Maria StefanidouLSA 3

Systems focus: GrammarLevel: Pre-Intermediate

Candidate name: Maria StefanidouCandidate number: Centre number: GR108Date submitted: 2/5/17

Class Profile

General overview of the course

The course consists of classes according to a schedule provided by the school administration. The classes take place from 10a.m-12a.m, Monday to Saturday and they last for about 40- 60 minutes. Students do not follow a particular course book and they are usually taught by DELTA and CELTA trainees.

General overview of the learners

This is a multinational mixed ability class of nine students whose level of English proficiency is within Pre-Intermediate level. They study English for communication purposes and seem to enjoy this experience a lot. Students are used to collaborative learning and they are willing to participate in different classroom activities so as to practise the language as much as possible.

Tina Tina is 50 years old and she is Greek. She is an unemployed woman who is particularly interested in swimming. She has been studying English for quite a long period of time with the hope to help her children who might move abroad. She considers herself good at reading and she seems to enjoy grammar lessons. However, she feels that when it comes to using grammar in real life communication she often finds herself thinking of the grammatically correct way to express her thoughts which makes her speech sound slow and disfluent.

MariaMaria is 61 year old Mexican woman who is studying English for work and travelling purposes. She has been attending English classes at Celt Athens for the lat eleven months. Although Maria has a good knowledge of vocabulary for her level and she is pretty fluent and always willing to participate in speaking activities, I have noticed that she has issues with her accuracy in spoken interaction and in writing as well.

SinanSinan is 39 years old and he is from Turkey. He works in logistics and he is studying English for work purposes. He has been studying English for ten months at Celt Athens and he clearly stated that he needs to work on his grammar so as to improve his speaking skills in terms of accuracy.

SonerSoner is a 32 year old man from Turkey and he is currently unemployed. He really enjoys studying languages and particularly English. He is studying the English language mostly for communication purposes and for reading international newspapers and magazines. He studied English in high school but feels that he needs improvement in managing discourse and grammar in which is absolutely right. He definitely needs to work on accuracy and particularly on the selection of appropriate verb patterns to be used in particular contexts.

Enes Enes ia a young man from Turkey who has been studying English for two years. He is an economist and he believes that the English language will improve his chances of finding a good job. He is particularly interested in improving his speaking skills in terms of fluency and accuracy. He hopes that this course will improve his grammar and boost his confidence when communicating with people in English. He definitely needs to enrich his grammar knowledge but what he mostly needs is to get more opportunities to practice and use that knowledge so

as to be able to participate in spoken interaction without frequent pausing to think of and select the appropriate structures to communicate his message.

AgronArgon is a 65 year old man from Albania. He is a retired actor who wants to improve his English for communication purposes. He hopes to move to England where his daughter lives and he seems determined to improve his speaking. He has been studying English for two years; however, he lacks basic grammar knowledge to communicate fluently and accurately without frequent and long pauses in search of appropriate words and grammar structures to express his thoughts.

Eri Eri is from Greece and she is unemployed .She has been studying English for three years and she hopes that it will help her find a job. She feels that she needs improvement mostly in grammar. She often pauses to think about how to say something accurately which makes her sound unnatural at times. Practicing grammar will definitely boost her confidence and improve her English competence in terms of other skills as well.

ChristiannaChristianna is a 37 year old Greek woman who is currently unemployed. She believes that English will improve her chances of employment. She studied English for some years at school but as she feels that she needs to pracise vocabulary and grammar.She is not confident enough in terms of her accuracy which makes her avoid participating in lessons generally. She definitely needs to practise grammar so as to gain more confidence and seek more opportunities to use the English language.

Doxa Doxa is a 60 year old Greek woman who is studying English for communication purposes. She is a housewife and she enjoys theatrical plays and walking. She has been attending English classes at Celt Athens for a year now and she is one of the stronger members of this group. She is good at speaking and she can manage exchanges without particular strain. However, working on grammar would improve her competence in terms of accuracy as well.

YlliYlli is 60 years old and he is an electrician. He comes from Albania and he has been studying English at Celt Athens for a year now. He is particularly interested in football and seems to enjoy English lessons. However, he is weak at speaking and needs improvement in terms of fluency and accuracy. His knowledge in terms of grammar is pretty limited, so working on this aspect of language will help him improve his performance in other areas as well.

Aphrodite Aphrodite is a 49 year old Greek woman. She is an unemployed housewife who is studying English with the hope to work in the tourism sector. She loves reading books and she wants to improve her speaking skills so as to be able to communicate fluently. She has clearly stated that she wants to improve her grammar so as to be able to articulate her thoughts better without searching for the appropriate grammar structures under the pressure of time.

