Evaluation of Activities 28, 29, & 30

Prepared by Guohong Xu

TCSOL

November 15, 2014

Activity 28

This activity has all the necessary components. The topic is reading to learn about Beijing, time allotted is 30 minutes, and goal is for intermediate language learners to gain information about Beijing travel through reading the travel brochure. The procedure consists of drawing the students’ interest by introducing and discussing travel brochures, a quick read of the brochure, circling unfamiliar vocabulary, turning and talking with classmates, and then answering questions to allow for close rereading. The expected outcome is for students to develop an interest in another genre of text, take risk in actively finding and learning unknown vocabulary, and learning about Beijing travel through close reading.

The activity focuses on reading but touches all four aspects of language learning (i.e. writing to answer questions, speaking to discuss unknown vocabulary and content, and listening to discussion). The activity is accuracy-oriented. With the brochure text provided, students can easily use this resource and background knowledge to engage in the activity. I don’t think there is enough time to reach the goal effectively. There is no pre-learning mentioned. Success orientation is where students read and discuss to answer questions about traveling. Interest is not high since there is no sufficient material provided. Teacher assists in building schema with background questions, vocabulary instruction after students’ self selection of unfamiliar vocabulary. The outcome effect may not be achieved as expected.

Activity 29

This activity has all the necessary components. The topic is speaking and asking about names, time allotted is 20 minutes, and goal is for beginning language learners to be able to ask and talk about their names using Chinese. The procedure consists of analyzing the conventional way to ask others about their names in terms of pronunciation and meaning, asking students to practice telling others their name by speaking with provided sentence frames, and practice telling others other people’s names (i.e. names of celebrities when provided pictures). The expected outcome is for students to be able to ask for other’s names, to answer these kinds of questions themselves.

The activity focuses on speaking and touches on listening (to be able to respond accurately to questions from others). The activity is fluency -oriented. With the question and sentence frame provided, students can easily use refer to these standard language structures to engage in the activity. It is valid and there is enough time allotted. There is pre-learning. Success orientation is where students practice using provided question and sentence frames with classmates but it is a very basic exchange of information and volume is not full and interest is low. No detail information is provided as mentioned.

Activity 30

This activity has all the necessary components. The topic is identifying animals through questions and answers, time allotted is 15 minutes, and goal is for Kindergarten children to understand when others ask them to identify animals and to be able to respond and give description if possible. The procedure consists of introducing the question and response sentence frame for identifying animals, have students repeat the spoken speech, and have selected students pull animals out of a box and ask others what the animals are (prompting others to answer and be the next selected “magician” who gets to pull out the next animal). The expected outcome is for students to be able to ask what animals are, answer this kind of question with a provided sentence frame, and review animal names and related adjectives.

The activity focuses on speaking but touches lightly on listening (to the question posed by classmates). The activity is fluency-oriented. With the visual stuffed animals, question and response sentence frame provided, and students’ own background knowledge, it is practical and easy to carry out in the classroom. It is valid but there may not be enough time allotted. There is pre-learning. Success orientation is where students can see, ask, and answer questions about animals with provided language structures and real life situation. There is a high interest as there is an element of excitement when children can be selected as “magicians” during this learning activity. Heterogeneity includes language structure instruction, visual animals to facilitate speaking and classmate asking and answering each other. Teacher’s sufficient assistance can be seen in introducing the language structures, facilitating the animal pulling activity from detail preparation.