A College English Reading Lesson Plan and Its Justification

【摘要】本文探討英文閱讀課堂設計應遵循的指導原則如先有知識理論 (Schemata Theory)，內容本位語言教學(CBI)，學生為主教學法等為大學英語閱讀教學提供理論指導和實踐的范例。

【關鍵詞】先有知識 K-W-L 學生為主教學法 內容本位語言教學 合作式學習 學習者自治

【基金項目】中央高校基本科研業務費專項資金資助項目，課題編號NKZXC10006。

【中圖分類號】H31 【文獻標識碼】A 【文章編號】2095-3089（2012）12-0108-02

Introduction

This lesson plan (Shown in Appendix) is designed for a Chinese reading class that consists of 30 sophomore students. It will be carried out in one class period with skill focus on “identifying main ideas”.

It is composed of 6 procedures with activities designed employing the K-W-L method. It is content?鄄based and student?鄄centered. At the end of the lesson， students will be able to 1. Identify the main idea of an article and 2. Apply relevant reading strategies in their reading tasks. The lesson plan also encourages cooperative learning， student?鄄student interaction and learner autonomy.

Rationale and theoretical considerations

According to the author?蒺s teaching experience in China， “reading for main ideas” is the most important for students because English is a “topic centred” language and “most comprehension exercises ask for readers to locate the main idea of the passage or a paragraph” (Farrell， 2002， p. 35). However， the students usually do not know exactly how to locate the main idea. Therefore， such a lesson is very necessary and helpful for Chinese students to develop the crucial reading strategy so that they can “think in terms of generalizations and topics when it comes to comprehending a reading passage” (Farrell， 2002， p. 35).

In his book Planning Lessons for a Reading Class， Thomas S. C. Farrell also writes that “identifying main ideas” involves using many reading strategies like predicting， prior knowledge， knowledge of text structure， skimming， scanning， and recognizing topic sentences， etc. And that is why it “calls for more advanced language proficiency levels” (2002， p. 37).

In this lesson plan， the K?鄄W?鄄L method is employed to “encourage students to have a personal connection to a reading assignment” (Farrell， 2002， p. 13). It helps students activate their schemata and anticipation of the text. It also helps students reflect what they have learned from the articles. Actually， students monitor their own reading activity through such an approach. Moreover， it makes the reading activity more purposeful and interesting by letting students ask themselves questions like “What do I know about the city?”， “What do I want to know about the city?” and “What have I Learned about the city through the article?”

Material and classroom procedures

The major material for this lesson plan is the articles chosen by the students themselves. Letting the students make their own choice for the reading texts is a salient feature of the learner?鄄centered approach (Cox， 2005， p.21). Moreover， it also gives students more freedom and promotes learner autonomy. In this way， students “take more control over and responsibility for their learning process” (Schwienhorst， 2003， p. 431)， and the teacher acts to “help the learner acquire autonomy for himself， ie to learn to learn” (Holec， p. 23).

The classroom procedures are divided into pre?鄄reading， during?鄄reading and post?鄄reading phases with the during?鄄reading phase taking up the bulk of class running time. The teacher does scaffolding through presenting the PowerPoint file and teaching the major strategies in identifying the main idea. Students are given tasks to transact and are given more varieties of organization in carrying out the tasks. First， they are asked to read and summarize individually， then they do their group work. Student?鄄student interaction promotes cooperative learning and enables the students to exchange ideas and work in a team.

Reflections on the lesson and problems anticipated

This lesson plan aims to be authentic and content?鄄based. It provides the students an opportunity to know more about the world as well as learning the reading strategies and applying them in the reading process. It turns the classroom into a lively learning venue and encourages interaction among the students. Stoller promotes the content?鄄based instruction (CBI) in his article “Project Work: A Means to Promote Language and Content”:

By integrating project work into content?鄄based classrooms， educators create vibrant learning environments that require active student involvement， stimulate higher?鄄level thinking skills， and give students responsibility for their own learning.

When incorporating project work into content?鄄based classrooms， instructors distance themselves from teacher?鄄dominated instruction and move toward creating a student community of inquiry involving authentic communication， cooperative learning， collaboration， and problem solving. (2002， p.107)

There are some anticipated problems for putting this reading lesson into practice in a Chinese classroom. One is that whether it is good for students to select their own articles. To the author， this is to offer more freedom to the students， give them responsibility for the learning and promotes learner autonomy. However， students?蒺 language proficiency is still in a sense limited and the articles they choose may not be perfectly appropriate for the lesson purpose. This demands the teacher to offer ready assistance and provide some guiding principles and even some example articles so that students can choose most appropriate articles to their own interests.

Another anticipated problem is that students may have some difficulty in identifying the main idea and this requires the teacher to provide enough scaffolding. The teacher needs to select “techniques that will facilitate learning in the most efficient way” (Walker， 2005， p.4) and teach the most relevant strategies.

Conclusion

This lesson is designed with a focus on “identifying main ideas” and K?鄄W?鄄L as the guiding method keeping Chinese college students?蒺 needs in mind. It is learner?鄄centered and content?鄄based. It aims to promote students?蒺 cooperative learning， student?鄄student interaction and their learner?鄄autonomy.

Works Cited:

Cox， C. (2005). Teaching language arts: A student—and response?鄄centered classroom.

Boston， M.A.: Pearson.

Farrell， T. S. C. (2002) Planning Lessons for a Reading Class. Singapore: SEAMEO

Regional Language Centre.

Holec， Henri. (1981). Autonomy and foreign language learning. Oxford: Pergamon Press.

Schwienhorst， K. (2003). Learner autonomy and tandem learning: putting principles into practice in synchronous and asynchronous telecommunications environments.

Computer Assisted Language Learning， 16 (5)， 427-443.

Stoller， F. L. (2002). Project work: A means to promote language and content. In Richards， J. C.， Renandya， W. A. Methodology in language teaching: An anthology of current practice. Cambridge: Cambridge U P.

Walker， B. J. (2005). Techniques for reading assessment and instruction. Upper Saddle

River， N.J.: Merill/Prentice Hall.