News Broadcast in Postmodernism

>
> 1.       Choose an area of interest: political conflict, science and
> technology, government, social classes
>
> 2.       Work in pairs. Search for a possible piece of news (broadcasted)
> related to the chosen are of interest. There are two possible websites:
> http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8004316/ns/video (more liberal);
> http://video.foxnews.com/ (more conservative).
>
> 3.       Check the following links:
>
> http://rhetorica.net/bias.htm
>
> http://www.media-awareness.ca/english/resources/educational/handouts/broadca
> st_news/bw_bias_in_the_news.cfm
>
> 4.       Summarize the piece of news and provide your critical opinion.
> Upload both your opinion and the video in your blog.
>

Methodology II

Hi there!
In methodology II we will be working with "Materials". Each of you must bring a textbook for the second session of this week. Try to get one from your family or friends...or buy one. I don't want the ones from the library this time because you need to explore a wide variety od cousebooks. If you don't bring one, you won't be able to carry out the proposed activity, so GET YOURS :)

List of Bloggers, Methodology II, Day class

Welcome!
http://teaching-the-future.blogspot.com/ Claudio Pérez

http://englishallover.blogspot.com/ Juan Alcafus

http://eslteachersandstudents.blogspot.com/ Karina Lorenzen

http://knowledgeandlearnigenglish.blogspot.com/ Evelyn Morales

http://crissteaching.blogspot.com/  Jorge Contreras

http://classeswithcristian.blogspot.com/ Cristian Gonzalez
http://englishinpratice.blogspot.com/ Pamela Alvarado
http://bl2g-celeste.blogspot.com/ Celeste Uribe
http://katherineberrios.blogspot.com/Katherine Berrios
http://actuallymissdi.blogspot.com/ Diana Salinas
http://englishworldspot.blogspot.com/ Romina Mino

List of bloggers, Methodology I, Night Class

 This is the list of blogs!

http://tobeteacher.blogspot.com/ Claudia Cabrera

http://www.englishclasses2011.blogspot.com/ Mabel Sepúlveda

 http://methodologyintheclass.blogspot.com/ Blanca Fernández
http://aniceteacher.blogspot.com/ Inelia Gòmez
http://alexbuzeta.blogspot.com/ Alejandro Buceta

Syllabus template

SYLLABUS TEMPLATE

[Course number and title]

[Term]

Instructor: [Names] [Office, e-mail, phone]

Office Hours: [Scheduled + by appointment? Virtual Office Hours?]

Location in the Curriculum:

Course Description:

Course Objectives: These should be written as learning outcomes or competency based objectives.

By the end of this course, students will:

List as specifically as possible the learning outcomes the course is intended to produce. Think about the kinds of evidence you will need to assess the students’ learning as the objectives should drive the assessment and grading schema. Kinds of evidence can be manifest in what students say, do, think and/or feel. A well stated objective has two components: substance (content/subject matter) and form: what action must the student perform with regards to the substance (compare and contrast, evaluate, analyze, apply, etc.). It may be helpful to use verbs that correspond with Benjamin Bloom’s taxonomy

Course Format:

Course Requirements: (Including class attendance, participation, class norms, assignments, and grading procedures) Faculty must specify the weight that each student assignment will contribute to the final course grade and include this information in the course syllabus.

Required Texts:

Supplemental Readings:

Required Readings (Specify if readings are on e-reserve or posted on Moodle)

Course Schedule by Session and list of readings for each:

Date/Session number	Objectives/Skills	Activities/materials

http://www.nwlink.com/~donclark/hrd/bloom.html

SIMCE Inglés 2010....what is the next step?

Today we got the results of this Chilean test http://www.simce.cl/index.php?id=941. It is important to reflect on the importance of measuring and ranking what the students are learning. There are new attempts by the MINEDUC to provide both quantitative and qualitative information; however, the ranking is the  information sticked in everyone's mind when finding out the results. It is important to find a balance between the skills to be developed, the syllabus in force and the instrument which is used to measure the student's performance. To sucessed in this type of examinations, it is important to make explicit the componets of the syllabus: the objectives, the content, the procedures in the classroom and the assessment. To attempt the best achievement possible we need to aid the learners during the different processes, considering the specific factors without forgetting the final aim.

