UNIT 25 SELECTION AND USE OF SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIALS AND ACTIVITIES

As we know in education and specially when teaching a second language, we must have a diverse choice of supplementary materials for our classes, the use of books which include grammar, vocabulary, phonology practice materials, collections of communicative activities, teacher’s resources and web materials. Supplementary materials could be also newspapers, magazines, articles videos, etc. these types of materials are called authentic sources.

To fit these materials into our syllabus, we have to get the right choice from them, according to the purpose we want to gain from those sources and answering the question will be adequate according to my student’s level? If we do that we will have a successful class with a huge variety of learning opportunities for our students.

Here there are some selection of classroom aids

Aids:

Resources and equipment available to use in the classroom, as well as the resources we can bring into the classroom are:

•          Cassette recorders

•          CD players

•          Video recorders

•          Overhead projectors

•          Beamer

•          Visual aids

•          Realia

•          Flashcards

•          Puppets

Source: Spratt, M., Pulverness, A., & Williams, M. (2011). The Teachink Knowledge Tests Course . United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press.

UNIT 24 SELECTION AND USE OF COURSEBOOK MATERIALS

One of the main questions to answer while we select to use coursebook materials would be how do we select and use coursebook materials?

 Coursebook materials are all the materials in coursebook package that we use in a classroom. Teachers often base their selection of teaching material on a “needs analysis”. Here we have to think carefully on the things

To build up a class profile we have to consider the gender, the amount of students we have, the age, the average of percentage of students.

To choose our coursebook, we need to answer some important questions. The right chose depends on the answers to those questions: Is the material visually attractive? Is the material well organized? Is it culturally appropriate? Is it suitable for your learners’ age and their needs and interests? Will the topics be motivating to suit their age, gender, experience, and personal interests of your learners? Is the material at the right level? Does it give learners enough opportunities to use the language?

In case that we couldn’t have the expectations we had about the coursebooks, we should do the following.

·         Replace the coursebook material.

·         You need to use materials with the same focus/aims from the other resource.

·         Some examples: teachers’ website or supplementary materials.

·         The other choice is to adapt the coursebook material.

·         You can change it to make it suitable for you students.

·         There are many ways you can use to adapt material that is not suitable. Here are some ideas
Source: Spratt, M., Pulverness, A., & Williams, M. (2011). The Teachink Knowledge Tests Course . United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press.

UNIT 23 CONSULTING REFERENCE RESOURCES TO HELP IN LESSON PREPARATION

The main question in this unit would it be how do we consult reference resources?

First of all we have to know what reference resources are. Reference resources are all the sources of information about language and about teaching that we can refer to for help in lesson preparation. They include reference materials.

Reference materials are: dictionaries, books, grammar books articles, magazines about the language.

Supplementary materials in a coursebook: Phonetic charts, list of irregular verbs, websites on the internet.

As well as the materials are considered as resource materials, we have to consider that people are also called resources like the department of colleagues who teach foreign languages or from other subjects.

All the materials or resources can be found in physical or on the net, so it is important that if we use the internet, we have to find relevant information.
When we think about other kind of resources to help our lesson preparation, we have to denote the necessities that our students have and also what we expect from them. As teachers, we have to push forward our students spectations by pointing different tasks to be developed.
Source: Spratt, M., Pulverness, A., & Williams, M. (2011). The Teachink Knowledge Tests Course . United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press.

UNIT 22 CHOOSING ASSESSMENT ACTIVITIES

Assessment means collecting information about learner’s performance, progress or attitudes in order to make judgments about students learners. At the moment of assessing students, we can choose from informal or formal assessment.

Informal Assessment: this type of assessment can be taken just by monitoring a lesson

Formal Assessment: this kind of assessment might be taken through tests and examinations and grade will be given to the students.

These are some types of assessment

1.      Cloze test

2.      Gap-fill

3.      Jumbled sentences

4.      Sentence transformation

5.      Proofreading

6.      Multiple-choice questions

7.      True/False/Don’t know (T/F/DK) questions

8.      Information transfer

9.      Matching

10.  Sequencing

11.  Dictation

12.  Summary writing

13.  Guided discovery

14.  Interview

15.  Information-gap

  In Conclusion at the time of assessing students, we have to mix both informal and formal assessment because not everything needs a grade. We also have to understand that not every student is going to respond as the way we would like.

Here there are some cites in which you’ll be able to find more information about assessing students.

http://www.scholastic.com/teachers/article/formal-versus-informal-assessments

http://www.uri.edu/hss/education/to/assess_stu_learning.pdf
Source: Spratt, M., Pulverness, A., & Williams, M. (2011). The Teachink Knowledge Tests Course . United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press.