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BRAZ-TESOLnewsletter 9 march 2005
and similarities of the TL and NL and predict the areas where they
would have problems since I can help them a great deal because
I know the characteristics of and speak their NL. All in all, since we
teachers cannot entirely motivate learners to correct themselves,
the activities I proposed and my own attitude to error treatment
seem to motivate my students to do that.
Through the research I conducted, I came to the conclusion
that communication depends on a certain level of accuracy.
However, I believe this paper will help demystify the idea that
mistakes are synonymous with failure. Fossilized mistakes, which
are a habit of speech influenced most of the times by NL, impair
students’ communication skills; however, it is inevitable that the
students would make them, even after being corrected. We, as
teachers, can make these students perceive as well as reflect on
their own mistakes by raising their awareness to become more
responsible for their learning and for self-correction.
I hold no illusions about having the final word on this topic but
it is axiomatic that the teacher should create a positive learning
environment and provide optimal feedback. “As part of a definition
of ‘learning a second language’, ‘successful learning’ of a second
language for most learners, involves, to a large extent, the
reorganization of linguistic material from an IL to identify with a
particular TL.” Selinker (1974, p. 44) and also “lies in the feedback
that a learner receives from others…” Douglas (1994, p. 218)
All in all, teachers will support learning if correction is used
positively rather than some kind of criticism or punishment, so
asking students how they feel about being corrected may be
considered to be a good way to approach students about error
correction since, as a rule, they want and expect mistakes to be
corrected in the classroom. By showing interest in the learner, the
teacher can encourage fluency but it is experience that will
determine when, how, and how much to correct mistakes.
ACTIVITY 1Try to correct the mistakes below and write down in your Learning
Diary the mistakes you want to get rid of.
Spelling1 I'm planing to go to the movies on Wednesday.
2 It's easyer to travel by bus.
3 My mom is a layer.
4 My holyday was fine.
5 I studyed a lot yesterday.
6 Of corse I like her.
7 It's a nice oportunity to travel.
8 Wich one is yours?
9 Are you redy?
10 My writting is terrible.
Vocabulary (Wrong Word)1 She told she was sick.
2 I made a test yesterday.
3 He said me I was wrong.
4 I ever go to the theater on weekends.
5 I went to German on business last week.
6 I've been playing tennis actually.
7 I did a lot of mistakes.
8 I'm telling you the true!
9 Thank you for all things you did.
Preposition1 I went to Canada for to study.
2 I want learn English fast.
3 John arrived to England 2 days ago.
4 I entered in the room at 2 o'clock.
BRAZ-TESOLnewsletter 10 march 2005
5 She's looking forward in meeting you.
6 It depends of the weather.
7 They called to the airport.
8 That book is for me read.
9 It's OK for me.
10 I have to call to my mom.
Grammar1 Did you like your trip to Cancun? I enjoyed a lot.
2 I'm work at Philco.
3 The culture activities are on Friday.
4 Where did you born? I born in Santos.
5 I looking for a new job.
6 London is more good than Oxford.
7 I'm very interesting in Modern Art.
8 Can you tell me where did you eat?
9 My city is bigger and crowded.
10 People who lives in Brazil is happy.
11 This is the first time is possible for me to write
12 I'd like to know how does it work.
13 She told about the trip.
14 Do you like to go to the movies with me?
Verb tense1 How long do you study at this school? I study here
since last month.
2 Last night I have bought a book.
3 I phone you as soon as I'll arrive.
4 I have difficulty to understand her.
Portuguese influence1 She went to the park with your husband.
2 I'll let you know how he looks like.
3 I have 30 years old.
4 The most of the people went home.
5 Because this he's not here.
6 I like very much chocolate.
7 I want that you meet my sister.
8 They take a walk all days.
9 I pretend to visit Montreal on my vacation
10 He calls me all time.
11 I stayed happy when I saw her.
12 How long time have you worked here?
13 Have a lot of traffic in São Paulo.
14 I don't have sure.
15 I and my husband.
16 I didn't like nothing.
17 The final of the book is great.
18 I travel at work.
19 I wrong it a lot.
As your teacher pronounces the words below, see which ones
you have the most difficulty with and write them down in you
Learning Diary
Pronunciation1 called 14 chocolate
2 electricity 15 mobile
3 rarely 16 feminism
4 dangerous 17 available
5 theater 18 purchase
6 island 19 used to
7 museum 20 other
8 world 21 culture
9 country 22 sea
10 office 23 popular
11 lawyer 24 calculator
12 examine 25 event
13 maintenance
Word stress1 police / policy 9 difficulty
2 develop(ment) 10 Japan
3 fortunately 11 visit
4 approximately 12 agriculture
5 television 13 detail
6 recently 14 hotel
7 interesting 15 discount
8 immediately 16 independent
ACTIVITY 2: My Learning DiaryAs soon as you NOTICE an error, write it down here. Try not to
make this mistake again.
