The Anglo-Mexican Foundation

In-Service Certificate in English Language Teaching

Methodology Assignment 2: Planning Beyond the Lesson

Tutors:

Andrew Watson and Arturo Calderón

Candidate:

Ramón Sabás Vargas Sánchez

Candidate Number:

015

Resubmission Date: June 19, 2015

 Methodology Assignment 2. Planning beyond the Lesson

The purpose of this report is to reflect on a previously taught language-focused

lesson and to plan follow-up work for three subsequent lessons. It also intends to provide

a brief rationale behind the planning of the activities and materials to be used in those

lessons, both for extra practice and to establish a basis for further students’ knowledge of

the language.

Harmer (2000) affirms that in order to keep students’ interest, we have to

provide a variety of contents which enable students to recycle and remember language

and vocabulary to have a sensible progression of the syllabus elements. Gorss, Puchta and

Thornbury (2006) agree with these points and also state that the tasks and practice have

to be fun among other things to be as memorable as possible. After having reflected on

the lesson taught, I decided to focus on the extra practice that my students might need to

develop their skill in using the target structures. I will also try to help them in their

analytical understanding of the two new structures they would have to study next in the

syllabus.

Lesson 1 (1a,b)

In this lesson, I aim at familiarizing students with two new future forms (future

perfect and future continuous). This lesson is to provide analytical understanding and extra

practice since they have to study the new forms according to the syllabus and they will

have an opportunity to recycle previously studied structures.

 First, a warm-up will activate students’ schemata and help them remember useful

vocabulary. After that, we will do a listening comprehension activity (Appendix 3) to set

the situation, check understanding and grasp some specific information. Students will pay

attention to the new structures and analyze form, meaning and function through time

lines on the board and pictures taken from English File (Appendix 6). Then using the

examples from the text, students will write their own predictions and write them on the

board. This will give us an opportunity to personalize the structures and analyze the

grammar again and have some feedback on their sentences. Then, in small teams,

students will discuss if they agree or disagree with their partners’ predictions and why,

thus, providing opportunities for extra practice on the target structures.

This task was selected in order to have students interpret the language by

identifying and understanding the structure and thus, reorganizing their grammar

knowledge, Gorss, Puchta and Thornbury (2006). The two new structures may prove

difficult to grasp and the combination of the time lines and the pictures are meant to help

them. The idea of how far technology can get has often seemed to be engaging and

interesting for students, especially of my students’ characteristics and ages so, I decided

to use this topic for this lesson.

Since in this lesson I intend to introduce two new future forms, students may tend

to use the previously studied structures because they might feel more comfortable with

them. I will try to encourage the use of the new structures in their predictions and their

conversations by asking them how they would express their ideas using one of the new

forms and checking with them. Vocabulary may be needed to express their thoughts. I will
walk around asking peers to help, encouraging students to use their technology to find the

answer or providing it myself as necessary.

Lesson 2 (1a, b)

Here, I aim at providing some extra grammar practice in order to consolidate the

previously studied forms of the future. This grammar practice also intendeds to analyze

the different clues that students may find when answering an exam or speaking and by

analyzing those clues, the students might be able to choose the right future form to use

for that situation.

First, the lesson will be based on the questions “What will you be doing next

Saturday at 10 am?” and “What things will you have accomplished by 2017?”. Some

students will be elicited to ask me these questions in order to model a conversation.

Students work in small teams and are encouraged to ask as many follow up questions as

possible. Then, students are asked to keep their partners’ plans in mind to report on them

later. After that, students will look at Appendix 4, an exercise taken from the English File

Teacher’s Book. They will be asked to answer the exercise and then, they will have to

compare their answers with a partner. After that, I provide the right answers and ask

students “Why are these the right answers?” Some examples are elicited for the first and

second sentences. In small teams students are asked to look at the sentences again and

try to find the clues for the right answers. Students then share their findings and these are

written on the board. For example, for number 3, the situation of the traffic is at the

moment so, two forms might be right (will and going to for predictions, going to
particularly for predictions with some evidence). After that, students are asked to

remember their conversations with their partners at the beginning of this lesson. They

have to write a short report on the information about their partners’ plans that they

remember. Some students are elicited to report their partners’ plans.

Harmer (2000) states that, in order to uncover grammar, learners have to work out

and share their findings about the grammar. By asking students to look for clues in the

sentences, students will have to analyze the sentences and then they will have to write a

report thus, putting those ideas into practice, which, according to Gorss, Puchta and

Thornbury (2006) is not only favored by students at this stage but it also fosters their

creativity and the correct use of grammar forms.

However, some students may favor some structures more than others due to the

fact that they feel more comfortable with previously studied ones than with new forms. I

will walk around the classroom monitoring and encouraging students to find opportunities

to use most of the structures. I will encourage students to use their technology when in

trouble about vocabulary or I will provide it myself.

