First European Survey on Language Competences

I have been following the project to assess the level of European students' language competence since I first heard about the initiative when preparing to give a general picture of European language learning and teaching at the 21st APPI conference back in 2007 in Lisbon.

ANNE ROBINSON - Where are we heading? This talk will examine the main trends in English Language teaching in Europe. Areas such as starting age, contact hours, content-based learn- ing, teacher training and qualifications will be covered. 

Talk – All Teacher Development – Young Learners Room: Paris (150 seats)

I knew from the Surveylang website that the first survey had been carried out an that the results and findings were due to be published in 2012.

I remember checking the Surveylang website back in May to see whether the findings would be published soon.  They seemed imminent, but were not on the site yet.

The survey tested the two most widely taught European languages (from English, French, German, Italian and Spanish) in each country from a representative sample of pupils in their final year of lower secondary education.

The survey assessed students’ proficiency in listening, reading and writing. A sample of approximately 1,500 students per language tested, per country was used.

So while reading through an email with updates from Its magazine, I was rather surprised to find that when I followed the link below to the news article, that it was reporting the results of the Surveylang survey.  

Teenagers in England, France and Spain are among the least competent at languages. From BBC News. http://bbc.in/Lm4gne

Why was I surprised?  Because I hadn't heard a thing about the publication of the findings, yet I try and keep up to date with articles in the press on language teaching and learning, I receive emails from various organisations, I do a lot of work for the University of Cambridge ESOL (who were VERY much involved in the survey) and friends and colleagues very often pass on news like this.

Yet I hadn't heard a thing about the results being published!   Highly surprising!!!

I thought that this news (and the findings from the survey) would be very relevant and of interest to a lot of you out there, so I decided to write this post!

Here are the links to the final report  (241 pages long!)  It contains lots of information about the survey and the results.  I was impressed by the tasks participants were asked to complete in order to assess their reading, writing and listening skills.  (Speaking was not assessed in this survey)

and also to the Executive Summary (15 pages).

You can also read all about the Survey and the findings on the University of Cambridge ESOL's website here.

Ready, steady, go!

It's July 27th, and the 2012 Olympic Games are almost at their starting blocks!

I for one will be glued to the television this evening to watch the opening ceremony.  I've heard lots of snippets of information about what it is going to be like, but lots of things have been kept secret.

Almost unbelievably in this era of Twitter and Facebook, the tens of thousands of people who watched rehearsals for the opening ceremony this week have largely kept the details secret, although some aspects of the show have been announced already – including the choice of Sir Paul McCartney to bring the curtain down – and photos have shown the stadium transformed into a giant mock-up of the English countryside, complete with live farm animals, cricket players and actors in Victorian dress, with the curve of the Thames sweeping through the arena. Daniel Craig's James Bond is also said to feature.

One of the only things that seems certain, is that at some point, we will see a representation of a typical British rural landscape.

Yesterday, the BBC released a 30 second clip from a dress rehearsal for the ceremony, but unfortunately, because I'm in Spain, the BBC website won't let me watch it!

One of the things that also remains a mystery is who will light the flame in the Olympic Stadium tonight - lots of suggestions have been made.
 (See the previous entry today for an article about this.)
  Apparently, it will not be David Beckham, and I know it won't be me!!!


Of course, the build-up to the Olympic Games has been taking place for months.

You can watch a video showing some of the things that people have been doing around Britain to celebrate the games here.


And if you'd like to have something to remember these games, there are lots of things on offer, for example:

And today, at 8.12 a.m. UK Time, people around the country were asked to ring any bell for three minutes.

You can read about this initiative here.

Don't forget that there is a great part of the London 2012 website dedicated to the different sports.  I wrote about this back in April.

Let's hope the games are fun, successful and exciting!  Good luck to everyone involved in London 2012!!!

Who will light the Olympic flame? | Radio Times

Who will light the Olympic flame? | Radio Times

Fun video for practising questions

A friend sent me a link to a video showing Charlotte in the bath a few weeks ago:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=7cSudpyEU9w

While I was watching it, my teacher's brain started ticking over and I thought it would be great (and fun!) to use it in class to practise questions at low levels.