At the end of the course, check if you are still making the same
mistakes, notice what kind of mistakes you are making the most.
Talk to your teacher to see if there is anything you can do about it.
BRAZ-TESOLnewsletter 11 march 2005
Fabíola Novella Massaro has been an EFL teacher for over 11 years.She holds a COTE certificate (Cambridge) and a postgraduate degree in
English (UMESP). She is currently a teacher at Cel-Lep/Sto. André.The writer would like to thank Elizabeth Pow for revising this article.
ACTIVITY 3: E-mail extractsExtract 1Que bom que sua mãe pode vem. Meu pai fala que eu dar meu
tempo a vocês esta vez.
Eu estava esperando qualquer coiza de vocês… vocês não me
escreverão… Meus paes estavão quasi ligando de novo. Você
mando um E-mail?
Extract 2Meu pai troci o cachorro. Ele tem um cheiro disgraçado.
(…)
Eu não explicei como agente está viagando. De motor home!
(…)
Eu sei que algem nunca esquece mas agora olhando para atrás,
eu gostaria de fazer tudo de novo. Queria falar desculpa.
Extract 3Eu mandei uma otra e-mail, mas não deu certo… Talvez eu posso
ir para Brasil quando tenho emprego!!! Não se preocupa de
presentes, vocês fizaram tanto para mim, deixa!
(…)
Quando Scott está perto de mim eu como direito e fiquo legal. Faz
quasi dois anos que nao me preocupa de meu “weight”. Se ele
está longe, o circulo comiença.
Extract 4Meu pai está aqui. Ele está gritando para bems ao Brasil!! Ele viu
o jogo na TV, no “replay”, e está muito feliz.
Extract 5Aqui em Manitoba é bonito, mais não egual ao Brasil. É incrivel
aqui! Para primeira vez, eu vi um urso de perto e assisti o morto…
nossa, que lição grande… é uma situação muito controversial
aqui, matar um urso.
Taken from Lorrayne Morris’ E-mails
Adapted by Fabíola N. Massaro
Spel
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What I said/wrote Correct form
How to express your strenghts:write apowerful RESUME
artic
le
BRAZ-TESOLnewsletter 12 march 2005
SummaryWriting an impressive resume, either in English or in Portuguese, is
the first step to get a job interview. New ways to organize
qualifications are tools that have to be mastered by most people in
order to talk and write about their experience and select the most
relevant items to include in a successful resume.
Hiring an employee is a complex process that involves trained
and specialized Human Resources personnel and tools. They select
appropriate resumes, conduct interviews, tests, and other activities
specific to the job opening.
The purpose of a resume is to get an interview, to motivate an
employer to include you in the recruiting process. Here, we will offer
some useful tips, as well as vocabulary both in English and
Portuguese to boost your qualifications.
As a general rule, a good resume should have the following
qualities:
✔ It should be well organized so that it can be read in up to 10
seconds. The length has to be up to 2 pages. It should look
attractive.
✔ It should emphasize the strengths, accomplishments, and
qualifications of the candidate to the job.
The main components of a resume are:
✔ Heading (cabeçalho): includes full name, complete address and
telephone numbers. In Brazil some people include age, marital
status and nationality. In the US this information is not stated
because it can be discriminative.
✔ Job Objective (cargo pretendido): Specific job objectives should
reflect your experience. Candidates with little experience should
state broader areas. Adjust the job objective to the actual
position you’re looking for.
✔ Work Experience (experiência professional): This is the core of
your resume. A successful and innovative format is to organize
your qualifications under broad skills relevant to the job rather
than use the traditional reversed chronological order. This kind
of resume lists your experience by job functions and is
especially useful when you have limited experience, you are
changing careers or you are looking for your first job. It states
any major accomplishments, responsibilities, potentials, and
competences under broad skill categories. Your employers will
be listed separately. Thus, you can organize all your strengths
and highlight your professional achievements, and abilities
without linking them to specific employers that not necessarily
add value to your resume.
