Activity 3

I looked online for a while to see what other people have done to track student progress, but by using keyword searches, instead I found articles on "How to Teach ESL Students to Read a Chart/Graph" and "How to Track ESL Students' Progress" as they move on from the ESL program into the mainstream classroom. I'm sure that other charts or graphs like the one Nation suggests for speed reading exist; I just was not able to find any examples online. So, this post will reflect on my own ideas for tracking student progress in reading, writing, listening, & speaking.

As for reading, if we're trying to encourage our students to do more extensive reading and increase their reading proficiency (both in speed & level), then something as simple as have a piece of paper with a table that has the different levels on each row and blank space beside it where they could put a sticker beside the level for a book they have finished reading. You could set a class goal to read a certain number of books by the end of the term, but they would have some control over how many in each level they felt they could read. By the end of the term, they would have a great overview of how many books they have read and at which level.

As for writing, there are a couple of ideas for students to track their progress. You could have students keep a journal where they write for the first few minutes of class each day. If you keep the time consistent and ask them to count how many words they write at the end of the time, they could see how quickly they are able to think in English and then find the words to write it down. Similarly, you could do a timed writing once a week where again the students tally how many words they have written, but you also give them a 1-10 score on comprehensibility. Remembering our discussion about balancing fluency & accuracy, we don't want to produce students who can write a lot of English words that no native speaker could ever understand as a coherent thought. Again, students could keep a chart of their word count & comprehensibility score throughout the term.

Listening seems a little harder to measure in this way. If you had the equipment available, you could have a student listen to a passage or watch a scene for 10 minutes and answer comprehension questions that go in order. Students could be allowed to rewind it as much as they wanted to re-listen to a section of the passage. Students could see how many questions they were able to answer accurately. Perhaps the first time they only answer 2, but maybe by the end of the term, they can answer 10. You could also take a high level passage & work through it throughout the term, having students first just pick out individual words they hear. The next phase could be to identify phrases or topics that the passage is about, with the final goal of being able to summarize the passage. If you use the same passage each time, students will recognize it is familiar and hopefully that they are improving in comprehension & listening skills.

Speaking seems even harder to measure without the student individually speaking with the teacher (which could be hard with a large class). Perhaps the students could self-evaluate after speaking activities. Maybe they could keep a log and rate things like:

-How confident did I feel speaking? or

-How well did my partner understand me?

You could also give them topics and ask them to tell their partner certain things. For example, the topic could be Introduce Yourself and the certain requirements could be to tell your partner your name, where you're from, how long you've been living in Arlington, what you do for work, who your family is, etc. There is certain information that we repeat over & over again when we meet people and being able to at least say those key things confidently and with ease helps our students gain confidence in a conversation. Perhaps the first time you try this, they are only able to tell their partner their name, where they're from and how long they've been living in Arlington. But, hopefully, by the end of the term, they can spout off all sorts of things about themselves and other topics that you've introduced. For example, as an L2 learner of Spanish, I am really great at introducing myself, explaining how I learned Spanish, and talking about George W. Bush (in 2004, a common taxi cab conversation in Spain once they learned I was from the US) all in Spanish. Being able to say those things with confidence allows me to sort of warm up my Spanish skills in a conversation before delving into topics I'm not as fluent in.