INTRODUCTION
This document is a syllabus addressed to students of the first course of Bachillerato (Secondary Education) with an evening schedule.
This syllabus is thought to be applied in a public Secondary Education Centre placed in a big town like Pamplona, in Navarre, and for students over 18 years old, all of them being ready to study Bachillerato, in the module of Humanities and Social Sciences, and also to study English as they already know its importance as the language of international communication.
I have chosen two quotes as a summary of the main ideology underlying this syllabus. The quotes are the following:
– “We learn more by looking for the answer to a question and not finding it than we do from learning the answer itself”, by Lord Alexander (British politician)
– “Get over the idea that only children should spend their time in study. Be a student so long as you still have something to learn, and this will mean all your life”, by Henry L. Doherty (American businessman)
These quotes explain in a very explicit way that the process of learning is the most important aspect and it is life-long; it is a never-ending process where the student has to be the key element of control. The student has to be an active and reflexive being in his/her own autonomous process of learning, being able to create meaningful knowledge having as a base the already known, and being the teacher a mere tool to fulfil that process. In the specific stage of Bachillerato students are supposed to be mature and independent enough to be able to develop that process of autonomous learning, and they are also supposed to be in contact with the information and communication technologies, which nowadays offer many different possibilities to facilitate the process of learning, and for that reason they will be present as a key resource for the students’ acquisition of knowledge in the development of the didactic units that form this syllabus.
Programming answers an attempt to rationalize teaching practice with the aim that teaching should not be carried out in an arbitrary way but rather as a plan. Programming depends on the concepts one has about teaching and more specifically about the curriculum. Thus, the curricular model will have a decisive influence on the focus and the design of the program, adapting it to the cultural and environmental characteristics of the context, as well as leaving space for creativity. As I am concerned about English education and all the difficulties it implies, I want to give a clear idea of it but from the point of view of the student, instead of looking at the language from a teacher’s perspective, always focusing on the communicative situations as hierarchical force.
CONTEXTUALIZATION
LEGISLATIVE CONTEXT
This syllabus is based on the state and community legislation:
– The Organic Law of Education (LOE) 2/2006, May 3rd (BOE number 106, May 4th 2006).
– Foral Decree 49/2008, May 12th 2008 (BON number 70, June 6th 2008), for the curriculum of Bachillerato in Navarre.
– Foral Order 66/2008, May 14th 2008 (BON number 71, June 9th 2009), for the structure and organization of Bachillerato in Navarre.
– Foral Order 119/2008, August 4th 2008 (BON number 111, September 10th 2008), for the education of adults.
This syllabus is also adapted to the following aspects:
– The Government of Navarre’s plan for the bilingualism in the schools of the public system.
– The Government of Navarre’s plan for the use of the information and communication technologies in class.
– The Common European Framework of Reference for Languages’s plan for the development of the communicative competence and autonomous learning.
– The specific centre’s Educational Project
– The specific classroom’s reality, with the different students and their different needs.
EDUCATIONAL CENTRE
The Secondary Education Centre is a well equipped centre with one computer for each student and with access to Internet, and where students are motivated and with the possibility of self-development both personally and professionally. It is placed in a big town like Pamplona (Navarre) where people are aware of the importance of modern languages, especially the English language. Indeed, the Government of Navarre is developing different programmes and measures for the bilingualism of the educational centres, and also for the use of the information and communication technologies where English is the main language for communication.
This Secondary Education Centre forms part of the public system and has a group of professional teachers, some Educational Departments, the Pedagogical Coordination Commission, the Guidance Department, the Complementary and Extracurricular Activities Department. In each classroom there are 25 students.
In this establishment the school calendar is from September 15th to June 15th. The total number of direct classrooms day is about 170. The school day varies depending on the different optional subjects as well as on the more effective pupil performances and on the use of some school’s resources. These students are doing the module of Humanities and Social Sciences.
For students of the first course of Bachillerato with an evening schedule, the timetable is about 26 hours per week. The Centre begins at 5.30pm and finishes at 10.15pm, except on Wednesday and Friday when the timetable begins one hour later and finishes one our earlier correspondingly. As far as English is concerned, it forms part of the common compulsory subjects and so the timetable is 3 hours per week. There is also the possibility of distance learning, with the help of an orientating guide for the student as well as a personal tutor available for each subject. This possibility is focused especially on the possible working students who, as well, my have some difficulties to learn because they may have finished their studies several years ago.
Here is the organization of the centre:
- Parents
- Town council
- AMPA (association of students’ parents)
- School council
- PAS (administration and service workers)
- Management team
- Teachers’ assembly
- Delegates’ association
- Pedagogic commission
- Departments:
- Didactic
- Orientation
- Extra school activities
- Teacher tutor
- Students’ association
- Students
STUDENTS’ CHARACTERISTICS IN BACHILLERATO
Students of the first course of Bachillerato are adults who are at least 18 years old, or who are 16 or 17 years old providing that they are labourers or high performance athletes. Consequently, they are supposed to come from former studies or from the labour market, and so they have already established an aim for their lives and have a total responsibility for their acts. For that reason, all of them are ready to study Bachillerato, although some may have different difficulties as far as their working timetable is concerned and also focusing on the fact that if they are working they may have finished studying several years ago and, so, they have to reactivate their learning process.
In my class there are 25 students, 14 men and 11 women, all of them from different backgrounds: 2 high performance athletes of 19 and 23 years old, 3 housewives of 35-45 years old, 3 immigrant workers from Romania and Colombia of 25-35 years old, and 17 workers of 20-40 years old. Owing to this disparity, it is very important to apply the attention to diversity measures to take into account all the students’ specific needs.
The education of adults, as it is established on the Foral Order 119/2008, August 4th 2008 (BON number 111, September 10th 2008), has as main objective to offer to people over eighteen years old the possibility to acquire, update, complete or widen their knowledge and aptitudes for their personal and professional development. The general objectives and principles for the education of adults are the following:
– To acquire a basic formation, widen and renew their knowledge, abilities and skills in a permanent way and to facilitate the access to the different educative stages of the educative system.
– To improve their professional qualification or to acquire a preparation to perform other professional occupations.
– To develop their personal abilities, in the expressive and communicative areas, for the interpersonal relationship and for the construction of knowledge.
– To develop their ability to participate in the social, cultural, political and economic life, and to make effective their right to democratic citizenship.
– To develop programs to correct the risks for social exclusion, especially of the most underprivileged sectors of society.
– To answer appropriately to the challenges of the progressive aging of the population, ensuring the eldest population the possibility to increase and update the competences.
– To prevent and solve peacefully the personal, family and social conflicts. To promote the effective equality of rights and opportunities between men and women, as well as analyse and value critically the existent inequalities among them.
STAGE CHARACTERISTICS OF BACHILLERATO
The stage of Bachillerato includes two academic years that will be studied between the ages of seventeen and eighteen, or even adults like in the object of study of this syllabus. This is a stage within the secondary education which is not compulsory, but it is one of the requirements to study at university. If the evaluation team considers that according to their attitudes and interests, they are able to obtain the degree of Graduate in Bachillerato, and so be able to go to university or do superior studies.
Here are the main principles of Bachillerato:
– The main aim of Bachillerato is providing the students with the formation, intellectual and human maturity, knowledge and skills to be able to develop the social functions to incorporate to the active life with responsibility and competence, as well as qualifying them to get to superior education.
– The requirement to get to Bachillerato is to own the degree of Graduate in Compulsory Secondary Education.
– Bachillerato consists of two courses, developed in different flexible modules in order to provide the students with a specialized formation appropriate for their formation perspectives and interests, or to entitle them to incorporate the active life after finishing this stage.
– The students will be able to remain studying Bachillerato for four years according to the common schedule.
– The public Administration will promote a progressive increase in the offer of public posts for Bachillerato in its various modules of study.
The Bachillerato stage organizes the subjects to be studied according to three modules:
a) Arts
b) Science and technology
c) Humanities and Social Sciences
The Bachillerato stage is organized in common subjects, modality subjects and optional subjects, being the following the common ones:
a) Sciences for the contemporary world
b) Physical education
c) Philosophy and citizenship
d) History of philosophy
e) History of Spain
f) Spanish language and literature, and co-official language and literature in the Autonomous Regions where there is one.
g) Foreign language
The pedagogical principles of the stage of Bachillerato are:
– The educative activities of Bachillerato will favour the capacity of the student to learn on his/her own, and work in a team.
– It will be emphasized the relationship established between the theoretical aspects of the subjects with their practical application in class, developing the appropriate investigation methods.
– The syllabus will promote the necessary measures so that the different subjects develop activities to stimulate the interest and habit of reading. They will also ensure the comprehension of long texts about academic topics as well as social and professional ones.
– The teachers of the different subjects will include activities that promote the capacity to express, written and orally, correctly and clearly, long and well organised and argued texts and discourses.
– The educative centres will favour the treatment of the information and communication through different ways, including the use of the information and communication technologies.
ENGLISH SUBJECT CHARACTERISTICS IN BACHILLERATO
The knowledge of foreign languages is an increasing necessity in the society where we are living. There are a lot of reasons: international relations, professional travels, artistic and tourist manifestations, the access to means of communication.
The knowledge of foreign languages gives the opportunity to be connected with other cultures, habits, idiosyncrasy and, at the same time, it favours the inter-professional relations and encourage the international spirit, the respect to other countries and, of course, to know a little better the mother tongue.
The integration in the European Union with countries of different languages fosters the necessity of knowing these languages to make an easy communication. It is in this context that we recognize the role of foreign languages for well constructing the European identity:
– The multilinguistic and multicultural European identity.
– Free circulation of people.
– Cultural, economic and scientist cooperation.
The European Council has established a common reference for learning foreign languages (The Common European Framework of Reference for Languages), with the concept of the communicative competence, with its several sub-competences:
– Linguistic competence (semantic, morphosyntactic and phonologic elements).
– Pragmatic or discursive competence (functions, speaking acts, conversation).
– Sociolinguistic competence (social conversations, communicative intention, register).
– Personal competence (family relation, individual social practices).
– Strategic competence (educative, working competences).
Oral and written communication must be worked at the same time. We have to give importance to oral communication, and so the foreign language must be the language of communication in the classroom.
As the English language is an obligatory subject, we have to take in mind that students have different capacities, different levels in communicative competence and different interests too. For this reason we can’t have only one method. We have to be opened to all kind of differences and circumstances.
OBJECTIVES
Objectives are understood to be the intentions that orient the design and fulfilment of necessary activities for reaching the major educational objectives; they are the skills that the students must develop as a result of the educational action. They serve as a guide of the contents and learning activities, and they supply criteria for controlling these activities.
As a teacher I have taken into account that the students already have certain skills that could be developed even though they didn’t attend to school, but my objective is to promote the development of the ones that promote the personal maturity and the social and professional insertion, promoting them to a certain degree and level that is more particular of the educational context. Although we as teachers are very worried about the contents acquired, we must take into account that, being important as they are, they are often forgotten as the time passes. However, the developed skills remain longer and can be applied in different realities, and so they work as the essential base for the student to continue with his/her process of learning and his/her own life.
