MODULE 3.
PART 1: MANAGING THE TEACHING AND LEARNING PROCESS
UNIT 29
CATEGORISING LEARNERS’ MISTAKES
FOLLOW-UP ACTIVITY
I. Look at the table in the Key concepts section of the ways in which we
categorise learners’ mistakes. Think of at least two more examples for
each category of typical mistakes your leaners make.
Categories Written
Inaccuracy:
pronunciation
 He were not at her
Inaccuracy: grammatical house.
“He was not at his house”
 “Denis works as a
Inappropriate style / teacher.”
register “Denis work like a teacher”
Inaccuracy: lexical  “The city is big”.
“The city is large”
 “I'll arrive on Monday and
leave on Fraiday”
Inaccuracy: spelling “I’ll arrive on Monday and leave
on Friday”
 I went to the store but
they were closed
Inaccuracy: punctuation I went to the store, but they
were closed.
Orally
 “I have tree / ˈtriː/ dogs”
instead of
“I have three /ˈθriː/
dogs.
 My native language is
Espanish / ˈespænɪʃ/
instead of “My native
language is Spanish /
ˈspænɪʃ/.
 “French is more easier
than English”.
“French is easier than
English”
 “Hey, teacher, how are
you?”
 “Hello, teacher, how
are you?”
 “I didn’t do nothing”
 “I didn’t do anything”.
 “Look at her knew car”
“Look at her new car”
 I like red yellow and
blue
“I like red, yellow and blue.”
REFLECTION

II. Think about these comments from teachers. Which do you agree with and
why?

1. I find it hard to categorise my learner’s mistakes. I know something is wrong,

but I can’t explain to the learners what it is.

Whether teacher do not how to categorise, they have to focus on what part of the
language the students are having problems. They might have difficulties in
grammar, pronunciation, inappropriate style, lexical, incorrect spelling, or
punctuation. If teachers have knowledge about these categorise, it will be easier
to him to evaluate their students.

2. It’s very confusing for learners when we talk about inappropriate this or
incorrect that. When something’s wrong, it’s wrong!

I think that it is important that student know in which part of the language they
have problems. I mean, if they do not why something is wrong or not, they will
never correct their mistakes and it will cause problems in their language
accuracy.

3. I can identify when there’s a problem with word order, but I don’t always know
why it’s wrong.

As a teacher, we need to have a previous knowledge about what we are teaching

because it might be some things that we do not remember and have to check
again in order to be sure about what is going to be learn. For that, maybe we
need to take a course in grammar or syntax to improve our knowledge in those
part of the language.
TKT PRACTICE TASK 29

For question 1-7, match the learners’ mistakes with the areas of grammar listed A-
D.
Areas of grammar

A. adverbs
B. articles
C. verb forms
D. prepositions

LEARNERS’ MISTAKES
1. My sister wants to be dentist when she grows up.
b. article
2. If I see him, I would have told him.
c. verb form
3. He is very keen of becoming a musician.
d. preposition
4. My sister and her husband always arrived lately.
a. adverb
5. I’m looking for accommodation to live on next year.
d. preposition
6. One of the students were late for class today.
c. verb form
7. I really want to visit the Oxford University next week.
b. article
 MODULE 3. PART 2: CLASSROOM MANAGEMENT
UNIT 30
TEACHER ROLES

FOLLOW-UP ACTIVITY
I. Here is an example of a classroom situation. Read ad decide which role
(A, B, C) you think is the most appropriate for the teacher to adopt. Think
about what the teacher might say.

1. The teacher has just introduced the first conditional to a group of teenage,
pre-intermediate students through a reading text and wants to find out if they
understand what the structure means.

b. Assessor.

2. The teacher has planned to start the lesson by going over homework set in
the previous lesson. However, only half the class have done it.

c. The teacher collects the homework from the students who have done
it and tells the other students to bring their completed homework to the
next class.

3. The teacher has finished what she planned to do in the lesson but there are
still five minutes of the class left.

b. The teacher tells students to close their books and to try and
remember six of the new words from the lesson.

4. Half students always arrive late for the lesson because they have gym
immediately beforehand.

c. The teacher prepares a game on the topic of the lesson for the
students who come on time.
 5. The students are passive and always wait for the teacher to tell them the
answers and to give examples. He wants them to participate more actively in
the lessons.

a. The teacher lets students check answers and ideas in pairs before
eliciting answers from the class.

REFLECTION

II. Think about these comments from teachers. Which do you agree with and
why?

1. I like my class to be very organized and I like to be in control. I believe the

main roles of a teacher are to manage and assess.

I agree with the characteristics but there are some important things that we have
to consider when we teach students. One of them, is the teacher as facilitator
which means that we have to provide students opportunities for learning as well
as language resource.

2. I think of myself as a facilitator in my classroom because I want my learners

to become more independent.

I agree with this, because this is the correct way to encourage students to be
autonomy and also they can be able to access in some resources and
understand by themselves the information that is given.

3. I’m in my twenties. My students are the same age as me. I like the classes to
be informal, so I don’t think many of the teacher roles are appropriate for me.

