Introduction
This treatise offers a comprehensive critique of the lesson taught by Bill, the teacher, in an elementary classroom. The lesson is about speaking and pronunciation of English words by learners who are learning to speak in English.
Bill makes good use of the dialogue frame as the primary tool for practising speaking and pronunciation in the multicultural class environment. Bill also uses the white board in an interactive lesson delivery approach to the young adult learners.
The lesson in taught in English language through the use of productive and receptive skills via the ESA model of lesson delivery. Bill’s lesson was perfect since it was angled on complete learner engagement in an interactive process that accommodates the learning needs of each student.
At the end of the lesson, the learners showed competency in speaking and pronouncing the English words taught in the most appropriate manner.
Theory
The entire framework of Bill’s lesson in based on the inductive approach. Bill begins the interesting lesson through displaying series of facial expressions that depicts different moods after which the learners are expected to speak before he offers the correct pronunciation and explanation.
This approach works perfectly in the elementary class as all the learners are engaged and seems very interested in what Bill has to say next.
This approach may also be referred to as the Practice, Production, and Presentation Model as the focus of the lesson is on the ability to properly pronounce and speak some English words with the right tone (Harmer, 2007).
Explicit Talk about Language
The lesson delivered by Bill was created to test pronunciation and reading skills among the learners of English as a secondary language. The lesson was delivered in a progressive manner within the Practice, Production, and Presentation model.
The learners seemed to enjoy the topic and were fully engaged from the beginning to the end since Bill’s style of lesson delivery was characterised by humour and use of very practical examples. The pronunciation was made very simple through application of tonal variation to create different meaning for words in a sentence.
Bill used the example of describing an experience in the cinema hall through person reflection about immediate environment and occurrences during the event. This gives Bill the opportunity to introduce different descriptive words since the learners could relate to the topic (Harmer, 2007).
As the lesson begun, Bill allowed the learners to read the words written on the whiteboard without interjection.
Bill was keen on allowing the learners to pronounce the words with periodic interruptions whenever he noticed gross misspelling since the lesson was focused on checking the learners’ ability to correctly pronounce some words and read them properly.
As indicated by Harmer (2007), allowing learners to pronounce words on their own without constant interruption is instrumental towards building the self confidence and oral proficiency of the students.
Though Bill encourages free participation of all the learners, he is careful to apply the guided participation approach to ensure that the learners remain objective in contributing in the class.
In order to keep learners from feeling out of place, the lesson objective adopts an inclusive education and interactive lesson session where every student is expected to contribute equally.
During the practical assessment of the learners through direct participation, Bill was careful to pair the learners and gives room for higher Student Talking Time (STT) while regulating the Teacher Talking Time (TTT). Bill was very successful in ensuring that every learner participates in the STT.
Through description of how each learner spent his or her previous evening, the confidence level of each learner was strong as they freely express themselves with their pronunciation skills (Harmer, 2007). The instructor is careful to guide the learners when he proposes the STT.
The success of Bill’s lesson could be attributed to his ability to give clear instructions, application of guided participation, and proactive delivery methods.
The focus of Bill’s lesson captured series of concepts on pronunciation and speaking of different English words within the right tonal variations. Through use of the cinema experience, Bill was able to introduce different tonal variations in pronouncing certain words that have different meanings.
Bloom outlined the hierarchy of cognitive objectives of learning; from simple to complex as knowledge (remembering information), comprehension (ability to acquire meaning from the information), application (ability to use the information), analysis (ability to break information into parts to understand it better), synthesis (ability to consolidated materials together to create something new), and evaluation (ability to check, judge, and critique materials) (Harmer, 2007).
Due to bilingual nature of learners in this class, several instructional challenges were encountered by Bill in the process of implementing the lesson objectives. To begin with, basic understanding of English as an art varied among.
Therefore, it was important to incorporate simple English vocabulary and sentence structure in explaining some words used in the class. The lesson adopted a practical, interactive, and inclusive learning to minimize impact of the above impediments.
In addition to STT learning, Bill applied flashcards, cue-response drill, and brainstorm to teach vocabulary to the learners. For instance, Bill constantly used different facial expressions to describe their meanings such as sadness, smile, and happiness among others.
Moreover, Bill instructed the learners to apply the dialogue simulation through oral presentation. When correcting the mistakes made by the learners (inability to correctly use present and past tenses), Bill uses oral presentation to ensure that the students internalise construction of different English words and phrases (Harmer, 2007).
In addition, Bill has been successful in applying the repetition approach to improve the memory of the learners through repeated pronunciation of certain words. Through stressing some words and balancing the intonation in application, Bill was successful in applying the freer and controlled practices in delivering the lesson.
The teacher’s role
The lesson delivered by Bill was systematically structured and delivered in a humorous way to maximize level of learner engagement.
As the instructor, Bill was clear, practical, and focused in delivering the lesson content through the STT format. Bill does not shy away from the interactive learning. Besides, Bill uses facial expressions and practical examples to ensure that the lesson in a success.
Inclusion
Bill applied flashcards, cue-response drill, and brainstorm strategies to teach the learners on proper pronunciation and speaking correct English. Through the whiteboard, Bill was able to apply the Presentation, Practice, and Production approach to ensure that the STT is maximised.
Concluding Sentence
The lesson delivered by Bill is a perfect example of a pronunciation and reading class that demonstrates the significance of STT and PPT in lesson delivery as part of scaffold learning in a dynamic classroom environment.
Reference
Harmer, J. (2007). The practice of English language teaching (4th ed.). Harlow, UK: Pearsons Longman.