Teacher portfolio

TEACHER’S PORTFOLIO

Student’s name, surname Maria Shestakova

Group, course 3 course, 5AF

Unit 1

Teacher’s tips

• keep up-to-date with what parts of the language are changing and how.

• need to consider whether it is helpful to teach grammar to learners simply by making them aware of patterns and practicing them, or by also teaching them grammar rules and some grammatical terms

• Choose exercises and activities which focus on form and use to give students practice of both

Useful unit vocabulary

• Grammatical structure - the arrangement of words into patterns which have meaning.

• Contractions - two words that are pronounced or written as one.

Unit 2

Teacher’s tips

• Include in exercises the same words again and again as students advance in their language learning.

• Teach students key (important) words and expose them to many others.

• To teach in context.

• Use the relationships in meaning between words (synonyms, lexical sets, word families, etc.) and the ways in which they can be built (prefixes, suffixes, compounds) to make activities to help students extend their knowledge of words.

• Check if words have any false friends in their language or if these words are homophones or homonyms. Then point this out to the learners.

• Highlight chunks of language for learners (e.g. collocations, fixed expressions.).

Useful unit vocabulary

• Lexical set - groups of words that belong to the same topic area, e.g. family, furniture, food.

• Word family - words that come through affixation from the same base word, e.g. real, really, realistic, unreal.

• False friends - words which have the same or a similar form in two languages but a different meaning.

• Homophones - words with the same pronunciation but a different meaning or spelling.

• Homonyms - words with the same spelling and pronunciation as another word, but a different meaning.

• Varieties of English - different kinds of English spoken around the world.

Unit 3

Teacher’s tips

• Give students different accents to listen to in order to understand different speech.

• Focus in lessons on different aspects of pronunciation.

• Find out which phonemes are problematic for learners and focus on them.

• Have a copy of the phonemic chart on the wall.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Minimal pairs - words distinguished by only one phoneme.

• Word boundaries - where one word ends and the next one begins.

• Connected speech - spoken language in which all the words join to make a connected stream of sounds.

• Contrastive stress - putting the stress on an unexpected word in a sentence.

Unit 4

Teacher’s tips

• Focus on functions in the classroom to an emphasis on communication and learning language in chunks

• To focus in "Writing" on the study of functions.

• Combine functions and grammar.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Exponent - the language we use to express a function.

• Levels of formality - more or less relaxed ways of saying things.

• Colloquial - very casual and conversational.

• Appropriacy - level of formality that suits a situation.

Unit 5

Teacher’s tips

• Check which reading subskills learners are good at, then focus on practising the subskills they are not yet using well.

• Make pre-teaching vocabulary (teaching vocabulary from the text before the learners read the text), by asking learners to predict text content , encouraging them to predict text structure.

• Do lead-in activities before the class looks at the text.

• Give learners lots of opportunities for extensive reading, in or out of class.

• Give graded readers (books with language made easier for language learners).

• Teach depending on the age and first language of the learners.

• Choose the right texts for our learners. Texts should be interesting in order to motivate learners. Texts should also be at the right level of difficulty.

• Give students different kinds of texts to read, e.g. articles, stories, postcards, emails, brochures, leaflets, etc.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Cohesion - the grammatical links between the sentences.

• Reading for gist or skimming - glancing through a text to get a general idea of what it is about.

• Reading for detail - getting the meaning out of every word and out of the links or relationships between words and between sentences.

• Deducing meaning from context - reading the words around an unknown word or thinking about the situation the unknown word is used in to try and work out its meaning.

• Layouts - the ways in which text is placed on the page.

• Lead-in activities - generally involve looking at the pictures around a text or at the title and trying to predict what the text will be about.

Unit 6

Teacher’s tips

• At primary level we may spend a lot of time teaching learners how to form letters and words, how to join them together and how to write short texts of a few words or sentences, often by copying.

• At secondary level we may need to focus more on other kinds of accuracy and the communication skills required to write longer texts such as letters, emails or compositions.

• It's useful to encourage learners to think about why they are writing (their reason for writing) and who they are writing to (their audience).

• Practise accuracy in writing, for example, by labelling, copying, sentence completion, gap-filling, sentence transformation exercises, dividing texts into paragraphs, putting punctuation into an unpunctuated text, proofreading exercises to correct errors in texts.

• Practise communicating through writing by story completion, jumbled picture stories, writing birthday cards, writing emails of invitation.

• Support learners in their writing by moving on to writing after doing some listening, reading or speaking on a topic

• Work with models (clear examples) of text types when to show learners what patterns of language, vocabulary, register or layout to use, or how to structure their writing.

• Guide or support learners in their writing through the use of a process writing approach.

Class activity/ lesson plans

In the coursebook "Complete advanced", the section "Writing" focuses on the type of text (report , interview, essay, proposal), as well as on the exact structure of each type of writing(introduction, main part, conclusion, linking words), in addition, the section focuses on finding ideas for a full disclosure of the topic. For each type of text there is an example, key points, word limit, pre-tasks.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Gap-filling - a practice exercise in which learners have to replace words missing from a text.