The criteria for the elaboration of the objectives are: clarity, scope of contents in concepts, procedures and attitudes, and awareness of students’ needs and flexibility to adapt to them. These are two kinds of objectives: stage and subject.
GENERAL OBJECTIVES OF THE STAGE OF BACHILLERATO
The general objectives are based on the Organic Law of Education (LOE) 2/2006, May 3rd (BOE number 106, May 4th 2006), in which the Bachillerato Curriculum is established for Bachillerato. Here are the general objectives of the stage:
– To exercise the democratic citizenship, from a global perspective, and acquire a responsible civic consciousness, inspired in the values of the Spanish Constitution as well as the human rights, that promotes de co-responsibility in the formation of a fair and equitable society.
– To consolidate the personal and social maturity that allows them to act from a responsible and autonomous way and develop their critical spirit. To prevent and solve the personal, family and social conflicts peacefully.
– To promote the effective equality of rights and opportunities between men and women, analyse and value critically the existent inequalities and to promote de real equality and not to discriminate the disabled people.
– To consolidate the reading, studying and discipline habits, as necessary conditions for the effective performance of the learning process and as a way for the personal development.
– To dominate, orally and written, the Spanish language and the one being co-official in the Autonomous Community, in this case the Basque.
– To express fluidly and correctly in one or more foreign languages.
– To use the information and communication technologies fluently and with responsibility.
– To know and value critically the different realities of the contemporary world as well as their historical predecessors and the main factors for their evolution. To participate in a shared way in the development and improvement of their social context.
– To gain access to the main scientific and technological knowledge which is crucial and to dominate the basic skills appropriate for the chosen modality.
– To understand the main elements and procedures of the investigation and the scientific methods. To know and value critically the contribution to science and technology to change the life conditions, as well as consolidate the sensitivity and respect towards the environment.
– To consolidate the enterprising spirit with attitudes of creativity, flexibility, initiative, team work, self-confidence and critical sense.
– To develop the artistic and literary sensitivity, as well as the aesthetic criteria and the sources of cultural formation and enrichment.
– To use the physical education and sport to favour the personal and social development.
– To consolidate the attitudes of respect and prevention in road security.
– To know, value and respect the natural, historical, artistic and cultural heritage of Navarre and the women’s involvement in it.
SPECIFIC DIDACTIC OBJECTIVES OF THE ENGLISH SUBJECT
The students that start Bachillerato already have knowledge of a foreign language that allows them to develop in habitual communicative situations, and their interests are clearer. For these reasons, the objective of this subject during this stage is to deepen in the discursive skills acquired previously and to enrich them in detail, as well as to widen the areas or situations where it is contextualised and to continue reinforcing the student’s autonomy with more specific activities that will guide the student in his/her academic and professional future. Therefore, the students can be closer to other ways of living and social organization, and can interchange opinions about problems that are shared internationally, and diversify their professional interests and consolidate social values that favour the meeting of the world where the international communication is day after day more necessary.
Taking into account my specific group, their previous knowledge and the whole educational context, here are the didactic objectives for the teaching of English for this syllabus, being related to the general objectives of the subject established by the official educational institutions for the stage of Bachillerato.
To understand the global and specific information about oral texts and to follow the arguments of nowadays topics in habitual communicative contexts and by the media.
– To get accustomed to the immediate understanding and reprocessing of oral information through the form of dictation, where there is no possible context to guide the student.
To express and interact orally in a spontaneous and comprehensible way, both fluidly and correctly, using the proper strategies to the different communicative situations.
– To establish English as a way of communication in class.
– To give priority to oral language against written language, as the main objective is the communicative competence.
– To be able to speak correctly in both the informal or familiar context and the formal or work related context.
To understand and interpret critically several types of written texts of general topic, using the comprehension strategies which are appropriate for the required tasks, understanding the essential elements of a text as well as their function and discourse organization.
– To extract specific information from a written and oral text from different types and registers.
To read in an autonomous way texts with diverse appropriate objectives to the interest and needs, as a way of acceding the information and for the leisure time.
– To encourage the student towards graded reading books.
To write diverse types clear and well-structured texts in an appropriate style according to the readers to whom it is directed and to the communicative intention.
– To be able to write correctly in both the informal or familiar context and the formal or work related context.
To use the knowledge of a language and the linguistic use rules to talk and write in an appropriate, coherent and correct way, to understand oral and written texts, and to reflect about the functioning of a foreign language in the different communicative situations.
– To be aware of the importance of speaking a foreign language correctly, paying attention not only to grammar but also to a correct pronunciation.
– To relate the verbal tenses and the grammar in general to their specific communicative functions.
– To make the student understand the importance of phonetics, grammar and vocabulary.
To acquire and develop different strategies for learning, using all the ways that the student can use, including the information and communication technologies, so that they can use the foreign language in an autonomous way and to continue progressing in his/her learning process.
– To encourage students to trust in themselves when they speak, and avoid ridiculous when there are oral or written mistakes.
– To promote the students to get profit of their mistakes and to use them as a way of learning.
– To participate actively in classroom activities, especially in the ones related to oral communication and with the use of the Internet and the information and communication technologies.
To consolidate the self-evaluation strategies in the acquisition of the communicative competence, with attitudes of initiative and responsibility.
– To give the student the possibility of auto-assessment, especially with the repetition of some exercises seen in class in the evaluation so that the student is aware of his/her mistakes, and to make the students be conscious of their progress.
– To make the student become aware of his capacity to learn a foreign language: English.
– To make the student discover the organization of his English book, so that he/she can participate in the learning process in an autonomous way.
To be aware of the main social and cultural aspects of the foreign language to understand and interpret in a better way the cultures which are different to our own and the language which is being studied.
– To develop curiosity and respect for the different English speaking countries and cultures, focusing on the topics studied in the didactic units: history, politics, education, technology…
To value the foreign language as a way to gain access to other knowledge and cultures, and to reckon its importance as a means of communication and international comprehension in a multicultural world.
– To make student aware of the different possibilities of the linguistic knowledge related to work, trade, communication…
Analysed according to the main features within the general objective of the communicative competence, the objectives are:
Knowledge:
– Knowledge of vocabulary and functional grammar, intonation and pronunciation.
– Awareness of the various types of verbal interaction (for example, face to face, telephone conversations, interviews).
– Knowledge of an appropriate series of literary and non-literary texts (for example, short tales, poems, newspaper and magazine articles, web pages, instructions, letters, short reports, etc.).
– Comprehension of the main characteristics of the main styles and registers in the spoken and written language (formal, informal, journalistic, colloquial, etc.).
– Awareness of the social conventions and cultural aspects, and about the variability of language in the different geographical areas and in the communicative and social fields.
Skills:
– Ability to listen and understand spoken messages in an appropriate series of communicative situations (family topics, of personal interest or about daily life).
– Ability to start, maintain and end conversations about family or personal issues, or about daily life.
– Ability to read and understand non-specialized written texts about various topics or, in some cases, specialized texts in a family field, and the ability to write different types of texts with different purposes in different situations.
– Appropriate use of resources (for example, notes, diagrams, maps) to understand or produce spoken or written texts (for example, conversations, instructions, interviews, discourses).
– Ability to start and maintain an appropriate variety of autonomous activities for the learning of a language.
Attitudes:
– Development of a positive attitude towards the language, admitting it as a source of personal and cultural enrichment.
– Disposition to receive the opinions and arguments of others without prejudices and to maintain a critic and constructive dialogue.
– Self-confidence to speak in public.
– Interest and curiosity for the intercultural communication.
CONTENTS
KNOWLEDGE AND SKILLS
Contents are a way of achieving the proposed objectives. The contents have been divided in four blocks:
– Block 1: Listen and understand, speak and talk
– Block 2: Read and write
– Block 3: Socio-cultural issues and intercultural awareness
– Block 4: Language knowledge, reflection about the language learning.
Block 1. Listen and understand, speak and talk
Listen and understand:
– Understand the general and specific meaning of conferences and discourses about specific issues and with a certain abstraction within the student’s general and academic interest field.
– General and specific comprehension of texts produced by the mass media and both in standard language and by speakers with different accents.
– Comprehension of the interpersonal communication about daily life and abstract topics, so that the student is able to answer immediately.
– Usage of strategies to understand and interpret non-explicit meanings, to catch the main ideas or to check the comprehension by using contextual key.
– Awareness about the importance of understanding a text globally, without the need to understand every of its elements.
Abilities and strategies:
– To catch the main elements of a text: parts, structure, main ideas and specific information.
– To interpret the topic and communicative intention of the speaker.
– To answer to orders, instructions, wishes, implicit requests.
– To answer to questions of a text about general information, specific information, vocabulary or certain expressions.
– To make an effort to interpret the text, although it hasn’t been completely understood, overcoming the minor difficulties that could be caused by different accents or environmental noise.
– To interpret more complex expressions and to carry out more detailed analysis, focusing on the specific information about less familiar topics and not previously prepared.
– To participate in longer presentations and discussions in group.
– To use in the process of listening different means of information register (notes, pictures, graphics…), taking notes and doing a sketch that will help the student to reconstruct the main aspects of the text.
– To value discourse with respect to the content, form and appropriateness to the listener. To distinguish if the discourse is formal or informal.
Speak and talk:
– Planning about what you want to say and how to express it, using various resources to facilitate communication, like circumlocution and paraphrases to make up for the linguistic deficiency.
– Oral production of previously prepared descriptions, narrations and presentations about general topics or about his/her field with reasonable grammatical correction.
– Participation in discussions and debates about current topics, defending his/her points of view with clearly, offering detailed information, using appropriate examples.
– Participation in growingly fluid, natural and precise conversations about various cultural topics.
– Use of strategies to participate and maintain the interaction and to negotiate meanings, like using paratextual elements, clarifying opinions, summarising and repeating in other words part of what said before to confirm the mutual comprehension.
– Use of coherence and cohesion mechanisms of the discourse in presentations about family topics.
– Use of the foreign language to participate in communicative tasks in groups, assuming individual responsibilities and taking decisions in a cooperative way.
– To reckon the error as part of the learning process, and tendency to overcome difficulties caused in the oral communication by the lack of linguistic resources, exploiting the knowledge and communication strategies available.
Abilities and strategies:
– To handle oneself, although doubts may appear and circumlocutions or pauses may be used for planning, in topics about family, friends, hobbies and interests, leisure time, journeys or current events.
– To use with reasonable correction a variety of formulae and structures of habitual use.
– To prepare an oral presentation about a topic of his/her interest using a previously prepared sketch or additional material, and taking into account its appropriateness to the audience, discourse structure and coherence, with the help of various resources (charts, graphics, images, ppts…) and references or expressive resources to illustrate the content.
– To maintain the attention with emphasis, appropriate volume and tone, using interesting data and humour touches and paraphrasing what you want to say.
– To apply the dialogue dynamics to participate, ask for turn, ask for repetition or explanation, show agreement or disagreement, express their points of view appropriately, etc.
– To express clearly, keeping the discursive structure and with the help of an outline, audiovisual media and information and communication technologies.
Block 2. Read and write
Written texts comprehension:
– Prediction of information based on textual and non-textual elements in written texts about several topics.
