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Developing Practical Knowledge for TESOL Teaching

Module description

This module is designed to provide students with the opportunity to develop the practical skills and techniques required to teach English effectively in their contexts. Students will be invited to reflect upon key practical aspects of English language teaching, such as lesson planning, designing and adapting materials, grouping techniques, classroom management, and error correction, among others. Students will have the opportunity to plan and deliver lessons and receive teacher and peer feedback. They will also observe language classes in different contexts and reflect about how the practical techniques used by others might be appropriate, or not appropriate, to teaching in their own contexts.

Module aims - intentions of the module

1. To provide students with a thorough understanding of the relationship between theoretical perspectives and different TESOL classroom practices.
2. To provide an introduction to key concepts associated with the practice of foreign or second language teaching.
3. To familiarize students with the core competencies associated with successful practice in TESOL classrooms from both a theoretical and practical perspective.
4. To develop students’ capacity to successfully apply conceptual and practical knowledge about foreign or second language practice to the realities of their own current and/or future teaching contexts.
5. To develop students’ capacity to reflect critically on their own teaching as well as their peers’.

Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs)

ILO: Module-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 1. Demonstrate a comprehensive understanding of the key aspects of classroom practice including the organisation of activities, classroom management, and classroom interaction;
• 2. Demonstrate a critical application of these skills and knowledge in the preparation and teaching of a language class;
• 3. Demonstrate the ability to successfully apply conceptual and practical knowledge and skills to teaching activities in the TESOL classroom in a rigorous and systematic way;
• 4. Reflect critically upon observed teaching and microteaching in relation to key principles covered in the module;

ILO: Discipline-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 5. Demonstrate the knowledge, understanding and skills for students required in order to analyse TESOL policy, theory and practice;
• 6. Demonstrate the ability to analyse data for teaching purposes;
• 7. Evaluate complex TESOL issues drawing on national and international perspectives;
• 8. To provide students with knowledge and skills needed to apply theory to practice in TESOL;

ILO: Personal and key skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 9. Engage in independent study and group/pair work, including the microteaching and evaluation of peers' teaching and their own;
• 10. Digest, select and organise material to produce, to a deadline, a coherent, thoughtful and creative analysis of theory to particular professional and socio-cultural situations;
• 11. Undertake a critical analysis of the teaching skills, knowledge and techniques developed in the module through personal reflection.

Syllabus plan

The syllabus plan is subject to change, but is anticipated to include the following:

1. Introduction to the module. The relationship between beliefs, practices and contexts.
2. What does it feel like to be a language learner?; The importance of reflection in language teaching; Introduction to teacher observation.
3. Organizing a group: from non-communicative to communicative.
4. Lesson planning 1: Key concepts in planning; planning to introduce and practice new language.
5. Lesson planning 2: Planning a task-based learning class.
6. Choosing and adapting materials.
7. Classroom management (e.g. giving instructions; questioning techniques; using the whiteboard).
8. The role of error in language learning.
9. Checking learners’ understanding; Slippage.
10. Microteaching: Students deliver a lesson and receive peer and tutor feedback.

Learning activities and teaching methods (given in hours of study time)

Details of learning activities and teaching methods

Formative assessment

Summative assessment (% of credit)

Details of summative assessment

Details of re-assessment (where required by referral or deferral)

Indicative learning resources - Basic reading

Cook, V. 2016. Second Language Learning and Language Teaching (5^th Edition) Routledge: Oxford.

Lightbown, P. & Spada, N. 2013. How languages are learned. Oxford Handbooks for Language Teachers (4^th edition) Oxford University Press: Oxford.

Hall, G. Exploring English Language Teaching. 2018. (2^nd Edition) Routledge: London.

Hall, G. The Routledge Handbook of English Language Teaching. 2016. Routledge: London.

Scrivener, J. 2011. Learning Teaching (3^rd Edition, with DVD) Macmillan.

Harmer, J. 2015. The Practice of English Language Teaching (3^rd Edition). Harlow: Longman.

Key words search

TESOL theory and practice