Assignment - DLSC

SUBJECT ASSIGNMENT:
DEVELOPING LANGUAGE SKILLS IN THE CLASSROOM

Students’ full names:

Thomas James Calvert

Yuri Paola Infante Tejada

Group: 2017-06
Date: April 9th /2018

Subject: FP008 - Developing Language Skills in the Classroom

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Table of contents

Introduction……………………………………………………………………….3

Learning theories and approaches…………………………………………….4

The relation grammar-skills

Reading skills………………………………………………..………….……….5

Listening skills…………………………………………………….…….……….6

Speaking skills…………………………………………………….…………….7

Writing skills……………………………………………………………….…….8

Conclusions……………………………………………………………………..10

The Choice

Bibliography…………………………………………………..………………….12

Webography…………………………………………………………….……….13

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Introduction

The significance of foreign language skills, as part of fundamental class

requirements, is reflected through success, satisfaction, and in life enrichment,
altogether as the most valuable skills to develop in today’s society. These purposes
may lead the learners to think about the structure and the role of the language.
Certainly, there is no doubt about it; teaching foreign language skills will not only open
the learners and the teachers’ minds but also syllabus designers and researchers’ to
new perspectives, opportunities and experiences, and therefore to infinite chances to
learn, comprehend, and practice the language as well.

Furthermore, and in order to endorse an effective and consistent language

teaching and learning, there should be a set of principles focused on assessing this
objective accomplishment. Evaluating the amount and extent of language teaching
comes through testing. Of course, we do not only test to measure grades of acquisition
but we also test to analyze, reflect, review, and make decisions about the who, the
what, the where, the when, and the how to test. These abilities are, according to us, the
main basis to concrete the most appropriate way to effective teaching and testing
language skills, and therefore, reinforce and unite the teaching/learning and testing
process practices.

According to the above-mentioned statements, it is necessary to check the

fields of teaching and testing the language skills. These are the main points we are
working around to analyze through the related literature background. As Henry
Widdowson (1978:1) pointed out: “the aims of a language teaching course are very
often defined with reference to the four skills: understanding speech, speaking, reading
and writing.” (FUNIBER material, n.d.; DLS; p. 1, 2). The objective of this assignment is
to analyze the unit 7 from the course book ‘Bachillerato Made Easy’, Richmond
Publishing and the unit ‘Botellón!’ from English textbooks. Through this assignment, we
are going to relate, contrast and evaluate how each skill is going to fit the student’s
needs and how they are presented in the units.

We consider developing this analysis around the four skills. Firstly, we make an
introduction for each of them that will also mirror what we have learned from the
reading of the subject material; then we are going to talk about how we perceive which

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of the books offer the best potential to be use in class thanks to the information related
to the four skills.

Learning theories and approaches

As seen in the previous Methodological Approaches subject, most of the

approaches focus on a particular skill. Nevertheless, there are a number of concepts
that “have opted for a ‘multi-syllabus approach” (Funiber material; n.d.; DLS p. 2) and
try to integrate the four skills as much as possible. Concerning the unit from the course
book Bachillerato Made Easy and the unit Botellón!, ’they both have a marked
tendency towards Communicative Approach or CLT that accentuates interaction
between the means and the main objectives of study. The four language skills are
tailored and they are interrelated within the same topic. However, there are other
aspects that have to be taken into account and that is what we are presenting as
follows.

The relation grammar-skills

Most teachers disagree on the idea about grammar being taught isolated, it
means, not integrated with other skills such as reading and writing. Conversely,
sometimes it is possible to note a strong sense of divergence between teachers’
definite beliefs and current classroom practices related to grammar teaching as
conclude Richards, Gallo and Renandya (2010). In Bachillerato Made Easy there is an
evident connection between grammar and production. It is noted that grammar is
taught inductively and it is integrated with the other four skills. The unit teaches
reported speech asking the learners to write related sentences, taking into account the
way to report what someone has said, after that, it is assessed through an oral task.

On the other hand, in Botellón! The use of speaking, listening, writing and
reading are presented, but it does not have grammar activities. The rules of grammar
are not explicit which means that it is a form-focused instruction. Anyway, Doughty
(1991) observed the effectiveness of focusing on form and noted that students with
form-focused instruction outperformed those without instruction on the target forms.