– Comprehension of general, specific and detailed information in the media, advertising, letter writing, reports, instructions, short official documents or in literary texts referred to various topics.
– Identification of the communicative purpose, the textual or paratextual elements, and of the structural organisation of the information, being able to distinguish the different parts.
– Comprehension of the implicit meanings, ideas or points of view in articles or reports about specific current topics.
– Autonomous reading of long texts related to their own future academic, personal or professional interests.
– Autonomous use of diverse digital, computer and bibliographical resources in order to solve comprehension problems or to look for information, ideas and opinions necessary to carry out a task.
– Use of diverse reading strategies according to the textual typology and the pursued purpose.
– Interest for reading in an autonomous way different texts with the objective of obtaining information, widen knowledge, enjoying, etc.
Abilities and strategies:
– To apply the appropriate reading skills: before reading (to activate the previous knowledge and predict), analysis (reading, underlining, note taking) and synthesis (schemes, summaries and conceptual maps).
– To distinguish the main and secondary ideas of texts, the theses and the arguments, the relevant and irrelevant information.
– To identify the structure of the text and its cohesive elements (connectors, discourse organisers, pronouns and reference words). To identify their meaning and the way they are used.
– To distinguish objective facts and opinions, and to interpret the communicative intention and the author’s point of view. To identify the textual genre.
– To interpret the meaning of unknown words and structures based on the contextual or structural keys, and to interpret implicit elements, lexis…
– To identify the mistakes and correct them.
– To read in a comprehensive way, focusing on the intonation and fluency.
– To look for, compare and contrast information, and to solve comprehension problems.
Written texts composition:
– Planning and writing of various and complex texts about personal, current or academic topics.
– Use of text organization, articulation and cohesion mechanisms.
– Writing, in written and digital form, about various texts of their interests clearly, with reasonable grammatical correction and lexical appropriateness to the topic.
– Use of the appropriate register to the reader to whom the text is directed.
– Use of graphical and paratextual elements that facilitate the comprehension, such as illustrations, charts, graphics or typology, in a written and digital form.
– Interest for the production of clear and comprehensive written texts, with an appropriate structure, focusing on the different needs and communicative intentions.
Abilities and strategies:
– To plan and organize the elaboration process of a text, selecting the relevant information, organising the paragraphs according to the content function and using the appropriate cohesive elements.
– To synthesize the information from different sources and to integrate it in new texts.
– To identify and apply in the proper texts the structure and form of different textual genres like descriptions, experiences, journeys, letters, book or film plots, dreams, hopes and ambitions.
– To apply correction and reformulation strategies, and to write successive versions until you reach the final one, respecting the orthographic rules.
– To gain access in an autonomous way to the sources of information to select the relevant data in relation to a specific communicative purpose, to organize this information by means of flashcards, summaries, schemes… and to reuse it in the elaboration of texts of diverse typology.
Block 3. Socio-cultural and intercultural awareness aspects
– Knowledge and valuation of the most relevant cultural features, such as literature, art, music, cinema, of the countries where the foreign language is spoken.
– Identification of the meaningful differences between customs and behaviours, attitudes, values or beliefs that prevail between the speakers of the mother tongue as well as of the foreign language.
– Use of the appropriate registers to the context, speaker and the communicative intention.
– Acknowledgement of the importance of the foreign language as a way to gain access to the knowledge that is of interest for his/her academic and professional future, and for his/her personal enrichment.
– Valuation of the foreign language in the international relationships and as a means of communication and understanding among people and of access to other cultures and languages.
– Interest in getting to know cultural information about the countries where the foreign language is spoken.
Abilities and strategies:
– To make an effort to communicate with the foreign language, without being afraid of committing a mistake.
– To acknowledge the discrimination situations because of language and to avoid them.
– To be aware of the most meaningful differences between the customs, uses, attitudes, values and beliefs that prevail in the community where the foreign language is spoken as well as in the student’s own community, and to be able to identify such differences.
– To show interest for the foreign languages and the cultures that they represent.
Block 4. Language knowledge and learning reflection
Language knowledge:
– To amplify the lexis with the idiomatic expressions, synonyms, antonyms, connotations, and of vocabulary about general topics of interest for the student and related with the other curriculum subjects.
– Word formation with prefixes, suffixes and compounds.
– Use of complex grammatical structures and of necessary functions to communicate correctly.
– Use of the phonetic alphabet to improve his/her pronunciation.
– Productions of different necessary patterns of stress, rhythm and intonation to express different attitudes and feelings.
Use of language structures and functions:
– Phonetics:
o Correct pronunciation of words and sentences. Comprehensible pronunciation, although the accent may seem evident and some sporadic pronunciation mistakes may be committed.
o Knowledge of the basic, common and general pronunciation rules.
o Development of an own system to retain the pronunciation patterns: words, stress, sentences.
o Pronunciation of especially difficult phonemes:
§ Silent phonemes, /s/ in final position, -ed in verbs and participles, etc.
§ Weak forms: was, were, etc.
§ Pronunciation of contracted forms: mustn’t, can’t, won’t.
§ Stress of words and sentences.
§ Intonation of sentences: question tags.
o Production and interpretation of necessary different stress, rhythm and intonation to express and understand the different attitudes and feelings.
– Lexis:
o Amplify the semantic field with idiomatic expressions, synonyms, antonyms, connotations and of vocabulary about general topics of interest for the student and related to other curriculum subjects.
o Word formation with prefixes, suffixes and compounds. Distinction between flexible and non-flexible words and acknowledgement of the different grammatical categories and the mechanisms for word formation (composition and derivation).
– Functions of language and grammar:
o To define, describe, compare. To contrast and differentiate between data and opinions. To reason, justify, argue, express their own points of view and opinions: >
§ Like/enjoy/hate/prefer… + -ing o to + infinitive; I’d rather + bare infinitive.
§ Want + noun/pronoun + to / Want to + infinitive.
§ Static verbs: believe, understand, know, etc.
§ Phrasal verbs.
§ Prepositional phrases: be good at/keen on/fond of.
§ Relative clauses.
o To express past experiences, customs and habits. To express the changes that have happened in them and in the surrounding context. To narrate past events:
§ Different verbal tenses: past simple and continuous, present perfect + just/yet/already/since/for, past perfect. Passive voice.
§ Would/used to + infinitive.
§ Be/get used to + -ing.
§ Gerund uses after certain verbs, prepositions and as subject.
§ Mode and intensity, time and place adverbs.
§ Time linkers.
o To express plans with different temporal references. To make arrangements. To predict events:
§ Present continuous / Future with will / (be) going to.
§ Probably/certainly, likely…
§ When/as soon as/before, after… + present simple or perfect.
§ Future continuous.
§ Future perfect.
o To express obligation and non-obligation, prohibition, necessity, ability and possibility. To express hypotheses and suppositions, preferences and wishes, offers and suggestions. To ask for and give permission or advise, to make polite requests:
§ Modal and semi-modal verbs: must, mustn’t, should/ought to, needn’t, have to, don’t have to, can/be able to, could, may.
§ He’s supposed to be…, She was believed to…
§ I’d rather + bare infinitive / I wish I had…
§ Shall, let’s; what about/how about + -ing.
o To express real and non-real possibilities, and to make hypotheses:
§ 1st, 2nd and 3rd conditional sentences.
o To report what other person has said, asked, ordered or suggested before:
§ Indirect speech: questions, statements, commands and suggestions.
§ Reporting verbs: ask, say, tell, declare, explain, refuse, advise, invite, offer, suggest, apologise, etc.
o To make deductions and suppositions with reference to present and past actions; to criticize past actions.
§ Modal verbs: must, can’t, may, might, could, should + simple infinitive.
§ must, can’t, may, might, could, should + perfect infinitive.
o To express consequence, result, cause and addition. Purpose, contrast and concession:
§ Subordinate sentences introduced by so, as a result, consequently, because, since, in addition, moreover, so as to, although, though, despite, while, whereas, nevertheless, etc.
§ Have/get something done.
§ Make/let someone do something.
Learning reflection:
– Acknowledgement of the language use varieties: differences between formal and informal language, spoken and written.
– Autonomous use of diverse learning, computer, digital or bibliographical resources like bilingual and monolingual dictionaries or reference books.
– Use of strategies to review, amplify and consolidate the lexis and the linguistic structures.
– Analysis and reflection about the use and meaning of different grammatical structures through comparison and contrast with the student’s own structures.
– Use of self-assessment strategies to progress in the autonomous learning of a language.
– Reflection about the strategies used to improve the oral and written productions.
Abilities and strategies:
– To be able to work individually and in teams, and to develop a personal and effective learning style, using the appropriate strategies, activities and material, and distributing the time according to the task needs.
– To be able to examine, assess and develop his/her own performance as well as his/her partners’ one to cooperate in a responsible way and to profit from the available means.
– To discover the multiple features that are involved in the language learning and the close connection existent between the lexis, the communicative skills and the grammatical structures.
– To reflect about the steps that are followed and the resultant products (texts, expositions, debate conclusions, schemes). To reflect and apply strategies to improve the individual and team productions. To develop the auto-assessment processes.
– To apply the transfer of the procedures used to read or write from L1 to develop the tasks of L2.
EDUCATION IN VALUES
Cross-curricular subjects within the curriculum are contents of teaching subjects that must form part of the activities stated in all the areas, subjects or modules. Their inclusion means formalizing an education in values and attitudes that is not temporary but constant throughout each grade level. It is important to be conscious in not imposing these values in an authoritarian way but as a continuous set of attitudes that are self-imposed by one’s own free will. They are an opportunity to globalise teaching and carry out a truly interdisciplinary programming.
Cross-curriculum subjects proposed by the Ministry of Education:
– Environmental education: Students need to understand the relationship with the surroundings we are immersed in and get to know environmental problems and individual and collective solutions to improve our environment. It is necessary personal solidarity and participation in environmental issues that are degrading our planet at a worrying speed.
– Education for peace: Creation of activities that stimulate dialogue as a privileged way in the resolution of conflicts between people or social groups is a basic goal in education. At the school there are many people that share space and time with interests that are not always similar. So, school is an ideal place for learning basic coexistence attitudes: solidarity, tolerance, respect for diversity, capacity for dialogue and social participation.
– Consumer education: Consumerism is present in our society and has reached points of accumulating products one does not need in an almost automatic and unthinking way due to lack of education. It is necessary to give students instruments to think about excessive consumerism of unnecessary products.
– Road education: Knowledge and use of public roads is, especially in large cities, a question of great importance. So, education in this subject must start in the schoolroom.
– Education for equality of opportunities between sexes: The Spanish Constitution commences with the right of equality without distinction between sexes, races or beliefs. However, a part of society is still anti-feminine, racist and intolerant. It is indispensable to transmit to students this right of humanity. Discriminations derived from belonging to a certain sex are of such a social magnitude that it justifies its entity as a subject in its own.
– Health education: In school it is necessary to create from infancy on physical hygiene habits, mental and social habits must be created to develop self-esteem and improve life quality.
– Moral and civic education: This is the referential axis around which the rest of the cross subjects are articulated around as its two dimensions include the set of basic features of the model of person that actively participates in solving social problems. The moral dimension promotes ethical judgment according to democratic, common and participatory values and the civic aspect insides on these same values in daily living conditions.
