Teaching grammarGrammar teaching depends on certain variables(learner and ins t ructional ) in the language teaching/learning context Grammar presentation methods-deductive method: relies on reasoning, analyzing and comparingteaching procedure:teacher’s example on the board,teacher’s explanation of the rules (in student’s native language),student’s practice application of the rules.Advantages:good for selected and motivate students;save time to explain complex rules;increase stude nts’ confidence in examination.Disadvantages:grammar is taught isolated ly;little attention is paid to meaning;the practice is often mechanical -inductive method:teaching procedure;authentic language presentation(give grammar examples);let students observe,analyse,compare examples;help students induct grammar rules,Advantages:inspire students’ thinking activities;motivate students’ learning interests;grammar is taught in context.Disadvantages:the presentation of grammar is more complex and time consumption;grammar is not taught directly;some rules can not be induced easily-guided discovery method: Similar to the inductive method:the students are induced to discover rules by themselves (similar);the process of the discovery is carefully guided and assisted by the teacher and the rules are then elicited and taught explicitly.(different) Implicit and explicit knowledge:Implicit knowledge refers to knowledge that unconsciously exists in our mind, which we can make use of automatically without making any effort;Explicit knowledge refers to our conscious knowledge about the language. We can talk about it, analyse it and apply it in conscious ways.Learning and acquiring (second language acquisition theory)The synthesis approaches to grammatical pedagogy:Collocational: grammar should be built on collocational relations between individual lexical items and their subcategories. Constructive: one’s knowledge of grammar is built bit by bit, which closely model the way language is learned and used. Contextual: Elements and structures are taught in relation to their context. Syntactic and lexical choices are explicitly related to pragmatic ones, and to social and cultural contexts.Contrastive: grammar involves drawing the learner’s attention to contrast the differences between the target language and other language.Grammar practice:Pre-learning;Volume and repetition:Success-orientation.Heterogeneity .Teacher assistance.Interest 1.Mechanical practice:activities that are aimed at form accuracy.By doing mechanical practice,students pay repeated attention to a key element in a structure.form of practice:Substitution and transformation drills2. Meaningful practice the focus is on the production, comprehension or exchange of meaning though the students “keep an eye on” the way newly learned structures are used in the process.ing prompts for practice:The prompts can be pictures, mimes, tables, charts or key words, etc.A good presentation should include both oral and written and form and meaning Visual materials can aid comprehensionIt’s the teacher’s involvement and his or her ability to personalise teaching and make activities engaging that often promotes successful learning.Teaching vocabularyThe first question need to know is what does knowing a word involve.A word:knowing its pronunciation and stress; spelling and grammatical properties; meaning; how and when to use it to express the intended meaning (freestanding and bound morphine)Vocabulary learning involves ate least two aspects of meaning: the understanding of its denotative and connotative meaning; and understanding the sense relations among wordsDenotative meaning of a word or a lexical item refers to those words that we use to label things as regards real objects Connotative meaning of a word refers to ‘the attitudes or emotion s of a language user in choosing a word and the influence of these on the listener or reader’s interpretation of the word. This words that may express a positive or negative attitude or subtle feelings toward something.Collocations refers to words that co-occur with high frequency and have been accepted as ways for the use of words. It is believed that teaching word collocations is a more effective way than just teaching one single word at a time.Synonyms refer to items that mean the same, or nearly the same.Antonyms refer to items that mean the opposite of a word. Hyponyms refer to words which can be grouped together under the same superordinate conceptReceptive and Productive vocabularyPassive vocabulary: the words they know.Active vocabulary: the words they useSo the job for the teacher is to guide the students to those words which will help them to add to their active vocabularies, and to distinguish those words from the much larger number of passive items. At the beginning of language learning, all the words which are taught must be acquired for active use, later, at intermediate and advanced levels, most of the words students meet will only be needed for passive use.Ways of consolidating vocabulary:labelling,spot the difference,descibe and draw,play a game,use word series,word bingo,word association,find a synonyms and antonym,categories,using word net-work,using the Internet resources for some ideasDeveloping vocabulary building strategies:review regularly,guess meaning from context, Organize vocabulary effectively,using a dictionary,manage