• Paragraph - a part of a longer piece of writing, which starts on a new line and usually focuses on one idea.

• Guide word - either one of the words that are at the top of a page in a dictionary or similar book and that show the first and last words on the page.

• Sentence transformation - changing or converting the words or form of a sentence without changing its meaning or sense.

• Drafting - a stage of the writing process during which a writer organizes information and ideas into sentences and paragraphs.

• Cohesive devices - ways of linking a text.

• Proofreading - the process of finding and correcting mistakes in text before it is printed or put online

• Re-drafting - writing a second/final version of your piece of writing.

Unit 7

Teacher’s tips

• Give learners the opportunity to listen to many sources of spoken language, e.g. the teacher, other learners, visitors, CDs, DVDs.

• Give pre-teaching key words, setting pre-listening tasks, focusing initially on gist listening to establish context, and playing the recording a second or even a third time.

• Combine authentic texts and simplified texts . Authentic texts allow learners to develop strategies for dealing with the challenge of real language, while simplified texts (texts that have been made easier) allow them to build up their confidence.

• Give tasks such as completing tables, true/false, ticking correct answers in lists, and putting events in order to know whether learners have understood or not.

• We can make a difficult text easier for learners to understand by giving them easy listening tasks, or we can make an easier text more difficult by giving them harder listening tasks.

Class activity/ lesson plans

What the learners found easy and why	What the learners found difficult and why
It was quite easy for 8th grade students to complete tasks to choose from, since there was a pre-assignment before listening, where they had already guessed a little what would be discussed, and it was also easier to exclude what exactly was not in such tasks.	It was difficult for the students to complete the task with "omissions", where they had to write the missing words themselves. Listening was slightly above their level in order to develop listening skills, not all students coped, but still many coped with the task at least not 100 percent.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Sentence stress - the manner in which stresses are distributed on the syllables of words assembled into sentences.

• Hesitations - pausing when speaking because you're not sure what to say or how to say it.

• Infer attitude - to decide how a writer or speaker feels about something from the way that they speak or write, rather than from what they openly say.

• Interaction - two-way communication between listener and speaker, or reader and text.

• Patterns - are ways of describing how words are used in English.

• Utterance - complete unit of speech in spoken language.

Unit 8

Teacher’s tips

• Focus regularly on particular aspects of speaking, e.g. fluency, pronunciation, register, grammatical accuracy, body language, interactive strategies, interactive speaking (e.g. conversations, discussions), speaking at length (e.g. presentations, giving points of view, ete.).

• Motivate learners by controlled practice activities. These activities include drills, repetition and saying things learnt by heart . They focus on accuracy in speaking by helping students to use grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation correctly.

• Give tasks such as information-gap activities, problem solving, project work, discussions, explaining solutions to develop fluency and communicative skills

• In fluency activities it is advisable not to correct learners immediately.

• Give a silent period if necessary.

Class activity/ lesson plans

In the coursebook "Complete advanced", the "Speaking" section mainly focuses on revealing the topic through oral speech, and also speaking tasks have the structure of the "CAE" exam, which allows me to say that the textbook focuses on exam preparation and speaking according to a template. In addition, the textbook has pre-information about the task, pre-tasks (suggestive questions), main tasks, post-tasks. I believe that my students need more focus on fluency of speech, the ability to discuss a more everyday "daily", vital topic, moreover, students need to get rid of fear and embarrassment to speak.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Drill - a technique teachers use to provide learners with practice of language. It involves guided repetition of words or sentences.

• Integrated skills - an integrated skills lesson combines work on more than one language skill.

• Silent period - the time when learners who are beginning to learn a first (or second) language prefer to listen (or read) before producing the language.

• Interactive strategies -ways of keeping people interested and involved in what we are saying.

• Controlled practice activities - activities in which the learners are required to repeatedly use the language that they have just been taught.

Unit 9

Teacher’s tips

• Show a good example by being committed and motivated

• Be as sensitive and accepting as you can

• Create a pleasant, calm, secure and ordered atmosphere in the classroom

• Bring in humour and laughter, and smile

• Point out the purpose and usefulness of every task

• Accept mistakes - they are a natural part of learning

• Select interesting tasks and topics

• Offer a variety of materials and activities

• Make tasks challenging to involve your students

• Set up several specific learning goals for the learners

• Encourage the learners to set goals and work towards them

• Do a needs analysis of the learners' goals and needs

• Invite native speakers to some classes

Class activity/ lesson plans

Based on the textbook for grades 8 "Starlight", I can say that it would be possible to increase the motivation of students in the "Reading" section, for example, to give a vocabulary with new or difficult words for students before the task, and also not to focus on every mistake when reading in order to give children more self-confidence. Also in the "Grammar" section, I would add a bit of interest, since often children do not like this section in the language, for example, to find some interesting videos or use an interactive whiteboard to answer tasks. In the Listening section, it would also be possible to use interactive, for example, the same videos, perhaps short cartoons or simple interviews with those who like students to interest them in the subject.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Motivation - the thoughts and feelings which make us want to and continue to want to do something and which turn our wishes into action.

