Assignment - DLSC

SUBJECT ASSIGNMENT:
DEVELOPING LANGUAGE SKILLS IN THE CLASSROOM

GENERAL INFORMATION:

This assignment must be done in pairs and has to fulfil the following conditions:

- Length: between 6 and 8 pages (without including cover, index or appendices –if
there are any-).
- Type of font: Arial or Times New Roman.
- Font size: 11.
- Line spacing: 1.5.
- Alignment: Justified.

The assignment has to be written in this Word document and has to follow the
instructions on quotes and references detailed in the Study Guide.

Also, the assignment has to be submitted following the procedure specified in the
document: “Subject Evaluation”. Sending it to the tutor’s e-mail is not allowed.

It is strongly recommended to read the assessment criteria, which can be found in the
document “Subject Evaluation”.

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Assignment instructions:

Take the unit from the course book Bachillerato Made Easy, Richmond Publishing,
available in the Evaluation materials section (at the same place where you can find
this paper): Materials 1, and the unit ‘Botellón!’ from an English textbook published in
the Basque Country (2010) for teenagers: Materials 2. Compare and contrast the way
the two units deal with the four skills. You should refer to the following matters:

- The learning theories implicit in the way the units are presented and developed.
- The extent to which the skills are integrated.
- The product-process aspects of the two units.
- The ‘authentic/genuine’ aspects.
- The issue of simplification of text
- The relationship between the skills work and the learning/practice of grammar.
- The opportunities for production (oral and written) the units provide.
- The types of production required.
- The variety (or otherwise) of the activity types.
- Which unit do you prefer? Why?

Of course, add any other aspects that you consider relevant or important. The above
list is simply a suggestion of the sort of considerations you will need to make in order to
analyse the two books critically, and to arrive at a conclusion as to which of the two
units you prefer, if indeed you have a preference.

Important: you have to write your personal details and the subject name on the
cover (see the next page). The assignment that does not fulfil these conditions
will not be corrected. You have to include the assignment index below the cover.

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SUBJECT ASSIGNMENT:
DEVELOPING LANGUAGE SKILLS IN THE CLASSROOM

STUDENTS’ NAMES:

Daniela Millán Tarquino

Login: COFPMTFL2612393

Luis Fernando Gómez Dávila

Login: COFPMTFL1439052

Ronald Ramírez Porras

Login: COFPMTFL2934593

Maritza Román
Login: COFPMTFL2942848

Group: 3

fp_tefl_2018-06_uneatlantico

Date: March 30th 2019

UNIVERSIDAD INTERNACIONAL IBEROAMERICANA (UNINI) PUERTO RICO

MASTER IN TEACHING ENGLISH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE
BOGOTÁ
2018

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INDEX

INTRODUCTION............................................................................................................ 5

Theories and approaches……………………………………………………………..........6

The extent to which the skills are integrated and the relationship between the
skills work and the learning/practice of grammar ….…………………….………….6,7

The product-process aspects of the two units………………………………………….7

The ‘authentic/genuine’ aspects…………………………………………………………7,8

The issue of simplification of text……………………………………………………….8,9

The opportunities for production (oral and written) the units provide and types of
production required………………………………………………………………………9,10

The variety (or otherwise) of the activity types……………………………...…….10,11

Which unit do you prefer? Why?..........................................................................11,12

References………………………………………………………………………………..13,14

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DEVELOPING LANGUAGE SKILLS IN THE CLASSROOM

INTRODUCTION

In today´s globalized world, being able to communicate in a second language has

become a main requirement in people curricula to reach better academic and job
opportunities, culture exposure or traveling. Therefore, the way a person acquires a
second language has been studied for centuries, aiming to find a suitable approach.
Challenges arise in the type of methodology for learning and teaching, as well as the
materials used to develop language skills that allows people to communicate
effectively.

On top of that, assessment is significant in this language acquisition process.

Assessment provides educators the opportunity to reflect, analyze, check and make
decisions about their particular learner´s process, at first, grading was learned by using
evaluation. Still, as teachers, we are aware of all kind of circumstances in the
classroom, for inspecting students, and studying the strategies to improve material and
results. Ellis in Tomlinson highlighted the alternative means teachers can use materials
such as questionnaires, guides, checklists or other different options for confirming and
collecting information to evaluate a to have integration of skills in class (Ellis in
Tomlinson 1998: 221).

