Universidad de Jaén

ASSIGNMENT – ORLC

SUBJECT ASSIGNMENT:
OBSERVATION & RESEARCH IN THE LANGUAGE CLASSROOM

GENERAL INFORMATION:

This assignment has to fulfil the following conditions:

- Length: between 4 and 6 pages (without including cover, index or appendices –if
there are any-).
- Type of font: Arial or Times New Roman.
- Size: 11.
- Line height: 1.5.
- Alignment: Justified.

The assignment has to be done in this Word document and has to fulfil the rules of
presentation and edition, as for quotes and bibliographical references which are
detailed in the Study Guide.

Also, it has to be submitted following the procedure specified in the Study Guide.
Sending it to the teacher’s e-mail is not permitted.

In addition to this, it is very important to read the assessment criteria, which can be
found in the Study Guide.

The assignment mark is 80% of the final mark and the participation in the activities
performed during the tutorials constitutes the remaining 20%.

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Assignment:
Read the six case studies in the pdf document, each of which investigates a different
topic: literature, grammar, oral English, teaching techniques, language learning, writing.
When you have finished reading, follow the instructions below (from Wallace 1998:
166-169). Of the six case studies outlined above, which topic would be of most
interest/relevance for a group of students with which you are familiar? Think about how
you would need to adapt the case study for your target group's needs by considering
the following questions:

1. Clearly outline the population for your adapted case study.

2. How would you adapt the structure of the case study to fit in with your target group
and teaching context?

3. What sort of data would you generate and how would you generate it?

4. How would you analyse the data?

Important: you have to write your personal details and the subject name on the
cover (see the next page). The assignment that does not fulfil these conditions
will not be corrected. You have to include the assignment index below the cover.

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Name and surname(s): Rebecca Fitzell

Username: ESFPMLAEILE1823552
Master Edition: 2014-2015
Date: 20 / 03 / 2015

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Case Study 6 : “Motivating the advanced learner in developing

writing skills: a project.”

Index
Page

1. Introduction 5

2. Population 5

3. Case study 6

4. Collecting the data 8

5. Analysing the data 9

6. Conclusion 9

7. Appendices

 Appendix 1.1 11

 Appendix 1.2 12

 Appendix 1.3 14

8. Bibliography 15

9. Webography 15

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1. Introduction

When teaching English as a foreign language, or any language for that matter, it is
important for the teacher to take the time to observe, research and reflect on their
teaching and learning methods. By doing this, he/she can improve his/her skills and
make teaching and learning more fun for both themselves and their students.
As outlined by Wajnryb (1992: FUNIBER p.29), the reflective model of research is that
the teacherr is actively reflecting and exploring, the concept of learning is the
construction of personal meaning and that teachers themselves are the primary
initiators of their own development. Each working day is a new opportunity for a
teacher to improve his/her teaching abilities through observing and conducting the
correct research.
When considering this particular case study six and its problem of motivating
advanced level students to do writing activities, I think it is important to highlight that
writing differs in some significant ways to do with the purpose of writing in the class and
in everyday life, and the relationship between these two settings. (McDonough and
Shaw 1993: 174)

2. Population

The population which I will use for my particular case study are ten upper-intermediate
students. They are preparing to sit a B2 exam, according to the Common European
Framework of References for Language. The particular exam which they wish to do is
the First Certificate Examination held by Cambridge University. All students are either
studying full-time at the University of Jaén or have finished university and are currently
unemployed. Thus, the university students require more than a B1 certificate to hold
their university degree, while the unemployed students require a minimum of a B1 title
for better job prospects and opportunities. The students all obtained the B1 Preliminary
English Test (Cambridge) in July 2014 and wish to continue improving their English to
further their chances of good employment in the future. Out of the ten students, five are
studying or already are play-school teachers, four are primary school teachers and one
is a secondary school teacher. The students who are currently unemployed are also
preparing for their ‘Oposiciones’, the Spanish-state exams for teachers which will be
held in June.

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These students make a comparison of doing an English writing activity with

doing a university assignment which they consider as long, tiring and stressful.
Because of this, they have very little motivation with participating in writing activities in
class or at home. Writing activities are supposed to be fun and imaginative, but this is
clearly not the case for this group of individuals. I find their reasoning for this dilemma
very interesting because as their are all studying to be or already are teachers, they, in
the future, will more than likely have to demand writing assignments from their own
students. Thus, I find it hypocritical that they have a lack of motivation in completing
writings, when they will be the people who will have to encourage and motivate their
pupils.

3. Case study

I believe that I could favourably adapt the structure of case study six to compete with
the circumstances of my particular group of learners. The group from the case study
and my group of students have some similarities in which both groups have a good
level of proficiency with the English language, the groups are or have been in university
and have been exposed to tertiary education, and finally they both lack some sort of
motivation with writing tasks due to some individual reason comparing an English
writing task with a longer, more difficult university prose.
When referring back to the case study, it is highlighted that this particular
teacher used a brainstorming activity to identify English-speaking institutions outside
the university. This is not applicable to my case study as in Jaén there are very few, if
even any, English-speaking companies, and although I agree that writing an article is a
good task, I want to make the writing task more personal to each student and their job.
For this reason, I would adapt the writing task to a creative writing prose, such as a
fairy-tale for children, as the majority of the students are in contact with children below
the age of fourteen. The basic function of knowing how to write in English is still
apparent in this task, and it may be used in their daily lives, whether it be in school
teaching students, or at home with younger members of their family.

