Individual response - Sharifah Wardah

1)   In my opinion, the Cognitivist & Interactionist theories are enacted in this lesson plan.

Cognitivist - Teacher explicitly teaches the 'rule' : Before a full stop or exclamation mark, syllables have a fall tone, and before a comma or question mark, syllables have a rise tone. She then goes on to explain how pitch and tone contributes to expressiveness when reading aloud. By explicitly teaching the 'rule', pupils will be aware of how to vary their pitch and tone when they are reading aloud.

        Interactionist – The activities in this lesson are mostly student-centered. These activities require pupils to work with one another. They learn with and from one another.

 Strengths:

• Teacher uses the video at the start of the lesson. An interesting start of a lesson is very important as it sets the ‘mood’ for the rest of the lesson. The video is an interesting ICT tool which will engage pupils in the lesson. As mentioned by Towndrow (2007), “Children are generally excited about using technology especially when it is compared with individual work that is based on a textbook or workbook. ICT is acknowledged for its power to motivate, engage and empower..” When pupils are engaged, they will be able to learn more effectively.
  
• Teacher explicitly explains the rule: Before a full stop or exclamation mark, syllables have a fall tone, and before a comma or question mark, syllables have a rise tone. In this way, pupils will be made aware of the importance of tone variation. They will thus be more conscious of their intonation, leading to improved speech.

• Pupils work in pairs, observing one another and giving feedback to one another. As mentioned by Chapelle & Jamieson (2008), it is good to provide learners with opportunities for interaction because interaction often entails getting clarification about the meaning of language that learners do not initially understand.
• The use of the IFS gadget in Activity 2 is a good way to monitor pupils’ understanding and provide immediate feedback. This is so as teacher will be able to instantly identify pupils who might be having some difficulty with the task and rectify the ‘issue’ immediately. According to Chapelle & Jamieson (2008), “The important purpose of classroom assessment, called washback, is a part of the language learning process.

• The activities in this lesson are mostly student centered. Students are given opportunity to work with and learn from one another.According to Towndrow (2007), “It emphasises the active role of students in learning and attempts to give them control over what and how they learn.”

• The individual activity, in which pupils are to record their own voice reading the passage and giving themselves a rating (own feedback). According to Towndrow (2007), allowing students to work independently with technology exercises their creativity for the benefit of a potentially wide audience. This enables the pupils to assess their own reading, evaluating their strengths and weaknesses. The teacher will also provide feedback on the recording after the dateline, which is an important aspect of language learning.

Weaknesses:

• After letting pupils listen to the audio clip (Activity 1), she should ask pupils why is it important to vary pitch and tone, instead of immediately telling them the reason. She should allow them some time to think and reflect, instead of ‘spoonfeeding’ them straightaway.
  
• The teacher plans and provides all the learning materials. Also, there is no differentiation of tasks according to different learning abilities. Even though the activities are mostly student-centered, pupils are not given the opportunity to choose learning materials according to their needs and interests. One of the four dimension of student-centered instruction is content, which includes “enabling students to choose learning materials according to their needs and interests (Towndrow, 2007).”