English Fluency by Students and Individuals - Essay Example

?Sentence Fluency In recent years, acceleration in the need for recognition of English fluency has been considered as a prime factor for individual’sdevelopment and growth. English fluency has usually been neglected by students and individuals, but in recent years it has proved to be of ample importance in the international context of reading development. In the debated stance of English fluency, sentences reflect an accelerated degree of craftsmanship that comprises the consistently stronger along with the varied structures of phraseology, which makes the oral reading easier as well as enjoyable. Furthermore, sentence fluency is also ascertained to indulge rhythm and movement. Contextually, it is these aspects that represent the important ideas of sentence fluency (Timothy, “Guided Fluency Instruction: Moving Students to Independence”). GOAL STATEMENT The fundamental goal of the curriculum will concentrate on critically evaluating knowledge gained by the learners with respect to planning, evaluation and editing of the writings by learners. In this regard, applying brainstorming sessions, group discussion and peer review will be taken into account strategically. The application of this curriculum is likely to enhance the understanding capability of the learners with respect to their ideas related to the usage of detailed information along with application of apt words. It is expected that with the assistance of this curriculum, learners will be able to easily identify and rectify their syntax mistakes, which they used to be ignorant towards in prior instances. This curriculum will also act with the aim to fortify the quality of the sentences framed by the learners (Timothy, “Guided Fluency Instruction: Moving Students to Independence”). This curriculum has been specially designed to initiate the need for sentence fluency among the domestic and the international students. This curriculum will assist the learners throughout their developmental course, generating a sense of need and importance for this particular subject, as it has a strong hold with respect to communicative competencies in the international plethora. DISCUSSION In precise, this curriculum will assist the learner to have a better insight about the importance of applying facts and figures within the informational article. It is worth mentioning in this context that there exist a generalized six kinds of writing traits viz., idea and concept, organization, voice, sentence fluency, usage of words and conventions. In consideration with the curriculum, it will enhance the ideas and the conception of the learner with regard to writing a sentence or sentence fluency. Furthermore, this curriculum will be intended towards assisting the learners in organizing sentences in order to develop their abilities to convey the concerned ideas maintaining consistency in the flow of information. It is in this context that voice frames an important part in the formation of sentences accelerating sentence fluency in turn. The curriculum designed will therefore foster understanding of the learner concerning smooth and harmonized flow of ideas and objectives with respect to the sentences. Moreover, this curriculum will also intend to assist the learners concerning the importance of words choice in maintaining and grooming sentence fluency (Timothy, “Guided Fluency Instruction: Moving Students to Independence”). Instructional design will also be regarded to hold considerable importance in the success potentials of the curriculum. Instructional design comprises a series of procedures, which aim at assisting in the development of the quality aspects and evaluative efficiency of the curriculum being designed. Instructional procedure comprehensively builds up with the requirement of sentence fluency for individual development. Furthermore, the instructional content of this curriculum will entail an objective-oriented approach in its designing. Fluency within the sentences, in this context, imposes a greater impact on the listeners and the readers too. The following procedures comprise learning format, which principally inculcates content-based learning. Grammar, small article and newspaper reading thus frame an important part of the design process. Brainstorming sessions, written examinations, solved answers with detailed explanations, usage of apt words, video clips containing different forms of questions and pronunciation related errors and their corresponding rectifications constitute some of the factors, which will be included in the curriculum sessions. Furthermore, the curriculum will entail certain articles depicting the importance of sentence fluency within the societal context. The instructional content therefore will aim at replicating the organized form of knowledge required to attain accelerated English fluency by the learners. Allocation of time frames can be affirmed as another important part for the instructional content. Accordingly, learning space will be allocated to each of the curriculum sessions for effective outcomes related to sentence fluency. Literatures, online journals, articles, worksheets for practicing syntaxes and grammar books among others, will be the resources used for this curriculum. In this regard analysis of the performances associated with the feedback obtained from the learners in the initial stages and accordingly, in the later stages of the curriculum will also be considered in this curriculum (Timothy, “Guided Fluency Instruction: Moving Students to Independence”). Another major feature of the curriculum will be its compilation of modern teaching techniques. In comparison to the traditional methods of teaching English, the modern technology mainly focuses on a student–centered approach