Reading skills

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Introduction

The importance of reading can be summarized in Harmer (1998; 99), ‘it has a
positive effect on students’ vocabulary knowledge, on their spelling and on their
writing’, in addition it offers significant models for future writing and gives opportunities
for language studying. Luckily, we have access to an extensive variety of text-types
(Grellet, 1981) but we should read them not only for pedagogical matters but for
information and pleasure because this skill ‘has a powerful effect on the development
of literacy-related aspects of language’ (Krashen, 1995). As educators this aspect of
the reading skill should be paramount. So that, we should choose what is more
appropriate for them, including aspects as authenticity and interesting ways to present
the texts to students.

Analysis

In Bachillerato Made Easy, the reading section has several kinds of activities
such as understanding text organization; checking comprehension; inferring; dealing
with unfamiliar word; linking ideas; reacting to the text; skimming; scanning; writing
summaries and reports. The warm up activity or pre-reading task emphasizes reading
as an active process because the students start guessing, confirming, anticipating, and
inferring.

Regarding authentic/genuine aspects in Bachillerato Made Easy, the text talks

about “friendship” which can be a very meaningful topic for students of all ages,
especially adolescents, and promotes the use of communicative functions that develop
and improve the integrated learning. Not only the authors paid attention to
“genuineness” but also to “authenticity”, since they stablished a connection between
the reader and the passages to stimulate a natural and fluent response. Therefore,
students will be motivated to participate freely and be engaged to the whole lesson.
The unit Botellón! shows somehow the same characteristics. Since both units are
authentic and genuine, they do not suggest the problem of text simplification

Listening skills

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Introduction

Similar to reading, listening is also a receptive skill and its importance stands on
the fact that ‘the more learners hear and understand English spoken, the more they
absorb appropriate pitch and intonation, stress and the sounds of both individual words
and those which blend together connected speech’ (Harmer, 1998;133). And taking and
agreeing on Nunan (1995: 189) ‘listening is probably the major source of
comprehensible input the learner is likely to receive’ we can say that most of the input
our students need and receive is conducted through this skill.

Having said this, teachers should “provide listening practice in authentic

situations: those that learners are likely to encounter when they use the language
outside the classroom.” (Ur: 1996).

Kathleen Galvin’s five reasons our students have to work on listening according
to Mary Underwood (1989:4) are to engage in social rituals, to exchange information, to
exert control, to share feelings and to enjoy themselves. (FUNIBER material, DLS; p.
29)

Analysis

There are three different types of listening: the first gives comprehensible input
that is very important to students; the second, listeners have to interact with the
speakers to achieve understanding and in the last one it helps learners to focus on new
ways of vocabulary and grammar.

The unit “Botellón!” does not expressly show any activity where students are
exposed to authentic/genuine or adapted listening chunks. However, it fosters
communication among students where listening to others and to the teacher is
important to generate new information.

Checking on the listening aspect in the unit from “Bachillerato Made Easy”, we
can clearly realize that it has a specific place within the unit and gives the students the
chance to be exposed to some chunks of prerecorded listening fragments where they
have to give, to an extent, an authentic response. As we do not have access to the

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listening tracks or scripts, we cannot determine if the listening fragments are

authentic/genuine or adapted.

Speaking skills

Introduction

Speaking is the most relevant aspect of the language for communication for
obvious reasons. Speaking tasks are the most appropriate way to identify students‘
strengths and/or weaknesses. As highlighted by (Harmer, 1998; 123) there are three
main reasons for making students speak in the classroom: 1) speaking activities
provide practice opportunities (real-life speaking in the classroom), 2) activities offer
feedback for both teacher and students and 3) students have more chances to trigger
the various elements of language, which can make the use of language more
‘automatic’

Consequently, students progressively become autonomous speakers.

Thornbury suggests that teaching of speaking depends on a so-called classroom
culture of speaking, and the fact that classrooms become ‘talking classrooms’. It means
students will be much more confident talkers if speaking constitutes a regular
component of lessons. We should move on a more ‘speaking-skilled’ classroom, and
let behind the 'Let's-do-some-speaking-today' notion as Funiber material (n.d.; DLS, p.
73) suggests.