Lesson 3. (1a)

For this lesson I aim at consolidating the use of the previously studied forms of the

future. In order to do this, I decided to use The Crystal Ball task from the Face 2 Face 2

Teacher’s Book (2005), page 151, Appendix 2. I would also like to provide them with as

many opportunities to speak and to expand on their conversation.

 First, as a warm up, I start by asking them about their plans for the next holiday or

weekend to activate their schemata. After that, the Crystal Ball task is introduced. The

class is split in pairs and told they are going to tell their partner’s future. They are to write

predictions about at least four of the different aspects in a person’s life (love, travel, etc).

In the meantime, some stems for questions are written on the board. Then students

predict their partners’ future and follow up questions will be encouraged. Then they

switch roles and do the same for their partners. As a wrap-up students are to report what

their fortune tellers told them about their future.

The decision on this task was in order to give students some kind of variety from

their student’s book and to provide them with a task that would be fun and relaxing and

that may interest them as Harmer (2000) states. This task would also give my students an

opportunity to remember and recycle the target language items in small teams where

they could feel comfortable and in some kind of privacy, Gerngross, Puchta and Thornbury

(2006)

Some students may have problems with vocabulary or expressions related to the

different aspects they will talk about. When monitoring, I will ask their peers to help and if

they do not know the vocabulary, I will provide it myself. Another problem that may arise

is the use of the different forms. I will ask them to refer back to their notes from previous

lessons and remember their previous examples. Another problem that might arise but it

is not about language is that some students may feel uncomfortable telling someone their

future. I will tell them that the activity should not be taken seriously and it is meant to be

fun, Gerngross, Puchta and Thornbury (2006).

 After reflecting on the planning of the lessons I described, one of the aspects that I

consider I have to work on is the sequence of activities I use. I need to read in more detail

about sequences and relate it to the big panorama and not only to one lesson. Although I

believe that one of my strengths is to choose appropriate materials and a proper pace, I

still need to study more in order to be able to vary my tasks and by doing so, help my

students more effectively.

Word Count: 1497

Bibliography

 Harmer, Jeremy (2000). The Practice of English Language Teaching. Third Edition.

Cambridge, UK. Longman

 Nicovic and Cabaj, (2000). Am I teaching well? Self-Evaluation Strategies for

Effective Teachers, Toronto, Pippin Publishing

 Gorss, Puchta and Thornbury, (2006), Teaching Grammar Creatively, Oxford,

Helbling Languages
Appendix 5

Post Evaluation Reflection

The Lesson Plan

The lesson was planned taking into consideration the level shown by students in

previous lessons and from this point of view I failed to recognize that students might have

problems with a bigger number of words than I had anticipated. This made the pace of the

lesson a little bit slow at the beginning. However, the suggestion of reading and trying to

infer the meaning of words seemed to have worked since students started to try and

explain some of the vocabulary themselves. After teaching the lesson, a need to pre-teach

specific vocabulary became evident in order to give the lesson a more dynamic pace.

The activities and the sequence

On the other hand, the sequencing of the activities seemed to have worked well

because it created an interest in the topic shown by students and their active participation

by contributing to the lesson with their ideas and points of view and this helped them

significantly to use the target structures. The idea of living forever suggested in the text

(Appendix 1) seemed to foster curiosity in the topic and thus the text helped to raise

awareness of the structures as Gerngross,Puchta and Thornbury (2006) suggest. Also the

exercise after the reading and understanding sections (English File) seemed to have

provided students with a clearer idea of when the different structures are used. Evidence

for this was the students’ reaction when answering the exercise and some of them also
commented that after answering it, they felt more confident in the use of the future

forms.

My use of L2

One aspect that I need to work on is my use of L2 in the classroom. I believe that I

need to control the speed of the language that I use in order to benefit my students and

not hinder their understanding. Sometimes during the lesson, some students looked

puzzled when I said something and this even went to my instructions. When I saw those

reactions I had to say the instruction again and had to even ask for clarification in L1 in

one of the cases. I did not remember to ask for examples which I believe would have

worked very well. Nevertheless, the lesson can be described as successful from the point

of view that most students were able to follow the lesson and my use of L2 helped them

to achieve the objectives of the lesson because, in most cases, students were following,

participating and doing what was asked of them.

How I plan to improve

Some aspects and ideas in order to improve my teaching for future sessions include:

 Control my use of L2 in the classroom. I need to be observed constantly in order to

be made aware of the moments in the lesson when I tend to do speak too fast or

when I tend to imply that students are following what I am saying and they are

not.
 Reflect more deeply on aspects such as what vocabulary needs to be pre-taught in

order to give the lesson an appropriate pace.

 Devote more reflection to the timing of the activities. This will allow me to use

students’ time much more efficiently.

 Study the sequences in highly more detail in order to apply them and thus, benefit

my students as much as possible.