7/29/2019 Curricular Unit Course Design and Methodology for Secondary School Teaching

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PLACES TO VISIT BEFORE YOU DIE

CURRICULAR UNIT

1. Curricular Platform

a. Theory of education: The Social Learning Theory.

Cognitive development is a process which requires the child to be involved in problem solving

experiences shared with other individuals such as: teachers, parents, siblings and/ or peers. Theperson who interacts with children in problem-solving experiences, assumes initially the

responsibility of guiding the problem solving. However child responsibility level will gradually

increase along the process.

In this model, language is the tool used by adults and children to exchange knowledge and

meaning embedded in the surrounding context. Thus, language become the primary intellectualadaptation tool, which allows the child to use internal language to direct their own behaviour.

Language allows child to internalize the elements, knowledge and tools seen outside them.

Curricula is designed according to this model emphasizing interaction between learners and

learning task. Teachers role in this curricular design is focused on instruction and support,because of the limited childs ability at completing a task for their own; therefore, the teacher will

be compared to a scaffold which supports childs learning process.. Along the learning process,

the teacher will adjust their responses to their pupils language performance to achieve optimalresults; the teachers responsibilities will decrease once the child improves their language

performance.

Assessment process is based on social learning model targeted to two levels: actual development

(understood as the task which can be completed by childs own ability) and potential development

(understood as the task which need to be completed by child and a peer).

b. Approach: Content-based instruction.

Content-based instruction (Richards & Rodgers, 2001) deals with teaching language through a

content or information, rather than teaching linguistic information on itself.

Content is understood as a subject matter, which requires language to be known or presented.

Content-based takes advantage of pictures, objects and audiovisual presentations to developlanguage learning. Among other purposes, content-based instructions deals with assigning

meaning to situations through language.

Information taken from the article Theories of education. Available at crescentok.com/staff/jaskew/isr/education/theories.htm#social

7/29/2019 Curricular Unit Course Design and Methodology for Secondary School Teaching

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According to Richards (2006, p. 27) Content-based instruction is based on interaction between

learners and users of the language, collaborative creation of the meaning, creating meaningfuland purposeful interaction through language, negotiation of meaning as the learner and his or her

interlocutor arrive at understanding, learning through attending on the feedback learners get

when they use the language, paying attention to the language one hears (the input) and trying toincorporate new forms into ones developing communicative competence [and] trying out and

experiment with different ways to saying things.

Richards (2006, p.28) also highlights the relevance of Content-based instruction as the frameworkfor a unit of workbecause a determined matter or issue might be taught, consideringthe key topicsas main knowledge to be presented. Those topics might be presented and treated through reading,

oral presentation skills, group discussion, grammar and report writing.

Curricular unit design and implementation.

This unit has been developed based on social learning theory because of the importance of

interaction and knowledge exchange given in language learning. Content-based was chosen as the

framework of this unit due to the appropriateness of learning language through interesting issuesand topics. The purpose of establishing this curricular platform consist on catching students

attention through an interesting topic to encourage and empower them with suitable and usefullanguage to be managed in real life situations.

The content presented and developed here will be: Places to visit before you die.

PLACES TO VISIT BEFORE YOU DIE

CURRICULAR UNIT