and aims to provide assistance in developing their individual understanding, rather than steering them to follow a predefined decorum. According to Jim Scrivener, a teacher’s primary role comprises of “help learning to happen”, which focused on involving the learner by allowing him/her to work according to their understanding, developing their aptitude level continually. According to various critics, the cognitive as well as the general knowledge of the learner concerning sentence formation, act as a key factor to determine the appropriateness of sentence fluency. This certainly requires the learners to cultivate their ideas spontaneously with continuous assistance from the teachers, rather than being steered towards a conventional way of conduct. Furthermore, it has been depicted that ‘communication of meaning’ is inculcated with the modern methodology of teaching. In the modern methodology, the focus has mainly shifted from the need of knowledge as well as skills to the usage of grammars and other language to foster effective communication. Furthermore, there are three principles related to modern methodology that will be taken into account in this curriculum in the forms of “the primary of speech”, “the centrality of connected text as the heart of teaching-learning process” and “absolute priority of an oral methodology in the classroom” (Timothy, “Guided Fluency Instruction: Moving Students to Independence”). TARGET AUDIENCES Targeted audiences for the curriculum of sentence fluency will comprises of the international students from distinct linguistic backgrounds such as, Mexican, Brazilian, Chinese, Korean and the Saudis. It further consists of the (English as the Second Language) ESL, graduates and the undergraduate students within the age group of 20 - 30 years. Correspondingly, targeted audiences of the curriculum will also comprise of domestic undergraduate students within the age group of 19-25 years. Contextually, in the recent years, countless immigrants in America have also been continuously striving for a successful career, wherein the most common challenges faced by this particular group was their incompetency in the context of English conversation (Helgesen, “Mexican Immigrant Challenges in the United States Public School System: A Case Study of Two Schools”). Hence, this particular group of population will also be considered as a prime audience segment for the curriculum. In consideration with the demographic characteristics of the students, 24% of the students who opt for English fluency development, represent the immigrants of the country, including Mexico, Brazil, China, Korea and the Saudi-Arabia. These students struggle hard to sustain within the school purview, as they face the problem of language fluency. This particular problem also creates hurdles in their understanding of the subject matter. Herein, emerges the importance of sentence fluency, which acts as a boon for the immigrants to sustain within the competitive scenario, in which they are studying (Helgesen, “Mexican Immigrant Challenges in the United States Public School System: A Case Study of Two Schools”). The other group of audience to be targeted through the curriculum comprises the students enrolled with ESL. ESL offered within the educational curriculum of many American schools. This particular segment is further characterized with Limited in English Proficiency (LIP) students, framing a major proportion of immigrants. Although the motive behind categorizing such a special dimension in the education system was to deliver due assistance to the foreign students in obtaining the benefits of the learning mechanism, a major negative implication of the framework is its ability to seclude students from the mainstream population and thus create hurdles for them to develop and understand foreign language easily and conveniently. Essentially, when addressing this particular group of audiences, the notion of ‘Language Shock’ can be considered as significant in unveiling the rudimental problems faced by LIP students. Furthermore, this particular term also signifies the nervousness that the immigrants mainly experience when they first enter the school to receive higher education and as a consequence, the students struggle for quite a longer period to acquire better understanding of the subjects. Furthermore, immigrants also have to face problems in aligning themselves with the dimensions of modern pedagogy owing to the differences persisting in the international educational system. In order to relate conveniently with the subjects being taught, clear understanding is the basic requirement. This curriculum, which is being designed for such students, will therefore ensure that the immigrants have a better understanding of the subject matter. This shall in turn affect their psychology to a greater extent (Helgesen, “Mexican Immigrant Challenges in the United States Public School System: A Case Study of Two Schools”). Concerning with the domestic students, it has often been ascertained that international students lay a greater impact on the progressive aptitude level of domestic students. International schools have been built up with an aim to establish international relationship among the students. Correspondingly, in recent survey reports, it has been depicted that domestic students are immensely uninterested to build up a relationship with the international students owing to their linguistic distinctiveness apart from other ethnic characteristics. Such behavioral traits have also been creating a hurdle in the development of psychoanalytic perceptions of the domestic students. The undergraduates of the domestic country have been thus facing the problem related to effective communication with the international students. Thus, the curriculum will aim to