Differentiation between homophones.

Show you red or blue card

red card blue card

know no

see sea

there their

Guessing the meaning of an unfamiliar word from the context.

Stop boasting of your strength! Do you think you can intimidate me? I know you are strong. I never fight with those who are weaker than me.

[in’timideit] 1. make me believe me 2. make me feel afraid 3. make me feel sorry for you

 

Anticipating the main word which renders the speaker’s attitude:

Fancy that! He had only two days to get ready for his exam, and he wasted them teaching his little sister to read. The idea! Why, the girl is only four. Couldn’t it wait a little?

How… he is! 1. absent-minded 2. silly 3. considerate

 

The functional skills of listening begin to develop as soon as the learners have assimilated a few dozen words and a couple of syntactical structures. Functional skills can be developed on the basis of minimal utterances, than is one-sentence utterance.

Listen to the statements or commands and ask for additional information. Listening + speaking.

Let’s meet. – When?

Let’s read? – What?

Listen and say as if it is strange or natural.

He lives in Mexico. He doesn’t speak Spanish. – Strange.

He hates school, he wants to be a teacher. – Strange.

23.04.2010

Teaching reading.

1. The peculiarities of reading as a major skill

2. The kinds of reading

3. The technique of reading­­

4. The main functional skills of reading

5. Teaching the functional skills of reading

Reading – written – receptive skill. It shares with listening most of the functional skills. Reading and listening make use of the same mechanisms.

Operational memory on one hand needs not work so intensely because if we forget, we can re-read the information. On the other hand we often read much greater passages than those we listen to.

The same concerns prediction or anticipation. Anticipation of content plays the same part in reading as in listening. And verbal anticipation, perhaps, has a greater importance in reading.

Soon after he returned..... (clause of time)

Soon after || he returned and.....

Reading is easier: you can slow down or speed up the tempo of reading at your convenience, whereas the tempo of listening is imposed on you by the speaker. Lack of intonation and pronunciation makes reading a harder job, because the syntax of the sentence can be interpreted in the wrong way, and also because of homographs, e.g. “bow”.

Therefore, both the major skills should be developed alongside and they should be treated as interdependent, helping each other. Every difficult intellectual skill (solving puzzle, guessing a riddle) should first be developed in reading and then transferred to listening (because of time limitations). On the other hand, listening can promote the skill of reading because due to listening we develop inner reproduction and it becomes easier for a reader to identify intonation patterns on the basis of printed matter.

Kinds of reading

A good reader does not only read quickly, he reads in a very flexible way, that is he processes information differently depending on the kind of text, but chiefly depending on his purpose. Therefore kinds of reading are selected according to the purposes of receiving information. There may be as many as perhaps 50 kinds of reading. Many of these are typical to the certain profession, e.g. proof-reading (корректорское чтение)– reading for singling out mistakes, it is very slow, you have to read every letter within a word which we normally never do; editor’s reading (редакторское чтение) – finding syntactical mistakes, wrong structures, altering the text according to the rules (it is even slower); pleasure reading (you can read an episode several times if you like it); actor’s reading.

For purposes of school reading can be:

Skimming – the most fluent. Its purpose is to get the essence of factual information. It is a bit superficial. It is enough to understand ¾ of the text provided (all of the really important facts fall within these ¾), details can be ignored.	Ознакомительное (75%)
Scanning – no challenges are left	Ознакомительное (100%)
Observational – the reader goes beyond the facts, establishing the main idea of the writer, the writer’s attitude to this or that fact or the writer’s tone, the logic of the utterance, predicts the further development, we interpret the human message, evaluate to what extent it is convincing. It is much slower. All the information must be understood. If there are lexical or syntactical problems, the reader cannot ignore it. Every detail can prove to be extremely relevant. This reading allows the use of dictionaries.	Изучающее
Skipping – not complete, it is selective. We do it when we open a book to see what information can be found in it, and what this chapter or article is about. But you don’t understand what it is about. You read in order to decide whether you need this information or not. It relies on the headlines, on specific uses of script fond type, graphical devices, italics or bold type, underlining, subtitles, key words, that catch the eye and are usually repetitive.	Просмотровое
Searching – presupposes that you know that the text contains some necessary information, but you don’t know where it is. This reading contains skipping and when you come across the essential passage, you read it in details for facts (skimming) or for implied information (observational reading). It is the most flexible kind of reading and it is selective. It can only be studied at the advanced level. It is a very difficult kind, we can prepare students for it practically from the very beginning, we can nurture the skills of searching reading within scanning or skimming reading. The unimportant parts of the text are read much slower.	Поисковое

 

The chief skill for reading:

· for gist (skimming) – for facts

· reading for detailed comprehension of facts (scanning)

· for separate facts, figures, dates etc. that interest the reader (scanning, searching)

· for the main idea (scanning, observational)

· for predictions (scanning, observational)

· assessing the logic, looking for redundancy, interpreting the meaning of imagery, of ‘telling’ details; understanding irony or humour (observational)

· understanding the writer’s viewpoint, attitude, mood (scanning, observational, if very explicit)

· comparing two or more texts for factional information and ideas expressed (observational)

· looking through the text to see what is it about in general (skipping)

The same text can be read and re-read several times by the learners if you set different tasks, and thus by shifting the focus of their attention the students can remember the text almost by heart. They can remember the text very well without several attempts to memorize.

