SOFIA AFIDCHAO
I had been in the teaching profession for many years teaching students coming from different cultures.
Location Philippines
Activity
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Thanks for all these great lessons
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Ni hao!
Wo jiao Sofia. Wo shi philippine ren
Hen gaoxing ren shi ni -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Thanks for the insights
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Thanks for the review I got from @ Sinphaxay Thongsombath.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
I'm working in China currently so I want to learn mandarin.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Sharing with you my essay:
https://write.as/tzmiekbicdrdt.md -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Thank you. the essay writing activities are great!
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
The criteria for organisation and ideas are achieved. I was just thinking if he could have added some statistical evidence to his claims to make it more convincing.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Essay Plan:
Background: Baguio City - The most visited city in the Philippines. It's the summer capital of the Philippines. It has cool weather with an altitude of 5100 feet. Its located at 1600 meters above sea level and nestled within the mountain range.
Thesis Statement: Why Baguio is the summer capital of the Philippines.
Paragraph 1
Paragraph... -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
The diagram is indeed helpful in mapping out the ideas: which to include and not to include
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
thank you for the learnings.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
To help my students remember the linking words, I let them use the code: FANBOYS - for, and, neither, but, or, yet, so
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
There are more than 7000 islands in the Philippines.
There is a dearth of trees now to give space to buildings. -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Thank you for the inputs and suggestions. The activities and quizzes are very helpful.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Discuss the reasons why learning the English language is important. I have chosen this topic because I have a good background in it and it has a general significance.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Very good suggestion.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Ni hao. Wo shi Sofia. Wo shi philippine ren. Wo shi laoshi. Hen gaoxing ren sheni.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Hi. I'm Sofia, currently working in China. I'm hoping to improve my Chinese language with this course.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
One thing I learned from this weeks lesson is to understand the essay question before developing the content. Thanks
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
I'm from the Philippines, "The pearl of the orient seas", where you can find over 7,000 islands, fine beaches and coastlines.
In the past, these islands, beaches, seas, and coastlines were guilelessly pristine. People would relish their beauty and charm. Nowadays it's sad to note that most of these islands and waters have been polluted brought about by the in... -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
His essay has improved.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Content: his ideas are evidenced by his actual observation and his knowledge of his country's history. These evidence gain for him trust from his readers.
Organization: I think he has to work on his connectors as he develops his essay to make the transition from one point to another easier to follow.
Language: he has to check on his word choice, spelling,... -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
There are a lot of things to talk about the past and the now of my country though I would zero in the culture of learners as this has a great impact on me as a teacher.
In the past, students are more focused, critical, and follow instructions without any hint of grumbling. Today, learners are faced with a lot of distractions more so those from technology. I... -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
I'm both a teacher and researcher. I teach writing but I never really considered myself as a writer. Joining this course I believe will help me fill in the gaps of my writing skills.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
A. Items to include:
1. Learning objectives for direction
2. Links to other subjects, careers, and local links to the real world.
3. Practical or contextualised activities.
B. Items not to include:
1. Timings
2. Prescribed assessments and activities
A factor that influenced my choice: Our curriculum is test-driven, hence learning is focused on... -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
star: straightforward curriculum linking learning to real-life situations
star: free implementation of teaching strategies according to students' level of proficiency.
wish: To teach to the construct instead of to the test. -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Thank you for these well - mapped pointers. They are indeed important reminders.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Base on the result of the entry test my students have different proficiency levels: pre-intermediate and beginner.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
At the beginning of classes, I require my students to fill in their "profile cards". These help me to get some information to understand and relate with them better.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
I see my learners are getting more confident in expressing themselves. I think this is because of my continued reassurance that "It's ok to make mistakes".
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO replied to Bernard Lewis
yes..this is also what i usually do. Giving an opportunity for student to self-correct their errors and it usually works.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Since i teach ESL, visual images are always an ingredient in my lesson. i deliver my lessons through power point presentation so all these pictures, video, and audio are easily embedded.
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Great resource material. I use visual images to teach vocabulary. I also use pictures for speaking activities, where I show each group a picture with different settings and personas. The group will put life to the people in the picture by creating dialogues according to the situatuation suggested in the picture, then they act it out in the class.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
We do role plays and group works. Pair work is not feasible due to our big class population.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
I asked my students to write a narrative essay since we just reconvened after the mid- autumn holidays. I mapped out the features needed including stating purpose of the essay, and including the three important parts of the essay. In each part,I asked questions to guide them. For language, I reminded them to use the past tense of the verb which they learned...
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
I never tried recording my feedback. I think this is interesting and I would like to try it.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
The essay has the basic parts of an essay: introduction, body, conclusion. Background information is provided which I think is important to pursuade the reader. The conclusion is straightforward but has a strong impact on the reader.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Thanks for this. I usually just do the 'building.. and modelling...then to individual constructing...' due to time constraints. But as presented here I think it's best to do all the steps..
