A case study of TBLT language lesson

鐘師一

Participants， Topic， Materials and Objectives

The four participants are four Chinese MA students from Newcastle University， whose language proficiency varies from B1-C1 based on CEFR. Considering their age， proficiency and can-do statement， a highly meaning focused topic as house renting in Newcastle is chosen. This topic links their real-world relationship， which means they have some schemata of this topic. The materials are authentic. Clips are from the property officer of the UK； written texts are extracted from the University websites； and the four accommodations are selected from house rental websites in Newcastle. The language skill is focused on speaking， unfocused open speaking and decision making. The communicative goals are expressing agreement and disagreement in different ways as well as give reasons. The linguistic goal is to use third person singular correctly.

Task Implementation

1. Pre-task

In this stage， the teacher role is to prime learners to focus on the topic， give precise instructions with a clear completion point， and introduce the vocabulary associated with the topic.

Firstly， the teacher showed three pictures induce students to guess what the task would involve. It helped the lesson procedure went on. After that the non-task preparation activity， brain-storming， activated learners schemata and successfully encouraged them to engage in participation. These two activities helped learners know what they were going to talk about and assist to formulate the language needed to express their ideas later

The video materials that involved the ‘tips before renting helped learners recalled and gained extra knowledge based on question and answer activity and information gap activities. Meanwhile， useful vocabularies are highlighted to draw learners attention. The tasks end up with a complete form filling of the house renting information. In this activity， learners were provided help on vocabulary comprehension and the teacher as a knowledge knower and facilitator to help them understand the instructions and implemented as planned. The last activity is the reasoning activities， in which learners are required to make an order from the most important and the least according to their own opinion. Through the two input activates， the last activity is a production phase.

2. Main Task

In this stage， students are required to come up with the best accommodation they want to live according to the previous ‘make order activity in the pre-task. This input retrieval process helps students to focus on language and go beyond the information provided. Finally， opinion gap activity that involved personal preference， feeling and attitude， could give response to the accommodation selection. It could be seen as a production process. It provided every student with plenty of opportunities to use language， to expose the third person singular when they describe the accommodations， and to show agreement and disagreement as well. For example， student A said ‘I dont think house A is the best choice， because it takes 20 minutes to the university. Finally， a short presentation was given with a clear decision as a communicative outcome.

3. Post-task

In this stage， learners are required to perform consciousness-raising and practice activities directed at the third person singular. The objective is to review the language form and help them to use it correctly.

Firstly， the teacher chose some sentences selected in the main-tasks with the wrong form to exam whether students could identify the mistakes. This could help learners not to be isolated for the form-focused activity. In this activity， the teacher found some way to facilitate learners to identify the language form by individuals or by group discussion. Teachers asked learners to read the sentence and then ask them if they can find the mistakes. Therefore， the noticing function could be achieved. Then， teacher made up relevant questions about the third person singular to help students to enhance their explicit knowledge. After that， plenty activities with the third person singular are provided them to do. The last activity is a production activity. Learners are required to introduce their current accommodation with the third person singular to their partners and then give some comments. This is the production part that provides learners with chances to use the third person singular.

Through these activities， all of them improve the accuracy and fluency of the target form as predicted. It restructured， automatized and consciously attended to language forms that were used in the previous phase.