independent film, I got a strong reaction from almost all the students.
Teresa and Fatima, in particular, surprised me with their enthusiasm for the
subject. I also felt that Ricardo might have an interest in foreign films as he
has told me that he has traveled quite a bit. Eduarda, I wasnt sure about
because she was probably the least enthusiastic in the group from the
previous lesson.

Lead-in
(Create
Interest)

a) As Jim Scrivener mentions in

what he call the pretext stage, the
purpose of the lead in is to get the
learners interested in the topic.
(Scrivener, p. 267 Learning
Teaching) and to make an explicit
link between the topic of the text
and students own lives and
experiences. I wholeheartedly
agree. Without this crucial link there
is no meaning for the students and
no development of the lesson plan.
The lesson plans effectiveness is
contingent upon catching the
students from the beginning of the
lesson. If the teacher is able to
effectively inspire interest in the
very opening of the lesson, chances
are that the students will be willing
to trust the teacher the rest of the
way through the lesson
b) I chose this particular staging
because I felt that the students
responded best to a modeling
approach. One in which I give
personalized information about
myself and then ask them to do the
same. I felt that since this was a
receptive skills lesson, that having
the students think about their own
personal links to the material would
make the transition to the next
stage a logical one.

a) It seems to me that this stage

was fairly successful. I could
have been more thorough
with my instruction though.
Students were a little
confused about what they
were to discuss in the closed
pair feedback. Rather than
giving concrete questions, I
kind of, left the subject open
with my tone. I think I also
mentioned too many things to
talk about. I asked them to
discuss whether or not they
have ever been to a film
festival, which movies they
had seen at the festival,
which international festivals
have they heard about and if
they knew the names of any
Portuguese film festivals.
That is quite a lot to
remember. Had I put the
questions on the board or
written them even, perhaps
they wouldnt have felt a bit
overwhelmed. I also didnt
pay enough attention to the
order of the questions and
kind of threw them out there
hoping that they would
answer a couple of them at
least.
b) I think I would have definitely
focused on one question as
the main question: which film
festivals have they heard
about? I think this would have
generated much more
participation since almost
everyone has heard of
Cannes or the Academy
awards. Then I could have
posed the second question:
which films have received
awards that they know of?
Have they seen any of them?
I could have left the Portugal
question for open feedback if the

topic remained interesting to the

students.

Lead-in
(Prediction)

a) As Scrivener points out, in the

second phase of the pre-text stage,
the first task, which he calls prereading (Scrivener, Learning
Teaching) the essential element is
to have students come up with their
own questions. In other words to
have students guess about the
material and make predictions
about it. The next stage in the
receptive skills procedure is to
actually focus on the text. The
efficacy of each stage really
depends on the previous stage.
Students, as Scrivener states,
focus on fast reading for gist
(skimming, eg check text against
predictions made beforehand.
(Scrivener, Learning Teaching) My
aim was exactly that. To first have
the students think about the topic,
then try to make a prediction based
on photos from the scenes of the
movie.
b) I chose this particular staging
because I felt that the students
responded best to a modeling
approach. One in which I give
personalized information about
myself and then ask them to do the
same. I felt that since this was a
receptive skills lesson, that having
the students think about their own
personal links to the material would
make the transition to the next
stage a logical one. As Scrivener
points out, in the second phase of
the pre-text stage, the first task,
which he calls pre-reading
(Scrivener, Learning Teaching) the
essential element is to have
students come up with their own
questions. In other words to have
students guess about the material
and make predictions about it. The
next stage in the receptive skills
procedure is to actually focus on
the text. The efficacy of each stage
really depends on the previous
stage. Students, as Scrivener
states, focus on fast reading for
gist (skimming, eg check text
against predictions made
beforehand. (Scrivener, Learning
Teaching) My aim was exactly that.
To first have the students think
about the topic, then try to make a

