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  60 MINUTES TEACHING ENGLISH AS FOREGIN LANGUAGE (TEFL)

Lesson Planning and Testing

A major responsibility of any teacher involves mapping out the long-term goals for
the course and the school term, as well as the outlines and plans for each lesson.
The function of testing is then to check that goals and objectives have been met.
At one point in Alice In Wonderland, Alice meets the Cheshire Cat, sitting on the
bough of a tree in the fork of a road. Should she go left or right Alice wondered.
“Cheshire Puss,” she began, “Would you tell me please, which way I ought to walk
from here?” “That depends on a good deal on where you want to get to,” said the
Cat.
“I don’t care much where . . . ,” said Alice.
“Then it doesn’t matter which way you walk,” said the Cat.
“So long as I get somewhere,” Alice added, as an explanation.
“Oh, you’re sure to do that,” said the Cat, “if you only walk long enough.”
Unfortunately Alice’s approach is shared by some teachers, who think that if they
just begin a lesson and talk long enough they are bound to get somewhere.
However, working without long-term goals and short-term objectives leads to
lessons that lack focus and direction. Your students look to you for a sense of
purpose. Your goal setting will reassure them that you are aware of their needs
and will demonstrate a thoughtful management of the classroom.
Long-term goals
Long-term goals reflect what you intend your students to be able to do with their
English at the end of the course or the school term. Your goals should therefore
be relevant, motivating, and concrete. They need to be relevant and to reflect the
effort you have put into understanding both the individual needs of your students
and the national educational goals of the country in which you are serving. They
need to be motivating and to be perceived by your students as being reasonable
and leading to successful learning. They need to be concrete, that is to say
specific and measurable. “To understand past tenses in English” is not specific
enough. “Students will be able to talk about past events” is both specific and
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measurable. In writing goals and objectives you need to include three

