TESOL Advanced Program Assignments

1.1 What do the acronyms TESOL, SLA, L1 and L2 stand for?

(1)TESOL: Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages.

(2)SLA: Second Language Acquisition

(3)L1: the first language

(4)L2: the second language

1.2 Describe the “bottom-up”and “top-down”listening process.

(1) ‘bottom-up’ processing: in which listeners attend to data in the incoming speech signals.

(2) ‘top-down’ processing: in which listeners utilize prior knowledge and expectations to create meaning

(3) Both bottom-up and top-down processing are assumed to take place at various levels of cognitive organization:phonological, grammatical, lexical and propositional. This complex process if often described as a ‘parallel processing model’ of language understanding: representations at these various levels create activation at other levels.

(4) Examples:

BOTTOM- UP: You’re going to a city for a trip and you’ve never been there before so you called one of your friends who has been living there for 3 years. She gave you some tips .You wrote down the details and would follow her suggestions.

TOP-DOWN: Your friend finished her master degree in U.S and came back .She will share the experience with you about all the things. You listen carefully   and you must be surprised and express your interests.

2. Name and describe the four fundamental properties.

(1) The phonological system: the phonemes used in a particular language, typically only 30 or 40 out of hundreds of possible phonemes;

(2) Phonotactic rules:the sound sequences that a language allows to make up syllables; ie. Variations of what sounds can start or end syllables, whether the “peak”of the syllable can be a simple or complex or lengthened vowel and whether the ending of the syllable can be a vowel or a consonant;

(3) Tone melodies: the characteristic variations in high, low, rising and falling tones to indicate lexical or discourse meanings.

(4) The stress system: the way in which lexical stress is fixed within an utterance. It can find itself in “bounded or syllable-timed” languages like Spanish or Japanese and “unbounded or stress-timed”languages like Arabic and English.

3. Name and describe three examples of input sources used to teach listening. These audio or video sources can be live or recorded.

(1) Songs: Students will memorize the language and gain a lot of communicative competence. Meanwhile students will know the culture. Using songs can also enrich the class and make students feel relax.

(2) Podcast: It has more information than a song. We can find a talk show or other news information. Using podcast is a very convenient way.

(3) Movies: We can use some movie clips to help students understand how words are used in sentences. Meanwhile, we can adjust the times speed to improve the students’ listening ability.

4. Name and describe the four major processes of speech production.

(1) Conceptualization: Planning the message content. Speakers think about what they will say aided by prior knowledge of the subject.

(2) Formulation: The formulators find the words and phrases to express the meanings, sequencing them and putting in appropriate grammatical makers. It also prepares the sound patterns of the words to be used.

(3) Articulation: It involves the motor control of the articulatory organs; in English: the lips, tongue, teeth, mouth cavity and breath.

(4) Self-monitoring: Language users are being able to identify and self-correct mistakes.

5. Define pedagogy.

Pedagogy is the art, science, and profession of teaching. Pedagogy informs teaching strategies, teacher actions, and teacher judgments and decisions by taking into consideration theories of learning, understandings of students and their needs, and the backgrounds and interests of individual students. Pedagogy includes how the teacher interacts with students and the social and intellectual environment the teacher seeks to establish.

6. Name and describe techniques and methods that are successful in English L2 writing classrooms.

(1) Careful needs analysis to plan curriculums.

(2) Co-operative and group work (including collaborative writing) that strengthen the community of the class and offer writers authentic audiences.

(3) Integration of language skills in class activities.

(4) Learning style and strategy training to help students learn how to learn.

(5) The use of relevant, authentic materials and tasks

(6) Creative writing exercise.

7. Define : Grammar, Morphology and Syntax.

Grammar: It’s the structure organization of a language. Grammar is twofold: a person’s internal, subconscious system of rules and linguists’ study of these rules, which govern speech and writing.

Morphology: It deals with the forms and structure words.

Syntax: It refers to how words, phrases, and clauses are combined to form sentences.

8. Discuss formal and functional grammar approaches.

(1) Formal grammars take as their starting point the form or structure of language, with little or no attention given to meaning (semantics) or context and language use (pragmatics).

For example: -Hello! How are you? -I’m fine, thank you.

(2) Functional grammars, conceive of language as largely social interaction, seeking to explain why one linguistic form is more appropriate than another in satisfying a particular communicative purpose in a particular context.

For example: -Hey, what’s up?- Not bad.

9. Describe one exercise for each eight learning styles.

(1) Visual: You prefer to use pictures, diagrams, images and spatial understanding to help you learn.

Exercise: Show the picture to the kids and ask them to say what I say. Then let the kids to clap the card and say the word to practice.

(2) Musical: You prefer using sounds or music or even rhythms to help you learn.

Exercise: When I teach animals, I can play the sound of the animal and ask the students to guess what animal it is. Then teach them to say the word. Then I will act the sound and ask them to guess the animal and they say the word.

(3) Physical: You use your hands, body and sense of touch to help you learn. You might act things out.

Exercise:   I can use the body language to teach. For example, If I teach ball, then I can throw the ball to the kid and ask them to catch the ball and say the word. Or I can ask the kids to pass the ball one by one and say the word.

