Development Personal Practical Knowledge of CLT

張曦月

1. Introduction

As Nunan （1991） points out that before teachers adapt materials， it is important to consider that many materials are well designed by publishers， and the material may useful and helpful in a suitable context， such as in my home country， published materials both in middle schools and senior high schools are edited every year， which is in order to address some problems from these materials and then provide a kind of fairly ideal ones to students. However， on the other hand，

“Published materials of any kinds have to cater for a very wide range of possible users， which means that they cannot address any individual student or group of students directly” （White 1998， p.73）.

So in McDonough & Shaws （2003. p.75） opinion， the teachers need to do some adaptation when they use a material.

According to Madsen & Bowen （1978）， a good adapting is to achieve “congruence” which means the teacher could strive for “congruence among teaching materials， methodology， students， course objectives， the target language and its context， and the teachers own personality and teaching style” （McDonough & Shaws 2003. p.75）. In order to reach this ideal purpose， it is necessary for teachers to decide how to change any inappropriate tasks and exercises then provide these revised parts to the whole class. And McGrath （2002） also mentions， it is essential for teachers to decide how much material they need to use and how much material they need to modify.

Based on the unit3 of the first year of Chinese senior high school syllabus， this paper will describe a main skill （speaking） which is covered inadequately in this material and then discuss the consequences for the learners might be of not mastering the skill， finally， it will present some ideas about how to adapt the material to make up the inadequate skill.

2. The Description of the Material

The material will be analysed （see appendix 1） is the unit3 of the course book in the first year of Chinese senior high school （semester 1）. The course book has been used compulsorily in every Chinese states school.

As we can see from the material（2010）， the topic of this unit is about travelling. It can be easily seen that the unit is a reading based one because most tasks and exercises are around these two reading texts， for instance， the questions in comprehending part are designed from the reading and in the learning about language part， the vocabulary student need to fill are also from the first reading text. However， the tasks for speaking are much less and the forms are also unvaried. In an eight pages unit， speaking activities simply account for three little tasks.

3. Why Speaking is Important for Learners to Master？

As McDonough & Shaw （2003） points out that English has become an international communicative language so that learners need to speak and communicative in various situations with foreigners so that to communicate and interact is one of a main aim to learn a new language. They also state that speaking is an essential criterion to judge a persons language competence since it is more direct than others language skill， such as reading and writing. Ur （2000， p.121） demonstrates that speaking seems the most vital part among four basic skills since “people who know a language are referred to as speakers of the language.” However， because of the limitation of Chinese University Entrance Examination， speaking accounts for less than other skills both in the compulsory course book and the teachers lesson plan. As a result of the lack of speaking practice， some Chinese students become poor speakers， even though they could obtain high scores in the entrance examination.

4. How to Adapt Speaking Parts in This Unit？

As McDonough & Shaws （2003） point out， when teachers adapt materials， there are several basic techniques which are adding， deleting， modifying， simplifying， and reordering. And this paper will adapt this material mainly in terms of adding and modifying. As McDonough & Shaws （2003， p.81） mention about， adding， straightforward， means put more contents in where are not supplemented and modifying refers to “an internal change in the approach or focus of an exercise or other piece of materials”. （Some detailed theories about adding and modifying will be mentioned below）

In addition， before teachers improve and adapt materials， it is essential to focus on the principles when adapting. As Cunningsworth （1984， p.66） states， four questions need to be considered：

（1）What does the exercise actually get the learner to do？

（2）What do I want the learner to do？

（3）How can I get the exercise to do what I ant it to do for the learner？

（4）What is the objective of the activity？

Based on these principles， some speaking parts in this unit are expected to be adapted as followed.

4.1 Adding Some Drills and Speaking Activities

4.1.1 Adding Some Drills

As Grant （1987， p. 35） points out in speech work， drills are also necessary since “drills are more or less mechanical exercises in which the students practice the sounds or grammar of the language.” Although drilling work is not that communicative， it still helps students to pronounce correctly and approach new sentence structure in some extent. For instance， in this unit， there are not enough drilling exercises. Firstly， as we can see from page 18， the reading text includes some new vocabularies which printed by boldface， but there is no exercise on the pronunciation of new words. Although students could listen to the tape to learn the pronunciation of vocabularies by themselves （if there is a tape symbol followed the heading of a part， which means this part could be listened from the tape which accompanies with the course book）， it is not that possible that every student will do that. So as teachers， it is acceptable to add some drills on pronunciation. For example， the teacher could list the new words first， then teach students the pronunciation accurately or play the tape first， then ask students to imitate in class. Apart from simply drilling on vocabularies， teachers could expand some words， such as McDonough & Shaw （2003， p.80） states it is possible to develop the materials in a “new direction”. For example， the word “altitude” could be expanded a little. It can be compared with “attitude” and “aptitude” which are similar in both spelling and pronunciation. In this way， it may possible to help students to remember more vocabulary.