Labour we delight in physics pain. – Enjoyable labour cures pain. (Labour / we delight in / physics / pain.)

Techniques of reading

1. Elementary techniques of reading deals with establishing letter-sound relationships on the level of a word

2. The expressive technique deals with reading aloud sentences and longer passages in order to develop inner reproduction and verbal anticipation, and understand the syntax of the text.

1. Find and name all the English letters among the following: Hh, Нн, Пп, Tt, Tm,...

2. Name all the English letters which have the following elements: “l”, “a”

3. Fill in the missing letter(s) to make the word sound according to its transcription “gi__le” [gigl]

4. Read all the words where the vowel is pronounced as in the first word of the line: STEVE, live, believe, fail

14/05/2010

Mr.Smith He The doctor

Was an old man Was a rich businessman Was a clever man

Who loved art better then business Who painted a very good picture Who thinks that medicine is the best hobby

Tasks

· Answer the before questions

· Answer the after questions

· Do the multiple choice

· Find all the facts which prove that... (which explain why...)

· Say what the text shows and what it doesn’t show. Use the substitution table

· Find all the information you didn’t know before.

· Look at the following human qualities and say which of the characters possesses this or that quality. Find evidences in the text.

· Look at the picture and compare it with the text. Find the details that describe the picture correctly and those which are wrong. Adapt the text to the picture.

· Compare two (three) texts and say which of them contains the following facts // expresses the following ideas

· Read the text and fill in the gaps with words or phrases given (First of all, in addition, however, in conclusion)

· Find the right clause to fill in the gap

In such cases you must proceed both from the possible meaning or method phrase and its syntax. That is you rely on the mechanism of verbal anticipation. “But the most important thing about the Hubble telescope is not how big it is…. how extensive was it? … where it is? …that it can?

Similarly a text may have gaps, consisting of complete sentences. The difficulty is that some of these sentences are really necessary because they connect otherwise disconnected statements and sometimes these sentences just can be put in the gap, but the context is logical enough without them.

· Reading + grammar Complete the text with the words in the correct form (The words are given as a separate list below).

· Read the text. Five sentences have been removed from it. Choose the sentence that fits each gap.

· Match the description (=advertisement) of places (“Where to GO?”) and the names of the places.

· Read the job advertisements. Which of the advertisements states the following?

You need to be a good communicator.

You must be able to work under stress.

You must be able to drive.

· Read and identify the topic not mentioned. E.g. Here is a guide to the meaning of most common images that appear in dreams. Match each type of dream with its meaning.

This represents power and strength. If the dreamers are inside, they are protected by thick walls. If they are outside and looking at it, they may desire that safety. It is also sometimes the symbol of a woman

· Matching paragraphs and their message. E.g. Read the article on self-help advice for those who are at risk of spending too much. Which paragraphs advises you to:

seek medical help

find out what is wrong in your life?

· Match a news item and its headline.

***

John Brown is a butcher who always sells good stale bread. One morning last week as he was busy working in his office a lady came in and ordered six loaves and four apples. John had never had such a large order before and he suggested bringing...

· Deduction puzzles is intensive reading and speaking practice. Read the puzzles and answer the questions to find the solution. (“the parachutes” – the title)

· Произнесите хором названия состояний вещества: solid, liquid, gas

· Произнесите хором названия веществ. Classify them into the three states of the material: cool, neon, iron, water, oil

· Составьте высказывания по таблице, чтобы показать изменения физического состояния вещества.

Liquids Gases Solids

can

Melt Evaporate Condense Solidify Liquefy Freeze Sublimate

· Используя табличку и текст (The three States of Matter), завершите следующие утверждения: Solids, unlike gases, …. Liquids, like gases,

· Охарактеризуйте такие (не упомянутые в тексте) объекты, как: воск, нефть, и т.д. подбирая характеристики из текста и таблицы.

· Read the paragraph and it summary conclusion. Underline and read aloud the characteristic which are mentioned in the text, but are not mentioned in the summary. So to sum up it all up, stars are sources of light and energy due to …

· Complete the following statements about the text looking for the necessary information.

· Read the text and find the only true version of the opening statements. The mechanization of life

will leave people more time for hobbies

will make life more difficult for many people

will make the future generations passive and lazy

Exposure – all language which the learner hears or reads in class and out of class.

Acquisition – the process of picking up the language without formal instruction and without a sustained conscious effort to learn the language. It usually occurs as a result of highly motivated exposure to the language in use.
21/05/2010

Teaching speaking.

1. Speaking as a major skill

2. Motivation as a unity of factors (мотивационно-побудительный комплекс)

3. The chief groups of skills relating to speaking

4. Tasks aimed at the development of speaking

Speaking is an aural reproductive major skill based on the same set of mechanisms as the receptive ones.

The order of the switching on is reversed. We start with a non-verbal idea, desire to express something, e.g. “I am hungry – I have a feeling of hunger”

Non-verbal – inner speech, a kind of note-making, key equivalent substitution: “hungry – fridge – get food – too late to go out –- empty”

Outer speech. As to anticipation of meaning this mechanism depends on how prepared the utterance is. If it’s improvised, it works more intensively. Verbal anticipation: in speaking the most important thing is grammatical obligation. This means that our phrases can be lengthy and complicated and when we start a sentence, e.g. with the clause we should remember to arrive to the principal clause.

