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The Language Awareness course

 

Dates:

Time:

Course fee:

Registration:

21 February — 25 April, 2017 (10 weeks)

Tuesdays 10.30 - 12.00

(20 academic hours)

16 000 roubles

1. Fill in an application form

2. E-mail it to t-training@bkc.ru together with the result of the BKC English language test (if you are a non-native English speaker)

 

Candidate requirements

  • Practising teachers with a pedagogical degree or an international teaching qualification (e.g. CELTA, Delta)

  • Advanced level of English (C1) and above

Required materials: all materials are provided by the school

Mode of delivery: interactive input sessions with elements of workshop

Trainers: BKC Delta-qualified teacher trainers who are CELTA and Delta tutors

 

The Language Awareness course is aimed to assist in improving the quality of teaching through improving the understanding of the English language systems from a teacher's perspective. It invites teachers to look at English from a new angle, often challenging the conventional views on grammar, and revisit and extend their existing knowledge. It encourages a critical analysis of current pedagogical practices adopted in coursebooks and focuses on learners’ language needs and challenges students face when learning a second language.

 

Why do the Language Awareness course?

  • To be able to answer students' language questions with confidence

  • To provide students with a better informed language analysis in lessons

  • To deal with students' language errors with more confidence

  • To help students to make faster progress

  • To develop a critical view on theory and practice of language analysis

  • To discover effective ways of teaching

  • To become more aware of students’ needs, anticipate their problems and find effective solutions

  • To develop professionally

  • To get a BKC-IH Certificate on completion of at least 80% of the course

 

Syllabus:

Date

Topic

Aims/Comments

21 Febr

Describing Language (Intro).

Tense

  • to gauge the needs and expectations of the participants;

  • to explain the aims and structure of the course;

  • to explore some of the different ways in which language can be investigated and described;

  • to ensure that participants are familiar with terminology in language description;

  • How many tenses are there? Tense, time and verb forms, the concept of ‘distance’.

28 Febr

Auxiliaries and Operators.

Modal Verbs 1

  • modal and primary auxiliaries;

  • the role of the auxiliary verb as operator;

  • the concept of invisible «do»

  • questions related to the teaching and learning of operator patterns

  • two types of meaning: extrinsic and intrinsic

  • central modals and their role in adding shades of meaning to full verbs

  • extrinsic meanings of modal verbs

7 March

Modal Verbs 2

  • intrinsic meanings

  • lexical expressions with modal meanings

  • teaching of modals

14 March

Will and Would.

Future Forms

  • Will and would as modal verbs

  • context-free meaning of will

  • relationship between 'descriptive' and 'pedagogical' grammars

  • the notion of grammar as choice

  • a range of future forms

  • implications for the teaching of future forms

21 March

Forms with «Have»

  • the perfect aspect by reference to the form have + past participle

  • a 'three uses' model

  • Present Perfect vs Past Simple as the most common confusion

28 March

Forms with «Be»

  • the progressive aspect and forms with be

  • the analysis of the progressive

  • non-finite verb forms and the passive voice

  • critique of coursebook analysis of the passive as a 'transformation' of the active

  • discussion on teaching and learning

4 Apr

Conditionals

  • The 'four conditionals' approach vs the 'lexical' approach

  • learning and teaching of conditionals

11 Apr

The Verb Form

  • review the forms and meanings of the features of verb forms

  • the form and meaning of non-finite verb forms

  • participle clauses

  • the «five rules»

  • learning and teaching of verb forms

18 Apr

The Noun Phrase

  • why the noun phrase may be regarded as 'neglected'

  • the description of the grammar of the noun phrase

  • ideas for dealing with noun phrases

  • practical activities for working with noun phrases

25 Apr

Language as Lexis

  • the general concept of lexis

  • categorisation of lexis into four types

  • benefits of the lexical approach to teachers and learners