When introducing the topic, I would ask them:

 Why do we have fairy tales?

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 Why do children like fairy tales?

 What was your favourite fairy tale when you were a child?
These questions can be discussed in pairs or in groups of three and then their
suggested answers can be given to the teacher. Then I would propose the project task
of writing their own fairy tale. The reason I considered this as a perfect opportunity
to practise their creative writing skills, is not only because it appears in the First
Certificate examination, but also because with my groups of younger students, I have
introduced a ‘Story-Time’ class which happens once a month. This could be the ideal
chance to motivate the upper-intermediate students with their imaginativeness and
writing abilities and put it into actual practice with children, which can in turn be
considered a part of their work-experience, should they choose to take part in this
special extra class once every four weeks.
Unfortunately, due to lack of imagination, it can be difficult to invent a fairy tale,
thus with any creative writing activities, I use ‘Rory’s Story Cubes’ (Appendix 1.1) from
the Creativity Hub. These are a set of nine cubes, like a set of nine die. On each side
there is a different picture which can represent a different word or idea. The students
roll the cubes and must use three pictures as the beginning of the fairy tale, three for
the middle and three for the end. The story must begin with ‘Once Upon a Time...’ By
using these cubes, they will have a better idea and improved guidance of the direction
of the fairy tale, instead of having complete writer’s block. This tactic can help the
students with some information, but of course they can expand the vocabulary and
grammar and add anything they want to make the story cubes link better and thus it will
be more creative.
This activity can be carried out as a pair work speaking activity to begin with, to
get some sort of sequenced story in order. After, individually, each student can write his
/ her own version of the story. Allow the students 30 minutes to complete their
composition. Then, by using peer correction, the students can pass their story to the
next person and receive another story, which they read and try to improve or correct
grammatical or lexical problems and make suggestions. When this has been
completed, they pass it along again to have a second person correct their work, and
following this, it is sent back to the writer and they can self correct and improve their
story. Finally, the teacher may take the stories to look over them and to provide more

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specific feedback. Finally, the following week, the ‘Story-Time’ class happens with the
younger students. The students are aged between eleven and thirteen.
From observing this entire process, it is obvious that the upper-intermediate
students gladly accepted the task when they were told what the final product was. They
recognized that the process was an important factor, because without this process of
writing the story correctly, checking grammar and vocabulary and having enough
imagination to hold the children’s attention and interest, the final product of the fairy
tale would not have been a success.

4. Collecting the data

Before this activity of writing was carried out, I carried out a short questionnaire
(Appendix 1.2) with the students asking them various questions about the reasons for
learning English, future prospects, difficulties with the languages and their preferences
with skills. This made them think about the root for their knowledge of English and why
it has such importance in their lives. It was clearly highlighted before administering the
survey that the students would remain completely anonymous, thus they did not feel
threatened by any answer he / she may have given and therefore, they would have
been more honest in their answers.
I believed a questionnaire was most suitable because as Houtkoop-Steenstra
(2000) points outs: “Closed ended designs enable researchers to produce aggregated
data quickly, but the range of possible answers is set by the researchers not
respondents, and the richness of potential responses is lower. Closed ended items
often cause frustration, usually because researchers have not considered all potential
responses.” Although there are some pitfalls about questionnaires, I do think that it was
the most appropriate research method given my time and resource restrictions.
The questionnaires were clearly laid out, which made it easier for the
participants, with multiple choice answers and closed questions which helped the
student in the process and myself later in the data analysis phase. I thought about
doing the questionnaire in class, but finally I decided to ask the students to complete it
at home where they could do it in a more private situation, free of others scrutinizing
their choices.
After the project was carried out and completed, including the writing stage and
the story-telling phase, I conducted a short interview with each student (Appendix 1.3).

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The questions included in the interview phase were quite open, which gave the student
more opportunity to add valid information with their opinions and thoughts about the
project, including its process and product. As the questions were about their beliefs and
ideas on the project, there was no correct nor incorrect answer, thus I presumed that
they would have a lot of feedback for me. It could have been time-consuming to note
down their possible answers, therefore using a voice recording system on my mobile
phone was more sufficient, of course, first asking for the permission from the students.

5. Analysing the data

From conducting the initial questionnaires, we could see if any initial trends appeared.
This was easy to do for many reasons including the fact that there were a limited
number of students in the research target group (only ten) and also due to the
questionnaires having closed or multiple choice questions. Thus, the questionnaire
itself was quite restrictive with options, but offered the teacher easier and more concise
data analysis. Therefore, due to the restrictiveness of each question’s options, I had to
plan the questionnaires quite well and with enough detail to cater to the students
backgrounds. Also, I had to premeditate what their possible opinions may have been.
With regards to the interview phase, data analysis for this was slightly more
difficult as many different opinions were offered. As there were a set standard of
questions, some trends appeared, namely by indicating yes or no, but when they
offered more information, notes had to be taken down.