Bearing this in mind, different experiences allow teachers to develop communicative

skills through the use of different tools. As a result of that, the following text will analyze
two different units material to teach English. One is unit 7 from the course book
Bachillerato Made Easy from Richmond Publishing and the other is Botellón unit from
English textbooks. Aspects related to the skills development, both will be consider
comparatively. What is more, the major aim will be to determine whether which material
could be more useful than the other. The aspects to examine are:

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Theories and approaches:

By regarding SLA language theories, the materials mentioned can engage students in
collective activities with a fair amount of input to communicate using different skills. In
that sense they can be improved according to Comprehensible Swain`s Output
Hypothesis (1985) when learners come across difficult situations to get their messages
across, they tend to make a more considerable effort to achieve this goal appropriately.
Students, therefore, need to be exposed or pushed in their output. Since materials
given have gap activities and tasks to make students to produce output. in Bachillerato
Made Easy, the activities are suitable to develop output, alternatively this output
created is strictly related to the input provided. Moreover, In Botellón´s case the output
depends on critical thinking about the topic. Those generate debates and discussion, at
this point, students could be able to produce comprehensible output independently to
the material. Also, those exercises in both materials allow the Noticing Hypothesis
(Schmidt 1990). In Bachillerato Made Easy students have less exposure to gaps but to
produce output Botellón in this case students are asked to give their concepts in the
whole process, brought about to this effect, Botellón additionally lets students
metalinguistic function development.

The extent to which the skills are integrated and the relationship between the
skills work and the learning/practice of grammar:

With reference to to the extent skills are integrated in both materials, Botellón offers an
effective integration of skills in contrast to Bachillerato made easy. Hence, Bachillerato
Made Easy, has a clear relationship in grammar to produce. It is universally
acknowledgment that grammar is important in order to provide an integrated material, it
is as important as the communicative approach based on the material. A grammatically
view and specifically Reported Speech and the differences between do and make verb
are presented inductively and integrated with the other skills. Nonetheless, one of the
most striking features here is the lack of listening skill, in contrast, to the amount of
grammar provided in the mentioned material. On the contrary, in Botellón the use of
speaking, listening, writing and reading are continual, as well as it is deductively and
more integrated, the material does not suggest grammar activities which can be
appreciated as a disadvantage for functional teachers whose regard is on the

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predominance of grammar as important factor for language acquisition. Our own view
of this is that the matter of grammar instruction is a conception that strongly differs with
authors like Doughty (1991) observed the effectiveness of focusing on form and noted
that students with form-focused instruction outperformed those without instruction.
However, the lack of grammar structures in the material Botellón the lack of grammar,
does not limit the competences development. Conversely, this material provides
significant opportunities to develop communicative and thinking skills proposed and
called by Foster: Higher order thinking skills (2004). This aspect benefits student since
a useful conceptualization of higher order thinking skills distinguishes two contexts in
which these skills are employed: contexts where the thinking processes are needed to
solve problems and make decisions in everyday life; and contexts where mental
processes are needed to benefit from instruction, including comparing, evaluating,
justifying and making inferences (Wheeler & Haertel cited in Foster 2004 on the target
forms).

The product-process aspects of the two units.

A huge difference is presented although both units present writing exercises in the
approaches they follow. This way, Bachillerato Made Easy presents writing activities
which can be related to a product oriented approach. According to McDonough (?) “In
a typical product oriented approach … writing will converge towards a pre-defined goal,
with a model text being presented to form the focus of comprehension and text
manipulation activities” In the unit previously mentioned, learners are supposed to write
an essay with a given topic, the model is presented to students and later a set of
questions so students can answer them to write the text, the activity is controlled by the
teacher and the material. On the other hand, Botellón offers a more flexible process
since students despite having a topic and a role in the text construction, they were not
given a template and it is their task to develop arguments for and against. The material
encourages students to go deeper of what they have studied to write their new
outcome so it is clear they use more process than product. Additionally in Lynch´s
words (1996) both units seem to pay attention to the product in terms of grammar and
punctuation. This was observed when in both texts they promoted the grammar text
checking before delivering the work.

The ‘authentic/genuine’ aspects.