• Demotivate - to make someone less enthusiastic about a job.

• Learner autonomy – when a learner can set his/her own aims and organise his/her own study, they are autonomous and independent.

• Sense of achievement - being successful at something we have worked at.

• Target language culture - the traditions and culture of the country whose language is being studied.

Unit 10

Teacher’s tips

• Give listen to recordings of e.g. stories or songs, or they can read e.g. magazine articles - maybe without any accompanying comprehension or language tasks for exposure.

• Choose recordings and reading materials at the right level of difficulty.

• Give tasks for paraphrasing.

• Help learners notice forms (become aware of particular language), e.g. by presenting new target language to learners, by asking them to find certain grammatical patterns in listening or reading texts, by pointing out useful language after they have completed a task, and also through correction.

• Consider learners' age, learning experience and learning styles when deciding how to teach.

Class activity/ lesson plans

In the coursebook "Starlight" for grades 8, all tasks mainly focus on the form, that is, how to spell, how to pronounce, how to grammatically construct a phrase and which vocabulary is used for a particular purpose. For example, in the "Reading" section for each task there is pre-listening so that children can hear how words are pronounced correctly, and there is also a separate framed vocabulary with new words used in the text, then there are post-tasks for understanding the text. All tasks in all sections focus on the form. For grades 8, I think this is done in order to successfully prepare for the exam and it is quite effective. But for me personally, the textbook lacks interaction between students, as well as acquisition would allow them to talk and express their thoughts more confidently. The textbook is not bad from the point of view of education, but I would use some additional materials to interest students more, and also encourage them to learn the language not only within the school, but also in real life.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Acquisition - learning a language without studying it, just by hearing and/or reading it and then using it.

• Structural Approach - method which focused only on learning and practising structures.

• Learning style - the way in which an individual learner naturally prefers to learn something.

• Grammar-Translation method - method which focused only on grammar and translating texts.

• Interaction - two-way communication between listener and speaker, or reader and text.

• Focus on form - to pay attention not just to the meaning of language but also to its formal features, for example pronunciation, word order, affixes, spelling, grammatical structures.

Unit 11

Teacher’s tips

• Think hard about whether, when and how to correct learners.

• Can't expect instant or immediate learning. Learning is gradual, and errors will occur.

• Think about what kind of mistake the learner is making - a slip or an error. If the mistake is a slip, the learner can correct him/herself, maybe with a little prompting from the teacher or another learner. Or, there may be no point in correcting a slip.

• Not to pay attention to learners' mistakes to give an opportunity to develop confidence and fluency, and to experiment and make mistakes with language.

• Give a feedback about learners` fossilised errors.

• Expose learners to lots of language that is just beyond their level of linguistic ability through reading or listening.

• Give them opportunities to focus on the form of language, e.g. through exercises, reformulation (when the teacher corrects what the student has said by repeating their words correctly, but without drawing the learner's attention to their mistake) or correction.

• Provide them with time in class to use language to communicate and interact and see if they can do so successfully.

Class activity/ lesson plans

A student of the 8th grade wrote an essay on the topic "Why I study English", there were several grammatical errors in the work, for example, incorrectly chosen time and omission or incorrect use of articles. These errors could arise due to the superficial study of these topics in the school curriculum. Also, some mistakes were made due to inattention. I would like to correct all these mistakes, this is possible by repeating the topics in general or by analyzing specific examples in which the student has difficulties.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Reformulate - to reword a sentence or phrase to improve it.

• Fossilisation - the process in which incorrect language becomes a habit and cannot easily be corrected.

• Exposure - being in contact with language by hearing it or reading it.

• Language processing - working on the language unconsciously to try to understand and learn it.

• Overgeneralisation - applying a rule too widely.

Unit 12

Teacher’s tips

• Make use of strategies to motivate students.

• Find out about learners' learning styles, learning needs and expectations, and match their teaching to them by varying their teaching style, approaches, materials, topics, method of correction, etc.

• Encourage learners to use English as much as possible in their out-of-class time, for example, by listening to radio programmes or songs, reading books or magazines, using websites, downloading podcasts, making English speaking friends, etc.

• Try to simplify language to a level that learners can learn from, and avoid correcting them too much.

Class activity/ lesson plans

Exercise 8 encourages students to interact with each other, it allows not only to express their thoughts, but also to hear the point of view and speech of another. Exercise 1 helps to motivate the student with an interesting topic, the teacher can also add a small suggestion from himself, for example, so that the students tell about their favorite movie / TV series and give advice to the teacher what to watch on the weekend, then this will create a comfortable atmosphere in the classroom, a student-teacher connection, and also motivate the guys to learn new vocabulary on their own to tell about that's what they're interested in.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Maturity - fully grown or developed.