(4) Verbal: Words are your strongpoint! You prefer to use words both in speech and in writing.

Exercise: I can ask the student to write a short passage by using the words we learned today. For example, we learn mall, buy, bus station. Then the students can make a short passage like ‘I went to the shopping mall yesterday and I bought some clothes. When I went back home it was raining, I waited at the bus station for one hour.’

(5) Logical: Learning is easier for you if you use logic, reasoning, systems and sequences.

Exercise: I can use a type of thinking map to teach the students. For example, when I teach family members like ‘ grandparents, grandfather, grandmother, father, mother, parent, cousin, etc.’ I can draw a tree map to help the students to understand the relationship.

(6) Social: You like to learn new things as part of a group. Explaining your understanding to a group helps you to learn.

Exercise: I can divide the students into pairs and ask them to make a conversation to practice the sentences we learned. Like, when we learn ‘What animals live on the farm? Sheep live on the farm.’ Then I can ask the students to practice in pairs to make sentences like the example.

(7) Solitary: You like to work alone. You use self-study and prefer your own company when learning.

Exercise: I can prepare a paper work like ask the students to do a handcraft themselves. For example, when I teach shapes I can ask them to draw a picture with different shapes and they can draw whatever they want by themselves.

(8) Combination: Your learning style is a combination of two or more of these styles.

Exercise: When I teach family members, I can use two types of learning styles. First I can use the tree map to teach the words. Second I will ask the students to act out the word without saying anything, just action. Then other students need to guess the word.

10. In writing practices, Lewis concentrates on what he calls “lexical Chunks”. Describe the characteristics of a lexical approach.

Lexical approach is a way of teaching language that focuses on lexical items or chunks such as words collocation and fixed expressions rather than grammatical structures. The following are the characteristics of a lexical approach.

(1) More time should be spent teaching base verbs than tense formations.

(2) Content nouns should be taught in chunks which include frequent adjectival and verbal collocations.

(3) Sentence heads such as ‘Do you mind if…’and ‘Would you like to…’should be focused on.

(4) Suprasentential linking should be explicitly taught.

(5) Prepositions, modal verbs and de lexical verbs should be treated as if they were lexical items.

(6) Metaphors and metaphor sets should be taught on account of their centrality to a language.

For example, lexical chunks that are not collocation: in addition to; till now; in this way, etc. Lexical chunks that are collocation: soft pillow, happy ending, etc.

12. Define and describe the elements of pronunciation.

When we talking about pronunciation, we mean the production and perception of the signify sounds of a particular language in order to achieve meaning in contexts of language use. This comprises the production and perception of segmental sounds of stressed and unstressed syllables, and of the ‘speech melody’, or intonation, also the voice quality, speech rate and overall loudness.

For example, Is this your English teacher? Is this your English teacher? Is this your English teacher?

13.What learning materials/teaching skills aids will you utilize in the TESOL classroom?

Teaching aids are really important for teachers to make the classroom interesting and engaging. The following details are the aids that I will use in my classroom:

(1) Using variety of games, such as matching, puzzles, role play, board games, allow students to practice their speaking and also let them know how to use the words and recite the words.

(2) Using variety of materials, such as videos, radios, newspaper articles, flash cards and so on. Then the students will enjoy the class and they will make the words and sentences easier to be understood.

14.Define psycholinguistics and bilingualism.

(1) Psycholinguistics is the study of language as it relates to behavioral and cognitive characteristics of language users. It is interdisciplinary in nature and is studied by people in a variety of fields, such as psychology, cognitive science, and linguistics.

(2) Bilingualism refers to the phenomenon of competence and communication in two languages. A bilingual individual is someone who has the ability to communicate in two languages alternately.

15.Describe five teaching methods in your own words.

(1) Direct Method, teachers use target language to teach with real materials such as pictures, gesture, videos and so on. Then students will repeat after the teacher or answer the questions that are given. The students are encouraged to express themselves like they need to listen, read and talk.

(2) TPR Method, it’s an approach to teaching a second language. Teachers will use body language or physical activities to help students to understand and remember the words and sentences. For example, when teachers teaching verbs they may use a chant and body movements.

(3) The Rassias Method, learning a second language we need to peak it and live it so as a teacher. We need to make the students feel comfortable to speak English or any second language in a short period of time. For example, we need to help the students to feel shameless by asking them to sit in a circle and relax instead of sitting well in a line.

(4) Project Method, it’s a good way to study a second language with others. In other words, it will be good for us to study in a group. This method helps the students to see the different points of view. Through this way, group member needs to work together in order to make a successful task. Besides, what we can utilize here are communication, problem-solving skills, critical thinking and so on.

(5) Grammar- Translation Method, the main goal of direct method is to communicate and for grammar-translation method is to understand things. Teacher can use this method by reading, writing and so on. Whenever we find an error, teachers need to correct it.

免费领取更多英语教学法请联系我们　

TESOL中国官网：www.tesolinchina.comTEFL中国官网: www.teflinchina.com

了解更多课程信息和最新开课信息

TESOL客服微信：13241000737总部电话：400-6666-232

企业邮箱：admin@TESOLinchina.com学员服务邮箱：hi@tesolinchina.com