Jim Jim is a 43 years old and he is Greek. He is a plumber. However, he is currently

unemployed. He has been studying English for four months with the hope to improve his chances of employment. He needs to work on various aspects of language such as accuracy, lexical range and fluency so as to be able to manage simple exchanges. Thus grammar lessons will definitely help him towards this direction.

Lesson Aims/Learning Objectives

Primary aim

1. To distinguish between will and be going to as used to make spontaneous decisions and report predetermined ones respectively.

2. To give students opportunities to practise and use the contrasted verb forms.

Secondary aims

1 To practise listening for gist and specific information.

2. To practise speaking skills

Evidence of achievement

By the end of the lesson students will be able to decide whether to use will or be going to when making spontaneous decisions and reporting predetermined ones.

During the restricted and authentic output stage students will be selecting and using one of the two structures in different contexts.

During the listening stage students will be listening to an extract of a dialogue between two people and choosing the best description of the situation. Then they will be ticking off the food items discussed in the extract on a list provided.

In the free production stage students will be performing role-play in which a group of friends have just won the lottery. They make and report their decisions regarding how they are going to spend the money they won.

Source Aids/HandoutsPower Point Presentation Board/markersHandoutsBoard Game (self created)Microphone (self created)

The images used in the lesson were taken from:

https://www.google.gr/search?q=shopping+list+picture&tbm=isch&imgilhttps://www.google.gr/search?q=shopping+list+picture&tbm=isch&imgilhttps://www.google.gr/search?q=money++euros&source https://www.google.gr/search?q=customers-toasting-wine-glasses-restaurant-table&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj0ycPxqszTAhXGPhQKHU7yDq4Qhttps://www.google.gr/search?q=reporter&tbm=isch&source

Assumptions Students are familiar with some basic vocabulary used in the dialogue and

the rest of the activities Students are familiar with will and be going to structures in terms of form

and pronunciation. Students will be willing to participate in the activities during the lesson.

Anticipated Difficulties1. It is a mixed-ability pre-intermediate class, so some students might find some of the tasks challenging.Some of them might even find the instructions difficult to grasp.

2. Some students who have already studied will and be going to might feel demotivated.

3. Some students share the same L1, so they might be tempted to use it during the activities.

4. Some students might not want to work with some of their classmates perhaps because of cultural or even nationality reasons.

5. During the board game, some students might not be able to formulate and articulate their responses fast enough. It might discourage and disappoint them.

6.During the board game some groups might finish earlier that the others.

7. Shy students may not want to participate in role play activity for fear

Solutions/ Remedies1.Strong students will be paired with weak students so as to support and help each other throughout the whole lesson.I will try to make my instructions as clear as possible. I will also check them with appropriate ICQs

2. I will make it clear that the purpose of the lesson is to help them select between these two structures when making and reporting decisions and offer opportunities to use them.

3. Students with different mother tongues will be paired together where possible.

4. I will monitor closely so as to make sure that all students participate well and in case I notice an issue, I will rearrange the seating

5. I will point out, right from the beginning, the playful nature of the activity and encourage them rather to enjoy themselves and stop worrying about making mistakes.

6. I have prepared an extra activity for the early finishers.

of not knowing what to say.

8. Not many students might turn up (for example, only five) so the lesson might take less time than expected and perhaps end too soon.

9. The technology may malfunction.

7. I will give students some time to prepare and rehearse their utterances before acting them out. Moreover, I will encourage them to use their mobile phones or dictionaries to look up any words they might want to use.

8. I have prepared an extra activity for the free production stage.

9. Prepare back up material.

Language Analysis

Will

Form:

It is a modal verb and it doesn’t change form to show person. (*he wills)

In affirmative sentences, it is placed first in the verb phrase. For example: I will buy bread

It forms its negative with not ( will not/ won’t) For example: I won’t buy any bread.

It forms questions by inversion. For example: Will you buy some bread?

Meaning /Use:

Announcing spontaneous decisions.

OK. I’ll buy some bread, too.

Phonology:

Will: /wɪl/

In spoken English will is frequently reduced to ‘ll = /l/

I’ll buy some bread: / aɪl baɪ səm bred /

Style:

‘ll : in informal speaking/writing after pronouns (in affirmative sentences) and question words (I’ll, Who’ll)

Be going to

Form:

The structure be going to is formed using the auxiliary verb to be in the present tense + going to + bare infinitive.

Affirmative : Subject+ am / are/ is + going to + bare infinitive Negative: Subject+ am/are/is + not + going to + bare infinitive Question: (Question word) + are/ is + going to +bare infinitive

Meaning /Use :

Reporting decisions already made.Describing present intentions held before the time of speaking.

It’s all right. It’s on my list. I’m going to buy some. (sugar)

Phonology:

Going to: /ˈɡəʊɪŋ tə/

I’m going to buy some: /aɪm ˈɡəʊɪŋ tə baɪ sʌm/

In informal speech going to is often pronounced /ˈɡənə/ (whose non-standard spelling is gonna).