A typical mistake. Leave the sentence unfinished.

Teaching speaking

1. teaching speaking as discourse:

answering questions (explicit or implicit) of the interlocutor. In monolugues the utterances are implicit, but a good listener should forestall the questions that might arrive. The nature of discourses is rooted in dialogues.

Dialogue may involve two interlocutors or more. A monologue is also inner dialogue (“autodialogue”) 2 forms should be taught together from the very beginning, parallel to each other. Because they interact to the great extend and have many skills in common. They have a unit if speech which they share – extended utterance (развернутая реплика). Linguistically it equals SPU – super phrasal unit (сверхразовое единство) a unity of 2 or more sentences which are supposed to have a thematic unity. In writing a paragraph may correspond to SPU or may consist of several SPUs. Similarly a monologue is a large unit as an extended utterance, but an extended utterance can be seen either as the beginning of a possible monologue, or it can be seen as skeleton.

By teaching an extended utterance we potentially teach not only monologue, but dialogue too. Because the dialogue is an exchange of utterances, in which some can be minimal and others extended. If we compare monologue and dialogue, each of them has its advantages and disadvantages. Dialogue is easier because you share a border of conversation, you are rested, while your partner does his own line, if you don’t know what to say next, you can rely on your interlocutor to find new way to continue the conversation. A monologue is easier because you are not taken unawares by your friends rushing a new topic, you are not at the mercy of the speaker as far of the tempo of speech goes. It is only during the first few weeks, that dialogues prevails, because it is possible to keep up a conversation however short on the basis of one or two structures and minimal vocabulary.

-Let’s meet.

-When?

-When? Well. at twelve.

-Oh, no, it’s too late.

-Let’s meet at eleven.

-Let’s.

Speech can be prepared up to a certain point. It can be composed and rehearsed in advance, half-prepared, e.g. when you have key-phrases, it can be almost unprepared, when you have just a minute for preparation, it can be improvised on the spot. But improvisation on the spot can only be effective in informal situations (dinner-table talk, small talk). This kind of speech should be taught alongside each other. Improvisation involves mostly typical classroom situations (May I borrow your pen. – You do!).

At the same time teach prepared speech, when you need logic, sufficiency, expressiveness. Beginning with the middle stage and upwards encourage half-prepared speech based on note making which is rooted in inner speech with its equivalent substitutions.

Modes of discourse

· description

· narration

· exposition

· argumentation

Additional modes:

· urging (побуждение)

· comment – is mostly typical of dialogue (What a beautiful wedding!)

· inquiry – it is possible to think of an extending utterance consisting of pure inquiries.

Effectiveness of speech.

· appropriateness

· sufficiency – is not measured by the length of the utterance. It means that enough was said to achieve the speaker’s goal. (The sentence “she was beautiful” is sufficient to the question “Why did he marry her”, but it is not sufficient in question “Why did she look like”)

· An acceptable degree of accuracy.

× precision

× expressiveness (metaphor and other stylistic devices)

Economy (compression) consists in choosing the right word, the right strategy.

 

Lecture 1 (1-09-2010)

Teaching speaking begins with the sentence level:

Listen to the teacher and say whether you agree or disagree

- a horse is stronger than a camel

Listen to the teacher and say that it is good/bad, wonderful/tragic. This is a memory exercise/grammar exercise.

Что произойдет, если …. It will be tragic.

Listen to pairs of short sentences and connect them by one of the given conjunctions (in one of these ways – and/but):

He was sleepy. He wanted to watch the football match. = He was sleepy but he wanted to watch the football match.

Reproduce a mini-dialogue and enlarge it using some of the following phrases:

-Let’s go home.

-I’d rather not.

-It’s late and I’m sleepy.

-It’s a pity but the party is so nice.

Provide the learners with some Russian sentences (У меня болит голова) and ask them to insert them.

Listen to mini-dialogues, decide if the speakers agree with each other and say a sentence: I also think so; I agree with the first speaker.

Early spring is the most beautiful season.

There’s practically nothing to do in the country at the end of March.

Listen to 2 statements and decide if they were said by one speaker or by two. Then change the mini-dialogues into mini-monologues and vice-versa.

Let’s give her an umbrella. She has two umbrellas. (+ The one is broken and the other is ugly.)

A snowball-monologue:

I hope that warm weather will return. (+And the sun will shine again.)

Each sentence can be answered with two or more variants on the right:

It’s a good book. / Wait a minute. / I like it too.

Let’s start. / Read it. / When?

The opening stage. Read the sentences and say what sentences you will use if you want to make a compliment/ to boast of smth/ to share smth with your friend.

It’s a nice bag. – Take it. – I like it. – I like your cat. - You need an umbrella.

Arrange separate phrases into a unified utterance. You can add “but”, “and”, “so”.

Read the short utterances and find the sentence which reflects the purpose of the speaker. “ She is a kind girl. She always pities me when I feel blue. She always helps the poor.” Or: “She is a kind girl. Let’s ask her to help us. ”

When you teach a new type of utterance, you start with analysis of the samples. The props can be either in the target language, or in the native language, or they can be visual (direct demonstration). The scaffolding has the following functions:

· prevention of mistakes whether lexical, or structural, or cultural;

· scaffolding can show the logic of developing the utterance;

· scaffolding can suggest what else can be discussed within the given issue or it can a sample of performing the task

A set of tasks based on asking and answering questions. When starting a new topic, perhaps after some new vocabulary has been introduced, the teacher asks the class a set of general questions (Is it getting colder? Are you fond of the rain? Is autumn your favorite season?) because the new vocabulary is used receptively. The next set of questions must be alternative (Are you a good mixture or do you feel ill at ease among strangers?) as they teach to memorize the utterance, they teach to understand idiomatic expressions and besides sometimes they can even help to teach paraphrasing. The most challenging are special questions because they involve production of one’s own utterance.