It's short (it lasts 31 seconds!)  So, students could watch it without any viewing or listening task and just enjoy!

Next, they could be asked to count the number of questions Charlotte is asked.  (10)

Then, they could listen and say how many times the question 'Do you love .....?' is asked (6) and which other questions are asked (Do you want a million dollars?  Do you want to go night night?  Did you have a good Christmas?  Is there anything you like?)

You could discuss with students which question that Charlotte answers no to and they find most surprising.

Then, you could ask them to write questions that people would normally answer 'yes' to and then they roleplay  - one student is Charlotte and has to say 'no' convincingly to all the questions!

As usual, I received an email this week with the TeachingEnglish newsletter.

As I read through the summaries of the featured content from the TeachingEnglish website, two things immediately caught my eye.

http://www.walls-hd.com/

The first is a video tip explaining how to draw animals on the board.

http://fairydustteaching.blogspot.com.es/

Paul Millard explains (without speaking!) how despite failing his school art exam at 16,

Paul shows us how to draw animals and how changing the size and/or shape of the body especially, we can use similar forms to draw different animals.

Now I don't know about you, but I am reluctant to draw on the board except for some animals like sheep, fish and pigs.  I have these three animals well-rehearsed.  Like Paul, I use a cloud to draw a sheep.  I'm sure if I watch Paul's video a few more times, pausing it to copy his shapes and techniques, I could expand my repertoire!

Looking around the web after watching Paul's video, I came across a couple of useful resources to share with you:

At http://www.meddybemps.com/letterary/letterzoo.html, you can see how to use letters to build 4 animals.  The letters needed to put together a cat, snail, bird and caterpillar are provided.  Students could then produce their own 'letter animals'.

And on the Harptoons site, you can learn to draw lots of animals using letters and numbers.

Let's see if this summer I can find the time to doodle and practise drawing and develop my board drawing skills!

Back to basics grammar

http://www1.ccs.k12.in.us/teachers/esalona1/grammar

There has been a lot of talk in the news about the UK Government's proposal to test 11 year old's grasp of grammar, spelling and vocabulary.
You can read about this in this article in the Telegraph newspaper.

Over the years, I have spoken to many teachers about the fact that when we started teaching English, we knew very little about our own language.  What I knew about English, I had transferred from my learning of French and German.
Over the years, I gleaned many insights from coursebooks and often found myself telling Advanced and Proficiency students that I'd get back to them in the following class with an answer to an awkward grammar question.

http://library.nd.edu.au/home

So what would the test for 11 year olds ask?  The Telegraph gives these example questions (notice the mistake in question 3 of Level 3-5):

LEVEL 3-5

1 Circle all the adverbs in the sentence below:

Open the drawers carefully and quietly when using the filing cabinet. (1 mark)

2 Tick one word to complete the sentence below.

Michael and Kate read their books ______________ they ate their sandwiches.

 while

 which

 between

 during

(1 mark )

3 Draw lines to match each sentence with the most likely final punctuation.

Look out ?

How are you doing !

January is the first month of year .

(1 mark)

4 Circle the word that describes how William played on the field.

William played badly on the field.

(1 mark)

5 Look at this sentence

The shopping list said he should buy bread, butter, jam and tea.

a) What is the name of the punctuation mark that is used after the words ‘bread’ and ‘butter’?

________________________

b) Why is this punctuation mark needed in the sentence above? Tick one.

 to mark the start of a new clause

 to show that a word is missing

 to separate the items in a list

 to take the place of brackets

(1 mark )

6 The sentences below each have an error. The errors are underlined. Write the correction in the dotted space allocated, making sure the verb matches the tense. One has been done for you.

had

Yesterday, I have the chance to play for my local team.

......

Our local café makes great cakes. We like to sit and ate them on a Saturday.

..................

The children are going to a shopping centre tomorrow and they had bought some new toys.

.................

I am putting on my shoes and I will have been for a walk in the park right now!