a) I think this stage was fairly

successful. However, it took
way to long. I got
sidetracked. What happened
was, I realized that I forgot to
put the titles on the w/b and I
guess the apprehension of
making a mistake made me
focus on the titles of the films
when there was no need. In
fact, the titles were there
only for identifying the film
and matching it to the text. I
lost a lot of time on the titles.
Actually, the stage was going
well before that. The sts
were engaged and
accurately deducing the
genre the films were
associated with. That was
the only aim of this stage: to
predict the content of the
film, which they did
remarkably well. In fact,
Antonio with some eliciting
was able to predict the
content of the movie with
surprisingly very little
information.
b) Firstly, I think if I were to do it
differently I would have had
all of my materials ready to
go on the wall with blue tack.
When there is a hiccup for
whatever reason (nerves,
tiredness or getting
sidetracked) it could really
derail you. When your
materials are well prepared
and in place well before the
class starts, it gives you a
greater peace of mind.
Secondly, when something
unexpected happens during
a class, I do have a
tendency to kind of just try to
keep things going rather
than gathering myself and
moving on. Perhaps thats
why I began to veer off into
the eliciting about the titles.
And lastly, I need to refer
more to my lesson plan and
have a very clear and legible
lesson plan to refer to.
Because my lesson plan was
not well organized, it wasnt
easy to recover and find my

prediction based on photos from the

scenes of the movie.

Pre-teaching a) if unfamiliar words

Lexis
impede the students
ability to read the text,
otherwise known as blocks,
then sts will be unable to
achieve the aim set forth in
the reading for gist task. In
fact, these blocks if not
resolved before the initial
reading for gist task, could
render the receptive lesson
moot. A receptive skills
lesson, by virtue of its
design, relies on the reader
not getting stuck on
individual words and seeing
the text as a whole (see
reading for gist stage). I
would apply this passage by
Scrivener to illustrate, Many
learners approach reading texts
expecting to read them thoroughly
and to stop only when hey have
understood every word. Clearly,
there is value in this as a way of
improving their vocabulary and
their understanding of grammar,
but, as with listening, this kind of
approach does not necessarily
make them into better readers,
because this plodding, word-by
word approach is not the way that
we most often do our reading in
real life (Scrivener, p. 264 2011) I
think what Scrivener is referring to
is that there is an inherent
contradiction in a foreign learners
process of reading. On the one
hand, he believes that it is more
beneficial for readers to skim the
text first but there arises a
problem. There is vocabulary that
can diminish understanding of the
text, which is the aim of the
reading task. Therefore, as a
subsidiary aim, it is important to
resolve those blocks beforehand

direction back to my main

aims. Subsequently, I lost a
good 10 minutes, which then
resulted in rushing the
students through the last
reading stage and was
unable to do a follow up.

a) Actually, I think this stage

was the strongest of the
stages. The materials were
well organized and the
instructions clear. Sts were
able to accomplish the task
and when one st was
unable to find the
appropriate match of
definition to word, other
students readily came to
their aid.
b) I dont know if I would have
done this much differently. I
believe that a matching task
was an effective means of
quickly resolving blocks in
vocabulary

so comprehension of the text, as a

whole, can take place.
b) I chose this particular staging
because I agree with Scriver in
that its important to identify
possible blocks in the text that can
impede the learners
comprehension. I assessed the
level of the sts and tried to
appropriately select possible
trouble areas in vocabulary that
were essential and perhaps, not
apt to be deduced from the
context in the text.

Reading for
Gist

a) I think this stage is of utmost

importance because it is essential
that readers get the main idea of a
text before delving into the details.
They can read something and
perhaps understand each Word
but not get the main idea. This
would defeat the purpose of the
task. The task is meant to be a
get the student to comprehend the
text as a whole. After the student
is able to comprehend the content
do details become important. The
details are meaningless as long
as the student doesnt have a
general understanding of the text.
As Scrivener points out In order
to make students better readers,
we need first of all to raise their
awareness that its not always
essential to understand every
word, and that practicing some
different reading techniques in
English may be very useful to
them. And if their basic strategy is
to ready slowly and ponderously,
then a good first strategy could be
to help them learn to read fast; not
worrying about understanding
every word; not, perhaps, even
understanding most words, but
still achieving a specific and useful
goal.
b) I chose this particular staging
because I felt that it kept with the
continuity of the stages. Students
appreciate when there are logical