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Thank you. Awaiting for more courses from you.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
I would follow through the explicit vocabulary instructions, focusing on active practice. Thank you for all the learnings and enlightenment.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
thanks for sharing the PPT.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
i usually use the Frayer model and word association which is similar to word mapping. I would like to try the Paint chart model.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
I usually do this by asking students to fill in their vocabulary charts with these categories: words I know, words I know a little, and words I don't know. These give the students a chance to play an important role in vocabulary instruction which is often times only given to the teacher to do.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Thanks for the illustration. But I'm still not confident with how to categorize between useful and important words. Actually even in the illustration, Rebecca was saying "... put bide in difficult words but I think it’s a really useful word". The term "useful" and "important" here are a little tricky. I hope you can give a more concrete example or non-example...
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
How do you exactly put these methods in the teaching process? is this a teacher or student tasks?
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
I didn't know that reading aloud is one strategy to teach vocabulary.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Hi everyone! I guess I'm in good hands..
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Great team !
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
It was unfortunate that I wasn't able to watch. Fire wall issues.
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Thank you for these learnings.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
I opt to use MCQs in my big classes. This is for practical reasons.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
I feel satisfied when after giving feedback on my student's grammar test, they will come to me to "negotiate". Like one student will insist on his answer by pointing out some rules of grammar while another student will come to verify on his score. All these are part of the learning process I believe.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
I have taken notes of the APTIS sample vocabulary test types. They are very simple yet thought provoking with easy to follow instructions. I will be adapting some of this test types in my vocabulary assessment. Thank you
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@CathK I'm sorry I don't understand what you mean by ' my observation is opposite to what the article reports'.
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I'm sorry I don't understand what you mean by 'my observation is opposite to what the article reports'?
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The given answers are all possible in a prescriptive point of view and I totally agree. But as to where I'm teaching the "only" correct answer is the one that follows what grammar rules dictate. Again in here, the scenario goes back to the issue as to whether we are teaching to the test or to teaching to the construct.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
I agree with Mr. O'Sullivan. It is important to learn grammar. If we intend to be proficient with our language, we need to improve on our accuracy. Assessing grammar only therefore may result to a negative washback as it would not check on how students can use grammar in context which accordingly is one important aspect of learning a language. Hence, as...
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
My students are A2 level but I taught them the first conditional only to reinforce my lesson about future clause using time conjunctions.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
We teach grammar to prepare students to take their 'gaokao', a standardized test given by the govt which has a gate function to determine students who can and can't enroll in university.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Its in not written in English?
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Can I post a question?
In EFL classes, is it helpful to give the translation of the technical word in Students' language? -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
I'm only able to go through source one but I see the other sources promising a wealth of information for neophyte researcher like me.
Currently we do 'looping' in our school where a teacher in the 10th grade follows through his Students in the 11th grade ( our program follows a two-yr curriculum). As per my observations looping helps in two significant... -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
There's nothing in the link...
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
I am Sofia, a foreign teacher. I joined this course to help me develop some research materials for topics that I'm interested to research on.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
It all depends on the subskill that I'm testing, like if its listening for gist, then a spelling error would not be taken against the score for I'm more interested with the general idea taken from the recording for example. But if its listening for specific information, then the keywords must be spelled correctly.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
The school provides us the listening tracks to test students..one that is difficult for student is the speech rate which is quiet fast.
Solution: I recorded the tracks myself following a normal speech rate. Doing this, students were able to follow through. -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Thank you so much
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I agree..and on the issue of students not knowing how to answer the question types, it will help and it's important that our test Instructions are clear and intelligible..
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Culture sensitivity is an important criteria I consider whenever I choose a task for my students. Here are some topics that are taboo in my classroom: religious practices and politics.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Very helpful tools indeed. Thanks
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Since my students language level is A1-A2, I need to consider vocabulary, sentence length/structure, tone of language (culture sensitivity) of the text.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
In my location, where mostly teachers are teaching to the test, reading process operates at a local level or as they say 'bottom-up process'. The text is understood via a thorough dissection of words, phrases, grammatical structure to finally getting meaning at sentence level.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Scanning - emails, text messages
skimming - posts from social media
intensive reading - online courses for professional development
extensive reading - 'how to books/articles' for enjoyment -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
I see the act of seeing/hearing as passive taking that I'm merely using these senses anatomically; reading/listening as a receptive skill is active for whilst learners don't need to produce language to do this, they receive and understand it.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Thank you for all the learnings and insights discussed, presented, and shared. It was a productive week. I'm holistically rating the course 9.8 (10 is the highest) The remaining 2 points is to give room for improvement which I believe is achievable.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
in as much as I would like to join, my location does not allow me to sign in
in Facebook not even with my VPN. Nevertheless, thank you for all the learnings I'm looking forward to more relevant topics that for sure will help everyone. -
This is fun.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
The most recent writing I asked from my students was simply to write the story behind a shadow dance that I let them watched. This is their output after we talked about the parts of a short story.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
We do standardization meeting to discuss on the differences/similarities of scores that we give to a writing paper. At the end of the meeting, we do revisions of the criteria that we used and make amendments to fit in with the pointers we have agreed on. This way, the criteria that we used for a school term are either revised or totally changed.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Aptis writing rating scale is holistic; IELTS is analytic.
