American Language Institute

TEFL Training Certificate Program

Summer 2018

TEFL Training Program

Lesson Plan Template

Teacher/s: Izzy Vizcarra Date: 06/25/18

Class: TEFL Level : 5

Goal: Be aware of how sentence construction reveals the authors opinion in academic and non-academic
texts.

Objectives: (In a perfect world) Students Will Be Able To…

1. Discuss their opinions about the assigned reading.
2. Read the text and identify the author’s stance, as well as the intended purpose and audience of the text.
3. Differentiate between academic and non-academic texts.

Lesson Theme (e.g. U.S. holidays): FIFA World Cup 2018

Activity / Skill Procedure Interaction Pairings Time

(S-S, T-Ss, (pairs,
WC) groups of 4)

Warm Up: Ice Breaker and 1. Introduce myself, and have students T-Ss 5 mins
Lesson Objectives introduce themselves.

2. Go over lesson objectives and key

Transition to Activity #1: So vocabulary.
who can tell me what “stance”
means?

Activity 1: Short Text 1. Show sentences on projector, and WC 25 mins

Activities have students identify words that
reveal the authors stance.

2. Discuss “Audience.” Show short

passages and ask students to identify
the intended audience.

Transition to #2: Good! Now 3. Discuss “Purpose” and how it

let’s try and find all three in a relates to whether a text is academic
couple of larger texts. or not. Show short passages and ask
students to identify their purpose,
and the type of text.

Activity 2: Long Text 1. Hand students the longer, non- WC 25 mins

Activities academic passage and ask them to
read silently. After they finish,
discuss the parts from the reading
 that they found interesting.
S-S
2. Show questions about the text on the
projector. Students should answer the
Transition to Wrap-up questions individually.

3. Discuss their answers as a class. WC

4. Hand students a longer, academic

text and ask them to read silently.
After they finish, discuss the parts
from the text that they found
interesting.

5. Present them with new set of

questions, and have them answer
individually.

6. Discuss their answers as a class.

Wrap-up: Key Vocabulary 1. Key Vocab review WC 5 mins

review 2. Q&A

Materials:
- Lesson PowerPoint
- Long Text Activities handouts

Anticipated Problems & Suggested Solutions:

- Students might take less time than anticipated and will progress through the lesson quickly.

Contingency Plans (what you will do if you finish early, etc.):

- In case I finish early, I plan on having extra passages to go over, or a more fun activity.

Key Vocab:
 - Stance: The opinion put forward by the author. Aka position, point of view.
- Audience: The people who the text was written for. Pay attention to language
- Purpose: The reason the author chose to write the text. Why was the text written? Ex: to inform,
persuade, warn, entertain, advertise.
- Academic: The purpose of an academic text is to make a contribution to its respective field. Texts
written for the academic community will use technical or specialized vocabulary.
- Non-Academic: The purpose of non-academic texts can vary greatly. They can report on new
information, attempt to persuade the reader, warn, give advice, or simply entertain. Non-academic
texts are written in simple language accessible to a general audience.

Short Text Activities:

Sample Sentences to identify Stance:
- Iran played a great game against Portugal in the World Cup on Monday, scoring a fantastic
penalty kick in the final minutes of the match. Iran tied with Portugal, who was the heavy
favorite, with a score of 1-1.
- Japan has a strong soccer team, and I think they will definitely beat Poland in their upcoming
match.
- Portugal’s game against Iran was crucial for their advancement into the next round of the World
Cup. A mistake by Portugal late in the game allowed Iran to score the game tying goal in what
should have been an easy win for the Portuguese.
- While the Japanese soccer team’s offense has been incredibly successful, Poland has the
advantage on the defensive end, which will prove to be a real challenge for their opponents.

Sample Passages to identify Audience:

The following passages are by the same author, about the same experience. Which passage would the
author send to her school advisor? Which passage would she send to her friend?
- Last Saturday, I volunteered at a local hospital. The visit was fun and rewarding. I even
learned how to do CPR. Unfortunately, I think caught a cold from one of the patients. This
week, I will rest in bed and drink plenty of clear fluids. I hope I am well by next Saturday to
volunteer again.

- OMG! You won’t believe this! I was basically forced to do my community service hours at this
hospital all weekend! We learned CPR but we did it on dummies, not even real people. And
some kid sneezed on me and got me sick! I was so bored and sniffling all weekend; I hope I
don’t have to go back next week. I definitely do not want to miss the basketball tournament!

Imagine that you went to a World Cup game, and after the game you receive two emails, one from your
parents and one from your best friend. Take some time to write 3 or 4 sentences about your experience,
keeping in mind your audience.

Sample Passages for identifying Purpose:

- Javier Hernandez notched his 50th international goal in Mexico's 2-1 win over South
Korea on Saturday. With one more, he can become Mexico's all-time leading scorer in
World Cup play with five, breaking a tie with Luis Hernandez.
A: To inform audience of how many goals Hernandez has scored, and how many he
needs to break Mexico’s record.
 - Due to heightened political tensions between the UK and Russia, you should be aware of
the possibility of anti-British sentiment or harassment.
A: To warn British readers about potential dangers in Russia. This is a non-academic
source.
- When visiting Russia you should only tip in those places that have a menu, and your food
is brought by a waiter. The general amount for a tip is no more than 10% of the total bill.
A: To give advice about tipping while traveling in Russia.
- Not long ago, the volunteer movement in Russia was almost non-existent. In recent years,
however, and thanks to major international events, the country has learned the power and
value of volunteers. Visit www.welcome2018.com/volunteers to learn how you can join
the more than 17 thousand volunteers at the FIFA World Cup 2018.
A: To advertise the volunteer program for the World Cup.

Sample Passages for identifying Academic vs. Non-Academic texts:

Academic:
- Cardiovascular events occurring in patients in the greater Munich area were prospectively
assessed by emergency physicians during the World Cup. We compared those events with
events that occurred during the control period: May 1 to June 8 and July 10 to July 31,
2006, and May 1 to July 31 in 2003 and 2005. Acute cardiovascular events were assessed
in 4279 patients. On days of matches involving the German team, the incidence of
cardiac emergencies was 2.66 times that during the control period for men, and for
women, it was 1.82 times that during the control period.

Non-Academic:
- A college student, Jose Ramon Diaz has made some sacrifices to finance his first trip to
Russia, starting with leaving Mexico, where he lives with his father, to go to Los Angeles
(Diaz was born in the United States) and sleep in a homeless shelter for a month while
working two jobs to stockpile cash. In Russia, Diaz has been eating as infrequently as
possible. When he does, he aims to spend no more than 300 rubles, or about $4.75, per
meal. This has left him subsisting mostly on Subway sandwiches (“Give me the
cheapest,” was the first Russian phrase he learned) and baby food (“It’s cheap and
nutritious,” said Diaz, a 23-year-old adult man).