I don’t agree. It does not matter if teacher have the same age of their students,
teacher must have to adapt the materials formally or informally because at the
end of the class, teachers need to correct the learners’ work.
TKT PRACTICE TASK 30

For question 1-7, look at the incomplete statements about teacher roles and the
three options for completing them listed A, B and C.

Choose the letter (A, B or C) which does NOT complete the statement correctly.

1. When acting as a monitor in pairwork, the teacher

c. partners learner.

2. When acting as a language expert, the teacher

a. maintains discipline.

3. When acting as facilitator, the teacher

a. finds out learners’ names.

4. When acting as a manager, the teacher

b. presents new language.

5. When acting as a diagnostician, the teacher

c. Introduces new lexis.

6. When acting as a rapport builder, the teacher

a. Uses a correction code.

7. When acting as a resource for learners, the teacher

b. Gives homework.
 UNIT 31
GROUPING LEARNERS

FOLLOW-UP ACTIVITY

I. Here is a lesson plan from a methodology book for primary learners. Study
the lesson plan and decide on appropriate learner grouping for each stage.
What aspects will you have to consider when grouping the learners?

Stage 1; Team game: Learners characteristics in the teams.

Stage 2; Whole class: The whole class can work, and shyer learners are not
forced to back.

Stage 3; Group work: To make sure about learners’ dominances in the topic.

Stage 4; whole class: Not chatting in L1.

Stage 5; Individual work: Focus on listening.

Stage 6; Pairwork: Provide learners key language to use in a real context.

Stage 7; whole- class: Naming students to make them feel part of the class.

Stage 8; Class discussion: Give students some useful language for giving
opinion in an informal conversation.

REFLECTION

II. Think about these comments from teachers. Which do you agree with and
why?

1. My classes are only 45 minutes long, and it takes time to arrange students
into different groupings for different activities. I think it’s a waste of time.

Not always students have to work in groups, it depends on the context or activity.
In this case, teacher have to change students that are always in the same group
 as well as the use of the differences interaction patterns such as role plays,
mingle, pairs and so on.

2. When my students work in pairs and groups, the classroom becomes a noisy
place. Other teachers comment on it in the staffroom. It makes me feel as if
I’m not doing a good job.

Teacher have to plan the lesson and take into account what is causing problems
with the behave of students. Most of the time learners work well together in
different groupings.

3. I teach groups of business people and they prefer working on their own. I’m
not sure if I should include other learner groupings or not.

Here, teacher have to include a variety of interaction patterns in a lesson to get

students interested and motivated to work with other partners which are not at
the same level of them. They need to know how to work in group.

TKT PRACTICE TASK 31

For question 1-7, match the teaching strategies with the problem with group or
pairwork listed A, B and C.

Problems with group work or pair work

A. Some students dominate.

B. Some students always finish first and get
bored.
C. Some students use to much L1.
Teaching strategies

1. Plan short extension activities and have them ready to hand out to students.

b. Some students always finish first and get bored.

2. Plan learner groupings carefully begore the lesson so that all learners can
take part.

a. Some students dominate.

3. Make sure students know the key expressions to use in the activities.

c. Some students use to much L1.

4. Demonstrate activities to provide students with models of language they

need.

c. Some students use to much L1.

5. Make sure that activities are differentiated so that some students are
challenged more.

d. Some students always finish first and get bored.

6. Be ready to change learner groupings if some students are stopping others

from taking part.

a. Some students dominate.

7. Make one student in each group responsible for monitoring language use.

c. Some students use to much L1.

 UNIT 32
CORRECTING LEARNERS

FOLLOW-UP ACTIVITY

I. Read through the following classroom situations and decide which might
be the most appropriate correction techniques to use.

1. The teacher is presenting a new structure to an elementary class and is

asking students to repeat the target sentence in small groups. She notices
that some of the students are not using appropriate rhythm un the utterance.

The teacher can use gesture in order to provide students the correct
pattern of the words.

2. A teacher is working with a class of young leaners. He has asked them to take
it in turns to talk briefly to the rest of the class about their favourite toy.
Learners have brought in realia to help them. The first leaner to speak makes
mistakes with adjectives order and comparatives.

Whether the ideas are not being understood by students, teacher can
correct pupils by echo correcting or reformulating the sentences. By the
other hand, if there’s not interference in the communication, then teacher
could give learners induvial feedback.

3. The teacher has collected an essay which her intermediate students wrote for
homework. She wants the students to become more aware of their own errors
and mistakes.

At this level, students already have knowledge about some characteristics

of language. So that, teacher could use a correction code to let learners
identify their mistakes by themselves.
 4. Students in an intermediate young learner class are preparing posters on the
unit topic for display. The teacher notices that there are several errors in the
posters.

In this case, teacher could go around and tell students to look for some
mistakes at the posters.

REFLECTION

1. I’d like to use different strategies and techniques for correcting my learners,
but I find that in the classroom I automatically use echo correction without
thinking.

I agree with this, teacher have to use different techniques to help students with
the aim of each lesson. But it is important to tell students the reason of the use
of each of them, in order to make students conscious about the characteristics of
the language.

