Hello Exam Seekers,
there’s been a while since I post something about the CELTA, so I decided that today I would give you some more hints about the assignments.
I’ve already given you tips on how to write your Assignment 1: Focus on the Learner and Assignment 2: Language Related Task. We are in April, May is almost there, so I believe that for those taking the part-time CELTA, assignment 3 will be required very soon. Therefore here are some tips for it.
youtube: watch?v=krZkDTxutdk
Well, differently from assignment 2 which focuses on an analysis of the language (grammar, pronunciation, and form), the Language Skills-Related is much simpler.
You are expected to write an assignment divided into four parts using 750–1,000 words. According to Cambridge, the design of the assignment includes:
- evidence of the candidate’s background reading in the topic area
- identification of the receptive language skills and/or subskills that could be practiced and developed using coursebook material or authentic text
- identification of productive language skills that could be practiced and developed in relation to that text
- task design in relation to the text with a brief rationale
Candidates can demonstrate their learning by:
- correctly using terminology that relates to language skills and subskills
- relating task design to language skills development
- finding, selecting and referencing information from one or more sources using written language that is clear, accurate and appropriate to the task
I’m going to dive this assignment into steps so that you can follow it properly.
STEP 1:
Choose one of the CELTA groups that you are teaching and provide a class profile which includes names, age range, professional and educational backgrounds, linguistic strengths and development needs, interests and reasons for studying English.
Keep in mind that you don’t have many words to write a profile on all of your CELTA students, só try and choose around 6 students and write something like that:
This is a pre-intermediate heterogeneous group of volunteer students in the CELTA course at _____. We follow Total English Pre-Intermediate as a course book, and sometimes we use authentic and supplementary materials.
Regular attendees
| Name | Age Range | Professional/Educational Background | Linguistic Strengths & Development Needs and Interests |
|
Angelina
|
70-80 | Retired teacher | · Likes grammar and writing, but has problems with listening and speaking.
· Has a good range of vocabulary and grammar structures. · Is interested in England, so studies English to travel. |
STEP 2:
Chose a type of material to provide them (a text or an audio/video) and justify why you have chosen this text for this particular class based on the class profile.
According to my class profile, most of my students are retired and they like to travel, so I chose a video about traveling tips and I rationalized my choice:
I’ve chosen a video called Travel Tips: Real Discounts on Airfare Found!!! (appendix1) because I think it’ll be interesting for this group of students since most of them love traveling abroad: Angelina loves England and every year she goes there. This year she is taking Maria Ester with her. (…) As Harmer(1988:84) says, adults “often have a clear understanding of why they are learning and what they want to get out of it”. Therefore, I believe they would all profit on having some tips about discounts on airfares.
The video contains a large range of vocabulary on the topic, and grammar points (present tenses, giving instructions) which they’ll have the opportunity to recognize in an authentic context.
This was just a snippet of my assignment part 2 rational. As you could see, I provided the video source (you should attach it to the appendix) and I explained why I chose that video relating my choice to my students’ likings and to a reference.
STEP 3:
After having chosen the text/video, you should design and submit a reading/listening for gist and for detail tasks for practicing these skills and provide answers to these tasks. Don’t forget that you have to provide reference all the way long. “According to….”, “this author believes that…”, by doing that, you show that you are making conscious choices and not random.
The length and content of this video make it ideal for students to practice listening for gist and detail, because the topic matches the students’ interests and the vocabulary and structures match the pre-required knowledge for pre-intermediate students.
It would be a good idea to have a skimming task of this video, for students to be more aware of the general idea, they’d be “trying to extract a mostly general understanding of what, superficially, the audio […] is all about”(HARMER,2005:271). In this case, understand that the video is about discounts on airfares.
Task 1 (Reading for Gist)
1) Watch the video and circle the best title for it:
- Travel Tips: Real Discounts on Airfare Found!
- Flight Tips: How to book your flight?
- Watch out: What makes a flight expensive?
Answer key: a.
As you can see in my example, I explained why it would be interesting for students to have a gist and detailed activity based on the video, and why that specific task. I provided the task and the answer key.
This was the gist task, the example of one of the exercises, remember that you have to provide at least two, okay?
STEP 4:
Do you remember that a lesson plan should provide 4-5 tasks? Warm up/Lead in, Read/Listen for gist/detail, and follow up. Well, part 3 was focused on receptive skills, now part 4 is focused on productive skill. So at this part, you should say which productive skills could be practiced in relation to this text in a follow-up activity. Design and submit the follow-up tasks with the rationale.
As this group of students would benefit from further development of speaking skills and given their general interest in travels and tips for trips, for productive skills, I have devised some questions for the students. They have some questions related to the context (trips, tips, and pre-traveling suggestions) as exercise 3 on their exercise sheets, which they should discuss in pairs and exchange information. They would do this activity with more than one pair so that they would practice speaking and exchange personal information several times and later on expose to the class their peers’ answers as feedback and conclude the productive stage.
1) Discuss the questions below about trips and tips:
- Do you like traveling? How often do you travel?
- When you travel, do you use any search engine to book flights?
- Do you think it is cheaper to book a flight online or in person? Why?
- What was the price of the cheapest and the most expensive flight in your life?
- Do you think that Sonia Gil’s tips were good? Why?
- Do you think you might use her tips in the future?
Extra steps:
These extra steps are the basics: REFERENCE and APPENDIX.
At the end of your assignment include the reference to your background reading and include at least two methodology sources in your list of references. Make sure these references are cited in the body the assignment.
Mine was like that:
Bibliography
- GIL, Sonia (2014). Travel Tips: Real Discounts on Airfare Found!!!. Available at: <https://www. youtube.com/watch?v=jgbrVzEMolA>. Access on: 24 Jan. 2015
- HARMER, Jeremy (2005). The practice of English Language Teaching. e. Pearson.
- HOGAN, Jonathan T., IGREJA, José Roberto (2004). Phrasal Verbs.
- SCRIVENER, Jim (2005). Learning Teaching. e. Macmillan.
And since you had an authentic material (a text/video/audio) from which you created your gist/detailed task, you should also provide it in your appendix. Since mine was a video, my appendix was like that:
By the way, this youtube channel (Sonia Travels), is fantastic for you to use as authentic material for classes based on trips and travels.
I hope that this text was really helpful for you to write your assignment. If you still have questions don’t forget to send us a message. Leave a comment in the comment section below or on our social media:
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Have a great weekend,
Patty
Thank you a lot! You’ve saved my life!!!!