• Abstract - connected to thoughts and ideas rather than real objects, situations or actions.

• Academic writing - writing for school or university

• Cognitive skills - the mental processes involved in thinking, understanding or learning.

Unit 13

Teacher’s tips

• It can be useful for teachers to become aware of -their own learning styles, past

learning experience and learning strategies, and to compare these with how they

teach.

• We can train learners to become aware of and use different learning strategies. This is part of learner training. We can, for example, give learners a list of strategies for remembering words and ask them which they prefer and why; or we can ask them how they arrived at a solution to a problem to raise their awareness of useful learning strategies.

• Teachers can build into their lessons activities which match different learning

styles, e.g. a listening activity followed by a reading activity followed by group work followed by a mingle, followed by an exercise.

• It is not possible for the teacher to match the learner characteristics of each learner all the time. Across a number of lessons teachers can try to vary how they teach so that they can match the learner characteristics of a range of learners.

Class activity/ lesson plans

One of my students has visual learning styles. Information is most easily perceived by him when he sees it. And he also has a reflective learning style, he needs time to process new information, and then give an answer. My second student has a kinaesthetic and individual learning style. For a better understanding, he needs to do something physically, and it is also easier for him to do the work on his own.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Mingle - an activity which involves learners walking round the class talking to other students

• Short attention span -shorter periods of concentration

• Learning strategies -  individual's way of organizing and using a particular set of skills in order to learn content or accomplish other tasks more effectively and efficiently in school as well as in non-academic settings

Unit 14

Teacher’s tips

• Primary age learners have a particular need for praise and for play, teenage learners may have a need for more autonomy and recognition of their individuality. Learners may also have special needs such as dealing with dyslexia.

• Teachers can find out about learners' needs through observation, questionnaires or through discussing them with students.

• Teachers cannot meet all their learners' needs all the time. Making use of variety

within or across lessons can help though: for example, using different kinds of

activities, different interaction patterns, different teaching approaches.

Class activity/ lesson plans

I watched a 9th grade student for a week. In my opinion, he needs: personal needs: motivation, more tasks, on topics interesting to him. Training needs: preparation for exams, in a suitable style of training (visual, analytical).

Useful unit vocabulary

• Pace - the speed at which someone or something moves, or with which something happens or changes:

• Praise - to express admiration or approval of the achievements or characteristics of a person or thing

• Personal needs - security, challenge, support, praise, movement, goals, learning expectations, other psychological or physical needs

• Learning needs - specific ways of learning, specific target language, specific language subskills, exam strategies, learner autonomy, working at a suitable level

Unit 15

Teacher’s tips

• The best approach to use depends on who your learners are and what your teaching conditions are. Consider learners' age, level of English, motivation to learn, expectations of learning, previous learning experience. Think, too, about the aims of the course your learners are on, what resources are available to the classroom, class size and number of hours of English in the course.

• Some people believe in an eclectic approach which uses classroom practices from

a variety of approaches/methods. This can be a successful approach, but it needs

to be used carefully. If you are constantly changing your methods and approaches,

your learners may become confused and begin to think that you are not very sure

of your teaching style.

Class activity/ lesson plans

Most of the topics in textbooks are aimed at studying grammar and vocabulary replenishment. I can say that in most cases a lexical approach is used, as well as a grammar-translation one. Both approaches have both pros and cons, but I believe that the teacher should select additional materials and mix approaches.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Eclectic - selecting what appears to be best in various doctrines, methods, or styles.

• Target language - a language other than one's native language that is being learned.

• Silent period - is a phase reported to have been observed in second-language acquisition where the learner does not yet produce but is actively processing the L2 (second language).

• Acquisition - the learning or developing of a skill, habit, or quality.

Unit 16

Teacher’s tips

• Using warmers as introductory activities makes the students feel comfortable and

ready for the lesson.

• Lead-ins introduce the content of the lesson. They give the learners a chance to

remember their thoughts and experiences of the content before they start actually

working on it.

• The ways you present new language or introduce lessons will depend on your

learners - their level, interests, age, what language they already know, weaknesses

and strengths in English and learning styles, and on the resources available to

you in your school and the approach to presentation used in your course book.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Realia, mime - using the body and no words to convey meaning.

• Warmers – type of introductory activities, often are used to raise students' energy levels or to make them feel comfortable before the main learning of the lesson starts.

• Teacher strategies - are methods that teachers use to deliver course material in ways that keep students engaged and practicing different skill sets.

Unit 17

Teacher’s tips

• When selecting activities for practising and developing language it is up to the

teacher to decide whether to do a controlled practice, freer practice or free activity,

or an activity that focuses on accuracy or on communication. The choice will

depend on students' needs and preferences.

• When choosing activities and tasks for developing skills, the teacher can decide

which skill or subskill to focus on. Again, students' needs and preferences should

help us to make that choice.

