Design of brainstorming activity: Reasons for Stage 1: The purpose of this stage is to stimulate the students’ interest and to bring a close link between the students’ prior knowledge and the in-coming input. The design of the first stage in this way is based on the constructivist theory. The constructivist theory believes that learning is a process in which the learners construct meaning based on their own experience and what they already know. Therefore, in these two steps, I aim at engaging in the students’ personal experience by activating the students’ schemata. Gansu Poor Project Hope School Children Countryside 6
Stage2: 3. 1st listening of the dialogue for the gist Listen for the gist of the Ask the students to listen multiple choice question and do multiple choice on the worksheet. question on the main idea of the text. To let the students have 4 mins text. dialogue and do the for the gist of the dialogue a general picture of the 4. 2nd listening for the Listen to the dialogue for Ask the students to listen the 2nd time and do the T/F statements on the worksheet. to the dialogue for the 2nd time and do the T/F statements on the worksheet. To let the students have 5 mins a better understanding attention to the details 6 mins of the dialogue and pay Top-down listening details 5. 3rd listening for Do the reading language on the worksheet with the present perfect. 6. 4th listening Ask the students to do the comprehension on the questions perfect. comprehension questions reading worksheet with the present for Retell the dialogue orally Provide the students with Enable the students to 5 mins by using the key words some cues to prepare their sort out the text in a as cues provided by the text-retelling in pair work logical way. teacher. for 2 minutes. And then ask some students to retell retelling 7
the text in class. Design of Step 3: What’s the topic of this dialogue? ( ). A．school life B．family C．work D．future Design of Step 4: T/F statements: 1) Betty has known Lingling for 3 years. ( F ) 2) Sally will arrive in Beijing next month. ( T ) 3) Betty have you lived here since 2004. ( T ) 4) Lingling has learned Chinese for a year. ( F ) 5) A Hope School is a school for rich children. ( F ) Design of Step 5: Language work: The present perfect with “ how long ” 1. How long has Lingling known Sally? 2. How long has Project Hope built schools all over China？ 3. How long has Sally studied Chinese? 4. How long has Betty lived in China? 8
Design of Step 6: Cues for retelling: know/ arrive/ get on well with/live/ hear/ arrive/how long/Chinese/has studied/since/the Hope School/all over China Summary for reference: Sally and Lingling are having a talk. Sally will arrive in Beijing next month. Betty asks Lingling “How long have you known Sally?” Lingling say “For two years. Sally can speak a little Chinese.” And Betty has studied Chinese for a year. She lived here since 2004. Sally’s school orchestra has some concerts, but she has heard about the Hope School for poor children. Since 1989 Project Hope has built schools all over China. Reasons for Stage 2： Socio-constructivist theory believes that learning is best achieved through teacher’s scaffolding and students’ peer support. For this reason, I ask the students to listen to the text for 4 times with the listening activities more and more difficult from getting the gist, to catching the details, to learning the linguistic items, and to retelling the text. In this way, I set up scaffolding for the students ladder by ladder by carrying out a series of closely connected and difficulty-increased activities. Then the students can extend their skills and knowledge to the fullest potential. In this process, teacher’s role, as a guide and facilitator, can be enacted vividly. Stage 3: Production 7. activity Take the teacher’s written Present the students with a Enable the students to pay attention 5 mins write a paragraph on the topic text as a reference for the My experiences of studying students to imitate the English. writing on the topic My experiences of studying Follow-and-write summary as the reference to written summary of the to the language points of this lesson 9
8. Oral presentation activity Present the English. written Encourage the students to To give the students an opportunity 6 mins and give peer evaluation. And the teacher provides feedback. 9. Homework Write a composition of 50 words about the Project Hope. To let the students use what they 2 mins have learnt into practice paragraphs in the whole class present their written work to practice speaking. and make peer evaluation. Reasons for Stage 3: Stage 3 is the last stage to detect the accomplishments of the teaching objectives and to see the effectiveness of this class. Therefore, productive skills as writing and speaking should be concerned. This is the reason that I design follow-and-write activity and oral presentation activity in this stage. In addition, the communicative approach believes students can be motivated by authentic tasks that have some communicative elements, and so the topic for writing should be familiar, meaningful, and relevant to the students’ life and interests. Therefore, I choose the topic “My experiences of studying English.” which meets the requirements mentioned above to the fullest extent. Teaching Reflection 10