METHODOLOGY
Pedagogic methods will be adapted to the characteristics of the students, they will favour the capacity to learn on their own and work as a team promoting creativity and dynamism and they will integrate resources of information technologies and communications in learning.
GENERAL METHODOLOGICAL PRINCIPLES
– Teaching methodology in Bachillerato should generally aim for the students’ development, integrating their experiences and learning.
– Teaching must be personalized and adapted to the various learning rhythms of each student.
– The teacher is responsible for the methods to be used, which in turn are to respect a series of methodological principles of a general nature proposed by various Autonomous Regions.
– Contents should be organized with a global focus and being interrelated.
– The teaching process is to be based on students’ meaningful constructive activity, ensuring that what is learnt will be of actual use and encouraging pupils to learn on their own active autonomous process.
PSYCHO-PEDAGOGIC AND DIDACTIC PRINCIPLES
The educational intervention must take into account a series of basic psycho-pedagogic and didactic principles that impregnate the entire curriculum:
– Need for beginning teaching with students’ real level: The beginning of new learning at school always starts by concepts, representation and knowledge that the students have constructed in past experiences. Thus, taking into account the level of the student in elaboration and application of the program requires simultaneous attention to their level of cognitive competency, in other words, the level of development they are in and the knowledge they have constructed in the past.
– Need to insure construction of significant learning: The teaching and learning process can give way to significant learning as well as repetitive learning. If the new learning material is associated in a significant way and not arbitrarily in such a way that the students already know that they can assimilate and become integrated in their past cognitive structure, then significant learning takes place that is capable of changing that past structure and at the same time be long lasting and solid. If not, learning is just going to be memoirist and condemned to quick oblivion.
– Significant learning implies an intense activity by the student: The contents should be potentially significant from the point of view of the subject worked upon as well as of the psychological structure of the student. The students have to be motivated to connect new matter being learnt with what they already know, with the aim of modifying their knowledge structures and carrying out significant learning on their own. Teacher/student interaction is what enables construction of knowledge by the student, being the student the active part in the process.
Other necessary conditions for learning to take place are:
– Motivation strategies:
o Knowing the motivational style of each student (necessity of reward, avoiding a punishment…).
o Stimulation of the student to achieve significant learning.
o Identify their interests and use these as a starting point.
o Control factors that have a positive influence in students and their progress.
o Recognise factors in which students attribute success to, being a way to increase the level of individual motivation.
However, each student leans towards a type of motivation; so, when programming the basic question is to detect what moves them to learn and use that as a starting point to increase their motivation in different lines, making use of entertaining activities and assuring a good environment in the classroom.
– Individual and team work organization:
On the other hand, groupings carried out in the classroom are also important as the image that the student has of what should be known will depend on the type of relationship produced with the rest of the schoolmates, with anxiety increasing or decreasing. The different distributions that can be done in the classroom are:
– Individual work to promote originality and creativity.
– Pair work to promote interaction and cooperation between students.
– Group work for enriching, dynamic and relaxing working where cooperation and commitment are essential.
– Forming a circle, in debates for example, for interaction, respect and turn-taking habits, all of them unifying in a democratic society.
GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS OF THIS METHODOLOGY
Language is above all a communication system. It is therefore necessary to learn how to communicate properly (first orally, then by writing). From this general principle, here are the main characteristics of this method:
– It is necessary to follow a direct, functional, flexible, communicative method by using the most usual audiovisual resources: video, tape recorder…
– We must never forget that the teacher is the driving force of the English class.
– Learning should be personalised and adapted to the different rhythms of each student.
– Methodological guidance is inclined to a general principle: first oral communication, then the written one.
– Oral and written languages have good specified rules.
– English learning should be functional, practical and useful.
– English knowledge makes easier to gain access to culture, knowledge, work, tourism, science, culture, institutions…
– Grammar, phonetic, lexical and textual subjects must be analysed in situation and with the oral and written peculiarities.
– Grammar is also a means of communication. Consequently, it is necessary to analyse it from a communicative, situational point of view.
– It is necessary to look for learning an active, autonomous, useful and practical English.
– It is necessary to give more importance to communication than to forms, to oral language than to the written one.
– Making errors is part of every learning process. It is better to avoid them.
– Teacher must be the driving force and the guide to this learning. He is himself the head of the planning, of the methodology, of the efficient running of the class.
– Authentic motivation must come from the real necessity of the English language in everyday life: science, culture, tourism, work, society, institutions…
– Cultural contents are full part of the matter to teach because they make up a part of the components of the communicative competence. “Civilization” knowledge is melted with linguistic knowledge.
ENGLISH SPECIFIC METHODOLOGY FOR STUDENTS IN 1ST COURSE OF BACHILLERATO
Historically, didactics is based on several linguistic and psychological theories applied more or less strictly to methodologies: the direct method, the audio-lingual method, the audio-visual method… They come from the structural linguistic theories and the behaviourism tendencies of learning. Communicative methods come from cognitive and constructivism theories and promote a functional teaching. The current tendency is to Methodological Flexibility, which is coming from direct, audio-lingual, audio-visual, structural and behaviourism theories of learning. Here are the main points of the proposed methodology:
Strategies to gain access to oral and written sense:
In the first years of learning, oral comprehension and expression must be a priority in opposition to written language (first oral language, then the written one). Some strategies to make easier the access to sense:
– Visual and voiced supports to make easier the understanding, even gestures.
– First we have to assure that communication is correctly interpreted and that the principal message has been decoded. Later, we will be more demanding.
– It is necessary to choose subjects close to students’ vital worries.
– It is necessary to check regularly the oral comprehension level.
– From a communicative perspective that gives priority to oral language, phonetic correction must be privileged.
Comprehension strategies in written language are more important as we go into linguistic knowledge:
– Read long-illustrated books that reuse already known vocabulary and expressions.
– Ask to look for some information in the long texts guiding the student with some questions.
– Checking written comprehension is assured through the questions of the comprehension, texts to be filled due to the sense…
The acquisition of a communicative competence:
The main objective when teaching a foreign language is the communicative competence, developed progressively through a series of communicative tasks or actions with a communicative purpose in a specific situation that demand you to be able to understand and interpret the communicative elements implicit in a discourse, produce discourses with these comprehension and understanding procedures and the communicative strategies. For this reason, the guided production of texts done through the presentation and analysis of models and the creative imitation or their transformation according to the different purposes and situations, will be necessary. In a secondary school context, where it is difficult to express oneself in English, the communicative competence should be done in appealing feigned situations, making use of characters or images close to the adults that can invite them to oral or written communication and create a nearly real communicative situation. Some principles are: use of English as code of communication in class and use of posters in class for an immersion process that propitiates short messages for fast exchanges, and also to move from creation of short written texts to longer and more complex ones.
A spiral progression:
In a foreign language, progression should be done in spiral, that is to say, to incorporate and enrich contents progressively. This way of progression is applied above all to vocabulary and syntax. We pass from the comprehension of mini-texts to small texts, then to medium texts and finally to large and complex texts. It is the linguistic philosophy of a planned balance.
Learning assessment:
Assessment is an important point in this methodology. The main objectives are:
– To help the teacher to know better the potential of his class, to measure the results of his teaching.
– To help the student to auto-assessment, to know their strong and weak points, to adapt his learning process to improve the results by correcting the errors…
– Diagnostic assessment is used to improve the knowledge of the potential of the class at the beginning of the learning state. It will permit to adopt measures to attend the so wanted objectives.
– Formative assessment will permit to measure progressively the acquisitions and to change learning dynamics.
– Final assessment will permit to measure the acquisitions at the end of a learning stage (every three months, annually…).
– Auto-assessment and co-assessment permit to share evaluation criteria between the teacher and the students. They approach teaching poles and practice towards autonomy.
It is important to take into account that mistakes are considered as part of the learning process and not as something to be punished.
Administration of space and technology:
The space in the class can be made profitable to make easier the active use of language. By the way, every student is going to have a computer available in his desk so that they can have access to the technologies of the information and communication. In this way, the space-class can be opened to overseas, with the organisation of communicative exchanges with Anglo speaking students through Skype sessions, and the possibility of exchanges of students abroad. Furthermore, the desks in the class are going to be organized in a circle, so that the process of learning can be collaborative and more open, and also propitiating the teacher’s role of facilitator.
ROLE OF THE PARTICIPANTS IN THE LEARNING PROCESS
Role of the teacher:
The teacher should encourage and motivate students in order to create significant learning situations and should succeed in linking the new concepts and structures to be learnt with those covered previously. The teacher should adopt different roles according to the work to be undertaken in the different sections of the material. Sometimes he/she will be the informer and instructor who provide necessary data or information to carry out the task. Other times, he /she will act as a guide to facilitate student participation, approving correct actions or results and proposing the revision of conclusions or tasks that have led to incorrect answers. Finally, he/she will also act as an observer who takes notes of any relevant aspects to be considered, in order to contribute to the student’s progress.
Role of the students:
Students should be aware of their own role the learning process. Therefore, students are expected to take part actively, both in carrying out the exercises as well as in the processes of reflection, hypothesis formulation and the drawing of conclusions. Students are supposed to be aware of the importance of studying and so are aware of the effort they have to perform so that the process of learning is fulfilled as they are responsible for it.
EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES
Typology of activities:
Activities are selected according to the four basic skills necessary for the development of the communicative competence: speaking, writing, reading and listening (oral and written comprehension and expression), always following the general principle of learning to learn and being contextual activities with real everyday situations.
– In oral activities students are expected to take part in discussions and conversations in a variety of topics.
– In written activities it is not enough to write simple compositions in Basic English. Students must pay attention to form and content, summarise complex texts, express complicated ideas and manage a mixture of facts and opinions.
– In reading activities students should learn how to manage new techniques that allow for greater texts exploitation and comprehension.
– In listening and comprehension activities students should use strategies that help them reinforce the ability to recognise words, phrases and registers.
There are different kinds of activities according to the general development of the class:
– Activities to motivate and introduce the students to the didactic unit.
– Activities to detect the previous knowledge.
– Activities of development of the new knowledge acquired.
– Synthesis and consolidation activities.
– Specific evaluation activities, where teachers and students themselves can evaluate their progress and assess their work.
– Reinforcement activities for the students who need more time to learn the contents and fulfil the objectives.
– Widening activities for the students who learn very fast and can go beyond the objectives.
There are also different activities according to the participants:
– Individual activities: content activities.
– Pair activities: role-playing dialogues.
– Group activities: debates and communication activities.
In each didactic unit there is going to be:
– Initial warm-up activity
– Reading comprehension exercises
– Oral expression exercises
– Pronunciation comprehension exercises
– Grammar comprehension exercises
– Listening comprehension exercises
– Vocabulary comprehension exercises
– Writing comprehension exercises
– Review activities
– Internet and Skype activities
– Evaluation activities
Resources:
– Computers and television for the use of the information and communication technologies.
– Internet and Skype access for oral expression or communication activities and for self-learning investigation activities.
– Use of songs and films for listening comprehension activities.
