Students’ Needs

Good morning everyone! How is

Christmas going?

   In this entry we are going to talk about student's needs in the classroom, this is the type of linguistic exchanges that students need to use.

  For this activity, I've selected the first year of Bachillerato, where we can find our subject: Universal Literature.

  While the lesson is going on, our students will need a certain level of English to understand it. The materials they will be working with, would be in English, such as their textbook, articles, the literary works and the digital content and tools that can be used (PowerPoint presentations, online dictionaries, moodle, and so on).

Moreover, in order to understand some of the literary works, we can use films to illustrate them. So, since they are discussing with each other, watching films, listening to the teacher, reading different books and writing their own papers, they are developing the four areas that a language has. 

  According to the official curriculum (that can be found in http://www.ceice.gva.es/es/web/ordenacion-academica ), the content they will be studying is this:

• Use of online searching tools such as social networks, blogs, wikis, forums, specialised web pages and online dictionaries and encyclopaedias.
• Use of common ICTs tools to collaborate and communicate with their peers with the aim of planning their work themselves and providing with constructive ideas.
• Learning habits of filtering information and sharing with their group.
• Reading, analysing and interpret a literary work developing critical thinking.
• Critical observation and consideration of the existent relations between universal literature from every period and our official languages’ literature.

  For this content, we can find these evaluation criteria points:

• Search and select information in documents, images, audios or videos related to the subject.
• Collaborate and communicate to construct a project or common task filtering and sharing information and digital content using ICTs tools.
• Create and edit digital content as text documents, media presentations and audio-visual productions with and aesthetical sense.
• Effectively management of tasks and project, elaborate creative propositions and developing confidence in their work.
• Organising a working group distributing responsibilities and assuring every group integrant participates and achieves the goals.
• Writing developing of a History of Literature subject.
• Read and understand the sense of the literary works o significative fragments from each different period.

In order to be able to follow the lesson, our students will need a B1 or B2 level of English. According to the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR), these are the skills that a B1 and B2 level speaker should have:

B1

• Can understand the main points of clear standard input on familiar matters regularly encountered in work, school, leisure, etc. 
• Can deal with most situations likely to arise whilst travelling in an area where the language is spoken.  
• Can produce simple connected text on topics which are familiar or of personal interest. 
• Can describe experiences and events, dreams, hopes & ambitions and briefly give reasons and explanations for opinions and plan.

B2

• Can understand the main ideas of complex text on both concrete and abstract topics, including technical discussions in his/her field of specialisation. 
• Can interact with a degree of fluency and spontaneity that makes regular interaction with native speakers quite possible without strain for either party. 
• Can produce clear, detailed text on a wide range of subjects and explain a viewpoint on a topical issue giving the advantages and disadvantages of various options.

This would make our students an Indepent English User.