ensure better understanding of the sentence formation and the importance of fluency for internal as well as external developments (Helgesen, “Mexican Immigrant Challenges in the United States Public School System: A Case Study of Two Schools”). LEARNING OBJECTIVES The standards or criteria to be inculcated in the curriculum will emphasize achieving language proficiency in English, developing an advanced academic knowledge within the learners and making them eligible to face the challenges of the pedagogic contents along with assisting them to achieve competencies that will ensure better growth and development of the international as well as the domestic students in the American educational system. Furthermore, the objective of the curriculum will be aimed at developing English language proficiency on the basis of two prior standards that viz., ‘cross-curricular second language proficiency’ and the differentiated ‘proficiency level descriptors’. Moreover, this curriculum being designed will assist the students to have a better understanding about the nature of language proficiency and its corresponding needs. Wherein, the notion of language proficiency will can be attained with the implementation of Basic, Interpersonal, Communication and Skills (BICS) and Cognitive, Academic, Language and Proficiency (CALP) (Teresa, “Methods for Becoming a Better Writer”). Correspondingly, the learner will become aware of academic languages and will feel convenient to indulge into for absorbing a better understanding of the contents included with the academic courses. This particular feature of the curriculum will further ensure the students to attain better results in the foreign countries and to gain competitive advantages over other students. Academic languages are mainly linked with the thinking process of the classroom. It further inculcates the developmental plan of the students with regard to respective classrooms. Nonetheless, this particular curriculum will ensure in-depth analysis of the course study, emphasizing the cause and effect relationship concerning learners’ performances to have a better understanding of the subject matter and efficiency drivers of the curriculum (Teresa, “Methods for Becoming a Better Writer”). The other notion to be focused on in this curriculum will affirm that fluency not only includes speaking, but it also inculcates writing efficiency. The curriculum will thus foster effective communication among the peers, helping the students to deal with the challenges of using words correctly. It will further aim to enhance the grammar skills of the learner focusing on their competencies related to phraseology. It is expected that learners, with the help of the curriculum, will also be able to classify dissimilarities among others to have a better and a clear understanding of the subject matter. This particular curriculum will further assist the learners to build up confidence to perform in a foreign environment. Furthermore, by acquiring fluency in English, learners will be able to relate with subject matter more easily (Teresa, “Methods for Becoming a Better Writer”). ASSESSMENT The content of the curriculum will correspondingly assessed by considering theoretical foundations in this curriculum. This particular assessment tool will mainly reflect the content of the curriculum based on the current events to deliver updated information to the students regarding the subject matter. In lieu of this particular assessment tool, a research-based content will be applied in this study to help learners in analyzing and evaluating the accuracy of the content and accordingly, facilitate the logical interpretive capabilities of the learners in interpreting the ongoing phenomenon applying English language. In this curriculum, content assessment will also be considered as a vital assessment tool, which shall enable learners in absorbing a vivid view with regard to learning outcomes and its effectiveness. In this regard, the learners will be asked to convey their learning outcomes and experiences from the curriculum in a comprehensive manner, which will in turn be evaluated through the application of the balanced-viewpoint tool (AZED.gov, “Sentence Fluency”). The assessment methodology will entail adjunct questions throughout the curriculum. In this stand, fixed time will be allotted to the participants and immediate evaluation result will be depicted on the screen. This technique will ensure enhanced development of the participants with respect to sentence fluency. Correspondingly, the assessment tools will further include Microsoft Web matrix 3 and the Web server as a part of Html 5 environment in combination with Google sites. Furthermore, formative assessment tool will be implemented to activate the prior knowledge of the participants related to sentence fluency. The assessment technique will comprise of video instructions. This will enable the participants to get a proper assessment outcome and proper usage of tenses, which will ultimately enhance their competency related to sentence fluency ((Intel Corporation, “Updated Tools”; Microsoft Corporation, “Your First Website Using WebMatrix). Comprehensively, assessment signifies the generation of information related to the progression of learners as the most essential benefit of implementing the curriculum. Furthermore, this particular information is shared among the learners, with a view to provide them with almost accurate feedbacks, which will enable the learners to identify their strengths and weaknesses and accordingly, deliver greater assurance for effectiveness. Moreover, formal and informal feedback sessions will also enable the learners in identifying their next level of approach and strategy for personal development by engaging in the curriculum (AZED.gov, “Sentence