6. Conclusion

In conclusion, I observed an enormous difference in the motivation of my students and

I put this down to a few select things which were apparent from their feedback during
the short interviews which I conducted. Remembering the reference I made to
McDonough and Shaw in my introduction, let us make note of something else they said
about writing: “many adults...do not need to write very much in their everyday lives: and
if there are few 'real-world' reasons for writing in our L1, there are even fewer for doing
so in a foreign language.”(1993: 175-176)

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In my students case, firstly, they became more motivated when I highlighted

that the writings would be used to serve a certain purpose, namely the ‘Story-Time’
hour with younger children. They felt that this made the writing more personal and
applicable to their situation as teachers. They enjoyed the idea of working with children
as they believed it was good practise for their future careers as educators and also
something useful to have in daily life. As they now know how to construct a story similar
to this, they have asked me to dedicate a class once a month, solely to composing
these types of stories, but not only with using the story cubes, but with other materials,
for example, photos in magazines or on the internet. They considered it a real-life
experience, which it was. In this sense, when motivating students to do writing, it is
important to bring it back close to home. Make it something real which they can use.
This is comparable to that of what is outlined in case study six highlighted in our
assignment.

7. Appendix

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Appendix 1.1 - Rory’s Story Cubes (picture taken from

www.thecreativityhub.com)

Appendix 1.2 - Questionnaire

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Please note that by providing information in this questionnaire, your name

and organisation will remain unnamed and anonymous.

1. What is your educational background? (Please circle your answer)

a. undergraduate degree c. doctorate degree
b. postgraduate degree

2. What is your area of study?

a. technology d. tourism
b. education e. other
c. engineering

3. How many years have you been studying English?

a. 1 or less d. 4 years
b. 2 years e. 5 or more
c. 3 years

4. Why are you learning English?

a. for educational purposes (i.e to advance in your educational level)
b. for better job prospects
c. for travel reasons
d. because you have to (i.e to hold your university degree)
e. because you want to
f. other (please state) _____________________________________

5. Which aspect of English do you find most difficult?

a. reading e. pronunciation
b. writing f. grammar
c. listening g. vocabulary
d. speaking

6. Which aspect of English do you find least difficult?

a. reading e. pronunciation
b. writing f. grammar
c. listening g. vocabulary
d. speaking

7. When considering the skill of writing, on a scale of 1 (I love it) to 5 (I hate it),
how would you rate it?
a. 1 d. 4
b. 2 e. 5
c. 3

8. Still considering writing, what types of compositions do you usually have to

complete? (More than one answer may be possible)
a. articles d. stories
b. reports e. diaries
c. reviews f. informal letters

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g. formal letters i. essays

h. e-mails j. university assignments

9. Do you enjoy completing writing activities?

a. yes
b. no

If you stated NO to the previous question, can you explain why that is?
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________

10. Please circle some of the following adjectives you would use when thinking
about a writing activity.
a. exciting f. time-consuming
b. worthwhile g. pointless
c. important h. technical
d. practical i. demanding
e. boring j. long

11. Do you lack motivation when it comes to completing a writing activity?

a. yes
b. no

If you stated YES to the previous question, can you explain why this is?
_______________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________

12. Do you carry out any writings for personal reasons?

a. yes
b. no

If you answered YES to the previous question, please highlight the

compositions which you complete.
_______________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________

I would like to take the time to thank you for completing this questionnaire.

Appendix 1.3 - Interview questions

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1. When the teacher asked you the questions about fairy tales, were you
interested in the topic?
2. When confronted with the project of writing a fairy tale, how did you feel?
3. Did you feel like you didn’t have enough imagination to make such a story?
4. When told about the ‘Story-Time’ with younger students, did you feel more
motivated to write?
5. When introduced to the idea of using the Story Cubes, did this put your mind at
ease?
6. How did you find working and sharing your ideas with a partner first?
7. How did you find the initial drafting of your own fairy tale?
8. What are your thoughts on the peer-correction part of class?
9. When finalizing your writing, did you feel a sense of pride that you had
completed it?
10. How was your experience with working with the children during ‘Story-Time’?
11. Would you consider doing an activity like this again?
12. Do you believe that by making an activity more personal, and using it as you
need to use it in the future, it makes you more motivated to complete it?

8. Bibliography

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-Houtkoop-Steenstra H. (2000). Interaction and the standardised survey interview:

the living questionnaire. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000

- McDonough, J. & Shaw, S. (1993). Materials and Methods in ELT: A Teacher's Guide,
Blackwell.

-Wajnryb, R. (1992). Classroom Observation Tasks: A Resource Book for Language

Teachers and Trainers. Cambridge University Press. Cambridge.

9.Webography

- Common European Framework of Reference for Languages: Learning, Teaching,

Assessment (CEFR). Webpage: http://www.coe.int/t/dg4/linguistic/cadre1_en.asp

-Rory’s Story Cubes. The Creativity Hub.

Webpage: http://www.creativityhub.com/products/rory-s-story-cubes

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