(1 mark)

7 Write a short question beginning with the words below.

How many____________________________________

(1 mark)

8 Underline the subordinate clause in each of the following sentences. One has been done for you.

Although his Mum thought they were very smart, Peter disliked his new trousers.

Before he could go swimming, Ali packed his towel.

The twins asked Dad to turn up the heating as it was cold.

After drinking his water, Mark washed up his glass.

(2 marks)

9 Put the baker’s words into direct speech.

The baker said that he hoped to sell all of the loaves by lunchtime.

_______________________________________________________________________________________________

(2 marks)

10 Complete the sentences below using either I or me.

____ pulled out the keys from my pocket.

She asked ____ to help her put up the pictures.

My team and ____ are playing next week.

Why isn’t anyone able to understand what ____ am trying to do?

I had to help with the washing up before Dad would turn on the television for ____.

(1 mark)

11 Which sentence uses inverted commas correctly? Tick one.

 “Fortunately, Peter, you’re going after all, said Mrs. Smith.” It’s a good job, too!

 ”Fortunately, Peter, you’re going after all, “said Mrs Smith”. It’s a good job, too!

 “Fortunately, Peter, you’re going after all,” said Mrs Smith. It’s a good job, too!

 “Fortunately, Peter, you’re going after all,” said Mrs Smith. “It’s a good job, too!”

(1 mark)

12 Write whether each sentence is a statement, a command or a question.

Wait at the door.

________________________

What time are we going.

________________________

Think about it a bit more.

________________________

(1 mark)

13 Complete the sentence below with a contraction that makes sense.

If you give me the recipe _________ buy the ingredients on the way home.

(1 mark)

14 Add a suffix to this word to make an adjective. dread ____________

(1 mark)

LEVEL 6

1 Rewrite the sentences, changing them from the active to the passive voice. One has been done for you.

Active voice: Sam ate a biscuit.

Passive voice: A biscuit was eaten by Sam.

Active voice: Victoria drank her tea.

Passive voice ____________________________________________

Active voice: The team won the trophy.

Passive voice ____________________________________________

Active voice: Rishi poured the milk.

Passive voice ____________________________________________

(1 mark)

2 This sentence is made up of two clauses, a main clause (MC) and a subordinate clause (SC).

Paul’s Auntie May, who loves to bake cakes, always has flour in the cupboard.

Add a subordinate clause to the sentence below.

We walked, __________________________________________, to the local park.

(1 mark)

3 Rewrite the sentence below, changing it from a personal form to an impersonal form.

It takes me a lot of time to decide what shoes to wear.

_____________________________________________________________________________

(1 mark)

4 Insert a comma and a semi-colon in the sentence below to clarify the meaning of the sentence:

David eats cake whenever he has the chance I prefer apples oranges and bananas.

(2 marks)

5 Label each of the nouns below as either abstract AB, collective CL, common CM or proper PR noun.

Last Sunday, the team was filled with excitement that they might win the trophy!!

(1 mark)

You can see the answers here.

What makes us happier?

Back in the UK last weekend, I was reading through the Telegraph newspaper, and came across an article with the headline:
Learning is the answer for a happier life


The article attracted my attention for two reasons:
1  Working in education, I am always attracted to articles related to learning and teaching.
2  I was surprised to find where the source of this information originated:

A study by the Office for National Statistics found that the higher people’s level of general education the more satisfied they were with their daily life and the more worthwhile they felt.

The Office for National Statistics is often referred to in newspaper articles, but if you take a look at the areas of investigation it covers, you would find very different subjects reported, for example:

Output in the Construction Industry - May 2012

     Pupil Absence in Schools in England

Anyway, back to the article, which reports :
The ONS asked a group of more than 15,000 people to rate how satisfied they felt overall on a scale of nought to 10 as well as asking them how worthwhile they felt their lives were.
...  adults aged 16 and over with higher levels of qualifications are more likely to report having medium or high satisfaction with their lives overall and also to report finding the things they do in their lives to be more worthwhile,” the ONS said.


The UK is not the only country to be assessing people's happiness.  Look at this map for the USA:

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2011/03/06/weekinreview/20110306-happiness.html

I found this map very surprising - for me, living by the sea is an essential part of my happiness.  Yet people on the coast in the USA do not seem to feel the same!


