Becky Bonarek

4/16/14
LING 593
Mini Lesson #3
Course: IEP reading/writing course at an American university
Date: Week 7 of 12
Length of Class: two hours
Level: Intermediate/high intermediate
Class Profile: 10-15 college-aged students of varying ethnicities who all have the goal of passing the TOEFL and attending an
English-speaking university
Course Goal: By the end of the course, students will be able to follow argumentative texts, construct arguments with support and
evidence, and go beyond text-level comprehension and start inferencing.
Part of Lesson: Beginning of class after T has gone over and collected homework from previous session.
Terminal Objectives: At the end of this lesson, students will be able to:
Correctly identify simple past, past perfect, and simple present tenses in a given text (Textbook p. 148)
Review simple past, past perfect, simple present, present continuous, and simple future by predicting events around a picture
Effectively transfer predicting skills learned in previous sessions to different contexts
Materials:
white board
markers
timeline
screenshot of The Sandlot
video clip of The Sandlot (37:03-40:09)
handout made from textbook (Q: Skills for Success Reading and Writing 3 p. 148 and 150)
projector and speakers (if none available, use laptop)
STAGE TIMING

AIM

PROCEDURE

INTERACTION

POTENTIAL
PROBLEMS & SOLNS

Warmup

Schema
activation,
review

T asks Ss to fill out timeline of verb tenses

on the board (they have filled it out
throughout the semester): T gives sample
sentences, Ss identify which verb tense T

Whole class

P: Ss dont understand
exs.
S: T gives multiple exs.
P: S places tense on the

2-3 mins

Pre-task
activity

5 mins

Schema
activation,
fluency
practice,
tense
review

used, and S writes on the board.

Each S places a tense in its correct spot on
the timeline: simple past, past perfect,
simple present, present continuous, simple
future.
Ss read text from book (p. 148; Ss have
already read the text for comprehension in
a previous lesson) in pairs, dividing text in
half; one S marks different tenses while the
other reads, and they switch.
Correct with the whole class.

timeline incorrectly.
S: Ask another S for
confirmation.

Pairs, whole class

P: Ss finish early.
S: T asks Ss to write their
own sentences.
P: Ss have trouble
identifying tenses.
S: T asks Ss to refer to
timeline.
P: Ss dont have
vocabulary for picture.
S: T asks other Ss to
supply vocab or refer to
dictionaries.

Skills work: T shows picture from the movie The

Whole class, indiv,
predicting;
pairs
Sandlot and asks Ss 1) what is happening
reviewing
in the picture, and 2) to predict what
tenses in
happened before the picture and what will
context
after the picture.
Ss write predictions individually before
checking with a partner.
Post4 mins
Checking
P: Audio/ visual
T shows clip from The Sandlot from which Whole class
task
predictions,
capabilities not present.
the picture was taken (37:03-40:09).
assessment T asks Ss to compare what actually
S: Bring laptop.
happened with their predictions.
Afterwards: T and Ss would discuss how predicting skills can be used outside of a text context; how mixing verb tenses creates a
fuller story; and how the latter skill will factor into their unit-long project.
Task

8 mins

General Comments:

Simple present
Ex: I study.
Now
Past

X
Simple past
Ex: I studied.

X
Past perfect
Ex: I had studied.

Present Continuous

Simple present

Ex: I am studying.

Ex: I will study.

Future

A. Look at the narrative essay. Read half of the essay to your partner and then
switch. If you are listening, do the following:
Underline the simple past verbs.
Draw a square around the past perfect verbs.
Circle the simple present verbs.

The Second Climb

A few months after the Half Dome climb, I decided to climb Mt. Whitney in
California. I had always wanted to climb Mount Whitney. There were several reasons for
choosing this mountain as my next conquest. First of all, it is the tallest mountain in the
continental United States. Second, when I looked back at my climb to the top of it eleven
years earlier, I considered it my greatest pre-transplant hiking accomplishment.
Many healthy people hike Whitney in two days. Some even manage to go up and
down the same day. We took three days. We wanted to make it to the summit and back
safely. On the third day of our trip . . . at 2:30 p.m., we all gathered under a spectacular
blue sky to walk the final steps to the geographical marker identifying the summit, the
highest point on the continental United States.
Tears rolled down our faces. Everyone knew how much this accomplishment
meant to me. I had made it to the peak, this time with a second heart and my husband. I

*Adapted from Gramer, M. F., & Ward, C. S. (2011). Q: Skills for success 3: Reading and writing Oxford University Press.

truly felt on top of the world. I raised my hands in victory and cried out to Craig, We did
it!