a) Students read the texts

enthusiastically and seem
to understand the task.
However, there were two
essential flaws. Again
preparation of materials
was inadequate. The texts
were on separate pieces of
paper. This was an
oversight. They could have
easily been on one hand
out. Instead, students were
confused and had to
constantly switch from one
handout to another. Not
only did they lose valuable
time but the continuity of the
task was somewhat lost.
Since they were referring to
photos from the films all in
one place, it stands to
reason that the movie
synopses should have been
organized in the same
fashion.
b) I think that was again, had I
to do it all over, I would
definitely go through all my
materials before class. It
wasnt very well thought
out. The materials were
good but sometimes there
is a tendency to think if your
materials are ready to go
then that is all there is to it.
The materials definitely
need to be tested and set
up way before class. Had I

links between stages and feel safe

when guided toward the aim. In
this case a prediction task had
already been set up and they had
one aim: to match the text to the
picture that they predicted. In
other words to compare their
predictions to actuality. In doing
the task, as a byproduct, they
would understand the main idea
through both the text and the
pictures. That foundation would
help them delve deeper into the
text in the next stage.

Reading for
Detail

a) Once the necessary

foundation has been
set in place (reading
for gist) and sts are
able to comprehend
the main idea of the
text and are not
impeded by
vocabulary. They can
delve further into the
text. It is at this stage
where it becomes
necessary to read
more slowly rather than
skim for information.
This stage develops
the students ability to
read intensively as
Scrivener puts it.
Scrivener goes on to
say, There is certainly
a place for intensive
reading in class,
helping students to
uncover and accurately
understand details in a
text (scrivener, p.264,
2011). He also
mentions that a
competent language
user might read an
instruction manual for a
piece of flat-pack
furniture or a leaflet
with guidelines on
whether they have to
pay income tax or not.
I definitely agree, these
are invaluable skills to
have and complement
those of being able to

gone through a test run

beforehand, I think I would
have realized that all the
texts could have been on
one page and that it would
have been a much more
logical link to the previous
stage.

a) Had students not been

rushed through the task,
I think that it would have
been successful.
Students were engaged
in the task and the
stages logically flowed
one into another. They
understood the task and
didnt seem to have a
problem with it. The only
problem is that there
was no feedback
because I ran out of
time. I could not make
up for the time lost in
the previous stage of
matching their
predictions.
b) I think the task was
appropriate and the link
to this stage fit very well
within the receptive
skills model.
Unfortunately, faulty
preparation in one stage
carried over into this
stage. If I had it do all
over again, I would pay
very close attention to
the ending time of each
stage. That is what I
plan to do in my next
lesson. I have written in
my lesson plan the
estimated maximum
time for each stage and
the ending time. So
when I finish my
monitoring, I plan to look
at the clock and glance

read quickly for the

main idea. They go
hand in hand in fact.
b) I chose to write
comprehension
questions at this stage
that were both easy to
answer yet had a
challenging
component.

Follow Up

a) According to Scrivner, the

follow up activity is the closing, it
draw[s] the lesson to a
conclusion, tie[s] up loose ends,
review[s] what has been studied
and what has been learned. To
me the follow up does exactly that
it gives closure to what has been
opened in the first stages. It gives
students a sense of completion
and a sense of accomplishment.
b) For the follow up activity I
chose a task in which the sts
would try to persuade each other
to go to a film of their choosing. I
think it would have perfectly tied
up the theme of film festivals.

at my lesson plan to see

if I meeting time
requirements. I learned
my lesson with time.
Sometimes its very
hard to resist veering off
track but its not worth it
because it catches up to
you at a later stage.

a) Sadly, I didnt make it to

the follow up stage. As
mentioned earlier, I was
halted at the prediction
stage.
b) Again to reiterate. As my
tutor once wrote in my
lesson feedback. The
problem is not
necessarily execution
but in planning. Had I
had the materials
worked through and
prepared, I may have
been able to get to this
stage. If I were to do it
differently, I would
definitely keep in mind,
arriving earlier going
through all the materials
as well as making it a
point to get to this stage.
Although it is not a main
aim, I think that it gives
both the teacher and
student a sense of real
satisfaction and closure.