CELTA Written Assignment :

Focus on the Learner- EXAMPLE

Example Assignment

Learner Profile
Manuel, 32, is a Colombian student at Intermediate level. He works as a lawyer specialised in
International Law. He works long hours and does not have much free time, but apart from studying
English he does enjoy doing some sports such as cycling and playing football.
He has been studying English privately for two years and previously studied English at school
and University. He says he learnt very little at school mainly because his teachers would focus on
reading out loud in class and memorising grammar rules. At University he was more successful. His
teachers used a more communicative approach to teaching since they would use games and role plays
so Manuel actually got to practise speaking in English.
He decided to continue studying English privately since it is important in his work: he
occasionally attends conferences in the US. Manuel is quite ambitious and by improving his English he
hopes to move up in the law firm so he is highly extrinsically motivated.
In class, he is an active participant and particularly enjoys speaking activities as well as games
and pair work that promotes production. He filled in a learning styles questionnaire and this confirmed
that he seems to be predominately an audio/visual learner..

Learner Needs

Skill (Listening)
Manuel found it particularly difficult to deal with intensive listening tasks. This, however, was less of a
problem in face to face interaction. He often based answers in class based solely on key words in the
questions heard on the CD rather than listening for other clues that might suggest the right answer.

Grammar
Manuel is quite a fluent communicator but he still has some problems with his use of the Present
Perfect, for example:

1. When I have studied English at school it was not good… (instead of “when I studied English at school…”)
2. I have started working in law firm in 1998… (instead of “I started working in a law firm in 1998…)

These errors are quite typical of Spanish speakers, since in Spanish, the Present Perfect, though it exists
as a verb form, is used differently compared to English. In fact, it can be used with time-when
adverbials, when English demands a past form (example 1) and it also expresses a finished action in the
past (example 2). (Swan and Smith. 2001: 102)
The Simple Past/Present Perfect distinction is an area that Manuel needs to continue working on in
order to move away from L1 interference, the principal cause of these errors.

Pronunciation
Manuel’s pronunciation is generally intelligible though again he makes typical mistakes of Spanish
speakers, for example:

1. I enjoy practise sport… (pronounced /’ szport./) instead of / ‘spo:t/

2. This school is good… (pronounced /’ szkul/) instead of / ‘sku:l/
3. I have a special dream… (pronounced /’ szpecial/ instead of /’ speSiel/

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 CELTA Written Assignment :
Focus on the Learner- EXAMPLE

In Spanish, ‘s’ plus another consonant never occurs at the beginning of a word, but is always preceded
by ‘e’, for example: estacion (station). Manuel is transferring this Spanish rule to English pronunciation
resulting in an inappropriately intrusive /e/. (Swan and Smith. 2001:94)

Suggested Activities

Skill (Listening)
He would benefit from an intensive listening programme – listening to songs in his free time noting
down the message of the song and since he is very interested in film he could watch with English
subtitles to build up a correspondence between the written and spoken form of the English language.
Another piece of practice would be the Listening task on page 66 of the workbook of Choice Pre-
intermediate where they deal with ways of predicting what words might be used instead of the key
word in the question to get the correct answer.

Grammar
For Manuel to practise differentiating between Past Simple and Present Perfect Simple I would give
him and his fellow students the activity “Find someone who… lied!” from the Cutting Edge Intermediate
Resource Pack in the Teacher’s Book (appendix 1).
In this activity, the students have to mingle and ask each other “Have you ever…?” based on prompts
given on the “Liar! question sheet”. The student answering can decide whether to lie or tell the truth.
The student asking the question can then ask a maximum of three follow up questions (in the Past
Simple) to determine whether his/her fellow student is lying or not. “Liar” cards are exchanged on the
basis of the answers and the winner is the student who has the fewest “Liar” cards at the end.

Rationale
This activity will force Manuel to differentiate between using the Present Perfect Simple to express
experience and Simple Past (finished actions in the past). He tends to over-generalise and express all
finished actions using the Present Perfect Simple. Since this is a mingling activity, it should appeal to
Manuel’s social nature and the question prompt sheet will aid his visual learning style. The activity is
also reliant on the students listening carefully to each other which should appeal to Manuel’s auditory
intelligence. The extent of repetition should also help make the production of this target language
more automatic.

Pronunciation
A simple game of bingo can help Manuel with his pronunciation problem (appendix 2). This can be
played first in T – Ss mode to demonstrate the activity, but then students in groups play the game.
Each student has a bingo card with words containing consonant clusters beginning with ‘s’ and also
some words beginning ‘es’. Students listen to the person calling out the words and put a cross on the
word on their bingo card, if they have it. The first student to cross out all their words shouts “Bingo!”
and is the winner.

Rationale
This game will develop his ability to discriminate between when ‘e’ is pronounced and when not. By
playing the game in groups, he should also get the opportunity to practise producing these sounds as
he calls out the words and this will get him to focus on the accuracy of his pronunciation. In addition,
it is the type of game Manuel enjoys playing so his motivation should be high.

991 words

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 CELTA Written Assignment :
Focus on the Learner- EXAMPLE

Bibliography
Learner English, ed. Swan and Smith, CUP 2001
Grammar for English Language Teachers, Martin Parrott, CUP 2000
Cutting Edge Intermediate Teacher’s Book, Cunningham and Moor, Longman 1998
Vocabulary Games and Activities for Teachers, Peter Watcyn-Jones, Penguin 1999

Appendix 1 (practice task for grammar)

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 CELTA Written Assignment :
Focus on the Learner- EXAMPLE

Appendix 2 (practice task for phonology)

Bingo cards

school special especially

sport strange sport

station estate starter star

station strange star estate

space string school

escape space station

Words to call out (cut up individually):

school special sport station estate especially

strange starter star space string escape

Adapted from Vocabulary Games and Activities for Teachers, Peter Watcyn-Jones, Penguin 1993

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