strategy useTeaching listeningListening problems:lack of teaching materials,both with print materials and audio or video tapes,lack of equipment in some schools;lack of real-life situations:lack of professional qualified instructorsA number of people have frequently made the point that of the total time an individual is engaged in communication: approximately 9% is devoted to writing, 16% to reading, 30% to speaking,45% to listeningListening and reading are receptive skills, but listening can be more difficult than reading.Different speakers produce the same sounds in different waysThe listener has little or no control over the speed of the input of spoken material;Spoken material is often heard only once and in most cases，we cannot go back and listen again as we can when we read;The listener cannot pause to work out the meaning of the heard material as can be done when reading;Speech is more likely to be distorted by the media which transmit sounds or background noise that can make it difficult to hear clearly; The listener sometimes has to deal simultaneously with another task while listening, such as formal note-taking, writing down directions or messages from telephone calls, or operating while listening to instructions.Characteristics of the listening process,formal or informal?rehearsed or non-rehearsed?can the listener interact with the speaker or not?Listening characteristics:Spontaneity,Context,visual clues,listener’s response,speaker’s adjustmen tListening purpose:for social reasons,to obtain and exchange informationPrinciples and models of teaching listeningFocus on process:(they have to hear what is being said,they have to pay attention and construct a meaningful message in their mind by rela ting what they hear to what they already know;it’s also possible to hear people talking without paying attention;we also know that if we don’t have enough previous knowledge of what is being said,it’s more difficult to make sense of what is said)Combine listening with other skills;Focus on the comprehension of meaning;Grade difficulty level appropriately Designing listening activity:give a clear purpose, a specific task,an appropriate context for doing themBottom-up model:Listening comprehension is believ ed to start with sound and meaning recognitions.In other words,‘we use information in the speech itself to try to comprehend the meaning’Listeners construct meaning of what they hear based on the sound they hear.Top-down model:listening for gist and making use of the contextual clues and background knowledge to construct meaning are emphasised.In other words,listening comprehension involves ‘knowledge that a listener brings to a text,sometimes called ‘inside the head’ information,as opposed to the informat ion that is available within the text itself’ In such a case,listeners can understand better if they know something about the speaker,the setting,the topic and the purpose of the talk.prior knowledge or schematic knowledge—mental frameworks for various things and experience we hold in our long-term memoryPre-listening activities:aim to motivate students,to activate their prior knowledge,and to teach key words or key sentences to the students before listening begins predicting,setting the scene,listening for the gist and specific informationWhile-listening:no specific responses,listen and tick,listen and sequence,listen and act,listen and draw,listen and fill,listen and take notesPost-listening:multiple-choice questions,answering questions,note-taking and gap-filling ,dictogloss(preparation dictation reconstruction analysis and correction)Integrate listening with the practice of other language skills,role play,debate,discussion,writing backTeaching speakingSpeech characteristic:spontaneous,full of false starts repetitions incomplete sentences short phrases time-constraintspoken languages features:Using less complex syntax;Taking short cuts,(incomplete sentences);Using fixed conventional phrases/ chunks. Using devices such as fillers, hesitation device to give time to think before speaking. Both learners and teachers need to learn to accept repetitions,rephrase,hesitations,incomplete sentences,fillers or pauses.th is doesn’t mean we don’t encourage fluent speaking.In training students’speaking skills,features of natural speech should be accepted.this doesn’t only have implication for teaching speaking but also for assessing speaking.Encourage students to speak up is the first and most important task Principles:Balancing accuracy-based with fluency-based practices, Contextualising practice, Personalising practice, Building up confidence, Maximising meaningful interactions, Helping students develop speaking strategiesDesigning speaking tasks:meaningful motivation linguistically appropriate cognitively challengeMaximum foreign talk even participation high motivation right language levelPre-communicative activities :structural,quasi-communicative Communicative activities :Functional communicative and Social interactionRole-play :perform in different moods,change different role relationship,actual word can be varied,make the dialogue longerLearners should be helped move from form to using what is learned in meaningful communicationThe problem is not having nothing to say but lacking the opportunity to say itTeaching readingReading aloud and silent reading:Reading aloud cannot replace