Style:

This structure is common in spoken interaction in an informal style because conversation is often about future actions and events.

Timetable fit

According to the information I have been given by the Celta tutors, the group of the Pre-intermediate learners have been following a coursebook and they have covered structures for futurity such as will, be going to and present continuous. Thus there is no doubt that the students have been exposed to the target language of this particular lesson which will allow me to focus on distinguishing between will and be going to and on helping them select the appropriate verb pattern when talking about their decisions (spontaneous and predetermined ones).

Board plan

Slide2 Slide 3 Slide 4

Slide5 Slide6 Slide 7

Slide 8 Slides 9 Slides 10

Slide 11 Slide 12 Slide 13 Slide 14

Slide 15 Slide 16 Slide17 Slide 18-21

White board

I’m going to buy some.

Subj+ be going to+ verb I’ll buy some bread, too.

Subj+ will + verb

Timeline

Past Now Future

will

be going to

Commentary (734)

I have decided to focus on grammar because obviously accuracy is important when it comes to conveying a particular meaning and also because some of the students explicitly claimed that they need to practise it. This goes along with what I have noticed regarding their weaknesses, so grammar is an area indeed that this group of learners needs to focus and work on. In this particular lesson I have chosen to focus on will  and be going to when talking about decisions made at the time of speaking/now and reporting decisions which were made sometime before now respectively. As I have mentioned in my background essay, learners of pre-intermediate level are familiar with these structures but they often fail to select the appropriate one to express the message they want to. For example, in the previous lesson I had with this group, Christiana said “I will visit the town hall to get a certificate” expressing her intentions or plans for the rest of the morning.

This group of learners have been exposed to the above structures, thus much attention to form will not be given. However, some attention will be paid to the pronunciation of the two examples used and the contracted forms of the two structures in the first person “I” after having established the informality of the situation. I decided to focus mainly on the first person pronoun ”I” as the meanings of the TL in this lesson often have to do with decisions we make about ourselves.

While planning this grammar lesson I kept in mind the suggestion made by Thornbury in his book Uncovering Grammar that we need to start thinking of the word grammar as a verb and not just as a noun (2001:1) Grammar seems to be like a process -an active skill of using language and not just the information/rules about this language. Thus I have tried to design a lesson where explanations are kept to minimum and all the necessary conditions are created to allow learners to actually do things. Following Scrivener’s advice I was thinking about this grammar lesson as primarily “practice” rather than “presentation” (2005:277).As he puts it, a language teacher’s job is primarily to push, encourage and help learners to try using the language themselves.(2005:277)

I have chosen to set up a lesson around a short simple dialogue which students will be listening to. This dialogue is related to food shopping and obviously it is a situation that all people find themselves in and can easily relate to. Moreover, it is a good example of the TL that students can easily learn and use. As I mentioned earlier, I will try to avoid giving long explanations or detailed information, but instead I will have students do activities and tasks that will allow them to generate their own discoveries and explanations. My role in this guided discovery process will be to ask questions that hopefully will make learners notice,

think about the TL and finally draw their conclusions/ rules.

The lesson was carefully designed so as to maximize students’ attention, motivate and keep their interest high by providing input and output opportunities through meaningful and playful activities.The board game, particularly, will benefit learners in terms of choosing the appropriate verb pattern under the constraint of time as the nature of the game lends itself to prompting students give instant responses without having the luxury of extended time to think before articulating their ideas. It will also increase students’ production in a playful manner and really help deal with the issue of Limited output opportunities discussed in my background essay. During the free production stage, students will be participating in a role-play where they will be invited to perform a short scene/sketch in which they have just won the lottery and decided to celebrate the event in a restaurant (the idea was taken from input on Futurity during the DELTA course). Although the possibility of this scenario in my students’ lives is quite low, it gives them the chance to rehearse and practise the language they might possibly use in other similar contexts of spending some extra money they might have earned or inherited.I have also decided to include this drama activity to suit learners who might feel uncomfortable “being themselves” in a second language and generally I feel that a playful element in the learning process makes it more interesting and memorable.

Bibliography:

Thornbury,S. (2006). An A-Z of ELT: A Dictionary of Terms and Concepts.: Macmillan Publishers Limited

Thornbury, S. (2005). Uncovering Grammar. Oxford: Macmillan Publishers Limited

Thornbury, S. (1999). How to teach grammar. Harlow: Pearson Education Limited

Scrivener,J. (2010). Teaching English Grammar: What to Teach and How to Teach it. London: Macmillan Publishers Limited

Scrivener, J. (2005). Learning Teaching: An Essential Guide to English Language Teaching. Macmillan

Online tools:

http://www.photransedit.com/Online/Text2Phonetics.aspx

http://imagesplitter.net/