Depending on my learning objectives I would either use Aptis or IELTS, but mostly I use Aptis. I treat writing as an avenue for my students to express their ideas as they freely write them down without so much pressure from me having them understood first what I wanted them to write. Thus, in... -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
1. Giving opinions, negotiating
2. The first questions were answerable with a word or a phrase. The
rest of the questions require the use of correct grammatically structured
sentences since they are asking for the writer's opinion.
The email to a friend - uses informal language, conversational tone
The email to the president of... -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
A. emails, text messages, graduation speech
B. emails, letters, narrative essays, short stories, dialogues
Differences: the purpose of writing, language use, lexical resources
Similarities: type of writing -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
My student's fluency and coherence lands at close to band 3.0, where they speak with long pauses having difficulty to link simple sentences and therefore unable to convey basic messages.
At the next level up - 4.0 , they start to respond with few noticeable errors, though speaking slowly, they are able to link basic sentences.
In feedback I need to teach... -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Peer assessment is great and very practical. Its important though that before students are plunged into this role, they must have understood what they are about to do - assessing their peers: what to assess (construct), how to assess (rating scale, rubrics etc...), and even may be why they are the ones assessing and not the teacher. With this, a positive...
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
The constraints that i face is time considering the large number of students i have. To address this constraints I go back to my construct (as has been well defined in this course - testing to the construct). If i want to test their speaking skills in informal conversations for example, this will be done by groups. Each group is given a real-world situation...
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
1. Obviously, the IELTS rating scale is more detailed than the FCE scale, however both follow the same criteria but only differs in some used nomenclatures such as IELTS use 'lexical resource' parallel to FEC's 'vocabulary. Each are designed for their specific purpose. IELTS exams for example has a gatekeeping function, it is taken for visa and citizenship...
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@NoemíMartínezPérez I see this "comparing themselves with other pupils" as a healthy competition in the classroom that is why teachers must be objective in giving feedback and not subjective, targeting on the good points of students' work and giving suggestions to improve as well. Rubrics are helpful in giving objective feedbacks.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
I've used all these formats, depending on my learning objectives and students' proficiency level and classroom behavior. Example, for students who are shy to talk, pairing them with someone boosts their confidence somehow.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
If I'll use this process in my class I will include language use as the 4th factor:
Audience: my mum
Reason: to allow me to visit my friend on Saturday
Context: informal conversation with her at lunchtime
Language: Can I visit my friend on Saturday?
Or: I want to visit my friend on Saturday, May I?
Note: language use depends on teachers language focus... -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
I always design my tests to teach to the construct because to me, the reason why I'm giving the test is to assess/ validate the students' ability say in speaking or writing which I've taught them. However, for purposes of revision, to prepare students for an incoming examination such as a final test, I teach to the test.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Recently, with my A1 and A2 senior high school students, we did a test on having a simple conversation with language focus on the use of the verbs - will, be going to, and present continuous used to tell their future plans and intentions. My only criteria is grammar - correct usage of the verbs mentioned.
Process:
Presentation: I started by setting the... -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
From where I'm teaching, passing the entry tests for university is almost the "be-all and end-all" of learning. Teachers and students focus on learning everything that is aligned to the test construct.
Indeed negative washback must be avoided and this is workable if teachers understand clearly the skills / abilities that they are testing. -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
My students fall at basic level: A1 and A2. Their macro skills can only do as much as to deal with simple topics of themselves, family, friends, where they live, what they do.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Doing continuous assessment in my classroom include: giving daily recitations to check on the speaking skills and language use of students as they freely share their ideas or answers to a given context, asking/ giving feedback from/to students to check listening skills and knowledge retention, checking/enforcing classroom rules (no food allowed in the...
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
I'm interested to learn about assessment because I believe this is the core of teaching-learning process and as a teacher I have to be at least well versed on how assessment works or applied.
I agree with what Dr. Nick Saville mentioned that successful teaching 'involves setting goals, monitoring performance, and giving feedback'. The absence of any of this... -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
error correction.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Thank you.
Is the course offer for free? -
SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Thanks for this summary. Let's not forget to set an environment where Learning is fun.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
Knowing students profile or persona is indeed important for teachers for two purposes: to build rapport with students, and for assessment purposes as discussed.
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SOFIA AFIDCHAO made a comment
1. I use on-the-spot correction to respond to errors that are merely "mistakes". In doing this I let the student corrects her own mistake (self-correction), at times I ask another student to correct a student's mistake (peer correction) or I do the correction myself.
2. I also use delayed correction. Here I do the correction after a speaking activity. So as...