– “Speak Up” magazine for reading and listening comprehension activities.
– Educational centre’s library for self-learning and reinforcement or widening of knowledge studied in class.
ATTENTION TO DIVERSITY AND SPECIFIC EDUCATIONAL NEEDS
Homogeneity in a foreign language class does not exist; indeed, it is heterogeneous as learning procedures are diversified due to each individual’s profiles and learning styles. It is clear that we are going to come across students with different abilities within the same class: there will be students who have certain difficulties in reaching the level of ability specified by the objectives at each stage, there will also be others who easily achieve the capacities expressed in the objectives and therefore require extra work in order not to lose interest in the foreign language.
Here are some of the principles to treat diversity:
– To admit the existence of diversity.
– To adapt pedagogic and methodological involvement to answer the necessities of every student.
– To develop the cooperation and solidarity among the levels which will be considered complementary and never as inferiors or superiors.
– Negative opinions about the capacity of comprehension or production of a classmate are not allowed in class.
– To permit as much liberty as possible when expressing oneself.
– To favour auto-evaluation and co-evaluation.
– To use Spanish to explain or translate what is necessary.
– To provide extra exercises for those who finish first.
– To give homework to those who need it.
– To use inductive or deductive methods, according to the needs of the class
– To be positive when evaluating work, even if there are mistakes.
We must dedicate attention to students with specific educational needs. These needs must be included in the syllabus and are centred around four elements of attention:
– Attention to foreign students: Incorporation to the educational system will favour students from other countries especially those in age of compulsory education. For students that do not know Spanish language and culture, or who present serious lacking in basic knowledge, specific learning programs will be designed with the aim of easing integration of these students in the corresponding levels. These programs can be taught in specific classrooms established in the centres that teach in ordinary regimes. Development of these programs will be simultaneous to that of schooling of students in ordinary groups, according to the level and evolution of their learning.
– Attention to intellectually gifted students: With the aim of offering a more suitable educational solution for these students, necessary measures will be taken to identify and evaluate in an early stage their needs, and rules will be established to give flexibility to the duration in each one of the levels and stages of the educational system, leaving to one side the age of these students.
– Attention for students with special educational needs: Students with special educational needs that require, in a period of their schooling or throughout their education, and particularly referring to evaluation, certain supports and specific educational attention because they have physical, psychic, sensorial handicaps or have serious personality or behaviour disorders will have specialised attention, according to the principles of non-discrimination and normalization of education and with the aim of achieving their integration. To this effect, these students will receive precise aid in the moment of their schooling or when their needs have been detected. Students with special education needs will be schooled according to their characteristics and will be integrated in ordinary groups, in specialised classes in ordinary centres, in special educational centres or in combined schooling.
ASSESSMENT
The teachers carry out assessment in Bachillerato. They have to evaluate students’ learning as well as their own teaching practices. An initial student assessment is to be carried out at the beginning of the stage, serving as a springboard for subsequent learning. Assessment of student learning process should be continuous and global and will be performed taking into account the education objectives and the assessment criteria laid down in the curriculum. The evaluation of pupils’ marks is expressed in terms going from 0 to 10 points.
ASSESSMENT CHARACTERISTICS
Here are indicated the main characteristics of the evaluation and promotion in the stage of Bachillerato:
– The evaluation of learning for students in Bachillerato will be constant and differentiated according to the different subjects. The teacher of every subject will determine at the end of the course if the student has passed the objectives required.
– The students will promote from first to second course of Bachillerato when they have passed the subjects studied or when they fail a maximum of two. In this case, they will have to register in the second course the pending subjects of the first course. The educative centres will have to organise the activities required for the evaluation of pending subjects.
– The students will be able to do an extraordinary exam of the subjects that haven’t been passed in the dates that the educative Administrations state.
– To obtain the certificate of Bachillerato the students will have to pass all the subjects of both courses of Bachillerato. It will give access to the superior studies established in the legislation.
ASSESSMENT CRITERIA
The general assessment criteria are based on the Foral Decree 49/2008, May 12th 2008 (BON number 70, June 6th 2008), in which the Bachillerato Curriculum is established:
– Communicative abilities:
o To extract general and specific information, the main and secondary ideas from oral messages about familiar themes for students or having a relation with habitual aspects coming from countries where English language is spoken. To extract information from all kind of real written texts coming from different countries (descriptive, narrative, argumentative, explicative texts), making a difference between facts and opinions and identifying the main arguments expressed by the author.
o To participate in conversations and use correct strategies to begin, maintain and progress on communication making a comprehensible speech adapted to the situation characteristics and the communicative intention.
o To read in an autonomous way different kind of materials adapting them to the different intentions (consult, information research, detailed and pleasant reading…).
o To produce written texts following the different communicative intentions and respect the elements assuring cohesion and coherence in the text so that the reader may easily understand it.
– Reflection on language:
o To use consciously the acquired knowledge about the new linguistic system as a control and an auto correction instrument of the personal productions and as a resource for a better understanding of other students’ productions.
o To reflect on the regularities and exceptions of the foreign language linguistic system.
o To show an enough conceptualisation grade in relation to functions of language, linguistic elements, formats and characteristics of the texts, cohesion and coherence in discourse.
o To include in a conscious way already applied learning mechanisms (to make deductions, inductions, to classify, to establish categories, to form words) in new learning situations.
– Sociocultural aspects:
o To identify and interpret cultural references based on linguistic and non-linguistic keys that help to understand them.
o To recognize sociocultural elements in the information transmitted from communication media about current affairs.
o To show a critic, reflexive and respectful sense towards the differences in opinion that are based on sociocultural differences.
o To value positively the enrichment with which other cultures contribute to ours and vice versa, appreciating the advantages offered in intercultural exchanges.
EVALUATION CRITERIA ACCORDING TO THE SPECIFIC CONTENT BLOCKS
Blocks 1 and 2. Listen and understand, speak and talk. Read and write
1. To understand the main idea and to identify the relevant detail of oral messages, produced in communicative situations like face-to-face or by the mass media about known, current or general topics related to his/her studies and interests or to sociocultural aspects associated with the foreign language, as long as they are articulated clearly, in the standard variety of the language and being the discourse development helped with explicit markers.
This criterion is intended to evaluate the students’ ability to understand and interpret the information about specific and abstract topics, transmitted by different speakers, and taking into account features like the used register, the purpose, the speaker’s attitude, etc. In addition, it evaluates the ability to understand the main and the previously required specific ideas of longer oral texts produced by the mass media as long as they are produced in a clear way, with a standard variety of a language, and being the message structured clearly and with explicit markers.
2. To express oneself with fluency and with appropriate pronunciation and intonation in improvised conversations, narrations, arguments, debates and expositions which have been previously prepared using the necessary communication strategies and the appropriate discourse type according to the situation.
This criterion evaluates the ability to organize and express ideas clearly, based on previously prepared topics, and to develop clear descriptions and presentations about different known topics, to relate real to imaginary facts, books or films arguments, describing feelings and reactions. It also evaluates the ability to react properly in the interaction, showing a respectful attitude, and to collaborate in the discourse continuation with an appropriate register according to the situation and the communicative purpose.
3. To understand in an autonomous way the information included in written texts coming from different sources: correspondence, websites, newspapers, magazines, literature and popularizing books, referring to the present moment, culture or related to their interests or with their present or future studies.
This criterion evaluates the ability to understand the relevant information, to distinguish the main from the secondary ideas, and to identify the required information in authentic written texts, of general interest and popularizing, which offer enough accuracy and detail so that a critical analysis of the information can be carried out, applying the necessary strategies to develop a task and to grasp the implicit meanings and points of view. This criterion also evaluates the ability to use in an autonomous way digital, computer and bibliographical resources in order to look for, compare and contrast information and to solve comprehension problems.
4. To write clear and detailed texts with different purposes with the appropriate formal correction, cohesion, coherence and register, valuing the importance of planning and revising the text.
This criterion evaluates the writing of texts with a clear organization and linking the sentences following a cohesive linear sequences; the interest in planning and reviewing the texts, preparing successive versions until the final version is reached, with respect to the orthographic and typographic rules. It also evaluates if the definite texts show ability to plan and write autonomously with the help of the necessary reference material and if it the information from other sources is synthesized and evaluated, as long as it is about known topics.
Block 3. Socio-cultural and intercultural awareness aspects
5. To analyse, with authentic documents in paper or in digital or audiovisual form, geographical, sociolinguistic, historic, artistic, literary and social relevant features about the countries whose language is being learnt, deepening in the knowledge from an enriched perspective of the different languages and cultures that the student knows.
This criterion evaluates the cultural knowledge that the student has about the regions where the foreign language is spoken, and the ability to identify and analyse several specific and characteristic features of this context, getting close to social and cultural diversity and differentiating among groups of one’s own linguistic community from a different one and among members of different cultures.
Block 4. Language knowledge and learning reflection
6. To use consciously the linguistic, sociolinguistic, strategic and discursive acquired knowledge, and to apply accurately the auto-assessment and auto-correction mechanisms that reinforce the autonomous learning process.
This criterion evaluates if the students are able to manage the grammatical structures that express a more syntactic maturity, if they value the efficiency of the rules that they know through inductive-deductive processes, and if they are able to modify them when it is necessary. It also evaluates the widening of a more specialized lexis, the perfection of phonological features, the orthography, as well as the analysis and reflection about the different features of the communicative competence that facilitate communication. Besides, it evaluates the ability to value their own learning process and to correct or modify their own oral and written productions as well as their partners’.
7. To identify, exemplify and use spontaneous and autonomously the learning strategies acquired and all the available means, including the information and communication technologies, to evaluate and identify their own linguistic skills.
This criterion evaluates the ability to apply the already known strategies and skills to new situations, and to reflect about the learning process, valuing his/her role in the construction of learning through the decision taking, observation, formulation and readjustment of hypotheses, and the evaluation of progress with the best autonomy. It also evaluates the ability to use the information and communication technologies as tools for international communication and for an autonomous learning, and the conscious use of the learning opportunities that are offered in class and outside the class. In addition, it evaluates the identification of what the student can do with the foreign language, that is, the linguistic skills that he/she already has, but reinforcing the confidence in themselves.
SPECIFIC EVALUATION CRITERIA FOR THIS SYLLABUS
For the assessment process of the didactic units that form this syllabus there are three main features:
– The use of already done activities during the unit development. This criterion is focused on the idea that the students must be aware of their process of learning, and with this kind of evaluation activities the student can be easily aware of his/her mistakes and the consequences of his/her process of studying and learning. These activities are going to include:
o Grammar exercise (unit exercise)
o Vocabulary exercise (unit exercise)
o Speaking exercise (unit exercise)
o Writing exercise (unit exercise)
o Listening exercise: dictation
– The dictation is going to be used as a way of evaluating the listening skill in each unit. I have chosen the dictation because it is an integrating evaluation activity where all skills are evaluated: they have to understand what they listen (listening), then they have to write it correctly (writing), and finally they have to read and pronounce it correctly (reading and speaking). Besides, this way I evaluate according to the students’ ability of understanding what I say with my own specific pronunciation, which is the one they are accustomed to hearing in class.
