Mar 11 assignment:my lesson plan March 18, 2008

Lesson Plan Book 2 Unit 1 Images of Animals

Purpose: 1.   make students know the different cultural images of animals between Chinese and English.

   2.   require students searching both English and Chinese proverbs related to animals.

   3.   1^st Sentence Pattern: Dative Verb& 2^nd Sentence Pattern

   4.    introduce students about the transitional word and the format about English composition

Time: 6 classes

Class	Date	Content	Materials
1st		1. Warm-up activities ¨ Adjectives that modify animals(p3,6reading comprehesion) 2. Vocabulary teaching (1-16) HW1: preview /review vocabulary and phrase HW2 :search both English and Chinese proverbs related to animals
2nd		1. Share the search result (groups) 2. Vocabulary and phrase teaching (v:13-19, p: 1-11) HW 1: Prepare the quiz on vocabulary and phrase HW 2: preview the reading
3rd		1. Vocabulary Quiz 2. Listening to the reading 3. Reading (content and language) teaching HW: preview /review reading	Reading CD
4th		1. Reading (content and language) teaching 2. discussions(p7, 16,extended content) HW: preview /review reading
5th		1. reading review(including aural practicing) 2. sentence pattern1 teaching 3. introduction of composition format and transitional words(handout) HW 1: Exercises(p13) in the textbook HW 2: review the composition handout
6th		1. Check the answers of exercise1 in the textbook(p13) 2. sentence pattern2 teaching 3. composition format and transitional words teaching(handout) HW1: Exercises(p14,15) in the textbook WH2:use the format to write a short composition/paragraph involved transitional words WH3:Prepare unit quiz

p.s I revised it from the sample 1 teacher gave us, and I just roughly put my ideas about the whole lesson. I havn’t build the category of  time management, so some of them  mayseem ridiculous …..  

reflection about the EFL class on Mar 18 March 18, 2008

I had to say that this week class really “shocked” me a lot. After the second group’s presentation,  the professor asked us to prepare vocabulary teaching in 15 minutes.  Actually, for me, at that short 15 minutes my brain only could go through some traditional teaching ways like syntactic categories analysis or  translation, etc. However, the impromptu the two classmates presented for us really made me surprised! ” Wow! I havn’t thought that definitions also can be taught as a vocabluary teaching materials.”  I believe it would be a good lesson for me to absorb others’ inspiration, and I also have to read more and think more. Hope that one day I can be a creative teacher:-)

questions about lesson plan March 17, 2008

The following are some questions and answers (some are summarized from materials and some are from self view) about the lesson plan.
1. What should go into an Englishlesson?
Engage- make students interest in our lesson/teaching.
Study- focus on materials’ language, also it should cover the taught material
Activate- require students producing their own works related some knowledge taught before.
2. What is a lesson plan?
For me, lesson plan means a blueprint about the process of the whole class. Though the practical teaching wouldn’t absolutely follow the original plan, teachers still have a prediction about the class and won’t be feel very nervous and helpless before the class beginning. It can be a note or a complete plan, and they all depend on teacher’s convenience.
3. Why is planning important?
It can help teachers to clean their thought and set their goals about the new knowledge” students should learn from the lesson. Teachers also can through this work adjust the teaching order and make it more appropriate.
4. What are the principles of planning?
Aim- knows what the students’ prior knowledge is and what they need or want to know.
Flexibility-teachers should prepare some extra tasks or materials for the accidental time.
Mood- not only students but also teachers should keep a good relationship in class and make the class go on fluently.
                                                                                            

reflection about the EFL class on Mar 4 March 9, 2008

For me, the second class really broadened my eye sight. I havn’t imagined that  such great technological programs or websites could help teachers integrating technology into our language class. I’ve known that some teachers would use their teaching platforms , and students are required to leave comments or fb to others in the discussion section. Also, students can download some materials teacher uploaded. It’s amazing that there still have so many creative room for teachers enhancing their teaching technique.
From this class, I discover that teachers wouldn’t require students do their paper personal learning portfile anymore; instead, students can through writing the blog regularly post their assignments, and it has so many advantages. One is that students can design their own blogs presentation and make it privercy. Sencond, teachers and students can use the “bloglines” checking classmates’ new posts and giving latest fb. Third, after the class end it is convenient for students  continuously buliding their e-portfile and revising it. Moreover, besides the blogs teachers can use advanced teaching assistant and make students communicate or exchange their learning productions on the web. In shore, if teachers know how to properly utilize the technology, language teaching(learning) would be so fun.

two questions from 10 language teaching approach March 3, 2008

Question 1: Which of these approaches do you hope will have more influence on your teaching in future?                                                                                                                              

I hope I can simultaneously use the communicative language teaching and affective humanistic approaches. I was under the traditional teaching environment that teachers mainly focused on learners’ linguistic knowledge but lost the attentions on their individual varieties. But actually each learner has their own learning style and personal factors influenced on their learning consequence. I would stand a position of counselor and facilitator and help learners communicate and interact in the class in TL. Furthermore, the course would be student- centered and teacher would make students discuss in their group. I assume students can trough the authentic communications gain some confidence on self English learning. I would primarily focus on learners’ TL fluency and secondary on their accuracy. I consider that students can gradually self correct and watch out their own feeling on the process of learning.

Question 2: What strategies will you use to make your teaching more effective and meaningful?                                                                                                                               

I would use cognitive, CLT and task- based approach to facilitate my teaching. I would stress on students’ learning and thinling.  Also I would see each student as a isolated individual that one should responsible for his or her own learning. My potential students would be the high school academic level, so I assume they have the ability of self correction and I wouldn’t mainly focus on their pronunciation. Instead, I would choose to emphasize on their whole language skill separately. L, R, W, and S should all be emphasized. However, I would apply task- based approach and make students communicate and learn from activities. Also through peer correction, students can reduce their anxiety about TL learning and gradually reach the goal of SLA.