To teach immediate response you can use the following set of exercises:

v Exchange a few separate remarks with your partner. You give a set of phrases absolutely disconnected but on the same topic. They need to give responses.

It’s raining cats and dogs. It looks like rain. It is very cold. The rain has stopped. It’s snowing hard. I’m very hot. Take off your coat. Let’s go for a walk. Take your umbrella with you.

v An oral exercise combined with grammar. The teacher gives an example: I’ m looking forward to Easter. – Oh yes, Easter is a wonderful holiday. The response is unprepared.

v For more advanced learners. Listen to the teacher and respond with I also think so, I’m afraid I don’t think paraphrasing what the teacher’s said. I usually feel more dead than alive by the end of the term. – I also feel exhausted when the term is coming to an end.

v Listen and clarify the statement by asking ”Do you mean…?” I can’t make both ends up

You can give them phrases for phonetic drill. Of course not. I hope not. Not at all. After the phonetic drill get your students to use one of these phrarses. I think it will rain tomorrow. – I hope not. Do you mind if I borrow your book. – Not at all.

To give a brief, extended utterance, you can use a substitution table. It is prepared, but it expresses the opinion.

Have you seen   Have you read   Have you heard

The Titanic Faust

You must   Then don’t

It’s   He’s   She’s

Great   Wonderful Very bad terrible

Film Book opera

 

Stimulating cue, based on opposition (may also include argument=> counter-argument => cause-effect) table

Shall I make tea/ or would you rather/ have some coffee?

Shall we go to the movies/ or would you rather/ stay at home?

Shall we finish it now/ or would you rather/leave it till Tuesday?

 

Stimulus + response, based on selection

Work in pairs. Read the phrases which mean “А не сделать ли нам это?” Say that you’d rather not. Shall we have some tea? – I’d rather not. I’d have some coffee.

In order to teach to focus on the intention given. The table that teaches to select both purpose and intention.

I don’t recommend you to buy a car

1. Statistically, car owner have shorter lives 2. You can hardly afford it. 3. It is not at all time-saving as it seems to be.

There are so many traffic jams in the town. The money can get your son through college. You’ll forget how to walk, it ruins your health. You’ll spend hours trying o repair it yourself.

Fill in the blanks in an extended utterance expressing your opinion.

Let’s have a better city! Say how you want our city to change. Follow this plan: “We have very few… in Ryazan and too many… I want to live in a city with more…and better… Let us have fewer…but we really need more…”

Extended utterance based on filling in the blanks in answer to questions.

I don’t know if I will…I hope I’ll be able to…(When will you get married? How many children will you have?) You can use questions in Russian.

Compiling an extended inquiry based on selection and translation. You are in a strange city. The problem is a)how to get a room at the hotel, b) how to get to your hotel, c) how to get about the city.

У вас в городе много гостиниц (музеев, театров)? Как туда добраться? Где мне выходить?

Teaching description. Give your students a sample (e.g. describing a family). Give them a task based on the sample. (Find all the facts that show that every member of the family is an individual)

Description based on a diagram.

David Blake (52) + Martha Blake (49)

Alan (28) + Kate (23) Tom (27) + Ann (25)

Parker Blake

Philip (3) Dick (4), Emily (6)

 

Analysis + transformation based on the change of the speaker’s attitude. (Here we are, you and I in a railway compartment…) Read the inner monologue and give the inner monologue of the other passenger.

Identification of factual mistakes and editing the information. Correct the speaker and give a better explanation. “Are you looking for the circus? Go along Svoboda street as far as the corner and then turn to the left (right)…”

Classification + comment. Find rules which should be followed and then explain why the other rules are quite wrong.

i. Attempt to set the broken bones.

ii. Support the broken arm or leg with the splints.

iii. Loosen clothing at neck and waist.

Using analogy to make one’s own utterance (chiefly based on lexical substitution). Read a detective story. Try to make your own beginning of the story. The situation is the same but the details are different.

Describe a season of a year. Your description should be guided by the epigraph you select.

o My heart is like a singing bird. (C. Rossetti)

o The poetry of Earth is never dead. (J. Keats)

 

Teaching writing

1. The role of writing as a major skill and as written-recording of aural speech

2. Teaching the technique of writing

3. Teaching writing as “functional literacy”, i.e. teaching writing as self-expression, as a set of productive competences