– The inclusion of a speaking activity which is not often included in this level of the secondary education, but which I consider essential to evaluate their level of communicative competence.
PROMOTION
At the end of the first course, and as a consequence of the process of evaluation, the evaluation team will adopt the decisions about the promotion to the second course. Students will promote to the second course when they have passed all the subjects studied or with a negative evaluation in a maximum of two subjects. Students who promote to the second course without having passed all the subjects will have to sign in for the pending subjects of the previous course. The coordinating departments will arrange the activities necessary to pass for the re-evaluation of the pending subjects.
The students who don’t promote to the second course will have to stay one more year in the first course, which they will have to study again as a whole if the number of failed subjects is superior to four. The ones who don’t promote to second course and have failed three or four subjects could apply for repeating the whole course or for doing only the failed subjects of the first course and to amplify the course with two or three subjects of the second course, but with certain conditions established by the Education Ministry. The failed subjects of the second course can be studied again but not as a whole with the passed ones.
The ones who successfully pass the Bachilerato in any of its modules will receive the Bachillerato certificate, with the consequent working and academic results. To obtain it the candidate must pass all the subjects of both courses of Bachillerato.
DEVELOPMENT OF THE ASSESSMENT PROCESS
The teacher will give information referred to the objectives stated in the syllabus and progress and difficulties detected in achievement of these. A continuous evaluation has to contemplate:
Initial evaluation:
– This is carried out at the start of each one of the educational phases (stage, cycle, course or didactic unit). In the case of starting a new stage, it will include information about schooling, school history, medical data and psycho-pedagogic information of interest for school life and all will be stated in the academic life.
– This will supply information about prior knowledge and determine the starting level.
– Supply orientation in decision taking about objectives, contents, methodologies, classroom organisation…
– Help adjusting actuations to need, interests and possibilities of the students.
Progress evaluation:
– This extends throughout the educational process.
– Supplies information about how the process is developing.
– Includes all the factors that intervene in the process.
– Diagnoses needs and difficulties as well as determining the source of these.
– Orients modifications to be introduced in the progress to regulate the process and overcome difficulties. The didactic objectives will guide the educational intervention and constitute an immediate reference point for continuous evaluation, enabling finding most suitable evaluation procedures for the objectives.
Final evaluation:
– This takes place at the final stage of learning.
– It evaluates learning carried out using as references evaluation criteria that judges the development degree of capacities and the assimilation of contents.
– It is a synthesis of continuous evaluation that reflects the final situation of the process.
– Orients planning of new teaching and learning sequences.
DIDACTIC UNITS SEQUENCE AND ORGANIZATION
Unit 1: How often do you choose the Prime Minister?
Objectives:
– To practice the four skills: reading, speaking, listening and writing.
– To learn about British history and politics.
– To learn to write an interview within the global focus of the term on describing and asking.
– To learn to describe and ask in the present, paying attention to the pronunciation.
Contents:
– Grammar: Present tenses (simple, continuous and perfect)
– Vocabulary: History and politics
– Phonetics: Word stress
– Writing: Interview
– Communication: Describing and asking
Evaluation criteria:
– To be able to talk about British history and politics.
– To be able to use the present tenses in different communicative situations.
– To be able to speak correctly focusing on word stress.
– To be able to write an interview correctly.
Sessions development:
1st session:
o Reading (20 min):
§ Exercise to answer in your own words (individual task)
§ Exercise to find synonym in the text (individual task)
o Pronunciation (10 min):
§ Exercise of discrimination (individual task)
o Speaking (15 min):
§ Exercise to talk about one of the three optional topics (pair task)
2nd session:
o Grammar (30 min):
§ Exercise to correct mistakes (individual task)
§ Exercises to complete and choose alternatives (individual task)
o Listening (15 min): Exercise to complete a chart (individual task)
3rd session:
o Vocabulary (15 min):
§ Exercise to complete a chart (individual task)
§ Exercise to choose the correct alternative (individual task)
o Writing (30 min): exercise to write a composition and complete the gaps
(pair task)
4th session:
o Investigation task: Internet search (20 min) (group task)
o Communication task: Skype session (25 min) (group task)
5th session: Review (45 min) (pair task)
6th session: Evaluation (45 min) (individual task)
Sequencing: 16-30th September
Unit 2: Have you ever been abroad?
Objectives:
– To practice the four skills: reading, speaking, listening and writing.
– To learn about British education and learning process.
– To learn to write a biography within the global focus of the term on describing and asking.
– To learn to describe and ask in the past, paying attention to the pronunciation.
Contents:
– Grammar: Past tenses (simple, continuous and perfect)
– Vocabulary: Education and learning
– Phonetics: Regular and irregular past
– Writing: Biography
– Communication: Describing and asking
Evaluation criteria:
– To be able to talk about British education and learning process.
– To be able to use the past tenses in different communicative situations.
– To be able to speak correctly focusing on regular and irregular past.
– To be able to write a biography correctly.
Sessions development:
1st session:
o Reading (20 min):
§ Exercise to answer in your own words (individual task)
§ Exercise to summarise (individual task)
§ Exercise to find synonym in the text (individual task)
o Pronunciation (10 min):
§ Exercise of discrimination and classification (individual task)
o Speaking (15 min):
§ Exercise to talk about one of the three optional topics (pair task)
2nd session:
o Grammar (30 min):
§ Exercises to complete and choose alternatives (individual task)
§ Exercise to correct mistakes (individual task)
o Listening (15 min):
§ Exercise to complete questions and answers (individual task)
3rd session:
o Vocabulary (15 min):
§ Exercises to choose the correct option (individual task)
§ Exercise to fill the gaps (individual task)
o Writing (30 min): exercise to write a composition and fill the gaps (pair task)
4th session:
o Investigation task: Internet search (20 min) (group task)
o Communication task: Skype session (25 min) (group task)
5th session: Review (45 min) (pair task)
6th session: Evaluation (45 min) (individual task)
Sequencing: 1-15th October
Unit 3: It will have already been updated.
Objectives:
– To practice the four skills: reading, speaking, listening and writing.
– To learn vocabulary about science and computers.
– To learn to write an e-mail within the global focus of the term on describing and asking.
– To learn to describe and ask in the future, paying attention to the pronunciation.
Contents:
– Grammar: Future tenses (will, going to, present simple, present continuous, future continuous and future perfect)
– Vocabulary: Science and computers
– Phonetics: Long/short vowels
– Writing: E-mail
– Communication: Describing and asking
Evaluation criteria:
– To be able to talk about science and computers.
– To be able to use the future tenses in different communicative situations.
– To be able to speak correctly focusing on long and short vowels.
– To be able to write an e-mail correctly.
Sessions development:
1st session:
o Reading (20 min):
§ Exercise to answer in your own words (individual task)
§ Exercise to choose true or false (individual task)
o Pronunciation (10 min):
§ Exercise of discrimination and classification (individual task)
o Speaking (15 min):
§ Exercise to talk about one of the three optional topics (pair task)
2nd session:
o Grammar (30 min):
§ Exercises to complete and choose alternatives (individual task)
§ Exercise to correct mistakes (individual task)
o Listening (15 min):
§ Exercise to choose true or false (individual task)
3rd session:
o Vocabulary (15 min):
§ Exercise of classification (individual task)
§ Exercise of discrimination (individual task)
o Writing (30 min): exercise to write a composition and fill the gaps (pair task)
4th session:
o Investigation task: Internet search (20 min) (group task)
o Communication task: Skype session (25 min) (group task)
5th session: Review (45 min) (pair task)
6th session: Evaluation (45 min) (individual task)
Sequencing: 16-31st October
Unit 4: The more, the merrier.
Objectives:
– To practice the four skills: reading, speaking, listening and writing.
– To learn vocabulary about people and behaviour.
– To learn to write a description within the global focus of the term on describing and asking.
– To learn to describe and ask in the comparative, paying attention to the pronunciation.
Contents:
– Grammar: Comparatives, so/such, adj. -ed/ing
– Vocabulary: People and behaviour
– Phonetics: Silent letters
– Writing: Description
– Communication: Describing and asking
Evaluation criteria:
– To be able to talk about people and behaviour.
– To be able to use the comparative in different communicative situations.
– To be able to speak correctly focusing on silent letters.
– To be able to write a description correctly.
Sessions development:
1st session:
o Reading (20 min):
§ Exercise to choose true or false (individual task)
§ Exercise to find synonym in the text (individual task)
o Pronunciation (10 min):
§ Exercise of discrimination and repetition (individual task)
o Speaking (15 min):
§ Exercise to talk about one of the three optional topics (pair task)
2nd session:
o Grammar (30 min):
§ Exercises to correct mistakes and choose alternatives (individual task)
§ Exercise to rewrite sentences (individual task)
o Listening (15 min):
§ Exercise classification (individual task)
§ Exercise of detail search (individual task)
3rd session:
o Vocabulary (15 min):
§ Exercise of word formation (individual task)
§ Exercise of classification (individual task)
o Writing (30 min): exercise to write a composition (pair task)
4th session:
o Investigation task: Internet search (20 min) (group task)
o Communication task: Skype session (25 min) (group task)
5th session: Review (45 min) (pair task)
6th session: Evaluation (45 min) (individual task)
Sequencing: 1-15th November
Unit 5: How much money do you spend?
Objectives:
– To practice the four skills: reading, speaking, listening and writing.
– To learn vocabulary about food and cooking.
– To learn to write a recipe within the global focus of the term on describing and asking.
– To learn to describe and ask with articles, adverbs and quantifiers, paying attention to the pronunciation.
Contents:
– Grammar: Articles, adverbs and quantifiers (some, any, much, many, a lot of)
– Vocabulary: Food and cooking
– Phonetics: Schwa ә and silent r
– Writing: Recipe
– Communication: Describing and asking
Evaluation criteria:
– To be able to talk about food and cooking.
– To be able to use the articles, adverbs and quantifiers in different communicative situations.
– To be able to speak correctly focusing on schwa ә and silent r.
– To be able to write a recipe correctly.
Sessions development:
1st session:
o Reading (20 min):
§ Exercise to answer in your own words (individual task)
§ Exercise to choose true or false (individual task)
§ Exercise to find synonym in the text (individual task)
o Pronunciation (10 min):
§ Exercise of association and discrimination (individual task)
o Speaking (15 min):
§ Exercise to talk about one of the three optional topics (pair task)
2nd session:
o Grammar (30 min):
§ Exercises to complete and choose alternatives (individual task)
§ Exercise to correct mistakes (individual task)
o Listening (15 min): Exercise to answer questions and fill gaps (individual task)
3rd session:
o Vocabulary (15 min):
§ Exercise to choose the correct alternative (individual task)
§ Exercise to join with pictures (individual task)
o Writing (30 min): exercise to write a composition (pair task)
4th session:
o Investigation task: Internet search (20 min) (group task)
o Communication task: Skype session (25 min) (group task)
5th session: Review (45 min) (pair task)
6th session: Evaluation (45 min) (individual task)
Sequencing: 16-30th November
Unit 6: Anyone but you.
Objectives:
– To practice the four skills: reading, speaking, listening and writing.
– To learn the difference in vocabulary between American and British English.