And where do you fit in the following profile?

I personally would rate happiness not on a scale of 1-10 or 1-100, but by asking people to choose from a range of adjectives and expressions:

bright, cheerful, elated, ecstatic, content, floating on air, as high as a kite.....

How are you feeling today?  I hope your answer is one of the above words or expressions!!!

Correcting Writing on the Cambridge ESOL Support Forum

In my last post, I brought up the issue of what colour pen teachers choose to use for correcting written work.

I've been away for a few days, but wanted to come back to the subject of correction.

When catching up on emails, I was reading through the Cambridge ESOL Teacher Support Ezine and after following a link, I ended up reading the contributions to the debate about how best to correct writing.

Forum Index » Solving your Problems
Subject:  Correcting Writing

Messages: 134 
Offline 

Dear Colleague, I find teaching the essay, composition quite difficult, students do not seem to want to check their own compositions eagerly, they feel shy or uneasy, embarrassed with comments, do not want to evaluate their work. 

Do you have any hints or tips that can help encourage students to identify their writing errors? 

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 02/12/2011 11:52:46

Looking through the replies to this request for suggestions for encouraging students to identify their writing errors, I felt that some very useful advice was given (see here)
For example: using a correction code; giving students model answers to help them see what is needed and how to organise the content; correcting essays with the student present and discussing the mistakes; highlighting typical mistakes that students make so that they are aware of them.  


And last but not least, the fact that good language should be highlighted and not just errors!


As you are probably aware, Cambridge ESOL has recently updated all its Handbooks for the exams.

In the handbooks for Cambridge English: Key, Preliminary, First, Advanced and Proficiency, you can find the Assessment Scales used by Writing Examiners when assessing the answers to the different Writing tasks.  


The same areas are assessed in all five exams:


Four subscales are used:  Content, Communicative Achievement, Organisation and Language.

Content focuses on how well the candidate has fulfilled the task, in other words if they have done what they were asked to do.

Communicative Achievement focuses on how appropriate the writing is for the task and whether the candidate has used the appropriate register.

Organisation focuses on the way the candidate puts together the piece of writing, in other words if it is logical and ordered.

Language focuses on vocabulary and grammar. This includes the range of language as well as how accurate it is.

Responses are marked on each subscale from 0 to 5.

In the Handbooks, model answers are given marks for each of these subscales. (I personally find that the fact the there is no longer one overall mark at the end of each sample makes the assessment very clear).
 Maybe one answer will contain very few mistakes and a wide range of language, but has omitted one of the content points.  Another sample answer may communicate the message but be full of spelling mistakes.

I find that making students aware of what the criteria for marking is helps tremendously.  Showing students that the skill of writing is much more than correct spelling, punctuation and grammar usually makes them think more about the message and content.  Demonstrating to them that if they use paragraphs and linkers and think about style and register, the message is clearer is an important step towards better writing skills.

Do you still use a red pen?

I was following a link from one of my subscription emails to a Forum Debate on tes.co.uk.

The question being discussed is:

Do you still use a red pen?

Here are a few of the comments posted in reply to this question from tes.co.uu:

We have to mark in green because, apparantly, the children get upset if their work has red marking on it! Now green is the new red!  Having marked in all the other colours of the rainbow over the years, we now HAVE to mark in red... I mark in black or blue for positive comments and in red to highlight the mistakes the students makes and my feedback, otherwise they would not take notice of what  they have done wrong and why. I mark in both green and red. The more the green the better the work, the more the red, the more mistakes they have made. I think its right to highlight the negative elements so that they know what to fix for next time. The worst thing I think is when kids don't review their homework and this is likely if the marking is monotone and uninteresting ... http://www.eltvista.com/2011/07/using-correction-codes-saving-your-students-from-going-down-with-their-slips-in-a-sea-of-red-ink/ What about you?  Do you use a particular pen for marking students' written work?  Do you think it makes a difference? We will come back to the subject of correcting written work in another post! http://www.getfreeimage.com/image/15/check-and-cross-marks-icon