Teaching Language Skills Final Exam

Answer only FIVE of the following questions.

1. Teaching language skills as an academic course has been incorporated into the teaching as a
foreign language curriculum. What are the contributions of this course both to theory and practice in
TEFL? How will the teachers, learners, and practitioners in the field benefit from the materials and
presented information in this course?

1. According to Long (2009), in discussion of how to teach second or foreign language skills, it is
useful to distinguish between methodological principles and pedagogical procedures. Methodological
principles are universally desirable instructional design features motivated by theory and research
findings whereas pedagogic procedures comprise potentially infinite range of options for
instantiating the principles at the classroom level. How can the MPs and PPs contribute to language
teaching in general, and teaching language skills in particular?

MPs specify what should be done inside a language class. They specify the
direction (they’re a kind of framework that has roots in educational psychology
and general education curriculum design)

Pedagogical Procedures on the other hand are the potentially infinite range of
options for implementing principles at classroom level. We have some
methodological principles that are derived from theory, have roots in
educational psychology and based on research findings. Now we want to put
them in practice inside the classroom. Pedagogical procedures suggest how this
can be done. They help teachers to put the MPs into practice.

There are some implementation factors when a teacher wants to implement

MPs in the class. Considering age for example, we should be aware that adults
have serious problems in achieving native like mastery in speaking a second
language.

Or for example consider providing negative feedback as an MP. To put this MP

into practice in the class we have a number of options. For example providing
overt and explicit feedback or covert and explicit negative feedback

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3. Flowerdew and Miller (2014) provide an overview of the research areas into academic listening.
According to them, four main methodological approaches (psychometric research, research into
listening strategies, discourse analysis research into listening, and ethnographic research into
academic listening) to researching academic listening can be identified. Explain why such
methodological approaches are needed in the area of academic listening. What implications are there
for teachers, learners, and practitioners within the field of language teaching who apply such
approaches?

They were needed because listening was not seen as a language skill that required
much attention. Because Speech and grammar were considered more important than
listening. Listening was considered a skill that could be picked up without overt
instruction. Because language teachers and researchers had probably never been
taught how to listen explicitly in a second language. They didn’t see the need to
explicitly teach this skill

Using discourse analysis, spoken texts are examined in detail to discover the features
that listeners need to be able to identify to aid their listening.

Research into listening strategies helps to identify the listening strategies that L2 learners use
and to assess how efficient these strategies are.

Ethnographic research into academic listening tells us that Students’ comprehension of a given
lecture for example, is based not only on their level of language skill but also on their previous
learning experiences

4. Argue for and against the incorporation of a task-based metacognitive instruction into a listening
comprehension course.

By incorporating metacognitive activities into task-based instruction, teachers can

develop learners’ knowledge about ESL/EFL listening processes and the contribution
they themselves can make to enhance the comprehension and learning process.

It enables learners to plan, monitor, and evaluate how they process information in
listening.

It provides useful opportunities for learners to practice listening to a variety of

discourses and to use listening strategies whenever they are needed.

Learners are told their purpose for listening or are given an opportunity to define the
purpose and anticipated outcomes themselves.

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Not only are teachers unable to observe learners’ development and the problems the
learners face; the learners themselves are often unclear about how they listen because
they quickly forget the processes that they engage in unless there are opportunities for
them to reflect on these processes, document them, and learn from these reflections.

5. Weigle (2014) presents three different types of teacher feedback on writing (written comments, individual
conferences, and recorded oral feedback) and discusses their pros and cons. Argue for and against possible
outcomes of such feedback types in EFL contexts and their implications for language teachers and learners in
teaching and learning second language writing.

Written comments: can reinforce strengths of a paper or indicate where exactly improvement is
needed. So they can prevent some errors and cause the development of the students’ writing.
But teachers should write comments as clear as possible. And they are not feasible in crowded
classes.

Individual conferences: this can provide opportunities for students to develop their listening
and speaking skills through discussion. And obviously clear feedbacks and instructions will help
the students to improve their writing abilities. On the other side of the coin we should consider
that Teachers or students may not be available outside class. And if the students do not
understand the teacher’s comments they may not be willing to admit.

Recorded oral feedback: This definitely is faster than the other feedbacks mentioned. It
provides opportunities for students to develop their listening skills. And students can listen to
feedbacks multiple times. So this is a very good way to improve our students’ writing. But we
should consider that in some cases technology may not be available so we cannot use this type of
feedback.

6. Expound upon the theoretical and practical contributions of focus on form and focus on forms to language
teaching in general and teaching language skills in particular.

Focus on forms is the traditional teaching of discrete points of grammar in separate lessons.
Forms are derived from textbooks so teachers themselves choose the linguistic items to be
focused on. Learners are less likely to feel a need to acquire the new item because they
certainly will not feel the need to acquire the new item. It is synthetic in nature. Linguistic
items are presented one at a time separately piece by piece and language learners are required
to synthesize these linguistic items for communication. Learners are extrinsically motivated or
not motivated at all. The syllabus content consists of a preset list of linguistic forms and
functions. In other words linguistic forms and functions are predetermined in focus on forms.

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In focus on form we are communicating with each other. We are involved in the process of
communication and in acts of communication our attention will be drawn to linguistic form but
the major focus of the lesson is on communication and meaning. When we focus on form there’s
no disturbance in the fundamental communication focus.

It is consistent with the learners’ internal syllabus. It’s triggered by a problem that occurred in
the students’ performance not by a preset or a predetermined syllabus having prescribed it for
the day’s lesson. It’s analytic in nature. Learners are allowed to analyze the input. they induce
meaning. They’re involved in discovery learning. It provides richer input. It allows learners to use
their cognitive abilities to segment the input and induce rules and processes. Learners’ interest,
desire and communicative needs are well taken into account. It provides real life authentic
models of language use .In this approach learners are intrinsically motivated because linguistic
items are derived from their needs. Focus on form is more efficient if near native proficiency is
a goal.

7. A classic model of listening comprehension has been put forward by J. R. Anderson (1995) which consists of
perception, parsing, and utilization. Perception occurs as listeners match the sounds they hear to the words they
know. Parsing occurs when the decoded words are analyzed in larger units according to grammar or lexical
cues. utilization occurs when the processed information at the phonological, grammatical, and lexical levels are
related to the listeners'' prior knowledge of the facts and listening contexts. What are the implications of such a
model for both L2 listening teachers and learners?