components:
type of behaviour: the specific action expected of the student
condition: the circumstances under which the behaviour is to be demonstrated
criterion: the degree or level of which the behaviour must be demonstrated to
be acceptable
Here is an example beginning level objective for listening:
After listening to a simple passage on “Walking to School” (condition), students
will be able to draw a picture and colour 10 objects in the drawing (behavior), with
fewer than five mistakes (criterion). The task will be accomplished in 10 minutes
(criterion).
Here is an example of an intermediate level objective for speaking:
After selecting a topic (condition), students will be able to give a one-minute
presentation (behaviour and criterion), using correct pronunciation of the /th/
sound (criterion).
Here is an example of an upper-intermediate level objective for writing:
After reading a passage on “Pollution” and a phrase outline of the same passage
(condition), students will be able to change the outline into a sentence outline by
rewriting each phrase as a complete sentence (behaviour), with fewer than 10
mistakes in the construction of the sentences (criterion). The task will be
completed in 20 minutes (criterion).
You will find additional information on instructional objectives and lesson planning
in the Peace Corps Manual Teacher Training: A Reference Manual (ICE Manual No.
T-45).
The basic information which you need to write your goals may be found in the
following sources:
a copy of the syllabus for your classes for the year (if one exists)
copies of the textbooks available to your class
back copies of the national exams, if you are teaching a class which will be
taking these exams within the next two or three academic years
ideas for sources of supplementary materials
information on communicative approaches to the four language skills: listening,
speaking, reading and writing (see Chapters Three, Four, Five, and Six)
information you have gathered on the needs of your students
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Once you have written your goals, your long-term plans are in place and you can
move on to outlines and lesson plans.
Outlines
These outlines are your drafts and foundations for your lesson plans. For these
outlines you will need to select your:
topic (where necessary, as in a science class which has one hour of English a
week)
lesson objective, including reference to condition, behaviour and criterion
language skill focus: listening, speaking, reading, writing
vocabulary
grammar focus
materials: textbook and supplementary materials
activities
assignments
Figure shows the
outline of a lesson
plan. This outline is
based on an extract
from a syllabus used
by a Central
American country.
Volunteers teaching
English in schools in
that country are expected to follow this syllabus. The extract reads as follows:
Lesson VII -Talking about Family Relationship!.
By the end of the lesson the students must be able to:
Use the verb characteristics-present tense in English with the structures “have”
and “has”-affirmative and interrogative.
Understand and use “have” and “has” with different nouns and pronouns in
affirmative sentences.
Complete the set of possessive adjectives by adding “our” and “their” to nouns.
Use the possessive for persons: “Robert’s wife.”
Recall possessive adjectives and use them in comparison to possessive
pronouns: “my/mine,” “your/yours,” and so on.
Understand and use “whose,” answering with “mine,” “hers,” etc.
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There are no differences between the content of Figure 8.1 and the extract from
the syllabus, but the column on the left hand side of the figure adds an
organizational dimension which makes it easier to read and which will act as a
reminder for you to include all the elements in your outline.
Steps in a lesson plan
With your outline clearly established, you can develop your lesson plans by
following these steps:
review
presentation • practice
application • assignment
Review
Reviewing previous work allows you to check on understanding of the previous
lessons and gives students an opportunity to ask for clarification.
In a fifty-minute lesson you should allow approximately ten minutes for review.
Presentation
Setting a familiar context is an important part of presenting new material. This
step of your lesson should therefore be closely tied to your Review. Your objective
at this point is to move your students from the known to the unknown.
Practice
Practicing new material requires guidance and control from the teacher. Exercises
in this section of the lesson will need to be carefully prepared and include
exercises such as multiple choice, substitution drills, true or false, and filling in
blanks. You will need to monitor activities, checking that new information has
been understood and that students are putting their new skills correctly into
practice.
Application
Applying new material is different from practising it in that the teacher steps back
and allows the students to take control. Your students will have had time to
absorb your input and they can now focus on their output. Exercises in this part of
the lesson will be more open ended. They will include role-plays, written reports,
complex group activities. In a fifty-minute class these three steps, Presentation,
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 Practice, and Application should take approximately thirty-five minutes.
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Assignments
Explaining assignments should not be left until the last minute. Give yourself time
to prepare your students for the work they will be doing out of class. When your
students understand what is required of them they have a better chance of
succeeding and achieving the objective of the lesson. Your assignment should
reflect the materials presented in your lesson.
Traditionally, assignments have consisted of exercises from the text. However,
you may want to explore some of the options offered by a communicative
approach and give your students a real task to perform. For example, in a country
where English is widely spoken, such as Kenya or the Philippines, you might ask
your students to find out details of upcoming events and to report back to the
class. In a fifty-minute class, you should allow at least five minutes for this step.
A sample lesson plan
Title
Family Relationships or
Who’s Who in Your Family”
Objective
Students will be presented with illustrations of family trees and will be told a story.
They will be asked to demonstrate their understanding of simple instructions and
to ask and answer simple questions on family members, using the correct forms of
possessive adjectives and pronouns.
Review Presentation
Review assignment and materials covered in previous lesson.
(a) Teacher tells story of own family and draws a family tree with cartoon faces,
names, and relationships on the board.
(b) Teacher asks questions of one student and draws a similar family tree on
board. Sample questions will include:
What’s your father’s/mother’s name”
How many brothers and sisters do you have?
Is your brother Vicente married’.’
What is his wife’s name?
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 Does he have children?
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What are their names?

(c) Teacher checks comprehension of class by asking Yes/No questions about the
family tree. For example:
Is Juan’s mother called Maria?
Does Juan have three sisters?
Is this Vicente’s son?
Does Juan’s sister Alta Gracia have two sons?
(d) Teacher checks comprehension by asking individual students to go to the
board and:
Point to Juan’s sister.
Draw a pair of sunglasses on Juan’s face.
Change the hairstyle of Juan’s oldest brother.
Draw a big smile on the face of Juan’s father.
(e) Teacher writes chart of possessive adjectives on board:
my your his her
our your their
and uses them in sentences describing family relationships in the family tree
which is still on the board.
This is their mother.
This is his father. etc.
(f) Teacher describes the rule governing the use of the possessive form of nouns:
Add an apostrophe plus s (‘s) to singular nouns. Example: Juan’s sister
Add an apostrophe (‘) to plural nouns. Example: The brothers’ mother
(g) Teacher writes the verb “to have” on board, in present simple affirmative and
interrogative, and drills students, using the family tree on the board.
I have = Do I have _________?
You have = Do you have _________?
He/She has = Does he/she have _______?
We have = Do we have ______?
You have = Do you have_____ ?
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They have = Do they have______ ?