silent reading as it involves only the skills of pronunciation and intonation.Real reading ability re-quires the reading skills of skimming, scanning, predictingEffective reading:clear purpose in reading; read silently; read phrase by phrase,rather than word by word; concentrate on the important bits,skim the rest,and skip the insignificant parts; use different speeds and strategies for different reading tasks; perceive the information in the target language rather than mentally translate; guess the meaning of new words from the context,or ignore them; use background information to help understand the text.Reading comprehension means extracting the relevant information from the text as efficiently as possible,connecting the information from written message with one’s own knowledge to arrive at an understanding (construction of meaning from printed or written messa ge) Two broad levels in reading:1) a recognition task of perceiving visual signals from the printed page through the eyes;2) a cognitive task of interpreting the visual information,relating the receive information with reader’s own knowledge Vocabulary role:efficient reading begins with a lightening-like automatic recognition of word.this initial process of accurate,rapid and automatic recognition of vocabulary frees one’s mind to use other resources(reasoning abilities,,knowledge about topic)to con struct meaningSight vocabulary:you can recognise with both sounds and meanings without special effort from your brainFluent reading depends on an adequate sight vocabulary,a general knowledge about the target language, some knowledge about the topic, wide knowledge about the world and enough knowledge about text types.Teaching model:bottom-up model top-down model interactive modelPre-reading:pooling existing knowledge about the topic;predicting the contents of the text,skimming and scanning the text or parts of the text for certain purpose;learning key words and structures(predicting setting the scene skimming scanning)While reading: Information presented in plain text form is not facilitative for information retentionThe way to transfer information from one form to another is called a transition deviceReading comprehension questionsQuestions for literal comprehension.directly and explicitly available in the ually answered in the words of the text itself. Questions involving reorganization or reinterpretation.obtain literal information from various parts and put it to-gether or reinterpretQuestions for inferences. This type of questions require students to consider what is implied but not explicitly stated.Questions for evaluation or appreciation.most sophisticated ques-tions which involve making a judgment about the text in terms of what the writer is trying to convey.Questions for personal response. The answers to these questions depend most on the reader’s reaction to the content of the text.Post-reading:discussion questions,reproducing the text,role play,gap-filling,discussion,retelling,writingThe teaching of reading should focus on developing students’reading skills and strategies and on maintaining students’motivat ion for readingTeaching writingWriting purpose:get things done and to form;maintain social relationships;give a voice for shy students;less threatening for anxious students as it gives them to think about their meaning and purpose;raise awareness of how language worksA communicative approach to writing:Writing for learning”and “writing for communication”Sense of authenticity and audience motivation for writing purpose for writing proper procedures for writingProblems in writing tasks：They are mainly accuracy-based.They are designed to practise a certain target structures.There is insufficient preparation before the writing stage.There is no sense of audience and authenticity.Students are given ideas to express rather than being invited to invent their own.There is no opportunity for creative writing, particular for expressing unusual or original ideas.Many of them are test-oriented.The important point is that they are given the freedom to write about themselves rather than to write what they are told to write and therefore what they write should be more meaningful and communicativeA process approach to writing: creating a motivation to write, brainstorming, mapping, freewriting, outlining, drafting, editing, revising, proofreading and conferencing.Motivating students to write.1.make the topic of writing as close as possible to students’ life.leave students enough room for creativity and imagination. prepare students well before writing. encourage collaborative group writing as well as individual writing. provide opportunities for students to share their writings. provide constructive and positive feedback.treat students’ errors strategically. give students a sense of achievement from time to time.We have emphasized that the teaching of writing should focus on the process rather than the product, and that all the writing tasks should have communicative purposesSummative assessment is mainly based on testing,it’s done mostly at the end of a learnin g period or a school year Formative assessment is based on information collected in the classroom during the teaching process for the purpose of improving teaching and learningTeacher’s observations continuous assessment student’s self-assessment project work portfolios。