2. My students are all teenagers, I encourage them to use peer and self-
correction, but they prefer it when I correct them.

In this part, it is important that students find and correct their mistakes by their
own. It is helpful for developing learner’s autonomy and for helping learners to
develop the ability to rewrite and edit their work. By the other hand, teacher can
help students to tell them what type of mistakes there are having.

3. I always correct all my students’ mistakes on their written work. I don’t think
it’s a good idea to leave errors in their texts.

Teacher do not always have to correct students’ mistakes in their writing.

Sometimes we as a teacher can ignore mistakes that learners make in their
written work because we need to focus on the language that is taught and not in
the whole text. Whether teacher correct everything students will get confused
and demotivated.
TKT PRACTICE TASK 32

For question 1-6, match the correction techniques with the teacher’s aims listed A-
G.

Teacher’s aims

A. to expose students to corrections without

them being conscious of it.
B. to focus on pronunciation.
C. to focus on fluency and give students
encouragement.
D. to develop understanding of language use by
using a visual representation.
E. to focus students on features of connected
speech.
F. to encourage self-correction.
G. to encourage peer correction.

Correction techniques

1. The teacher decided to ignore the mistakes which she heard students making
in their role-plays.

c. to focus on fluency and give students encouragement.

2. The teacher used finger correction, highlighting what the missing word in the
question was.

f. to encourage self-correction.

3. The teacher reformulated a young learners’ utterance.

a. to expose students to corrections without them being conscious of it.

4. The teacher put students into groups and asked them to read and comment
on each other’s written summaries.

g. to encourage peer correction.

5. The teacher pointed at a symbol on the phonemic chart.

b. to focus on pronunciation.

6. The teacher drew a time line on the board showing the difference between
the present simple and present continuous after several had used the wrong
tense.

d. to develop understanding of language use by using a visual

representation.
 UNIT 33
GIVING FEEDBACK

FOLLOW-UP ACTIVITY

I. Look at this section of a lesson plan. What is the purpose of each of the
underlined feedback sections? Feedback might be teacher to students,
students to teacher or student to student.

1. Students compare their answers in pairs.

The purpose of this activity is to let students compare their work with a
partner for peer-correction. This helps them for being more confident
answering to the class when teacher elicits them.

2. Check answers with the class.

Teacher can make sure that students have understood the listening
sufficiently well to complete the task.

3. Elicit from students the strategies they used to do the true/false activity.

This strategy encourages students to reflect and to become more

autonomous.

4. Monitor students as they do the activity. Remind them to look back in the book
and check with their friends.

Teacher can be able to provide students the correct feedback of their work,
as well as help them in their doubts.

5. End the lesson by eliciting feedback from students on what they did in the
lesson and what they think they learnt.
 The purpose of this feedback is for teacher to find out what students think
they have done and learnt in the lesson. Also, it promotes learners
autonomy and reflection amongst the students.

REFLECTION

1. My learners are only interested in the marks they get for their work. They are
not interested in my comments. They don’t even read them.

I think that teachers do not have to ignores students’ mistakes. Teachers have to
indicate mistakes using the correction code on their mistakes. It allows students
to analyze in which part of the work they had mistaken.

2. I want to encourage my slower learners, but I sometimes find it hard to give

them useful feedback on their work. They make so many mistakes!

As a teacher we do not have to correct all the mistakes that students make
because is teacher corrects all the them, it can be demotivated for students. The
only thing that teacher might do is correct mistake which are the focus of the
piece of work and mistakes which we do not expect students of this level to make.

3. I don’t think we should ask learners to give feedback to their teachers. The
teachers know what to do and how to do it. It’s not the learners’ job to tell
teacher what to do.

I do not agree with this, because students are part of the class and it is really
important that teacher knows whether learners like what they are doing, whether
they are interested in the materials or activities or whether they are having
problems with an specific topic or grammar.
TKT PRACTICE TASK 33

For question 1-7, look at the classroom situations in which the teacher gives
feedback and the three possible types of feedback listed A, B and C.

1. The teacher noticed all the learners were having problems with some target
vocabulary. She noted the problems down and did a revision exercise the
next day.

a. delayed feedback.

2. A young learner had just finished talking to the class about this hobby. The
teacher said: Thanks, Juan. You tried hard. Well done.

b. feedback on effort.

3. A teenage learner had written a story for homework. The teacher marked the
work and wrote this comment: This is so much better than las week’s
homework. Well done.

b. feedback on progress.

4. The teacher wrote on the first draft of a learners’ composition: Look at this
website for more ideas.

c. help with finding reference resources.

5. A teacher, talking to a group of primary children at the end of a group work

activity, said: You talked a lot today and worked well together.

b. feedback on behaviour.

6. A group of students gave oral presentation to the class. Afterwards, the

teacher said: You didn’t mention your reasons for choosing this topic. You
need to include that next time.

c. feedback on content.
7. A student wrote in his learner diary. You always ask the same students to
answer. It takes me longer to think in English, so I never have a chance to
answer.

a. Feedback to the teach on classroom procedure.