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There is a mixture of authentic and non-authentic materials in both units. Taking into
account Widdowson cited in Ball 2016, the distinction between genuineness and
authenticity is well evidenced in the materials. Firstly, the genuineness in Bachillerato
made easy is observed in the text about Cheryl Wipperman, which suggests these
texts are taken from real interviews with teachers at Universities in the United States
and then adapted to less complex language. In the same way, the use of some cultural
information with the TV show friends contextualization which helps students to connect
with information from a real environment using English as a vehicle for learning. In
Widdowson (1978) words, (cited in Ball) the texts in the units would be also genuine
because of the students´ expected answer planned in the students’ outcome. Besides,
in Botellón, the topic´s progress presents itself genuine since it raises the need of
students’ authentic responses permanently. It also offers expressions to promote
conversations, it encourages the analysis of texts when students are asked to look for
information that is not explicit and promotes students use of inferences to later use
them in spoken discussions. This supports Lynch´s (1996) proposal on authentic
response to a text due to the material in Botellón offers a wide range of questions
where students need to work text comprehension. As a last point of this aspect,
Botellón also offers an authentic video where students can actually observe how a
debate is developed, this is important in terms of the exposure students have to real
language and the production benefit students can get from it.

The issue of simplification of text

There are two different ways to look at simplification, positive and negative. One of the
most negative perspectives on simplification is the alteration of meaning in the intention
of the original text. Widdowson (1979). Based on that premise, it is important to say
both materials have evidently not used strict original texts in their activities. This can be
found through the readings in Botellón, where the main reading resources are peoples´
opinions. In Bachillerato Made Easy, the reading section has understanding checking
comprehension, linking ideas, text organization, inferring, dealing with unfamiliar words,
reports, and skimming, scanning, writing summaries. The use of communicative
functions is also promoted by both units, which develop and improve the integrated
learning. Not just did the authors pay attention to genuineness but also to authenticity,
since they established a connection between the reader and the passages to stimulate
a natural and fluent response. The instructional purpose is significant and it shows the
language has been adapted to describe what people from different backgrounds would
say which becomes in a positive aspect since students can relate information from

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different sources, from academic and scientific experiences to young people’s

experiences about the same topic. Likewise Bachillerato made easy presents modified
its texts as well with instructional purposes for the most part. However, they mention
cultural actual references that give the text a mixture of authenticity. The language use
in both fulfills the requirements for the lesson, however, Botellón provides more
opportunities to use an authentic text even in other formats such as the video that was
served as an example of a debate in the unit.

The opportunities for production (oral and written) the units provide and types of
production required.

One of the teachers’ responsibilities is to help students notice the importance of

improving the communicative competence and help them to find productive activities.
In words of Richards & Rogers, the function of language teaching and learning is to
assist the learners to understand the purpose of learning and to enhance the
communicative competence in communication (Richards & Rogers 2002), in that way
the speaking activities provided on the units become a vital tool to present students the
benefits of using properly a language to solve real life conflicts and be an active
participant in a community discussion.

By means of the activities set on the units, teachers have the opportunity to lead their
students through the implementation of authentic situations that can be relevant and
meaningful for them. As Clarke and Silberstein stated, the communicative tasks in
class need to be close to the real conversations as fully as possible (Clarke and
Silberstein 1997), in that way contents must be focus on the relevance for students’
lives rather than other aspects

As it is noticed on made easy chapter, the steps to accomplish the writing activity are
well defined, and the instructions are detailed, which allow students to understand the
task’ objective and the final result the teacher wants to achieve, moreover the topics
given are engaging and current issues that will give learners a wide range of options to
express their opinions.

The first step on this task is activating the prior knowledge since the students are asked
to write a previous essay in which they can give some previous opinion. This exercise
promotes a first encounter with the subject and the appropriation and recognition of the

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vocabulary. Then a text is given as an example to be follow and some questions are
established so that the students may analyze and identify structures and words.

Once the text recognition exercise has been carried out, the elements necessary to
start the student’s own text are provided. It is necessary to use strategies such as
brainstorming among others.

The text should be written taking into account a structure that includes the introduction,
the body of the paragraph and the conclusion, once students have a first draft ready
the teacher should review their production to give some feedback. Author Mary Beavan
found that teachers who used shared experiences, discussed students’ thoughts, and
requested additional information as feedback were most successful in decreasing
students’ frustration thus making them feel more confident. (Mary Beavan 1977)

On the other hand on Botellon unit presents writing activities that encourage students
to use contrasting charts with the aim of recognizing words and identifying ideas. It also
presents a controlled writing exercise which consists in selecting sentences to write
them down on a separate space, applying scanning techniques in order to find them.

Another process identified on the exercise proposed in Botellón is a collaborative

learning since groups of students give their opinions first to create the paragraph by
taking all the points of view given. It helps students to support their arguments by
having different perspectives.