• Using several kinds of activities in our lessons adds variety. This helps to keep

lessons more interesting and motivating.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Chant – to recite something in a monotonous repetative tone

• Jigsaw listening - is an information gap exercise. Learners hear or read different parts of a text, then exchange information with others in order to complete a task.

• Drills - guided repetition.

Unit 18

Teacher’s tips

• To really reflect the level of learners' learning, the content and tasks included in

progress and summative tests should reflect the content and tasks in our teaching.

This may mean that our tests include a mixture of objective and subjective tasks.

• Assessment needs to be fair. This means that progress and summative tests should only test what has been taught and that tasks should be reliable and accurate in their marking. Using bands to help us mark subjective tasks helps achieve this.

• Informal assessment is often much more suitable for assessing young learners than formal assessment. This is because young learners' ways of thinking and learning are based on experiencing and communicating, and also because teachers of young learners are often interested in finding out more about their learners' attitudes, motivation and behaviours.

• Working with assessment criteria and bands helps the teacher grade all students

against the same levels of achievement. This can help the teacher and the students

know more about their real level of ability than if the teacher just ranks the

students according to their grades.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Hesitation - an unwillingness to do something, or a delay in doing it, because you are uncertain, worried, or embarrassed about it.

• Informal assessment - is when we observe learners to see how well they are doing something and then often give them comments on their performance.

• Formal assessment - is when we assess learners through tests or exams and give their work a mark or a grade.

Unit 19

Teacher’s tips

• The syllabus (i.e. the course programme) and/or the coursebook will give us a

general direction for planning our teaching. To specify main aims for a particular

lesson, we think about our learners' needs and the stage they have reached in their learning.

• Our main aims should not be too general. Aims such as 'to teach the past simple'

or 'to develop learners' reading skills' do not say enough about the purpose of

the lesson. More specific (or exact) aims might be 'to introduce and practise the

past simple for talking about personal experiences' or 'to give learners practice in

predicting content, scanning for specific information and deducing meaning

from context'.

• Once we have identified the most appropriate main aim for a particular lesson,

it should be easier to make decisions about everything else, e.g. the selection of

materials and activities, the organisation of the classroom, procedure, timing of

different stages, the stage aims.

• Learners of all ages find it helpful to know why they are doing things. It is often

a good idea to announce our main aims (or to write them up on the board) at the

beginning of the lesson, and/or to repeat them at the end.

Class activity/ lesson plans

The last topic I taught was "Plans and Intentions", the purpose of the lesson was to study grammatical constructions. This topic seemed to me very generalized, so I added my goals: to apply these constructions in practice, in speech (to work out the communicative skill and understanding of the topic), to observe the understanding of students, to analyze specific examples of the use of these constructions.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Syllabus - a requisite document for teaching in that it serves to outline the basic elements of a course including what topics will be covered, a weekly schedule, and a list of tests, assignments, and their associated weightings.

• A main aim - the one above, describes the most important thing we want the learners to achieve in a lesson or sequence of lessons.

• Subsidiary aim - shows the language or skills learners must be able to use well in order to achieve the main aim of the lesson.

• Stage aims - describe the particular purpose of each stage (or short section) of the lesson.

• Personal aims - show what we would like to improve or focus on in our teaching.

Unit 20

Teacher’s tips

• When we make a lesson plan, we need to be sure about the learning rationale (or

reasons) for the plan, to ask ourselves how the procedures will help to achieve our

main aims and to make sure there are strong connections between the different

stages.

• We also need to build in variety, i.e. how we can use different activity types,

language skills and interaction patterns.

• It's a good idea to keep lesson plans as simple as possible, so notes are better than

full sentences, and there's no need to describe every step in great detail. However,

we may want to write down some important things in a complete form - for

example, prompts for drilling, questions to check learners' understanding,

instructions, etс.

• A lesson plan should be clear and easy to read during the lesson. Different colours, boxes, underlining, etс. are useful. It is often helpful to include drawings of the way the board will look at different stages.

Class activity/ lesson plans

https://www.teacher.org/lesson-plan/present-perfect-tense/

I liked this site for its structure. It is written in blocks: goals and objectives, the necessary materials for the lesson, the lesson procedure. This lesson is dedicated to the study of the present perfect tense. I liked the way the lesson is structured, the teacher smoothly brings the children to the topic of the lesson by reading a book in which this time is often used. After that, the teacher gives the children the task of revealing the essence of the text and the pattern of the present perfect tense and announces the topic of the lesson. Then the students themselves find any suggestions from any book at that time and explain why they chose them. This method, in my opinion, increases the motivation of children, and also uses the method of "picking up".

Useful unit vocabulary

• Intensive listening - is slow, careful listening of short, difficult audio clips.

• Lesson plan - a set of notes that helps us to think through what we are going to teach and how we are going to teach it.

