Methodology 1

1. INTRODUCTION

The design and implementation of this task and activities were developed by me and for my students at Colegio Hebreo Monte Sinai. The principal language focus for the lesson is the presentation and practice of the auxiliary SHOULD, I will present a detailed lesson plan for this class (see appendix 1) as well as the analysis of the successful and less successful elements in the lesson, including the aspects that influenced those elements in a negative or positive way. Besides this, I will mention the changes that need to be made in the plan. As a final part, I considered some aspects for my further professional development.

1. SUCCESSFUL ELEMENTS

1.1 Achievement of Learning Objectives

Students were able to use the auxiliary SHOULD, to build different examples. They talked about what they should do at different places and circumstances. They were able to give their classmates ADVICE, ask questions as well as provide short responses.

1.2 Design and Implementation of Tasks and Activities

A game-like activity was implemented to provide more practice. It is called “What should I do” (see appendix 2). Although I did not expect it to be so attractive for the students, they seemed very interested and didn’t want to stop playing. Therefore, I consider it as successful. In fact, I think games are an important tool when teaching. I definitely agree with Larsen-Freeman’s idea:

'”Games also help the teacher to create contexts in which the language is useful and meaningful. The learners want to take part and in order to do so must understand what others are saying or have written, and they must speak or write in order to express their own point of view or give information.'” Andrew Wright, David Betteridge and Michael Buckby Cambridge University Press, 1984.

1.3 Teacher and Learner Language

First of all students were producing the language I expected, using the auxiliary SHOULD. Secondly, I achieved my personal objectives as I reduced my teacher talking time and gave them the chance to practice since practice is basic for students to learn in part-time language lessons.

2. LESS SUCCESSFUL ELEMENTS

2.1 Designing and Implementing Tasks and Activities

Stating what President John F. Kennedy once said; “Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.” And changing the modal CAN for SHOULD, I asked SS after finishing their game activity to write sentences about what politicians SHOULD do for our country. The result was not completely what I expected because students had problems with vocabulary. I provide them with some words related to politics; therefore, they took a long time thinking what to write.

2.2 Classroom Management

Instead of following the usual pattern of presenting students with gap exercises I used a broad variety of contexts.

The students alternated between class discussion, working in pairs, and individually when writing sentences, providing a balance between hands-on practice and discussion (testing one's understanding against that of another).

By sharing opinions, students deepen their discovery of the meaning of a modal verb SHOULD and possibly modify their understanding. Again, the approach of this lesson was one of induction and discovery, based primarily on experiment and feedback/discussion. No explicit right/wrong judgments were given by me.

Beyond this there was no balance between strong and weak students which is important as Harmer mentions:

“One suggestion is that pairs and groups should have a mixture of weaker and stronger students. In such groups the more able students can help their less fluent or knowledgeable colleagues; the process of helping will help such strong students to understand more about the language themselves. The weaker students will benefit from the help they get.” (Harmer, 2004, p. 121)

Of course this was evident because the stronger groups completed the sentence task first. In spite of this, everybody worked well and all activities planned ended by the time planned.

3. LESSON PREPARATION

3.1 Aspects that Contributed to Successful Elements

One aspect that facilitated the use of SHOULD was an activity called “An advice contest” which allowed students to brainstorm multiple ideas and choose the best. It was wonderful to see the partners listing 4-6 suggestions to each other, and using the proper grammar structure the whole time.

I feel that it was very important for them to practice, so I used a set of picture cards (see appendix 3) following Harmer’s idea (2004) that by using interesting pictures at least some of the students might be more interested. He refers to the more visual oriented individuals and how they can get engaged with the activity. Therefore, I had to be aware of the variety, so I could reach to a certain point, my students’ learning styles.

Even though the previous material and the game-like activity were controlled type, they provided the practice students needed in this level. As Harmer mentions (2004), these kinds of activities are focused on a particular language item and students have few opportunities of not using it.

Finally, I need to mention that having in mind the importance of me speaking less and doing it as I taught the lesson definitely was helpful for my students. I provided the input my students needed, which Harmer (2004) mentions as “something teachers are capable of doing” And “it is in the classroom where students get the language that is comprehensible for them”

3.2 Aspects that Contributed to Less Successful Elements

Recalling the written task mentioned before, the lack of vocabulary was something that did not help. Another possible reason is the topic because not everyone knows a lot about politics, so it could’ve been worth talking about something else. For example a list of bad habits or perhaps better routes to go to school.

Group distribution was another aspect that did not facilitate students’ work. I did not pay attention and consider Harmer’s suggestion of mixing students according to their abilities (2004).

4. CHANGES TO THE LESSON AND PLAN

There are two basic changes I would make to my plan and the lesson. The first one would be providing a list of new vocabulary words for students to use in their sentences not limiting them from using their own ideas. This way, students will not feel frustrated about not knowing what to write or not finishing the activity. The second one would be paying more attention to the grouping of students, so that they benefit from each

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