Teaching by Principles

This month, we are reading the book: "Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy", H. Douglas Brown - 1994 - San Francisco University

Text = Ofina: Práticas de Leitura Crítica em aulas de inglês instrumental

We did some activities with the text "Oficina: Práticas de Leitura Crítica em aulas de Inglês Instrumental", by Prof. Dr. Luiz Fernando Gomes

We did music analysis with the song: "The Boxer", by Simon and Garfunkel

Text = Teaching Methodology

We read a text last month with this text we gave a presentations with some subjects.

The topic of the text we read was: "Second Language Acquisition" - Chapter eleven

The practice of English Language = Writing

Written text has a number of conventions witch separate it out from speaking. We need to take care of some points in our texts: handwriting, spelling, layout, and punctuation.

Handwriting: The teacher may help the students how to improve their handwriting. The teacher can write sentences for students imitate that writing, but they will have a personal style.

Spelling: The students are used to write the way they speak. It’s a problem because in English we don’t write the same way. There is a difference between American English and British English, it can confuse the student. It’s necessary to focus on a particular variety of English.

Layout and Punctuation: Frequently the punctuation is a personal style of writing. As teachers we need to help them how to use the punctuation following the grammar rules. We can show them different types of letters, like: business letter, commercial letter, etc.

Different approaches to the practise of writing skills both in and outside the classroom:
* The student may write a draft first and then a final text after reviewing it.
* The student read an article and after write with their own words what they understood about it.
* Creative writing: poetry stories and plays. According to Gaffield - Vile, creative writing is a journey of self-discovery.
* Using the computer: e-mails, pen pals, etc.
* Writing lessons sequences: Students can look at the pictures and then write a story about it.
* Dictations