1. Writing and speaking are very much akin to each other, both being of a re-productive or productive nature. But the basic difference between them lies in the immediacy of speaking and the time you have for putting down to paper certain facts, ideas, emotions. Speaking and writing share lots of basic and functional skills, i.e. most lexical and grammar skills with some exceptions, of course. E.g. most written discourse is not characterized by slang whereas speaking seldom makes use of high-flown vocabulary (only if you’re producing a speech in some official situation). Grammatically, speaking is almost devoid of complex participial, gerundial or absolute constructions. Cf. Breakfast over, we went for a walk. – After breakfast we went for a walk. But it is not until the advanced stages of language learning that these linguistic differences start top matter. Therefore with the same vocabulary and syntax speaking and writing help to develop each other. In writing we do not use pronunciation and intonation skills, but we use them implicitly in order to pronounce what we are about to write in the so-called inner-reproduction. Speaking helps writing because it polishes pronunciation and intonation skills. Writing helps speaking just because it is unhurried and well-thought through. It helps to develop the effectiveness of language use such as economy of language, expressiveness, precision. So they should be developed together. Until recently writing was regarded as a means rather than an end. It should be regarded as both. But it has its own goals, esp. now as we are drifting into the European system of education. By teaching the technique of writing we mean teaching spelling, penmanship and punctuation. Writing proper, as self-expression presupposes the functional skills of producing written utterances envisaged by standard requirements:

I. The basic level (mostly standardized types of discourse)

o A personal letter

o Filling out a form

o Writing a CV (autobiography with the required format)

o Writing out citations

II. The specialized (advanced) level («профильный») (mosty creative types of discourse)

The same requirements plus the following:

o Writing a business letter

o Writing a resume (a letter of application)

o Formulate the information received in the form of abstracts, review, summary

o Making notes of the teacher’s speech

o Using written English in project work; writing a detailed plan of a presentation; summing up information received from a number of sources

o Descriptive essays

o Formulating one’s judgment concerning different aspect of life (argumentative or expositive essays)

The technique of writing. Penmanship.

1. Guess the letter on the blackboard by its element. Ask “Is it…?” (capital, low-case letter). You develop visual imagination.

2. Make as many letters as possible from the following elements.

3. Look at the letters on the blackboard, underline and name all the English letters: “Tt, Тт, Mm, Мм, Rr, Яя…”

4. Imitate the letter using the pattern (пропись).

5. Write the letter dictated by a fellow-student.

6. Fill in the gaps in the alphabet (you can give the pieces of the alphabet).

7. Rewrite the letters in the alphabetical order.

8. The lower part of the word is closed; guess the word by the upper part. Name it and finish writing it.

9. Write and name the letter or letter which can render the following sounds: [ei] – a, ai, ay, e (café), et (ballet)

10. Name each word twice: pointing to its transcription and to its spelling.

11. Find and read the word which does not correspond to the transcription (which doesn’t sound like that): [sel] – sell, sail, cell

12. Match the familiar words and their partial transcriptions: though, through, thought, enough, cough, laugh ([-a:f])

13. Name the missing letter, write it in and name the whole word: m…ther, f…ther, s..n, d..ughter.

14. Find a rhyme for each of these words

right eight me saw sale

due meal talk break go

15. Fill in the necessary letters or letters: pri..e [prais]

16. Group unfamiliar words into 4 columns according to the transcription: pool, cost, tune, etc.

17. Change the order of the letter to get familiar words

18. Make as many words as you can using the key-word, e.g. “demonstration”

19. Write and pronounce the familiar and unfamiliar word in Past Simple: prefer, interfere, admire, murmur, whisper, occur

20. Reconstruct the infinitives: hoping, hopping

21. Fill in the right word:

He is stronger … his brother. (than, then)

22. Spell the unfamiliar words dictated by the teacher.

23. Who wrote each word: a British or an American?

Teaching punctuation. Generally speaking, English punctuation obeys the same laws as Russian. But there are certain differences. Teach children to capitalize names of months and days, words which accompany geographical names, Miss Black, Mr. Green, Dr. Brown, President Obama, Professor Kolker)))

Generally you use a full stop, or a period in directed speech before the inverted comma. Use a full stop before decimal fractions (2.67 – 2 point six seven,.71 = naught point seven one, point seven one)

Use a comma:

§ before the direct speech.

§ in an enumeration before the final ‘and’

§ in numerals before billions, millions, thousands, hundreds

§ to clarify the meaning of the utterance (Candidates should answer the questions A or B, and C. vs. Candidates should answer the questions A, or B and C.

Do not use a comma

§ before objective causes: They told me _ that…

§ before and after attributing clauses restricting the object

Use a hyphen for numerals from twenty-one to ninety-nine. Don’t use hyphen in telephone numbers.

Correction of spelling mistakes.

§ Ask the question that brings forth the rule

§ You can write the transcription that illustrates the wrong spelling

§ Remind them of a Russian word of the same root

§ Ask to specify what the student meant

Dictations are useful as they teach more than spelling or punctuation. They also teach immediate memory and to decipher phrases which sound alike, i.e. to understand ambiguity. It is in dictations that students decipher difference between “they are at home” and “their home”. The whole dictation is read to the students, it is dictated sentence by sentence and only twice. The sentences are read at normal speed, but the teachers can make longer pauses between the sentences or even between phrases such as clauses. There is also such a thing as a self-dictation: the students read or listen to a text, try to memorize it and then write it down from memory. Then they can re-read it / re-listen to it and report on their performance.

Teaching writing. During the early stages there is not much difference between oral and written utterances. Written utterances help to enhance oral skills.

1. Что ты видишь на картинке? – It is a red cup. It is a little boy.

2. Use these questions to make a plan of your own utterance: Do you have a pet? What colour is it? What can it do? What animal is it? Is it big or small?

