To Write or Not To Write

Writing a well structured academic essay may be perceived as a task which is arguably daunting to perhaps most students. This perception is justified as it can be argued that the concept of writing of this nature tends to be almost not taught and entirely ignored. This is particularly evident in most cases in the secondary school system.It is, however, relatively an easy and straight forward writing process if one is equipped with the nuts and bolts of academic writing. As such, by outlining the sensible elements of a good academic writing and providing a step-by-step process, it is believed that writing academic essay would be a breeze.
There is a set of skills that we, English teachers wish our students to develop.Our first step is to identify which skills.Then we have to decide our teaching strategy, exercises and activities that will help them develop these skills. For instance, if we assign our students to write a persuasive essay, we have to make it very
clear to them that the purpose of writing a persuasive essay is to convince the readers to agree with their viewpoints.The students also must present strong evidence that support their viewpoints. It would also be great if they can discuss the opposing views. To make it a grade A persuasive essay, the students must write a strong and impressive conclusion. Anybody would like to share their experience in teaching writing skills?

Well done!!

Hello friends,

Kudos to the English Unit for coming up with this fantastic blog. It is an avenue for us to share our teaching materials, reflect on our teaching and learning experience and basically use this blog to help improve the quality of our teaching and simultaneously help our students to get better marks. Hope more good posts will come later...

Speaking

Dear friends,

I stumbled upon this interesting website while searching for my teaching materials. You can click here to read about the teaching of speaking. The tips are useful and effective.

The many faces of English Lecturers

"It's not what happens to you that will determine how your life will turn out; it's what you do about it that will determine your life." This is a quotation taken from a reading comprehension passage. To be exact, it is from one of the passages of PSPM II WB023.I make it a point to highlight this quotation whenever I discuss this passage with my students. I want them to acknowledge that they are in control of their decisions and actions. By having a positive attitude about life in general, the students are likely to accomplish their goals. Personally, I feel that teaching English Language is not all about grammar, essays and summaries. It is also about inspiring, motivating and encouraging my students to go further. There are many people who will put them down. However, if my students' minds are constantly being fed by positive materials I am pretty sure that their life will be great. Amin..

Last day of the final semester...

Time really flies...

It seems as if only yesterday I entered the classes for the first time... meeting new faces staring intently waiting and anticipating of what you'd be saying... such a warm atmosphere full of positive vibes as the starting of the semester began to take charge...

And now... it's already the last week for T&L after which next week will be their study week and the subsequent weeks - exams...

Usually we lecturers would be discussing past years' papers and giving last minutes tips to the students in the last few weeks of T&L. And after a while, we could see that the students were rather exasperated with all the last-minute-dos' and don'ts not just for English but all the subjects that they are taking.

The last day of the semester is the day where I would not be actually teaching anything in particular. Instead it'll be the time for story-telling sessions (from me of course!) capitalising on whatever interesting / bizarre / mind-boggling themes or issues which are worth sharing. This time around, no stories - I chose to do it differently. Well, it's an old hat for most but perhaps it could be of some use to some...

The aim was to leave a positive atmosphere when the students reflect on their learning throughout the session. So I asked them to choose ONE statement from the given few below and write their responses on a half-cut  A-4 paper supplied. The statements were:

a) The most memorable English lesson that I had
b) The most difficult thing I learnt and mastered in the English lesson
c) My most noticeable improvement in English

Students were told to express themselves freely without being too bogged-down by grammatical errors and the likes. They could choose to be anonymous if they preferred. What is important was - I wanted them to be honest with themselves and their own progress.

After about 15 minutes, the students folded the paper and put it in a box. Then we sat in a circle and each one took turn to pick one from the box and read it aloud for everybody to listen and comment on. They seemed to be enjoying the session greatly where each one was very eager to share what their friend has written about the subject. Some read comments were met with giggles and nods and whispers. It was obvious that they tried to guess who wrote which comments, etc - everybody laughed. Everybody seemed to be enjoying the "reflection" session.

As from my perspective, I learned what aspects of the lessons throughout the year were well-received and enjoyed so I could utilise these and improve on them for the benefits of my future students.

I'm sure each of us has our very own favourite last-day English lesson. Would you care to share it with the rest?

Thanks.

-Rizal-