Fluency”). CONTENT OUTLINE Content outline of the curriculum will entail all the information and the courses needed for an effective session to be developed. The courses inculcated within the content of this curriculum will mainly comprise of text books, video clips, short methods of learning and the work book for practicing. The content will also entail differentiated examples of methodology applied for learning in an effective way. In this curriculum, the content will mainly relate with the ESL learners. In accordance with these learners, it is necessary to build up interests within them concerning the subject matter. Moreover, as the main targeted learners in this curriculum are immigrants who have entered foreign schools for higher studies, the content development tool will be applied on the audience group comprising undergraduates separately from that applied to develop the graduates (Oxford, “Course Outline”). A brief explanation of the contents and the courses involved within it has been represented below. Considering the undergraduate level, it has often been asserted that the course content with regard to this particular group will be of basic level. It will entail three sessions for the implementation of the courses on a continuous procedure. In concern with session 1, it will involve principles of the effective ESL materials, designs as well as the developmental phases. In this part, the learner will able to understand the basic requirements for the courses to execute. Furthermore, this aspect will also provide a vivid view regarding the materials and the subject matters needed to be absorbed by the learners in course of their development. In with the first session, it teaching mechanism will further involve a brief introduction of the courses, which will be followed during the execution of the curriculum. It will also inculcate basic ESL games, which will be effective to hold the interests of the learners and also foster effective learning of English to increase the basic knowledge among the audience group (Oxford, “Course Outline”). The content will further inculcate active prior knowledge formative assessment, where a participant will be guided to obtain a clear understanding about his/her position with respect to sentence fluency by implementing Html 5 environment as a combination of Microsoft WebMatrix 3, Web Server and Google Sites. It is expected that this tool will assist the participants to eradicate the loopholes accordingly. The formative assessment tool will enable the participants to ensure prior knowledge related to sentence fluency.The participants will be provided with video instruction as well, which will assist them to evaluate their knowledge effectively. Correspondingly, the inclusion of the Summative Assessment Quiz will be implemented for making the self-evaluation technique more effective through embedded adjunct questions. Usage of correct form of parts of speech can be evaluated by the aforesaid forms of techniques (Intel Corporation, “Updated Tools”; Microsoft Corporation, “Your First Website Using Web Matrix”). Considering the second session, the curriculum will inculcate lesson planning and effective techniques to classroom management facilitating group activities to convey the importance of English fluency in the verge of modernization and as an important part in the personal development of an individual. Furthermore, this particular session will also intend the inculcation of cultural sensitivity within the learners so that they are able to get involve with the foreign educational system facing lesser difficulties. The third session entails English books, grammar materials and other reading books to increase the vocabulary of the learners. The grammar book will contain short exercises, which will result in the development of the basic knowledge of the learners. Furthermore, it entails vocabulary techniques to attain and preserve the enthusiastic interests of the learners and simultaneously, increase their effectiveness with regard to English fluency (Oxford, “Course Outline”). In the similar context, the course content of the graduate’s level mainly reflects the higher level English practices and activities. In this curriculum, the course contents of session 1 for the graduate will remain similar to that of undergraduates. Furthermore, the second session of the graduates will entail more difficult level of activities to derive a vivid understanding about the thinking process of the learners. This particular group will also need basic grammar sessions to achieve the desired results. Accordingly, it will further inculcate the usage of phrasal verbs and the idioms. Wherein in session three, the contents will include multiple intelligence theory, conflict resolution techniques and the usage of work book activities in order to gain transparency and accuracy in evaluating the learning progress observable among the students (Oxford, “Course Outline”). The pictorial representation of the curriculum contents in a flow chart format has been given below. Works Cited “Sentence Fluency”. Grade 3 Sample Test Prompt. AZED.gov, 2007. Web. 13 Sep. 2013. . Helgesen, Caitlin. “Mexican Immigrant Challenges in the United States Public School System: A Case Study of Two Schools”. Journal of Undergraduate Research 12(2009). Print. “Updated Tools”. Application Framework. Intel Corporation, n.d. Web. 13 Sep. 2013. . “Your First Website Using Web Matrix”. Home. Microsoft Corporation, 2011. Web. 13 Sep. 2013. . Nielson, Teresa. Methods for Becoming a Better Writer. Phenomenal Sentence Fluency, 2008. Web. 13 Sep. 2013. . “Course Outline.” Seminars. Oxford, 2013. Web. 13 Sep. 2013. . Rasinski, Timothy. Guided Fluency Instruction: Moving Students to Independence. Research paper, n.d. Web. 13 Sep. 2013. . Read More