3. Historical present. Look at the set of pictures and write a narrative completing these sentences: “It is a … day. …snowing. There are….. They are…Then the big boys start…”

4. Exchange the pictures you made and let your desk mate describe your picture in writing.

5. Writing an informal note. “Write at least 3 complements”. The style of a friendly note should be neutral or in informal colloquial style.

Specific writing skills. Teaching to write richly textured sentences. Teach to write descriptive sentences by showing the order in which attributes follow each other. You teach them to describe a ready-made object. “Cat – angora – black – fluffy – charming” = a charming fluffy black angora cat. “In the doorway there stood a … woman”. (pleasant-looking – ugly, smiling – grim-looking)

Fill in the necessary missing characteristics on your own. “I like our … school library”.

Cumulative sentences – simple with one predicate only with lots of descriptive words which gradually accumulate into a vivid image. They can be expressed by adjectives, absolute constructions, and participles. They are relatively independent and separated by comma; they come after the principle clause (or sometimes before). These cumulative details are called free modifiers and they can be of 2 kinds; they can specify the whole picture (specification) or they can specify separate aspects of the whole picture (division).

1. Choose the description which corresponds to the writer’s objective.

It is a nice room for a translator to work in:

§ with a sofa, tow big armchairs and a big round table;

§ with a computer on the desk, a shelf with dictionaries, and not a sound coming from the outside

2. Choose division: It wasn’t a particularly nice day – I mean … and Brian had warned us about the sea.

3. Restriction: “Tiger is a beautiful big Asian animal, with a strong body, stripped skin, and sharp teeth”.

Narration. You start teaching a summary in the following way. You give them a text to select ready-made sentences that make a summary.

1. Sum up the text answering the questions below.

2. Syntactical compression (based on questions), but 2-3 questions must be answered in one sentence. “Had the letter-box been open yet or not? Where did Jan climb? Did he look himself in or not? (Finding that) (and) = Finding that the letter box had been left open, Jan climbed into it and looked himself in ”.

3. Lexical compression – use 1 word instead of several which embraces all the means. “He is never at a loss. He never gives way to despair. He can always find a way out. = He is a) resourceful; b) optimistic; c) energetic; d) intelligent.

A summary of two or more texts.

1. Show the similarities: Both (all the) texts deal with… Both authors share…

2. Give additional information: Besides, the first author says…

3. Give details and facts: The first author, unlike the other…

4. Give a conclusion about all the texts.

It is useful to teach students a narrative text to decide on the importance of separate narrative details and their place in the story. Read a short story and decide if anything can be sacrificed. Explain why and why not.

The next thing to teach is to acquaint students with the strategy of influencing the reader. Use examples, definitions, classifications, comparison of different kinds (on the basis of similarity, contrast, and analogy).

§ Fill in the gaps with the best definitions, analogy among those given to you (of your own)

An essay is a complete piece of discourse which can be written in any of the modes of discourse (it can be descriptive, narrative, explanatory, argumentative). An essay has a specific shape.

§ Write out from the text the phrase which can serve as the chief statement.

§ Formulate in a sentence the purpose of the author.

§ Read the opening statement and formulate what the text is likely to be about

§ Read the opening statement and a set of questions that can be asked by a potential reader. Arrange the questions in the order in which they are likely to be answered.

§ Read the following short narration/description. Change or add whatever necessary to turn the text into an explanatory one.

§ Read a short argumentative text. Write out or name the thesis and anti-thesis. If they are given in one sentence, subdivide it in two.

§ Write our or name all the arguments supporting the thesis and the anti-thesis and some more arguments and counter-arguments of your own.

 

The structure of a lesson. General regularities

1. The main stages of a FL classHe

2. Types of lessons and the criteria underlying them

3. The connections (ties) between the tasks of a lesson

4. The structure of a task

5. The format of a lesson plan

The main stages of a FL class are practically the same as those of skill-formation (presentation, practice, performance):

1. the introductory stage (организационный этап): greeting, insuring order (standing straight, their work places), checking attendance, etc; presenting the goals of the lesson (“Today you must learn to give commands to people who are absent”.) Explaining the goal directly is only one possible strategy. It works well when the goal becomes personally meaningful to the learner. It can be presented:

§ as a game to be played (at pre-school level or first-from level);

§ as skills to be acquired (at the remaining levels);

§ as a warming-up activity (=речевая зарядка);

§ as a brainstorming activity;

§ as a solution of an intellectual challenge;

§ as a passing remark, a joke, a paradox, a maxim;

§ as an allusion to a familiar book or film.

2. the stage of presentation (этап ознакомления) may sometimes merge with the introductory stage, e.g. a teacher draws students’ attention to the sentence on the blackboard, he/she asks questions and explains the rules. Presentation may come a little later after so-called phonetic drill. Phonetic drill comes before presentation if the latter is brief and mostly conducted in English. It comes after presentation if the latter involves a lot of Russian for comparative analysis. Sometimes presentation may even come in the middle of a lesson, e.g. before introducing special questions we might review the use of general questions in a couple of drills. Phonetic drill may be multifunctional, i.e. besides pure sounds and intonation patterns we may work on memory, logic and various intellectual operations (selection, classification, re-arrangement, grammar/communicative choices). It is important that linguistic difficulty does not increase. (“What’s the good of tea without …?” – chocolate/milk/a piece of lemon).