Only 11% of Chilean teenagers can understand basic communicative needs. This corresponds to level A1 in the CEF. http://www.linguanet-europa.org/pdfs/global-scale-grid-en.pdf. Most of them are from private schools.  Having qualified and commited English teachers is a must. Take the challenge of being part of a change. English Simce 2010, results

http://noticias.123.cl/noticias/20110324_72732c21436b4b1c7ace2e61b1e45b8e.htm

http://latercera.com/noticia/educacion/2011/03/657-353598-9-simce-de-ingles-el-11-de-los-alumnos-comprende-frases-y-textos-breves.shtml

Methodology II (Night Class)

Hi again!
This is the list of bloggers,
http://jlblogdaquinudla.blogspot.com/ José Luis D'aquin

http://pablinglishblog.blogspot.com/ Pablina Ortega

http://mf-realia.blogspot.com/ Marisol Farias

http://updatedenglish-claudy.blogspot.com/ Claudia Rozas

http://englishishappening.blogspot.com/ María Mercedes Yeomas
http://methodologyexperiences.blogspot.com/ César Riquelme
http://diefword.blogspot.com/ Danny Oyarzún
http://teachingisabout.blogspot.com/ Kiria Lastra
http://rebekpino.blogspot.com/ Rebeca Pino

Language and Literature, The Mackay School

Hi Class!
This is the list of blogs up to now....

http://englesmackay.blogspot.com/  Matthew Faille

http://mneuweiler.blogspot.com Matías Neuweiler

http://youssef-postmodernism.blogspot.com/ Youssef Eltit

http://english2013.blogspot.com/  José Manuel Zulueta

http://rodrigo-sifon.blogspot.com/ Rodrigo Sifon
http://vgandaraf95.blogspot.com/ Vicente Gándara
http://mercry3018.blogspot.com/ Matías Valenzuela

http://englishib2013.blogspot.com/ Héctor Zuñiga

http://postengmack.blogspot.com/ Stefan Search
http://leyton0.blogspot.com/ Jose Tomas Leyton  

What about the rest? I hope to have the complete list soon.

Remember that the next post is what we have done with the novel Hard Times today in class. I hope you do your best :)

      

Syllabus Design, Methodology II

Counting the pages and activities proposed in a textbook or printing some pages with grammar and vocabulary is not a real syllabus. It implies considering the needs of the students, the context of the school, the skills to be developed and the materials available. This is a public document so it needs to be clear enough to be understood by any person. It is a general overview and a clear list of the skills, contents, materials and procedures to be followed by the teacher.

Check this site to get further information in your syllabus design.

http://www.englishraven.com/ttools_syllabus.html

Methodology 1 Day Class List of Blogs

List of Bloggers
http://its-mymoon.blogspot.com/ Yasna Roa
http://nataly-jovovich.blogspot.com/ Nataly Pinto
http://christopher-ibacache.blogspot.com/  
http://methodologyniko.blogspot.com/
http://merythodology.blogspot.com/  María del Castillo
http://methoangelo.blogspot.com/ Angelo Messina
http://englishduck.blogspot.com/ Patricio Onetto
http://methodologyjudith.blogspot.com/ Judith
http://susana-ilovemethodology.blogspot.com/ Susana Zapata
http://methodology1katy.blogspot.com/ Katherine Valenzuela
http://methodologyone.blogspot.com/ Neptali Vásquez
http://chelo086.blogspot.com/2011/03/methodology-1.html Marcelo Véliz
http://athanvillaiaz.blogspot.com/ Axel Villagrán
http://denissemethodology.blogspot.com/ Denisse González
http://dannymug.blogspot.com/ Danny Ulloa
http://thisisnotamethodologyblog.blogspot.com/ Francisco Norambuena
www.progressonmypath.blogspot.com Giannina Herrera
http://englishmethod1.blogspot.com/ Francisca Quezada

The Product approach for writing

I absolutely agree with the process approach to teach writing, specially if we talk about beginners. The second language learner is in an interlanguage continum; therefore, he or she is experiencing many interactive processes. These depend on several internal and external factors, in this way, evaluating the production of a text as a product in one specific moment may be unfair and stressful for the learner. When I started teaching, the product approach was the only one I knew, therefore, that's the one that I used. In some way this is more objective to evaluate because you may determine some criteria, for example, grammar, text features and vocabulary to use as parameters, without considering the emotional or social factors that you may observe during the process. Now, as I know both of them I prefer the process approach. I can see that my studets feel more comfortable and motivated in this way.