In conclusion, the writing tasks given in both texts are controlled since the book offers
some guidelines for carrying out the exercises; however the topics selection and the
group work methodologies allow students to achieve a greater motivation towards the
activities proposed

The variety (or otherwise) of the activity types.

The variety of the activity types presented in both units provide opportunities for
students to build awareness, understanding on different daily life situations. Equally,
both help learners to apply their reading and listening comprehension using a wide
range of processes and techniques. For instance Bachillerato Made Easy unit presents
oral activities such as dialogues, and discussions. Regarding to written activities, this
unit provides writing opinion essays, grammar use with sentences construction which

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can be understood in terms of what Mc Donough and Shaw (1993) defined as

Controlled Sentence Construction. Opposite to Bachillerato material, Botellón has
more written structured components which are product of the reading comprehension
section, in Botellón´s activities students are required to refute, debate and be critical.
The same controlled practice technique is observed in the listening material offered by
the unit, one of the main reasons is, the exercised proposed only works on literal
comprehension of the text but they lack of pre and post listening activities, a similar
phenomenon occurred in Botellón´s listening section. Finally both materials provide a
good resource of reading exercises: Comprehension, inference exercises. In this
particular case, Bachiilerato Made Easy unit offers multiple choice question, aspect that
is very relevant to high schools students who have to take standardized tests for
example, whereas Botellón offers more open questions, looking for information in the
text and analyzing discourse. Bachillerato material offers the possibility to work under
the Bottom Up strategies Ball (2016), because it gives the students material they can
work on through stages (Pre, while, after). Lastly, Botellón works speaking through the
use of debates and discussion, whereas Bachillerato focuses more on dialogues and
answering questions orally.

Which unit do you prefer? Why?

After analyzing both units, the unit from Bachillerato Made Easy has been selected
because it is considered as a genuine and authentic unit in which it is possible to see
that there is an integration of the four skills and grammar is given an extent of
importance. It can be concluded that this material allows teachers to use all the skills in
different moments during the class as well as it gives us the opportunity to explore
each skill from multiple ways in the benefit of the learning process of our students.

Finally it can be indicated that this book is more eye catching because of the usage of
colored pictures and the layout on each page is more attractive for both the learner and
the teacher. Additionally, it gives more variety of activities and offers more learning
resources to work on with the integrated skills. However, we also want to highlight the
importance that the unit Botellón has for students since it fosters the development of
critical thinking skills through the use of interesting current social issues and multiple
viewpoints that demands them their own view of the world and their respective
arguments to support them.

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REFERENCES

Arzamendi, J., Palacios, I., Ball, P. (2016). Second Language Acquisition. Formación
Universitaria: FUNIBER.

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Beavan, M. (1977). Individualized goal setting, self-evaluation, and peer evaluation. In

C.R. Cooper & L. Odell. Evaluating Writing 135-156. Urbana, IL: National Council of
Teachers of English.

Clarke, M., & Silberstein, S. (1997). Toward a realization of psycholinguistic principles

in the ESL reading class. Language Learning, 27(1), 48-65.

Ellis, R. (1998). The evaluation of communicative tasks. Chapter 9 in Tomlinson, B.

(ed.) (1998) Materials Development in Language Teaching. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.

Funiber (2016) Developing Language Skills in the Classroom.

Mansouri A. (2017) the importance of Teaching English Grammar in Foreign Language

Situations. Retrieved in: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/importance-teaching-
english-grammar-foreign-language-ali-mansouri

McDonough, J. (2013). Materials and Methods in ELT. Chapter 5. Oxford, UK. Retrieve
in https://books.google.com.co/books?
id=37LVTZiqC0oC&pg=PT95&dq=product+to+process+elt&hl=es&sa=X&ved=0ah
UKEwij8brhlbHVAhXCLSYKHb8ICEEQ6AEIOzAD#v=onepage&q=product%20to
%20process%20elt&f=false

Nunan, D (1995). Language Teaching Methodology. Prentice Hall. Hemel Hempstead.

Ur, P. (1996). A course in language teaching Practice and theory. Cambridge England
Cambridge University Press.

Richards, J.C., & Rogers, T.S. (2002). Approaches and methods in language teaching.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511667190

Swain, M. (1985) Communicative competence: Some roles of comprehensible input

and comprehensible output in its development. In Gass, S. and Madden, C. (Eds.),
Input in Second Language Acquisition, New York.

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