– To learn to write a composition within the global focus of the term on describing and asking.
– To learn to describe and ask with connectors of addition, contrast and cause, paying attention to the pronunciation.
Contents:
– Grammar: Connectors of addition, contrast and cause
– Vocabulary: American/British English
– Phonetics: Sentence stress
– Writing: Composition
– Communication: Describing and asking
Evaluation criteria:
– To be able to talk differentiating between American and British English, being appropriate to the communicative situation.
– To be able to use the connectors of addition, contrast and cause in different communicative situations.
– To be able to speak correctly focusing on sentence stress.
– To be able to write a composition correctly.
Sessions development:
1st session:
o Reading (20 min):
§ Exercise to answer in your own words (individual task)
§ Exercise to find synonym in the text (individual task)
o Pronunciation (10 min):
§ Exercise of discrimination and repetition (individual task)
o Speaking (15 min):
§ Exercise to talk about one of the three optional topics (pair task)
2nd session:
o Grammar (30 min):
§ Exercise to choose alternatives (individual task)
§ Exercise to rewrite sentences (individual task)
o Listening (15 min):
§ Exercise to answer and order (individual task)
3rd session:
o Vocabulary (15 min):
§ Exercise of discrimination (individual task)
o Writing (30 min): exercise to write a composition and fill the gaps (pair task)
4th session:
o Investigation task: Internet search (20 min) (group task)
o Communication task: Skype session (25 min) (group task)
5th session: Review (45 min) (pair task)
6th session: Evaluation (45 min) (individual task)
Sequencing: 1-15th December
Unit 7: You shouldn’t have smoked.
Objectives:
– To practice the four skills: reading, speaking, listening and writing.
– To learn vocabulary about crime and punishment.
– To learn to write a story within the global focus of the term on arguing.
– To learn to argue with modal verbs, paying attention to the pronunciation.
Contents:
– Grammar: Modal verbs (must, have to, should, can, could, may, might)
– Vocabulary: Crime and punishment
– Phonetics: Compound stress
– Writing: Story
– Communication: Arguing
Evaluation criteria:
– To be able to talk about crime and punishment.
– To be able to use the modal verbs in different communicative situations.
– To be able to speak correctly focusing on compound stress.
– To be able to write a story correctly.
Sessions development:
1st session:
o Reading (20 min):
§ Exercise to answer in your own words (individual task)
§ Exercise to find synonym in the text (individual task)
o Pronunciation (10 min):
§ Exercise of discrimination (individual task)
o Speaking (15 min):
§ Exercise to talk about one of the three optional topics (pair task)
2nd session:
o Grammar (30 min):
§ Exercise to join options (individual task)
§ Exercise to rewrite sentences (individual task)
o Listening (15 min):
§ Exercise to search the general idea and details (individual task)
3rd session:
o Vocabulary (15 min):
§ Exercise to join options (individual task)
§ Exercise to fill the gaps (individual task)
o Writing (30 min): exercise to write a composition and fill the gaps (pair task)
4th session:
o Investigation task: Internet search (20 min) (group task)
o Communication task: Skype session (25 min) (group task)
5th session: Review (45 min) (pair task)
6th session: Evaluation (45 min) (individual task)
Sequencing: 16-31st January
Unit 8: Do you know the man who has been promoted?
Objectives:
– To practice the four skills: reading, speaking, listening and writing.
– To learn vocabulary about work and employment.
– To learn to write an informal letter within the global focus of the term on arguing.
– To learn to argue with relative clauses, paying attention to the pronunciation.
Contents:
– Grammar: Relative clauses (who, which, that, whose, when, where, whom; defining and non-defining)
– Vocabulary: Work and employment
– Phonetics: Plosives and aspiration with p, t, k, h
– Writing: Informal letter
– Communication: Arguing
Evaluation criteria:
– To be able to talk about work and employment.
– To be able to use the relative clauses in different communicative situations.
– To be able to speak correctly focusing on plosives and aspiration with p, t, k, h.
– To be able to write an informal letter correctly.
Sessions development:
1st session:
o Reading (20 min):
§ Exercise to answer in your own words (individual task)
§ Exercise to find synonym in the text (individual task)
o Pronunciation (10 min):
§ Exercise of discrimination and repetition (individual task)
o Speaking (15 min):
§ Exercise to talk about one of the three optional topics (pair task)
2nd session:
o Grammar (30 min):
§ Exercise to choose alternatives (individual task)
§ Exercise to rewrite sentences (individual task)
o Listening (15 min):
§ Exercise to answer and choose true or false (individual task)
3rd session:
o Vocabulary (15 min):
§ Exercise to join with definition (individual task)
§ Exercise to fill the gaps (individual task)
o Writing (30 min): exercise to write a composition and fill the gaps (pair task)
4th session:
o Investigation task: Internet search (20 min) (group task)
o Communication task: Skype session (25 min) (group task)
5th session: Review (45 min) (pair task)
6th session: Evaluation (45 min) (individual task)
Sequencing: 1-15th February
Unit 9: I wish I were ill.
Objectives:
– To practice the four skills: reading, speaking, listening and writing.
– To learn vocabulary about health and medicine.
– To learn to write a letter of complaint within the global focus of the term on arguing.
– To learn to argue with the conditional sentences, paying attention to the pronunciation.
Contents:
– Grammar: Conditionals: 0, 1, 2, 3 and wish + inversion with negatives
– Vocabulary: Health and medicine
– Phonetics: Letter y
– Writing: Letter of complaint
– Communication: Arguing
Evaluation criteria:
– To be able to talk about health and medicine.
– To be able to use the conditional sentences in different communicative situations.
– To be able to speak correctly focusing on letter y.
– To be able to write a letter of complaint correctly.
Sessions development:
1st session:
o Reading (20 min):
§ Exercise to answer in your own words (individual task)
§ Exercise to summarise (individual task)
§ Exercise to find synonym in the text (individual task)
o Pronunciation (10 min):
§ Exercise of repetition (individual task)
o Speaking (15 min):
§ Exercise to talk about one of the three optional topics (pair task)
2nd session:
o Grammar (30 min):
§ Exercises to complete and choose alternatives (individual task)
§ Exercise to join options (individual task)
o Listening (15 min):
§ Exercise to complete and search general idea (individual task)
3rd session:
o Vocabulary (15 min):
§ Exercise of discrimination and classification (individual task)
o Writing (30 min): exercise to write a composition and choose the correct option (pair task)
4th session:
o Investigation task: Internet search (20 min) (group task)
o Communication task: Skype session (25 min) (group task)
5th session: Review (45 min) (pair task)
6th session: Evaluation (45 min) (individual task)
Sequencing: 16-29th February
Unit 10: Try it on!
Objectives:
– To practice the four skills: reading, speaking, listening and writing.
– To learn vocabulary about clothes and appearance.
– To learn to write an opinion essay within the global focus of the term on arguing.
– To learn to argue with phrasal and prepositional verbs, paying attention to the pronunciation.
Contents:
– Grammar: Phrasal and prepositional verbs
– Vocabulary: Clothes and appearance
– Phonetics: Strong/weak syllables
– Writing: Opinion essay
– Communication: Arguing
Evaluation criteria:
– To be able to talk about clothes and appearance.
– To be able to use the phrasal and prepositional verbs in different communicative situations.
– To be able to speak correctly focusing on strong and weak syllables.
– To be able to write an opinion essay correctly.
Sessions development:
1st session:
o Reading (20 min):
§ Exercise to answer in your own words (individual task)
o Pronunciation (10 min):
§ Exercise of repetition (individual task)
o Speaking (15 min):
§ Exercise to talk about one of the three optional topics (pair task)
2nd session:
o Grammar (30 min):
§ Exercise to choose alternatives (individual task)
§ Exercise to complete sentences (individual task)
o Listening (15 min):
§ Exercise of classification (individual task)
§ Exercise to look for details (individual task)
3rd session:
o Vocabulary (15 min):
§ Exercise to fill the gaps (individual task)
§ Exercise of classification (individual task)
o Writing (30 min): exercise to write a composition and fill the gaps (pair task)
4th session:
o Investigation task: Internet search (20 min) (group task)
o Communication task: Skype session (25 min) (group task)
5th session: Review (45 min) (pair task)
6th session: Evaluation (45 min) (individual task)
Sequencing: 1-15th March
Unit 11: Sue has been accused, hasn’t she?
Objectives:
– To practice the four skills: reading, speaking, listening and writing.
– To learn vocabulary about money.
– To learn to write a speech within the global focus of the term on arguing.
– To learn to argue with question tags, paying attention to the pronunciation.
Contents:
– Grammar: Question tags
– Vocabulary: Money
– Phonetics: Question intonation
– Writing: Speech
– Communication: Arguing
Evaluation criteria:
– To be able to talk about money.
– To be able to use the question tags in different communicative situations.
– To be able to speak correctly focusing on question intonation.
– To be able to write a speech correctly.
Sessions development:
1st session:
o Reading (20 min):
§ Exercise to answer in your own words (individual task)
§ Exercise to choose true or false (individual task)
§ Exercise to find synonym in the text (individual task)
o Pronunciation (10 min):
§ Exercise of discrimination and to fill the gaps (individual task)
o Speaking (15 min):
§ Exercise to talk about one of the three optional topics (pair task)
2nd session:
o Grammar (30 min):
§ Exercise to choose alternatives (individual task)
§ Exercise to complete sentences (individual task)
o Listening (15 min):
§ Exercise to look for detail (individual task)
3rd session:
o Vocabulary (15 min):
§ Exercise of word formation (individual task)
§ Exercise to join with definition (individual task)
o Writing (30 min): exercise to write a composition (pair task)
4th session:
o Investigation task: Internet search (20 min) (group task)
o Communication task: Skype session (25 min) (group task)
5th session: Review (45 min) (pair task)
6th session: Evaluation (45 min) (individual task)
Sequencing: 16-31st March
Unit 12: I had my house painted.
Objectives:
– To practice the four skills: reading, speaking, listening and writing.
– To learn vocabulary about housework and expressions with do/make.
– To learn to write a newspaper article within the global focus of the term on informing.
– To learn to inform with the passive voice, paying attention to the pronunciation.
Contents:
– Grammar: Passive voice and have something done
– Vocabulary: Housework and expressions with do/make
– Phonetics: æ/Λ, s/z/ƒ
– Writing: Newspaper article
– Communication: Informing
Evaluation criteria:
– To be able to talk about housework and expressions with do/make.
– To be able to use the passive voice in different communicative situations.
– To be able to speak correctly focusing on æ/Λ, s/z/ƒ.
– To be able to write a newspaper article correctly.
Sessions development:
1st session:
o Reading (20 min):
§ Exercise to answer in your own words (individual task)
§ Exercise to find synonym in the text (individual task)
o Pronunciation (10 min):
§ Exercise of discrimination and repetition (individual task)
o Speaking (15 min):
§ Exercise to talk about one of the three optional topics (pair task)
2nd session:
o Grammar (30 min):
§ Exercise to complete sentences (individual task)
§ Exercise to rewrite sentences (individual task)
o Listening (15 min):
§ Exercise to answer (individual task)
§ Exercise to choose true or false (individual task)
3rd session:
o Vocabulary (15 min):
§ Exercise to fill the gaps (individual task)
o Writing (30 min): exercise to write a composition (pair task)
4th session:
o Investigation task: Internet search (20 min) (group task)
o Communication task: Skype session (25 min) (group task)
5th session: Review (45 min) (pair task)
6th session: Evaluation (45 min) (individual task)
Sequencing: 16-30th April
Unit 13: John said that he would come.