Practice
(a) Teacher asks students each to draw their own family tree. Then, using the
example sentences on the board, each student describes the family tree to a
neighbour. Example sentences will include:
This is my father/mother/brother/sister.
This is my brother’s wife.
This is my sister’s husband.
This is my brother’s son. etc.
(b) Teacher asks each student to use the same sentences to describe the family
tree of the first neighbour to a second neighbour. This time the possessive
adjective will be “his” or “her” or a possessive noun form, for example, “Juan’s.”
This is his/Juan’s father.
(c) Teacher asks each student to fill in the blanks in sentences. (Sentences will
contain blanks for possessive adjectives, possessive noun forms, and “have” or
“has.”) Example:
___sister is called Maria.
My mother____ three sons.
Does Enrique _____ two or three brothers?
Presentation
(a) Teacher tells the following story, using dramatization and pictures on the board
to make sure that the main ideas are understood:
Two boys, Miguel and Jose, were friends. They both had baby sisters. One day,
Miguel’s mother asked him to take his baby sister for a walk. And Jose’s mother
asked him to take his baby sister for a walk, too. The two boys met at the soccer
field. They decided to put their baby sisters under a tree and to play soccer. When
they finished playing soccer they came back to the tree. But they could not tell
the difference between the baby girls.
“Which one is my sister?” cried Miguel. “Which one is mine?”
“Which one is my sister?” cried Jose. “Which one is mine?” “I think this little one is
yours,” said Miguel.
“Then this big one must be yours,” said Jose.
“Oh no,” said a passing man. “The little one looks like Miguel. It must be his. And
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 the big one looks like Jose. She must be his baby sister.”
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Miguel took the little baby girl back to his mother. His mother screamed and said
to Miguel’s father, ‘This isn’t our baby. Where’s ours?”
Jose took the big baby girl back to his mother. His mother screamed, too, and said
to Jose’s father, “This isn’t our baby. Where’s ours?”
Miguel ran to Jose. “Quickly,” he cried, “my mother says this little baby isn’t her
baby. And she wants hers back.”
Jose said, “My mother says this big baby isn’t hers. She wants her little baby
back.”
Later, Miguel and Jose sat and talked. “Mothers and fathers are very clever,” said
Jose. “They knew which baby was theirs. They only wanted their baby.”
(b) Teacher checks comprehension either by asking Yes/No questions, or by
asking four students to mime the story for the class.
(c) Teacher writes chart of possessive pronouns on board:
mine yours
his hers
ours yours
theirs
Teacher uses classroom objects to drill possessive pronouns and possessive
adjectives.
Whose pen is this? It’s mine. / It’s my pen. etc.
Practice
Teacher distributes texts of Miguel/Jose story, asking students to fill in the blanks.
(The possessive pronouns and possessive adjectives will have been deleted from
the text.)
Application
Teacher distributes cards and asks students to circulate asking each other the
questions given below. As students find a classmate who can give an affirmative
answer to a question, they ask that classmate to sign beside the question. The
object of the exercise is to see who can get all the questions signed off first.
Do you have two sisters?
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 Does your mother have two brothers?
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Is your sister’s name Maria?

Does your sister have three children?
Do you have one brother?
Is your father’s name Pablo?
Do your parents have four children?
Is your brother’s name Eduardo?
Does your mother have three sons?
Do you have a baby sister?
Are your brothers’ names Carlos and Vicente?
Is your mother’s name Maria Elena?
Assignment
To draw a strip cartoon of the Miguel and Jose story, and to put the following
sentences in the speech balloons:
Which one is my sister/mine? This little one is yours.
This big one is yours.
No, this one is his sister/his. This isn’t our baby/ours.
My mother wants her baby/hers.
My mother and father knew their baby/theirs.
Summary of guidelines for planning lessons
Build in student success by setting achievable objectives.
Provide input before expecting output.
Provide needed vocabulary.
Teach all four language skills.
Provide a variety of activities.
Allow for absorption time of new materials.
Teach from known to unknown.
Cover the syllabus.
Guidelines for testing
This section looks at two aspects of testing: classroom tests and national
examinations. These national examinations are usually set by the Ministry of
Education. Practices vary, but in most countries the two most important national
examinations are at the end of six years of primary school, and at the end of six
years of secondary school.
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Classroom Tests
The first and most important principle in writing tests is to test what you have
taught. What you teach should in turn reflect your long-term goals for your course.
In this way, tests check your ability to keep to your long-term goals and to
transform those goals into lessons. While the emphasis may vary, in most
situations you will be teaching all four language skills. Your tests should be
devised to test these four skills. While testing reading, writing, and listening is
relatively straight forward, the testing of speaking, particularly with classes of 50
and over, requires a little organization.
The Royal Society of Arts Examinations Board in England has developed a format
which can be adapted to meet your needs. First, divide your class into groups of
threes. Then give each group approximately five minutes in which to prepare a
task. An example of a task is:
The teacher is going to visit your village for a week. Ask the teacher some
questions about her plans. The teacher will ask you some questions about your
village.
Another example would be to give a group a picture or photo of a recent school
activity? such as weeding the school garden, the official opening of the school
fish pond, or the winning of a sports event, and to ask the three interviewees to
talk about the picture.
Then interview the group of three for approximately five minutes. If possible work
with another teacher on these interviews, so that while your colleague is
interviewing you can assess and take notes on student performances. If no other
teacher is available, you could record these interviews to playback and assess
later. It is also important that the interviewer make sure that each of the three
interviewees is given opportunities to speak. When writing long tests, make sure
that you sequence test items from easy to more difficult. Students suffering from
test anxiety could be completely unnerved if the first questions they read seem
beyond their capabilities. This sequencing of your test items could be done by
first asking your students to fill in blanks or answer multiple-choice questions,
then by including test items which require your students to write sentence
answers, and finally by moving on to test items which involve writing paragraph
answers.
Make your directions
clear. In a classroom
test you may want to
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 test you may want to
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check orally that

