11/11 Review Test on Lesson 7
1. Check the answers on Ss' workbooks. The English assistant wrote down the answers on the board. (5 min)
2. Elicit questions from Ss. Solve their questions before the review test started. (5 min)
3. Doing the test.(30-35 min)
4. Check the answers. (5-10 min)
REFLECTION
At first, I had no idea what kind of answers Ss would produce. After the first class, I got a grip on Ss' possible answers and was able to help them solve their problems more confidently.
I also learned that I have to trust my linguistic instincts.It is possible that there may be some mistakes in the test sheet and also the answer sheet.Some of the questions, especially the translation questions are not well presented in a reasonable context. The ambiguity made Ss confused and also made me feel uncertain how far I should explain to them and what types of answers could be accepted. I hate to tell Ss that they should stick to one possible answer, for example,環遊世界 should be 'travel around the world'('take a trip around the world' is accepted this time), not 'go all over the world' because Ss should be allowed to make mistakes and try out the language they learn. However, these mistakes are counted as grades,which are a huge concern for Ss. The ideas of encouraging Ss to produce the language and evaluating their production by grades seem contradictory to me. It seems that Ss get punished for their mistakes, which is an essential process of learning a foreign language. If the tests or the answers are rigid, how can we encourage our Ss to try out the language? I'm a little skeptical about the function of 'translation practices' in the review test and I'm not sure which position I should take.
posted by yuming at 9:12 AM
1 Comments:
Dear Yu-ming,
As long as you think the answer is right, don't worry about the "standard" answer. (The standard answer should only be for your reference.) This holds true for monthly exams and national exams as well. That was probably part of the reason why translation was removed from the national exams for quite a few years; unfortunately, it came back last year. People argue that students' writing proficiency went down with the removal, but I am not sure about that. Personally, I think translation practice is good under two conditions: one, there is no standard answer; two, the sentences to be translated into have more to do with "real English," not from textbooks!
Post a Comment
<< Home