Objectives:
– To practice the four skills: reading, speaking, listening and writing.
– To learn vocabulary about the media.
– To learn to write a report within the global focus of the term on informing.
– To learn to inform with reported speech, paying attention to the pronunciation.
Contents:
– Grammar: Reported speech
– Vocabulary: The media
– Phonetics: Emphasis
– Writing: Report
– Communication: Informing
Evaluation criteria:
– To be able to talk about the media.
– To be able to use the reported speech in different communicative situations.
– To be able to speak correctly focusing on emphasis.
– To be able to write a report correctly.
Sessions development:
1st session:
o Reading (20 min):
§ Exercise to answer in your own words (individual task)
§ Exercise to summarise (individual task)
§ Exercise to find synonym in the text (individual task)
o Pronunciation (10 min):
§ Exercise of discrimination (individual task)
o Speaking (15 min):
§ Exercise to talk about one of the three optional topics (pair task)
2nd session:
o Grammar (30 min):
§ Exercises to rewrite sentences (individual task)
§ Exercise to rewrite sentences (individual task)
o Listening (15 min):
§ Exercise of association (individual task)
§ Exercise to choose true or false (individual task)
3rd session:
o Vocabulary (15 min):
§ Exercise to fill the gaps (individual task)
o Writing (30 min): exercise to write a composition (pair task)
4th session:
o Investigation task: Internet search (20 min) (group task)
o Communication task: Skype session (25 min) (group task)
5th session: Review (45 min) (pair task)
6th session: Evaluation (45 min) (individual task)
Sequencing: 1-15th May
Unit 14: John ordered me to come.
Objectives:
– To practice the four skills: reading, speaking, listening and writing.
– To learn vocabulary about travel and holidays.
– To learn to write a review within the global focus of the term on informing.
– To learn to inform with reporting verbs, paying attention to the pronunciation.
Contents:
– Grammar: Reporting verbs and gerund/infinitive
– Vocabulary: Travel and holidays
– Phonetics: <th>: θ/đ, dς/tƒ
– Writing: Review
– Communication: Informing
Evaluation criteria:
– To be able to talk about travel and holidays.
– To be able to use the reporting verbs in different communicative situations.
– To be able to speak correctly focusing on <th>: θ/đ, dς/tƒ.
– To be able to write a review correctly.
Sessions development:
1st session:
o Reading (20 min):
§ Exercise to answer in your own words (individual task)
§ Exercise to choose true or false (individual task)
§ Exercise to find synonym in the text (individual task)
o Pronunciation (10 min):
§ Exercise of discrimination (individual task)
o Speaking (15 min):
§ Exercise to talk about one of the three optional topics (pair task)
2nd session:
o Grammar (30 min):
§ Exercises to choose alternatives and correct mistakes (individual task)
§ Exercise to rewrite sentences (individual task)
o Listening (15 min):
§ Exercise to look for detail (individual task)
§ Exercise to fill the gaps (individual task)
3rd session:
o Vocabulary (15 min):
§ Exercise to choose the correct alternative (individual task)
§ Exercise to join with the definition (individual task)
o Writing (30 min): exercise to write a composition (pair task)
4th session:
o Investigation task: Internet search (20 min) (group task)
o Communication task: Skype session (25 min) (group task)
5th session: Review (45 min) (pair task)
6th session: Evaluation (45 min) (individual task)
Sequencing: 16-31st May
Unit 15: Could you tell me exactly where you were at 8 o’clock pm?
Objectives:
– To practice the four skills: reading, speaking, listening and writing.
– To learn vocabulary with word-formation.
– To learn to write a summary within the global focus of the term on informing.
– To learn to inform with indirect questions and politeness, paying attention to the pronunciation.
Contents:
– Grammar: Indirect questions and politeness
– Vocabulary: Word-formation
– Phonetics: Homonyms, homophones and homographs
– Writing: Summary
– Communication: Informing
Evaluation criteria:
– To be able to acquire new vocabulary following the word-formation procedures.
– To be able to use the indirect questions in different communicative situations, especially the situations where politeness is required.
– To be able to speak correctly focusing on homonyms, homophones and homographs.
– To be able to write a summary correctly.
Sessions development:
1st session:
o Reading (20 min):
§ Exercise to answer and choose true or false (individual task)
§ Exercise to find synonym in the text (individual task)
o Pronunciation (10 min):
§ Exercise of discrimination and to fill the gaps (individual task)
o Speaking (15 min):
§ Exercise to talk about one of the three optional topics (pair task)
2nd session:
o Grammar (30 min):
§ Exercise to order sentences (individual task)
§ Exercises to rewrite sentences (individual task)
o Listening (15 min):
§ Exercise to correct mistakes and to answer (individual task)
3rd session:
o Vocabulary (15 min):
§ Exercises to fill the gaps, choose the correct alternative, and of word formation (individual task)
o Writing (30 min): exercise to write a composition (pair task)
4th session:
o Investigation task: Internet search (20 min) (group task)
o Communication task: Skype session (25 min) (group task)
5th session: Review (45 min) (pair task)
6th session: Evaluation (45 min) (individual task)
Sequencing: 1-15th June
|
1st Bach |
UNIT |
CONTENTS |
|||||
|
GRAMMAR |
VOCABULARY |
PHONETICS |
WRITING |
COMMUNICATION |
|||
|
1st term |
Sep. |
1. How often do you choose the Prime Minister? |
Present tenses |
History and politics |
Word stress |
Interview |
Describing and asking |
|
Oct. |
2. Have you ever been abroad? |
Past tenses |
Education and learning |
Regular and irregular past |
Biography |
||
|
Oct. |
3. It will have already been updated. |
Future tenses |
Science and computers |
Long/short vowels |
|
||
|
Nov. |
4. The more, the merrier. |
Comparatives, so/such, adj. -ed/ing |
People and behaviour |
Silent letters |
Description |
||
|
Nov. |
5. How much money do you spend? |
Articles, adverbs and quantifiers |
Food and cooking |
Schwa ә and silent r |
Recipe |
||
|
Dec. |
6. Anyone but you. |
Connectors: addition, contrast and cause |
British and American English |
Sentence stress |
Composition |
||
|
2nd term |
Jan. |
7. You shouldn’t have smoked. |
Modal verbs |
Crime and punishment |
Compound stress |
Story |
Arguing |
|
Feb. |
8. Do you know the man who has been promoted? |
Relative clauses |
Work and employment |
Plosives and aspiration: p, t, k, h |
Informal letter |
||
|
Feb. |
9. I wish I were ill. |
Conditionals: 0,1,2,3 and wish |
Health and medicine |
Letter y |
Letter of complaint |
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|
Mar. |
10. Try it on! |
Phrasal and prepositional verbs |
Clothes and appearance |
Strong/weak syllables |
Opinion essay |
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|
Mar. |
11. Sue has been accused, hasn’t she? |
Question tags |
Money |
Question intonation |
Speech |
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|
3rd term |
Apr. |
12. I had my house painted. |
Passive voice and have something done |
Housework and expressions do/make |
æ/Λ s/z/ƒ |
Newspaper article |
Informing |
|
May |
13. John said that he would come. |
Reported speech |
The media |
Emphasis |
Report |
||
|
May |
14. John ordered me to come. |
Reporting verbs and gerund/infinitive |
Travel and holidays |
th: θ/đ dς/tƒ |
Review |
||
|
Jun. |
15. Could you tell me exactly where you were at 8 o’clock pm? |
Indirect questions and politeness |
Word-formation |
Homonyms, homophones, homographs |
Summary |
CONCLUSION
To sum up, this syllabus has been designed for the group of students explained in the contextualization with their own specific professional and personal needs and following a communicative approach based on meaningful learning, communicative functions and autonomous learning, where the student is the active part of the process and the teacher is a mere facilitator. As has been explained in the didactic units sequence and organization, the didactic units have consequently followed a communicative approach and so have been divided into three main communicative functions of language: describing and asking, arguing and informing. As well, the didactic units have been designed following an innovative methodology based on the information and communication technologies, which are a key motivating and challenging factor for the students, and where English is the key language for communication.
BIBLIOGRAPHY AND WEBGRAPHY
SYLLABUS BIBLIOGRAPHY
BIBLIOGRAPHY
A. ANDREOLA, B.: Dinámica de grupo. Sal terrea, Santander, 1994.
ATIENZA MERINO, J.L.: El Juego en la clase de lengua extranjera: una estrategia para lograr buenos aprendizajes. Aula de innovación educativa, 1994.
DUNLEA, A.: How do we learn languages. Cambridge University Press, UK, 1995.
HARRIS M., MCCANN P.: Assessment. Heinemann, UK, 1994.
HOWE M.J.A.: La capacidad de aprender: la adquisición y desarrollo de habilidades. Alianza, Madrid, 1999.
MADSEN, S.H.: Techniques in testing. Oxford University Press, UK, 1993.
NUNAN, D.: The Learner-Centred Curriculum. Cambridge University Press, UK, 1988.
PARDO MERINO A., ALONSO TAPIA J.: Motivar en el aula. Ediciones Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, 1995.
POZO MUNICIO, J.I.: Teorías cognitivas del aprendizaje. Morata, Madrid, 1994.
POZO, J.I.: Adquisición de estrategias de aprendizaje. Cuadernos de pedagogía, 1989.
RICHARDS J.C., LOCKHART C.: Estrategias de reflexión sobre la enseñanza de idiomas. Cambridge University Press, UK, 2002.
SCHUCHNER, GASALLA: Aprendizaje autónomo: un saber para la vida, 2003.
VV.AA.: Atención a la diversidad. CPR de Aranjuez, 1999.
WILLIAMS M., BURDEN R.S: Psicología para profesores de idiomas. Cambridge University Press, Madrid, 1999.
WEBGRAPHY
http://www.navarra.es/home_es/Gobierno+de+Navarra/Organigrama/Los+departamentos/Educacion/
http://www.lexnavarra.navarra.es/indice.asp?s=51&p=5
DIDACTIC UNITS BIBLIOGRAPHY
BOLTON D., TATTERSALL L.: Select. Oxford University Press, UK, 1997.
COPAGE J., LUQUE-MORTIMER L., STEPHENS M.: Get on Track to FCE. Longman, 2005.
MURPHY, R.: English Grammar in Use. Cambridge University Press, UK, 1994.
O’NEILL, R.: Focus on First Certificate in English. Oxford University Pres, UK, 1994.
OXENDEN C., LATHAM-KOENING C.: New English File – Intermediate Plus. Oxford University Press, UK, 1997.
THOMSON, MARTINET: Practical English Grammar. Oxford University Press, UK, 1992.
VINCE, M.: First Certificate Language Practice. Heinemann, UK, 1993.