Ideas from Pre-writing

When I start writing I usually brainstorm and cluster my ideas on a piece of paper. Once I have this sort of sketch, I look for material to support my paragraphs. I also use a lot of questionnning.

Most of my students find pre-writing useless. Students want everything to be instant nowadays. Another problem is that they understand pre-writing and writing as separate stages, i.e. they may use different techniques during pre-writing but start textualizing following new ways of thought. This is very personal and it is connected with the student's learning style.

Overall, I think that pre-writing is very important to activate previous knowledge and retrieve information from the long term memory.

Giving feedback on writing

The first activity I'm going to analyse is a brochure created by the students to promote tourism in our country. This was part of a unit related to this topic and text type. They had time to research in order to have information to use according to the different parts of a brochure. I think that my feedback was very poor. I just circled or underlined the language patterns that I considered incorrect. I didn't provide the correct answer or talked to the students about it. I didn't give them the opportunity to defend or explain their language choices. I didn't help them to notice what were they doing wrong. The main reason for this lack of professionalism was time and motivation on my side. This is something important to consider, when the teacher is comfortable and motivated with a group, he or she will probably try different ways to guide the learners in a more personalized way. This is what happened but it is not a acceptable excuse. It was, as I mentioned before, my problem as a teacher. I hope this does not happen again.

The second activity I would like to present is the feedback provided for some literary commentaries written by a group of teenagers. They techniqued used in this case was mini-conferences with the students. I read their texts, underlined and took notes in order to explain and discuss with the students other ways to express their ideas or may be reorganize the content or add or leave out information. In this case, I had a very good relationship with the learners and the classrrom environment was very positive. I could notice that the conversation with each student was beneficial.

Affect in speaking lessons

As a foreign language learner I would say that I was shy and usually embarrased to make mistakes in front of my classmates. Most of them had a very good level of English and didn't have many problems to communicate or to use new structures.I think that this interfered with my learning process the first two years because my professors were more concentrated on the product than the process; therefore, If I was not able to show what I was learning in the way they wanted I was ignored or got low marks. After some years, I was gaining more confidence and expressing my ideas in the second language was not a problem anymore. Working in pairs or groups with the guidance of the teacher was the most useful for me. Following models and rehersing before the presentation of a specific task was also of great help. I would say that the activities more related to fluency involving problem solving were more meaningful and helped me to avoid feeling examined every time I tried to speak.

Most of my classmates were different from me. They loved talking and were more proficient (due to different reasons such as, travelling, living in an English speaking country before, or attending bilingual schools). Their personality and accuracy didn't help much in my learning process, because most of the times, I felt that my English was too basic. Nowadays, I have  a mixture of students learning styles and personalities in my groups. Some of them feel that they know everything, so most of the activities are considered boring, in this way, the weaker ones are not very motivated.

To work in a mixed abilities class, it is important to offer a variety of activities and to get to know each learner. I think that it is necessary to have an idea of the student's need and cognitive style to decide which speaking activity would be more useful.

Welcome bloggers!

It is not new to say that language is everywhere. This human faculty allows us to interact in the world we live in. You express your needs, thoughs and emotions through language. When teaching and learning a second language we become aware of the internal and external processes involved in language comprehension and production. Our teaching principles should go according to this real use of the language and not only to learn the surface structure or grammatical competence. Teaching implies many different challenges and teaching a second language involves a double effort. I invite you to enjoy this opportunity to make explicit the inborn capacity of all human beings: learn a language. In the same way, I would like you to be very creative and meet the needs of your future students with dedication, enthusiasm, love and professionalism.

In this blog, I'll share some of the reflections written around language teaching and learning, both in English and Spanish. I invite you to follow the website of the English Department from the school where I work. http://www.mackayzine.cl/ Feel free to send comments :)