Analysis

The opportunities for oral or written production that the units offer are noticeable
in both of them. In the speaking section of Bachillerato Made Easy, students are asked
to express their ideas, talk about their experiences and use their previous knowledge
on the exposed situations. The activities are question and answers, discussions,
dialogues and problem-solving.

Regarding Botellón!, the activities are discussions about some current social
issues, giving opinion and problem-solving. There is some work to be done individually
and students have to agree or disagree giving arguments about the solutions

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proposed. The final activity is a group discussion where students have to give
arguments and support ideas for and against a given problem. In the last section, the
written part, they have a discussion organizer where they have to take notes and
propose a solution that they consider proper for people on the Botellón.

Writing skills

Introduction

Writing effectively constitutes one of the most important life-long skills teachers
give to their students. When teaching writing, educators have to filter carefully
resources and support materials that help students on teaching how to write. “(Writing)
is the capacity of written language to transcend time and space that makes the
teaching and learning of writing such an important process” (White and Arndt; 1991:1)

Besides the necessity to communicate beyond the classroom, this skill can be a
bridge to generate self-evaluation inside the classroom allowing our students to share
their opinions about their peers in class and in this way empowering them to use all the
skills in the classroom.

Analysis

Although none of the units give the students the opportunity to write extensively,
in both units we can see that the writing skill is controlled, but under two different
perspectives. In the unit botellón!, students are asked to write answers to some
proposals about specific given topics, but they do not have to be grammatically and/or
syntactically correct as far as they are concerned to the topic.

On the other hand, the unit from Bachillerato Made easy, asks students to write
short controlled answers and/or sentences based on the grammar topic the unit
focuses on. Although the answers are short, they are related to the topic of the unit.
Such texts should be grammatically and syntactically right.

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Conclusions

We consider that effective teaching is actually based on principles of learning. It

is not possible to separate the main components of a teaching process, as to consider
the skills, the methods, approaches, and the techniques on which this process rests.
Anyway, sometimes teaching happens almost immediately and other times it is
accomplished only through a long, patient and diligent process. Then, it can be
condensed to preparation, presentation, application, and review and evaluation.

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All the way through this process, the teacher has to take into account several
principles which describe the wanted performance from the learners. This is the result
of considering the elements of performance-based objectives which include the
description of the skill or behavior which itself implies the desired output in concrete
terms that could be measured. These are, obviously, based on criteria used as the
standard which will be used to grade the accomplishment of the objectives: testing.

The Choice

After analyzing both units, we chose the unit from Bachillerato Made Easy
because we considered this a genuine and authentic unit where it is possible to see
that the four skills are integrated and grammar is given such importance as well.

As teachers we see this material permit us 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 yet importantly, we also see this book is more eye catching because the
use of colored pictures and the layout on each page is more attractive for both the
learner and teacher. Additionally, it gives more variety of activities and offers more
learning resources to work on with the skills integrated.

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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Bibliography

Doughty, C. (1991). Second language Instruction Does Make a Difference:

Evidence from an Empirical Study of SL Relativization. Studies in Second Language
Acquisition 13:431-469..

Harmer, J. (1998). How to teach English: An introduction to the practice of

English Language Teaching. Harlow: Longman.

McDonough, J., & Shaw, C. (1993). Materials and methods in ELT: A teacher's
guide. Oxford, UK: Blackwell.

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Richards, J.C., Gallo, P. B., & Renandya, W. A. (2001). Exploring Teachers’

Beliefs and the Processes of Change. PAC Journal, 1,1, 41-58.

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

[England: Cambridge University Press.

White, R., & Arndt, V. (1991). Process writing. London: Longman.

Webography

Product and process writing: A comparison. (n.d.). Retrieved March 12, 2018 4,
from http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/product-process-writing-a-
comparison

Receptive skills. (n.d.). Retrieved, Retrieved March 12, 2018 from

http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/knowledge-database/receptive-skills

Text Simplification for Language Learners: A Corpus Analysis. (n.d.). Retrieved

March 12, 2018 from

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http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~max/mainpage_files/files/SLaTE07_Petersen_Text_Simpl
ification.pdf

The use of authentic materials in the teaching of reading. (n.d.). Retrieved March
12, HYPERLINK "http://www.readingmatrix.com/articles/berardo/article.p

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