Apart from expanding， extension is also a form to adapt materials when we adding （Maley， 1998）. In McDonough & Shaws（2003） opinions， extension is a quantitative way to extend some practice. For instance， the speaking exercise on page 19 （The fifth one）， here the task requires students to mention that the implications on meaning when the stresses on different words. Here it simply provides one sentence as a model， which is not that enough. So teachers could choose several sentences （these sentences could from the reading text since this task is included in Comprehending.） and then ask students to do the practice more， which could improve their intonation in speaking.

4.1.2 Adding Some Communicative Speaking Activities

Basically， in a large class （in Chinese high school， there are normally more than 50 students in a class）， it is difficult to organize communicative activities because it is hard to control so many students. But it is also possible if teachers could control more or design some interesting communicative task which could involve students better. In addition， communicative tasks do not need to as same accurately as others tasks such as looking for answers in the reading text or filling blanks with correct words. On the other hand， as Grant （1987， p. 37） says， use language to communicative concerns more “on fluency than on accuracy”. Based on this purpose， a communicative task could be added after students finish the whole unit. From the material， we can see that the content of the two reading texts is about Wang kun and Wang weis bike trip which is a big challenge for most teenagers. Based on this situation， the teacher could list some objects might be used in this kind of trip to students， such as electric flashlight， tent， raincoat， lighter， map， match， medicines and so on. Then the teacher could ask students to choose six most necessary objects they thought. After students brainstorm their answers， the teacher could divide students into different four people groups， which is more convenient for Chinese large classs discussion since the two students sit together could turn over to discuss with another two students sit back of them. In this discussion， students are required to give their reasons about why they choose these six objects and discuss with group members， finally combine each members opinions to decide what the most important items are you thought. In this process， students may use some skills about agree or disagree， as well as some negotiation competence. When students discuss it， the teacher needs to monitor each group. Finally， share each groups idea together.

Conclusion

To sum up， this paper has discussed some ideas about adapting the speaking activities in the unit 3 of the course book in the first year of Chinese senior high school. Adding some drills， activities and designing some communicative tasks are both useful and helpful to improve students speaking competence.

However， because of the limitations of Chinese educational rule， language teachers in China have to follow the syllabus and as a result of huge quantity of students， some more communicative and authentic tasks are difficult to be provided in Chinese high schools. So， as language teachers it is a challenge but necessary to adapt the compulsory materials， then create more communicative opportunities to students.

References：

[1]Cunningworth，A.（1984），Evaluating and Selecting EFL Teaching Materials.London：Heinemann.

[2]Grant，N.（1987），Making the Most of Your Textbook.New York：Longman.

[3]Graves，K.（2000），Designing Language Course.London：Heinle & Heinle.

[4]Maler，A（1998），Squaring the Circle-reconciling Materials as Constraint with Materials as Empowerment.In B.Tomlinson（Ed.），Materials Development in Language Teaching.（pp.279-294）.Cambridge：Cambridge University Press.

[5]McDonough，J.& Shaw，C.（2003），Materials and Methods in ELT.Oxford：Blakewell.

[6]McGrath，I.（2002），Materials Evaluation and Designing for Language Teaching.Edinburgh：Edinburgh University Press.

[7]Nunan，D.（1991），Language Teaching Methodology.London：Prentice Hall.

[8]Peoples Education Press & Syllabus Research and Development Centre & English Syllabus Research and Development Centre，（2010），New Senior English for China Students Book 1.People Education Press：Peking.

[9]Ur，P.（2000），A Course in Language Teaching.Cambridge：Cambridge University Press.

[10]White，R.V.（1998），Listening.Oxford：Oxford University Press.

Appendix 1