Presentation should:

§ precede practice;

§ be laconic (therefore, formulated in advance);

§ focused on the essentials (when presenting the articles, do not go into details about using them with names);

§ involve the learner (either in discovering the rule or in putting it to test);

§ be mistake-proof and functional, not merely descriptive, i.e. it should be a usable algorithm (an anti-example of an explanation: The Present Perfect Tense means an action that happened recently (How recently???) and is connected with the present (“They showed this film last week” is connected with the present too!);

§ consider the specific difficulties caused by the native language interference (there is no need to explain the difference “must” and “can” whereas there is a problem in differentiating between “must have done” and “should have done”)

3. the stage of practice. The sequencing of tasks depends on the group. In a more advanced group it can start with Link 4; in a slow group communicative drill is preceded by Link 3 tasks. Simulation drills are useful, but whenever possible, offer authentic motivation and make them truly communicative without additional language challenges (Cf. practice in using the structure “see smb. do smth.” – make one sentence out of two, or:

Why do you think it was Bill who took the money? – Because I saw him take it!

Can a bird attack a dog? – No, I’ve never seen a bird attack a dog!

Never finish a class with a mechanical pseudo-communication. (Listen and say that you did it too.) Simulation may involve some emotional response.

4. the stage of performance. It is advisable not to impose tasks on the learners but to give them whenever possible a variety of issues. Some topics may be too personal (describe the furniture of your room, the members of your family). Remember to assess not only the language accuracy but first and foremost, apropriacy and logic. React to what you hear not only as a teacher but also as a sympathetic listener.

5. the concluding stage (завершающий этап) sums up the results of the lesson. The teacher tries to elicit information from the learners about what they have learnt as they see it. Sometimes the teacher may comment. Give them their home task, it should be written on the blackboard for them to take down. A typical difficulty must be analyzed in class. You give them marks, you can evaluate every student or only some of them, or for a specific task. Their marks should always be motivated.

The opening and the concluding stages and the practice are indispensible at a secondary school.

Main types of lessons. The main criteria of classifying lessons.

1. Is there presentation as a separate stage of the lesson?

2. Does the lesson have one chief goal or two?

3. Is the lesson focused on developing basic skills or functional skills?

Types of lessons according to these criteria:

1. A grammar class with the stage of presentation

2. A grammar class without the stage of presentation

3. A vocabulary class with the stage of presentation

4. A vocabulary class without the stage of presentation

5. A grammar + vocabulary class (double-focused): if there is a presentation in such a class, then only in one aspect!

6. A lesson focused on teaching monologue

7. A lesson focused on teaching dialogue or general discussion

8. A lesson focused on “close” (=observational) reading

9. A lesson focused on scanning and searching reading

10. A listening + speaking class

11. A listening + reading class

12. A double-focused class, developing both a certain basic and functional skills

The connections (ties) between the tasks of a lesson. No task should be “hanging loose”. Everything we were doing during the lesson should come in handy in the final tasks. You should time your class very carefully; you should not e.g. introduce the new vocabulary within the last three minutes of the class. It is true when your class is double-focused, a chain of connected tasks may be dropped for some time, i.e. may remain “hanging loose”, but only to join another chain however short in at least one task.

1. Determination (соподчинение) – the previous task is always simpler than the next and helps the learners to cope with it. This arrangement best answers the philosophy of a snowballing lesson in which each new task has one new challenge. Tasks connected by determination can never change places. This arrangement is ideal but unfortunately it is not always possible.

2. Though determination may form a kind of back bone of the lesson, but we have to use other ways of connecting exercises. When explaining things (grammar, vocabulary) to the learners, we have to consider different aspects – the word order, the meaning, etc. And then we have to give 2 or 3 tasks which belong to the same level of difficulty and which can often change places, which relate to same language phenomenon but which do not help each other at all. We call them “ constellation ”. E.g. introduction of the definite article – the. The learners can’t pronounce [ð].

1) Show your cards for the articles: Где собака? Давай подарим ей сумочку!

2) Pronunciation drill: Pete an d B en, a desk an d a map

3. Within the “constellation” you have to bring the tasks together – unification. The unifying task makes equal use of the results gained in the previous constellated task.

3) Which of these things go together naturally? Use them in pairs. Use articles where necessary.

Dog, cat, tea, meat, jam, cake, desk, knife, lamp, apple, map, pen, pencil, book.

4) Will you use the Active or Passive voice when translating these sentences:

Теперь дома строятся за полгода. Солдаты построились по команде. Шесть делится на три. Он делится с друзьями всем, что имеет.

5) Give the 3^rd form of these verbs: take, bring, buy,… etc. Then give back translation: купленный, отданный, принесенный и пр.

6) Open the brackets using the right Tense and Voice:

I try to cope on my own; I hate (to ask) for help.

 

4. Overlapping. Tasks related in this way belong to the same level of difficulty and can change places. They are inherently related by a common skill whether basic or functional, by a common intellectual operation. They need not be specially unified but they may just as well be.

Same basic skill, same operation.

Task 1. Listen and express your surprise:

- I found a gold ring yesterday. – ''What did you buy?

Task 2. Ask me to specify the information.

I came home very late yesterday. – When did you come home?

Task 3. Listen to 2 different opinions and agree with either paraphrasing it:

a) A cell phone is no luxury. b) A mobile phone is not as necessary as many people think.

- I also feel one can’t do without a cell phone.