To list your accomplishments, you should use action verbs that will
by Vicky Weischtordt – PUC-SP
help you create a well defined image of your performance. Here
are some useful verbs that may be included:
analyze analisar
conduct conduzir
coordinate coordenar
create criar
design elaborar
develop desenvolver
direct dirigir
evaluate avaliar
implement implementar
manage gerenciar, administrar
organize organizar
perform desempenhar, realizar, executar
plan planejar
prepare preparar, elaborar
specialize especializar
supervise supervisionar
train treinar
write redigir, elaborar
Also, there are other trendy buzz words that may be included:
teamwork trabalho em equipe
results oriented voltado para a obtenção de resultados
customer focused centrado no cliente
partnership parceria
leadership liderança
problem solver / solução /
problem solving resolução de problemas
value-added solutions soluções que agregam valor /
de valor agregado
take risks / risk-taker correr riscos
innovative inovador
creative criativo
persuasive persuasivo
responsible / responsável /
responsibility responsabilidade
marketing strategies estratégias de marketing
cultural fluency fluência cultural
competence competência
ability habilidade
skill capacidade
knowledge conhecimento
BRAZ-TESOLnewsletter 13 march 2005
outstanding excepcional
excellent excelente
impressive impressionante
extremely extremamente
specialized especializado
Full Name
Full Address
Phone / Fax / Cell Phone
Objective [Cargo Pretendido]: __________
Highlights of Qualifications [Destaques]
__ years’ experience in __________
Masters word processor ___, database, Internet , ___ [state all relevant information]
Graduated in ___ [state course and university if it is a good one]
Fluent English and Spanish
Professional Experience [Experiência Profissional]
Organizational and Planning Skills [Organização e Planejamento]
Developed __________
Prepared __________
Organized ___________
Conducted ___________
Interpersonal / Communication Skills [Comunicação e Relacionamento Interpessoal]
Strong leadership abilities
Highly cooperative team member
Well-developed __________
__________
Computer Skills [Informática]
Masters e-business softwares, __________
Experienced user of ___________
[You may include any Skill Categories that best describe your experience or that you may find necessary for the target job.]
Employment History [Cargos Exercidos] [List your employers]
Year Position Employer
Education [Educação / Escolaridade]
Course College / University / Technical Course
Specialization Courses
Language Courses
Professional Events / Seminars / Congresses
Date and Signature
accountability credibilidade, responsabilidade,
confiabilidade
proficient proficiente, experiente
technical knowledge conhecimentos técnicos
Don’t be shy to use intensification and effective adjectives such as:
Now, let’s examine an outline of this kind of resume:
Hope this will be useful and you all get wonderful jobs!!!
Vicky
Victoria Claire Weischtordt is a Professor at PUC-SP
BRAZ-TESOLnewsletter 14 march 2005
If your experience is similar to mine, many of you have had
students come to you and say that “I want to learn English in
order to speak and understand so that I can travel, but I don't
want to take more classes of grammar”. This comment usually
comes from students who have had years of grammar classes,
yet found themselves unable to speak and understand
afterwards. Well, let me offer a viewpoint based on an objectives-
driven classroom approach to possibly help you assist students
seeking this type of classroom instruction. Before continuing, I
would like to say that I consider all of you as experts in your own
specialties and hope that in some small way, the ideas, teaching
perspective, and experiences that I share with you now will
benefit you in your teaching.
During my teaching and research of English as a Foreign
Language (EFL) at my school, Interlanguage in Barretos, I found it
essential during the initial student contact to clarify the student's
primary learning objectives. That is, learning objectives relative to
the FOUR distinct abilities that one acquires when learning
English. Those four abilities are listening, speaking, reading, and
writing. The manner in which these abilities are acquired has been
and remains of utmost importance to me.
For example, if the student expressed an interested in the
objective: to pass the college entrance examination only, I would
describe a series of steps that I would take in order to impart
English grammar, structure, vocabulary, and reading skills
appropriate for pre-college preparation. The preparation
necessary in order to pass the TOEFL (Test of English as a Foreign
Language) as well as other standardized examinations for
entrance in a college or university outside of Brazil is similar but
NOT the same as for the Vestibular.