• Сomponents of a lesson plan - show us what the lesson is for (the aims), what the teacher and the learners will do during the lesson and how they will do it (the procedures).

Unit 21

Teacher’s tips

• Learners may well require more frequent revision than the coursebook provides.

A scheme of work is a good way to make sure that we recycle language (i.e. use it

again) and include regular revision activities during a sequence of lessons.

• Coursebook units are often arranged around a specific topic (such as sport or

relationships), which may be a useful way of linking together a sequence of lessons.

• When planning lessons we may need to think about the needs of individual learners or groups of learners, e.g. those that always finish first, those that can't concentrate for long, etс. This means we may need to plan parts of the lesson that adapt the course book or work with supplementary materials or activities.

Class activity/ lesson plans

In the "Spotlight" coursebook, lessons move quite smoothly from one to the other. For example, the first topic is the study of the grammatical structure of the simple past tense, then there is a lesson where you need to read the text (in which this time will be used), and the third lesson where you will need to apply this time in oral speech to reveal the essence of the task.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Recycling - is practising language that learners have seen previously. The recycled language will be re-introduced in a different context, or through a different skill. This helps the student extend their range of use of the new item.

• Supplementary material - is relevant material that is additional to the main article. It can be anything from tables to presentations, to video and audio files.

• A sequence of lessons - a number of related lessons that develop language knowledge and/or language skills over a period of time.

Unit 22

Teacher’s tips

• When we prepare a class test, it is important to test the main things we have taught, and to include a number of different tasks, so that we get a good picture of our learners' strengths and weaknesses.

• To carry out informal assessment of productive skills in larger classes, we probably need to assess small numbers of learners in different lessons. We can observe the class or particular students and record our opinions on a record sheet or fill in a checklist. We need to plan informal assessment and think about how we can organise assessment activities as part of our teaching.

• We can assess learners' grammatical and lexical knowledge informally by using

language games or quizzes, or by monitoring practice activities and making a note of frequent errors. We can then give feedback to individuals or to the whole class, or return to the problems later in a revision lesson.

• It is important to keep records of informal assessment, especially in larger classes, so that we have the information we need to report or give feedback on our learners' progress. These records can be quite simple, with headings (for example) for grammar, vocabulary, language skills, motivation and general progress against each learner's name. When completed, they provide the teacher with a useful learner profile.

Class activity/ lesson plans

I haven't had a chance to try new kinds of the assessment activities yet, but I really like the portfolio idea. I believe that this method allows you to see the work of students throughout the entire period of time, and it is also more creative than others. The teacher can see progress or problematic moments.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Guided writing - is an approach to writing instruction involving small groups and teachers responding to each student’s specific needs.

• Receptive skills - are listening and reading, because learners do not need to produce language to do these, they receive and understand it.

• Assessment - collecting information about learners' performance, progress or attitudes in order to make judgements about their learning.

Unit 23

Teacher’s tips

• Some grammar books and dictionaries may contain clearer explanations or

examples. So when checking a language item, we should try to look at more than

one reference resource.

• One way to keep up-to-date is to use the most recently published grammar books and dictionaries.

Class activity/ lesson plans

I don't have any fellow teachers, since I don't teach. But in practice, and used additional resources like: Cambridge Dictionary, YouTube, quizlet. I think that no textbook can include everything, so the teacher should carefully choose and use additional materials.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Interference - The phenomenon in which two or more waves superpose to form a resultant wave of greater, lower or the same amplitude.

• Bilingual dictionary - is a specialized dictionary used to translate words or phrases from one language to another.

• Monolingual dictionary - where the word and its meaning are in the same language.

Unit 24

Teacher’s tips

• There may be good reasons for leaving out part of a unit, or even a whole unit.

But the coursebook is one of the main sources of learning (and revision) for our

learners. So they may find it confusing if we do this too often.

• The course book will normally provide the main content for a lesson, while material that needs to be more personalised for the learners will probably come from the teacher (or from the learners themselves).

• We can change the order of activities in the coursebook in order to introduce

variety in one of the following areas: pace, interaction pattern, sequence of skills

practice, level of difficulty, content, mood, ete.

• We should think about how to make material more attractive and interesting for

learners and how to bring material to life, e.g. using mime, pictures, realia, etс.

Class activity/ lesson plans

A coursebook that I usually use at lessons for my students is Starlight (I also studied it at school). It consists students book, work book, teacher`s book, CD. There are a lot of visual materials that help and make learning easier (many pictures and photos, bright colors). The coursebook is well organized, it is divided into modules that are divided into units. This gives a clear understanding of the topics.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Class profile - compares information about the children in your classroom with widely held expectations for their age or class/ grade during a particular checkpoint period.

• Teaching materials - coursebook or supplementary materials.

Unit 25

Teacher’s tips

• Get to know what supplementary materials are available in your school. Use

observation, a questionnaire or interviews for analysis of your learners' needs at the beginning of the course to find out what you will want to add to the coursebook when you are planning your scheme of work.