students have
understood the
directions. Many
Volunteers report
that in moments of
panic students
misread directions
and fail tests
because of this. The
sound of your voice
reading the directions
slowly and clearly can be calming. Knowing the anxieties that surround tests, help
your students by developing their review practices. The ideas discussed in
Chapter Five, particularly the section on reading for academic purposes and the
exercises to develop reading micro skills, lend themselves well to the development
of review practices. Figure outlines some basic examination strategies for your
students. The most important of these strategies revolve around a planned use of
time. When giving classroom tests, tell your students at regular intervals how
much time has passed and how much time they have left to complete the test.
To get full benefit from the learning experience of tests, take time to go over
corrected tests with your class. The advantages in this for your students generally
outweigh the inevitable discussions over grades which some students will raise.
You can control this situation by setting aside 10 minutes at the end of the session
for questions on grades. Clearly though, you will need to think through and explain
your grading policy to your classes well in advance. It also behoves you to
familiarize yourself with the grading system of your colleagues. The American
system tends to be more generous in its allocation of points than other systems,
and you may wish to adjust so as to be more in tune with local expectations.
For your own benefit, particularly when working with large numbers of students,
make your tests easy to grade. Essay tests may be easy to prepare, but they take
a long time to grade. So unless the essay format is required by the school, choose
testing exercises such as multiple choice, completion, and cloze. The cloze test
consists of giving students a passage to complete in which every nth word is
deleted. However, you need not keep rigidly to a set pattern of deleting blanks
when writing craze tests for your students. Here is an example of a cloze test.
(When given, the words in parentheses are omitted.)
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Rikyia and Fatima decided to (take) a walk. They (had) wanted (to) walk by the
river, but the wind was (blowing) too hard. So they walked downtown instead.
They met (some) friends near (the) market, and decided to (stop) for a Coke in
their favourite cafe. The wind had dropped a (little) and the sun was (shining), so
they sat at a (table) outside.
Finally, make sure that your students understand the school policy on cheating
and the consequences for anyone caught breaking these school rules.
National examinations
The success of your students hinges on their ability to do well in the national
exams. A high school diploma is frequently the reward for a whole family who
have provided financial support to put one of their members through years of
schooling. Your ability to prepare students for national exams is therefore an
important response to your students’ most pressing need. Look for the
opportunity to serve as an examiner in the national exams. You could be an
interviewer in oral exams or a grader of essay exams. The educational authorities
usually work through the school principals and it would be easy to indicate your
interest to your principal. The experience will stand you in good stead when it
comes to coaching your students for these exams.
If this option is not open to you, familiarize yourself with the content and format of
the examinations. Keep abreast of any changes in the examinations. Make sure
that you cover the content in your lessons and that your students are aware of
your doing so. Build into your lessons mock examinations with test questions in
the national examination format, and when you go over the corrected copies of
these exercises discuss both content and format errors with your students. An
example of format error would be answering five questions when only asked to
answer four. Examination anxiety is hard to overcome completely. But you may
help your students master some of their anxiety by discussing and implementing
examination strategies. Strategies range from the practical to the esoteric.
Practical strategies might involve developing your students’ sense of timing,
helping them plan how they will use their time during an exam, and helping them
stick to that plan. At the more esoteric end of the spectrum come relaxation
exercises or exercises where students visualize their success during the weeks
leading up to an examination.
DISCUSSION

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ASK QUESTION

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