As a footnote for new, foreign teachers teaching in Brazil, the
Vestibular is an examination that can allow a student to study at
an elite, private Brazilian school, or permit a student to study at a
state or federal school that is tuition-free. So, as you can imagine,
the majority of students compete diligently to pass and be
accepted into one of these latter two types of higher education
institutions. Many of my students come to Interlanguage with the
objective to learn English based on the desire to pass this
examination.
Student Objectives –
Ski
lls
Bas
ed o
n S
tude
nt O
bjec
tive
s
EFL CLASSESDriven
by Gary E. Cain
artic
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Skill Objectives
On the other hand, if the student wants to listen and speak
well in order to visit the United States, Canada, England,
Australia, or some other English-speaking country, the overall
approach would be centered around multiple listening, speaking,
and reading opportunities with the intention to develop
functional fluency. There, of course, would be some grammar,
but it would be as little as possible in order to concentrate on
spoken English acquisition.
Similarly, should a student only wish to correspond by
facsimile, letters, contracts, or other written documents in
English, and express no desire to speak, or understand more than
the most basic aspects of the other 3 acquired abilities, then the
student's course would be composed mainly of many reading,
vocabulary-building, grammar, structure, and writing
opportunities. The end result of this course would be for the
student to compose written correspondence at a standard level of
written English within a given performance level either agreed
upon mutually, or established by the teacher. The table below
shows a sampling of student-driven objectives relative to specific
language skills.
Listening Exchange Student;
TOEFL;
Travel
Speaking Exchange Student;
Travel
Reading Exchange Student;
Vestibular;
TOEFL;
Travel;
Prepare & Send Faxes/Letters
Writing Vestibular;
TOEFL;
Prepare & Send Faxes/Letters
BRAZ-TESOLnewsletter 15 march 2005
Please keep in mind that a natural English methodology is
based upon the belief that the day-to-day subjects will be
“student-centered”. “Why student-centered?” you may be asking
yourselves. Student-centered instruction is important so as to
maintain a reasonably high level of student interest, interaction
and thus, attention. Especially in classes with adult EFL students,
we can and should draw upon the experiences of the adult
learner. The learner's professional and personal experiences also
tend to enrich the EFL classes.
Besides the need to identify student objectives, it is equally
important to ascertain the student's PRESENT level of English – if
any – during the initial meeting. I recommend that the teacher use
some type of standardized written placement test that measures
with reasonable validity and reliability whether the student is at
the BASIC, INTERMEDIATE, OR ADVANCED level of English.
It is important to realize that if the student wants to acquire or
increase his or her level of listening comprehension, the teacher
may use audio cassette tapes, video cassette tapes, and DVDs.
These classroom tools can give the teacher a general idea of the
student's level of listening comprehension. Working from the
perspective of developing the student's listening ability, EFL
lessons should contain specific objectives designed to further
enhance this capability.
Even though these listening comprehension tools are very
useful, my experience has led me to believe that the student's
level of spoken English is best identified through open
conversation. However, it is important to pace your rate of speech
and speak in a level-appropriate vocabulary; this manner of
speaking should allow the teacher to interpret at what point the
student can and cannot understand the GENERAL MEANING of
your conversation and/or questions. For instance, you may ask
the student: "How old are you?" and "How are you?" to see if the
student can discriminate the difference between the two
sentences and respond correctly. After awaiting the student's
response, ask the student if he or she understood some words, all
words, or the overall meaning. Short, simple sentences will reveal
the student's level of spoken English very rapidly.
Nevertheless, it is also important to remember that some
students will be nervous and a bit stressed when asked to speak,
especially in front of their parents or spouses, so consider this when
reaching a conclusion about the students’ level of spoken English.
Finally, I have found it productive to explain and show the
student the various learning materials that will be used to meet
the student's learning objectives. Showing the course book,
exercise sheets, supplemental information sheets, cassette
tapes, and video tapes goes a long way toward creating a sense
of professionalism in the mind of the student, and it demonstrates
your interest in fully informing the student of the multiple learning
tools that will be utilized to assure the systematic and logical
acquisition of English through the EFL program.
Gary E. Cain, Director, Interlanguage American School of English (17) 3323-2465 (or) (17) 9773-1144 Barretos, SP
E-mail: garyecain@hotmail.com Holds earned Bachelor's and Master's Degrees in Business Education
from Bowling Green State University, USA. Has owned, operated, and taught in this private EFL school for over 12 years.
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