• It may be useful to use authentic material (which is not designed for a particular

level), in order to give learners the experience of working with more challenging

texts and tasks.

• The activities in materials designed to develop individual skills often include the

use of other skills, e.g. learners need to read a text before they carry out a listening

task, or to do some writing as a follow-up activity after a speaking activity. When

selecting materials and activities, it is important for us to think carefully about all

the skills that they require learners to use.

• We can adapt many supplementary materials for use with classes at different levels. The texts used in these materials may not be graded, but we can grade the activities by making the learners' tasks more or less challenging.

• Games and extra communicative activities can provide variety and make learning

fun. But unless we think carefully about our reasons for using them, our lesson may not have a clear purpose. Older learners especially may want to know why they are doing these activities.

Class activity/ lesson plans

On many topics, I have to use additional material to either analyze the topic in more detail, or to make the tasks more interesting for students. For example, I often use supplementary materials for younger students, pictures, excerpts from cartoons to make the topic interesting and understandable for their perception.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Mixed level classes - classes, where students have different abilities, backgrounds and interests.

• Authentic material - which is not designed for a particular level.

• Supplementary materials - books and other materials we can use in addition to the coursebook.

Unit 26

Teacher’s tips

• Different aids have different advantages and disadvantages. Make sure you choose the best one for your specific teaching purpose and context.

• Aids that you can prepare in advance, like charts, flashcards and transparencies for the overhead projector, will help you to make sure that procedures outlined in

lesson plans match your aims. Another advantage is that you can save such aids and re-use them in future lessons.

• Learners may also make use of a self-access centre, a place with books,

worksheets, computers and CDs, where they can study by themselves.

Class activity/ lesson plans

In the last lesson I conducted, I used a projector, a laptop, worksheets, as well as gestures. All this helped me to achieve the concentration of students and their understanding of the material.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Prompt - is a cue or instruction that is given before or during the person's action or response.

• Teaching aids - the resources and equipment available to us in the classroom, as well as the resources we can bring into the classroom.

• Puppets - models of people or animals that you can move by putting your hand inside them.

Unit 27

Teacher’s tips

• Exponents used in the classroom must be appropriate for the classroom function,

for the learning context and purpose, and for the level and age of the learners.

• Language should be graded to suit the language level and age of the learners.

Grading language means choosing exponents that are suitable for the language level of the learners.

• Language needs to be sequenced appropriately to provide learners with a range of

learning opportunities.

• Learners can learn chunks of language, just by hearing them again and again. So

it is useful to use a fixed range of exponents for classroom functions at the early

stages of learning.

Class activity/ lesson plans

Unfortunately or fortunately, I don't teach and I can't make an audio recording. But, I can tell you what my lessons were in practice and what I used. I had a lesson with the 8th grade, I used the nomination, instructing(now you should do this, this), encouraging (like “great, it was good, but can you be a bit louder?). I think I used the appropriate markers corresponding to their language level.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Sequencing - using language in a logical order.

• Modelling - is about building representations of things in the 'real world' and allowing ideas to be investigated

• Nominating - to officially suggest someone for an election, job, position, or honour.

• Prompting - helping learners think of ideas or remember a word or phrase or what to do.

Unit 28

Teacher’s tips

• Learners need a range of exponents so that they can interact appropriately with

each other and with the teacher.

• Students can learn exponents as language chunks. They don't need to understand

the grammar of the utterance. They need to know when to use it and what it

means.

• Sets of useful exponents can be displayed on the classroom walls as a reminder for learners.

• Exponents for common language functions should be introduced on a step-bystep

basis. If we encourage learners to use these exponents regularly during

lessons, they soon get used to using English as the medium of interaction. Many

coursebooks or textbooks introduce exponents for classroom functions on a

regular basis.

• Exponents can be introduced to learners by teachers modelling them as part of

their own classroom language.

Class activity/ lesson plans

Students may need such functions as accepting of correction (I understood. Is it right now?), giving reasons (That’s why, because), agreeing (I agree. I totally agree with you), disagreeing (I don’t think so), asking for an opinion (What about you? What do you think about it?).

Useful unit vocabulary

• Target language – a language into which another language is to be translated compare source language. : a language other than one's native language that is being learned.

• Negotiating - having a discussion in order to reach agreement.

• Speculating - making a guess using information about the situation.

Unit 29

Teacher’s tips

• Learners can lose motivation if we correct every mistake they make. They become anxious and more unwilling to take risks and this can have a negative effect on their learning. We need to think carefully about what, how and when we correct.

• When correcting learners' written work, it is possible to use a correction code.

This uses symbols, for example sp for spelling, which tells learners the type of

mistake they have made. This can help learner autonomy because it raises

learners' awareness of the types of mistakes they make and encourages them

to correct their own mistakes.

• It is important not only to focus on mistakes of accuracy (e.g. grammar and lexis). Mistakes of appropriacy need correcting as well. Mistakes of appropriacy can often cause more misunderstanding and lack of communication than mistakes of grammar and lexis.