Reasons to use overlapping: we use it at the stage of practice to ensure a sufficient amount of drill and to avoid monotony. It makes the end of the lesson more flexible, resilient. You can finish the lesson with two or more overlapping tasks. If your students do one of the tasks is sufficient; the aim of the lesson will have been achieved. Besides, they get greater freedom in preferring this or that option to start with. Sometimes you can offer one of the remaining tasks for homework.

6. Inclusion is somewhat akin to determination. In case of inclusion the previously done task is done again by another student as part of a more comprehensive task.

Read the text about the Olympic Games and find all the facts which prove that the Olympic Games have always promoted peace.

Look through the text again and find all the information which shows why the Olympic Games are so popular.

The structure of a task. A task can be treated as the minimal unit of a lesson possessing all its characteristics. The task may a rather complex structure.

- A stimulating introduction (to motivate the learners and make the task more authentic)

- Directions (WHAT is to be done)

- Rationale (WHY it is to be done)

- Attention pointers (= HOW to do it correctly and effectively, what mistakes to avoid)

- Material to operate with (or reference to the page in the textbook). Sometimes no material is given at all especially when it is an authentic task.

- One or more samples. At least one sample is necessary when the task is of a new type and two samples are most welcome when you are afraid that all your students will give you practically the same utterance making the most trivial decisions.

Teaching English at the elementary stage

The present day educational policy in Russia is to introduce FL studies in the 1^st form in order to make the best advantage of the most impressionable years of schoolchildren in which languages are allegedly acquired easily and naturally. The greatest problem of learning a FL at the beginning of the1st form is the necessity of acquiring two alphabetical systems at once – i.e. literacy (foreign and native languages). The processes reading and writing in 2 languages are related to the same areas in the brain and a lot of interference. During the early stages preference is given to aural skills – listening and speaking. During the period of aural skill development learners are to assimilate the alphabet and the basic letter-sound relationships – the rules of reading. That’s why in some textbooks for first graders authors introduce specific characters – Mr. Letter and Mr. Tongue, or Mr. Rule. Unfortunately, there is no exact correspondence between the order of presenting sounds and letters. Letters are sometimes in the alphabetical order (a letter per lesson). That is why during the first lessons first graders have nothing to rely on but pictures and Russian directions. To compensate for it, teachers try to use direct demonstration in order to explain grammar structures. E.g. “Enjoy English” – a whole system of symbols is introduced:

Посмотри на 2 зашифрованных рассказа и выбери тот, в котором Красная Шапочка рассказывает о себе. Расшифруй его.

Psychological peculiarities of young learners. 4 stages of cognitive development:

1. Sensorimotor stage – birth to 2 years

2. Preoperational Stage – 2 years to 6 years

3. Concrete Operations – 7-11 years

4. Formal Operations (abstract thinking) – from 12 years onwards

Early schoolchildren need tangible things to assist learning (toys, cards, pictures, etc.); rely more on imagery than on logic; focus on playing as the target activity, while learning English is but a means to an end; are incapable of producing a monologue of considerable length, even in the mother tongue. If you want a lengthy description let it be a joint effort. They main even remain silent for some time (the so-called latent period). They are emotionally vulnerable.

Unlike per-school children early school children already begin to develop logical thinking, that is why they can acquire the language consciously though the rules given to the young learners would be quite different. They are based on images, games, pictures, analogy: Буква О пошла в гости к согласным; она устала и когда пришла, села на лавку и вздохнула [ou]!

Lexical units are selected according to the age: fairy tales, animated cartoons, computer games are necessitate introduction of exotic animals and movements (crawl, fly, climb). This is a good to provide exercise in class. There can be games like the following: one of the students shows the movements, the others guess what it is. I am an animal. I can do many things – fly, run, but I can’t climb.

Dogs can swim. – yes! Cats can fly – no!

Movements necessitate the introduction of “can” and “can’t”. All groups of vocabulary serve the means of each other, no word can remain idle.

Young school children quickly get tired – there should be more switching over from one activity to another. The integrity of a class as viewed by the learners is ensured by a ‘scenario’. They need to be given rigid forms of drills, but they should be camouflaged as communication. It is useful to work in chains.

Receptive tasks can be very simple in language and logic but they can provide intellectual challenge. (Listen and guess what animal it is.) (Look at the pictures and the captures under them. Is it necessary to change them?) (Look at the pictures and name those you can take with you to the country, to your friend’s birthday party etc.)

These learners enjoy language puzzles (tangible handouts). You can hand out letter; they select the letters, give them to the neighbor to re-arrange the letters in the word. (Which letter is lost? Get it out of the box and name it)

Sometimes activities can include drawing which prevents monotony and develop imagination.

When evaluating students’ performance, remember the extra-linguistic aspect too. (Кто лучше всех жестами показал животное?)

When they start to read, they can use ready-made patterns. You may use pictures that create a problem; you can use a part of the picture which makes it possible to guess the object but with some difficulty. You can turn it into a game – wrap an object into some paper and make the learners guess. It is useful to give rhymes to little children. They produce emotional effect, they are easily remembered; they provide useful speech patterns: Take it, Mag, it’s a bag. Take it, Ben, it’s a pen.

К нам в гости придут Том и Алиса. Вот что у нас есть еще на столе: plates, spoons, bread… Чего еще не хватает, чтобы хорошо принять и угостить их? It may be a competition between two teams. How will suggest more variants?