Reading to Learn in a Danish TEFL class of 11 year-olds

Anne Katrine Kryger, teacher, Susanne Karen Jacobsen,

Senior lecturer, Denmark

Agenda

• TEFL in DK• Learning a foreign langauage• R2L in a TEFL classroom• Rounding off

Teaching English as a foreign language in Denmark

• Children start learning English at the age of 9, in their fourth year of going to school

• They have 2-3 lessons a week on average• A focus on oral skills and communication• A written exam after year 9 was not

introduced until 2006 -> a demand for an increased focus on learners’ writing skills

Learning a foreign language

• Rich and varied input• Interaction and negotion of meaning• Forced output• Hypothesis formation and testing

The foreign language teaching challenge

• Authentic material is complex• Learners’ linguistic level vs. their cognitive

level• -> scaffolding

R2L in a Danish classroom

Brief overview of intervention• Unit 1 – Chocolate: 7 lessons

+ homework (teaching material text for year 8)

• Unit 2 – Mr Fox: 6 lessons (authentic literature, novel by Roald Dahl)

Learner’s individual rewriting

Preparing before reading and manuscript

Sentence prep The first sentence tells us that Mr Fox was near the end of the tunnel and how he was moving.

Cues What verb tells us that Mr Fox was moving slowly?Sentence Mr Fox crept up the dark tunnel to the mouth of his hole.Elaborations

Sentence prep The next sentence tells us that he pushed his face into the air and made a sound.Cues The second word tells us how he moved his head – and can you identify the

(sensing) verb where he smells?Sentence He poked his long handsome face out into the night air and sniffed once.  Elaborations Why did he sniff? He can smell humans if the wind is blowing in the right direction

(the scent of humans).

Sentence prep The next sentence tells us that he moved just a little bit. Cues How much was he moving? What happened then?Sentence He moved an inch or two forward and stopped.  Elaborations Why is he not out of the hole yet/now? 1 inch = 2,5 cm.

Joint rewriting on the board

Weak learner before/after R2L

What’s in it for us, then?

• The gap between learners’ cognitive level and linguistic level is minimized and rich and varied input is possible

• Joint rewriting and joint construction facilitate interaction and hypothesis formation

• Weak learners produce bigger quantities of language –> forced output

• Week learners are provided with ‘ready-to-use’ chunks and structures.

• Learners become risk-takers• Whole text perspective rather than focus on mechanic

details…?

Now what?

- We have a challenge!- We have the means to meet the requirements

of this challenge through a genre-based pedagogy

- New Nordic School

References• Gibbons, Pouline, 2006, Bridging Discourses in the ESL classroom,

Continuum• Krashen, Stephen, 1992, The Input Hypothesis: Issues and Implication,

Laredo Publishing• Lightbown, P & Spanda, N, 2006, How Languages are Learned, Oxford

University Press• Rose, David, 2005, Learning to read, reading to learn,

http://www.readingtolearn.com.au/images/pdf/national_inquiry.pdf • Rose, David & Martin, Jim, 2012, Learning to Write, reading to Learn,

Equinox• Swain, M, 2000, The output Hypothesis and beyond: Mediating acquisition

through collaborative dialogue, in: J.P. Lantolf (ed): Sociocultural Theory and Second Language Learning. Oxford University Press