Class activity/ lesson plans

8th grade students were writing a letter to a friend. So, their most frequent mistakes were grammatical and in appropriacy. For example, the wrong tense was used or incorrect use of phrasal verbs. They also used words or expressions that were not suitable for an informal style. As for the use of tenses, I think this is due to a lack of knowledge due to a lack of understanding of the use of these tenses or a lack of desire to learn it. And as for phrasal verbs, I think that these are errors related to L1, since students often used such prepositions, which they would use in Russian.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Slips - mistakes caused by temporary factors such as a learner being tired, nervous, excited or distracted.

• Errors - a deviation from accuracy or correctness; a mistake, as in action or speech

• Edit - to prepare (something, such as literary material) for publication or public presentation. edit a manuscript

• Interlanguage - learner’s own version of second language which is not fixed.

Unit 30

Teacher’s tips

• What we say, how we say it and what we do make our teacher roles clear to

learners. When planning lessons, it is useful to first identify the roles we are going

to take on during the lesson and then to think about what we are going to say and

do to convey that role clearly to the learners.

• It takes practice and experience to know which teacher roles are appropriate

with which classes and for which activities.

• It is important to be flexible in teacher roles. Sometimes roles need to be changed

because of circumstances in the lesson.

• It is sometimes necessary to take on roles we do not always feel comfortable with. The ability to take on appropriate roles in class is important for establishing class rapport and maintaining a positive and effective learning environment in the classroom.

Class activity/ lesson plans

I used such roles as planner, observer, facilitator, language resource, rapport builder. I think that the roles I used were clear to the students, because they were old enough. But I didn't use roles as Manager Diagnostician Assessor, because I was teaching when I was doing my internship, so I didn't have enough time and resources to use all the opportunities.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Teacher roles – different ways of how teacher behave in and manage the class.

• Assessor - evaluates the language level and attitudes of the learners by using different means of informal and formal assessment.

• Rapport builder - tries to create a good relationship with and between learners.

Unit 31

Teacher’s tips

• It is useful to include a variety of interaction patterns in a lesson to keep the

students interested and motivated and to give them different kinds of practice.

• With a class of between 20 and 30 learners, we can manage a range of interaction

patterns quite easily. With classes of more than 30 learners, interaction patterns

such as pairs, groups, mingles, teams are possible, but need more careful planning.

•It's important to consider how we will manage, for example, if the predicted class of 20 (5 groups of 4) is a class of 18 on the day.

• Sometimes a student arrives late for class after we have organised the groupings for the activity. You can deal with this by putting the student in a group and have the group explain quickly to him or her what they are doing.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Open pairs - two learners do a pairwork activity in front of the class.

• Closed pairs - learners all do an activity at the same time working with a partner.

Unit 32

Teacher’s tips

• It is important to be aware of the range of correction techniques and strategies

available in the classroom. We choose the technique appropriate for the teaching

approach, the learning purpose, the activity, the learner and the context.

• Over-correction can result in learners not wanting to say anything in class because they are afraid of making mistakes. So we choose carefully what to correct and what to ignore.

• Indicating mistakes and slips to learners so that they can self- or peer-correct will

help them become more autonomous in their learning.

• We can try to extend our range of correction techniques and strategies.

• When several learners make the same significant mistake during one or more

lessons it sometimes means that the class needs further practice with that area of

language in future lessons. If they are minor errors, this is probably not necessary.

If only a few learners make the error, we can provide those learners with individual

written or oral practice.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Echo correcting - repeating what a learner says with rising intonation.

• Peer correction - involves learners correcting each other's mistakes.

• Self-correction - is when learners correct their own mistakes.

• Reformulating - a technique when parents correct the mistake by repeating the utterance correctly, without drawing the child's attention to the mistake.

Unit 33

Teacher’s tips

• Wherever possible, feedback should be balanced, focused and helpful. It needs to be balanced so that there is comment on positive aspects of a learner's work as well as areas he/she needs to improve; focused so that the learner knows exactly what the good points are and what the problems are; helpful so that the learner knows what steps to take to improve. This is particularly important for weaker or less confident learners.

• Feedback can be given at different stages of a lesson

• During class or individual feedback it is possible to revisit or recycle language that learners are having problems with, by providing learners with written exercises, or by including the language for review in an oral activity in the following lesson.

• Feedback which is particularly personal or sensitive should be given to learners

privately and not in front of the whole class.

• Written or oral feedback can be given to learners after formal assessment in addition to a mark or grade. This feedback should include guidance on how learners can improve their work.

• Learners often need guidance to help them provide teachers with feedback.

Useful unit vocabulary

• Peer feedback – when learners give feedback to their classmates.

• Feedback - giving information to someone about their learning and/or showing them that you have understood (or not) what they have said.

• Tutorials - small meetings between the teacher and one student or a few students to discuss their learning.