Effective Lesson Planning in English Language Education

Posted on Jan 13, 2025 in Other civil servant exams

Programming in the English Language Area: Lesson Plans

Introduction

This essay will first reflect on the importance of planning our teaching based on the knowledge of our group of students. Then, we will study the main elements of didactic units. Secondly, the criteria for sequencing objectives, key competences, and contents will be explained and based upon the most relevant language learning theories. Next, some methodological considerations will be provided regarding learning and teaching activities and the instruments for evaluation of the teaching-learning process. Finally, I will compile the main conclusions and the bibliography used to develop this topic.

Legal Framework

As far as foreign language learning is concerned, the legal framework is the Organic Law 2/2006 of Education, 3rd May, modified by the Organic Law for the Improvement in Educational Quality, 8/2013, 9th December. One of the most relevant aspects of the Organic Law for the Improvement in Educational Quality is related to the Order ECD/65/2015, 21st of January, which establishes the relation among the key competences, contents, and evaluation criteria in Primary Education. On the other hand, the Royal Decree 126/2014, 28th of February, establishes the Minimum Teaching Requirement for Primary Education and it states in article 7 “to acquire basic communicative competence, in at least, one foreign language to enable expression and comprehension of simple messages and survive in everyday situations”. In addition, the Order EDU/519/2014, 17th of June, modified by the Order EDU 278/2016, 8th of April, which establishes the minimum contents for Primary Education in the Autonomous Community of Castilla y León.

The Foreign Language Area

Bearing in mind all these legal references, I will start mentioning the foreign language area. Learners are considered to be the center of the teaching-learning process, so they have an active role in the process of learning. Moreover, language is an instrument of communication. Following the input hypothesis of the Natural Approach, there are two ways of developing competence in a second language: the natural and unconscious language development, and the conscious rules about the language. The input hypothesis states that acquisition takes place as a result of learners having understood input. In addition, the affective filter hypothesis is also essential. Learning a second language is an active mental process where children must be trained in developing reflection and social integration activities.

Planning Didactic Units

But how to plan didactic units? They are units of planning and teaching action designed around a set of activities that are developed around a period of time, for the achievement of a set of specific objectives and key competences. Didactic units provide an answer to all the curricular questions: what, when, and how to teach, and what, when, and how to evaluate, all for a specific period of time. Before we can begin to consider planning our units, we need to know about how the school has adapted the curriculum to the context in which we are to teach, about the socio-cultural and familiar environment of our students, and about the motivation and the needs of our students.

Elements of Didactic Units

The elements we should include in the units will be: the justification of the unit, the topic, cycle, level and learners’ age, previous knowledge, didactic objectives, contents, anticipated difficulties, methodological orientations, activities, learning standards, time and space organization, materials, connection with other areas, key competences, and evaluation.

Criteria for Sequencing Contents and Objectives

Once I have explained the foreign language area and the didactic units, I will carry on with the criteria for sequencing contents and objectives.

Objectives

Objectives are the results to be achieved by the end of the unit. They must be formulated in terms of capacities. They must be flexible, so they can adapt to individual aspects of learning.

Contents must aim at developing the intended objectives. The contents established by the Organic Law for the Improvement in Educational Quality are divided into four blocks:

Listening, speaking, and talking
Reading and writing
Knowledge of the language
Socio-cultural aspects and intercultural awareness

Sequencing Criteria

The learning must range from general and simple contents to detailed and complex ones. The learners’ psychological development must be taken into account, so that the progress should be cyclical, not linear.

Selecting the Methodology

It is utterly essential to select the methodology. Learners must be exposed to comprehensible and meaningful input. The activities should be familiar, related to the topics close to the learners’ experience, and adapted to their age and interests. Skills must be taught from an integrative point of view, although we should give priority to oral receptive skills at first. Teachers should respect a learner’s natural silent period. Moreover, groupings should be flexible to assure a full and varied interaction. Besides, learners must develop communication strategies, whereas teachers should be encouraging participants of the communicative act and organizers of the communicative activities and material.

On the other hand, learning in pairs, groups, or with the whole class will encourage social relations. The English teacher should organize the teaching program with her schoolmates for globalization purposes.

Learning Activities

Now, let’s have a look at how to organize learning activities, bearing in mind we are following the Communicative Approach. The author Brewster identifies that activities should be divided into presentation, practice, and production stages, as well as aiming at a balanced integration of receptive and productive linguistic skills. However, we should bear in mind that at initial levels of Primary Education, oral skills must be emphasized, gradually increasing the relevance of written skills upon the student’s reading and writing development in their own mother tongue.

Evaluation

Related to the evaluation, with evaluation criteria we will assess the development of the intended objectives. Evaluation is used to check the efficiency of the program design. The evaluation should be done at the learning process which should be global, formative, and continuous; and at every stage initial checking the previous knowledge, continuous throughout the learning process, and final evaluation at the end of the didactic units. Any activity can become an evaluation activity, but it should be reliable, valid, practical, and easily performed. The teacher can use a great variety of evaluation techniques such as direct observation, direct questions, task analysis, final exams, self-assessment through a diary, audio, or video recordings. We have to make reference at this point to errors. Errors have to be understood as an essential element in the learning process. So it is important to correct those that cause misunderstanding so that the students can see in a practical way how appropriacy and accuracy are part of the message. Finally, I want to highlight that the evaluation of a learning process not only evaluates the pupil’s performance, but also the teaching practice and the curriculum itself.

Assessable Learning Standards

As far as the assessable learning standards are concerned, they are specifications of evaluation criteria that allow to define learning outcomes and to establish what students should know, understand, and know how in each subject; they must be observable, measurable, and evaluable and allow graduate performance or achieve. Your design should contribute and facilitate the design of standardized and comparable evidence.

Key Competences

Key competences are skills to apply the contents of each teaching and educational stage, in order to achieve the appropriate activities and the effective resolution of complex problems in an integrated way. They are:

Competence in linguistic communication
Mathematical and basic competence in science and technology
Digital and ICT competence
Learning to learn competence
Social and civic competences
Sense of initiative and entrepreneurial spirit competence
Cultural consciousness and expression

Communicative Approach

All these aspects of a didactic program are designed to encourage the Communicative Approach current in our Education System. The main goal is for our pupils to acquire what Hymes defined as communicative competence. He distinguished four aspects: the systematic potential, appropriacy, occurrence, and feasibility. One of the most helpful discussions of competence is to be found in Canale and Swain’s article. According to Canale, communicative competence refers to the underlying systems of knowledge and skill required for communication. The five components of communicative competence can be summarized as following: grammar competence, discourse competence, sociolinguistic competence, strategic competence, and socio-cultural competence.

Conclusion

As a conclusion, I would like to say that it is essential to design the didactic units of work according to our current educational system, following the guidelines set out in the Official Curriculum for Castilla y León. It is utterly important for the teachers to know every curricular element in depth to decide on the planning of the units. The ultimate goal of the planning teaching practice is for the learner to develop communicative competence, our main aim in the curriculum.

Bibliography

COUNCIL OF EUROPE. (2003). Common European Framework of Reference for Languages. United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press.
EMMER, E.T. & GERWELS, M.C. (2002). Cooperative Learning in elementary classrooms: Teaching practices and lesson characteristics. The Elementary School Journal.
GARDNER, H. (2001): Reformulated Intelligence. Multiple Intelligences in XXI Century. Buenos Aires: Paidós.
HARMER, J. The Practice of English Language Teaching. London: Longman, 2008 (4th ed.)
NUNAN, D. (2010): Language Teaching Methodology. University Press.