Tim Jacobs Course Design Final Project 5/20/2012

INTRODUCTION

Personal interest

The course that I am working on is called “English through American History.” I chose to

design a content-based ESL (CB-ESL) course for two reasons. The first is that the director at

my school, Kaplan International College Westwood, recently asked me to teach an American

History course which didn’t have a pre-established curriculum. I have been taking a “focused-

opportunistic” approach, so I am looking forward to learning more about course design so that I

am better prepared and the course is more efficient (Nation, 2010). The second reason I chose

this course is because I love American History and look forward to diving more into textbooks

and other curriculum options.

Target setting

This course is designed for an academic ESL setting. The students at Kaplan take three

hours of general English and then an hour and a half elective course. The general English

classes are Monday through Friday, while the elective courses only run four days: Monday

through Thursday. The elective is chosen by the students based on their own desires and goals.

Although the students’ goals and backgrounds vary, the majority of the students desire to study

in an English university at some point in the future. While their ages may range from teenagers

to middle-aged, the vast majority are college-aged learners. Some already have undergraduate

degrees and are looking for more advanced education here in an English-only setting. Their

levels are high intermediate to proficient.

There will be 30 lessons in the entire curriculum. Each lesson will be two hours long.

Students will have an opportunity to leave the class after 10 lessons and then again after 20

lessons. Students can be added into the course at any point.

As I have read through several key pieces of recent literature on content-based ESL, I

have learned some invaluable things that will help shape the course I plan on designing. The

three things that stood out to me the most were the effectiveness of CB-ESL in building

language skills, its motivational aspects, and the unique benefits offered by resources such as

film and the internet. Although it doesn’t always fit into the scope of CB-ESL courses, there is

great value in language and skills building in any ESOL course as well (Nation, 2010).

CB-ESL inherently provides students with meaningful, contextualized language (Brinton,

Snow, & Wesche, 2003). Using contexts of history, science, business, or other relevant content

can activate the schema of the students and build on what they already know (Kasper, 1998).

The learners build connections between existing knowledge and new input that fortifies it like a

brick on a wall. The plethora of evidence provided in studies shows that CB-ESL provides a

learning environment that enables students to improve their English (Brinton, Snow, & Wesche,

2003; Crandall, 1995; Kasper, 1994; Kasper, 1997).

These studies prove that CB-ESL not only helps the students learn English better, but

prepares them for future classes in an English-only setting. They become intrinsically motivated

because the instructor can also help the learners transition from a very sheltered language-

focused environment to a mainstream class that puts more emphasis on content. “CBI provides

the opportunities for teachers to match students’ interest and needs with interesting,

comprehensible, and meaningful content” (Brinton, Snow, & Wesche, 2003, p.26). While the

learner starts off worrying more about language, they eventually grow to be focused on the

content and by extension, more complex language items (Kasper & Singer, 1997). As they are

intrigued by the content, the less stressful environment helps them feel more comfortable and

motivated.

I have also found varying the classroom resources to feed into this type of environment

(Littlewood, 1981). As I am currently teaching this class, I have been using resources such as
film and internet. Research has backed up this approach by saying that varied materials are a

key element in a CB classroom. Several recent studies have discussed the benefits of varying

tools in the content-based classroom (Pennington, 1996; Kasper, 1997). A variety of resources

can provide a more student-centered environment which actively engages the students in the

learning process as opposed to being teacher dependent (Littlewood, 1981).

The internet can offer two main benefits in an ESL classroom. It is commonly used by

ESL teachers to provide worksheets and other printables for classroom use. A less popular

benefit, however, is the ability to use it directly in the classroom. There are countless content-

based resources on the internet. Using technology in the classroom enriches the learning

environment and provides a richer educational experience (Pennington, 1996). The interaction

between the learners and internet technology addresses learning styles that may be overlooked

or underutilized in another setting.

The other medium mentioned above was film. There are also a plethora of benefits

unique to film in a content-based course. Film offers a wonderful means of skills building. Using

full length film or short clips on the internet can reinforce the ideas presented in the content.

Visual media can bring the abstract ideas of the content into reality in a way that non visual texts

fail to (Kasper & Singer, 1997). Film can be helpful for all the skills, listening being the most

obvious, but speaking, writing, and even reading as well.

Plan and Principles

This course will be designed as a content-based integrated skills class. There will be a

primary focus on content with a secondary focus on skills building (Stoller & Grabe, 1997).

There will also be some emphasis on vocabulary as well. Form-focused activities are not a part

of the scope of this content-based course (Snow, 1997). Despite researching several textbooks,

I decided to use other resources as the main source for texts and materials.

An important principle underlying the design of this course is that motivation must be

paramount. The extrinsic motivation in the topic should take care of itself. This means the
intrinsic motivation will need to be provided through clear, defined, and achievable goals,

consistent feedback, varied types of activities, student input on the course syllabus, and

dynamic teaching (Nation, 2010; Snow, 2006; Brown, 2000).

This course will build students language skills through integrated activities. Reading,

listening, speaking, and writing skills will all be a focus of this course. Though there will be a

concentrated effort on the American History content, each activity in this course will aim to

achieve growth in at least one if not all of these skills (Hyland, 2006; Kasper, 2000; Brown,

2000).

Assisting the students in becoming autonomous learners is another important underlying

principle of this course. Learners will be equipped with learning strategies that are taught,

emphasized, and even modeled by the teacher. Various homework activities will be used to

keep the students learning outside the classroom. As the goal of many of the students of this

course is to go to an American university, and the topic is vast in its scope, they will need to be

prepared to study this on their own (Brown, 2000; Nation, 2010; Snow, 2006).

This course will provide consistent and accurate assessment and feedback. Students

will be given weekly assessments. Learners will receive regular feedback from the teacher on

content, language items, and skills issues. Though there are no grades in this course, students

will take the assessments on the content they are learning and vocabulary items. These tests

not only provide feedback, they are also designed to provide students with practice on multiple

choice quizzes that are typical of an average college level course. During class, the teacher will

also offer feedback on language structure and skills issues. Feedback will also be given on all

homework assignments (Brown, 2010; Brown, 2000; Hyland, 2006).

This course will be designed to teach content explicitly (Kasper, 2000; Reiss, 2005;

Brinton, Snow, & Wesche, 2003). One of the main goals of this course will be to provide the

students with a general knowledge and understanding of American History. Each activity will
provide new and useful information concerning the content as well as prepare students for

critical thinking skills. Key events and figures in American history will be taught.

This course will be sensitive to frequency. There are many words that the students need

to learn which are relevant to history books and other historical texts. Learners need to learn

language that is frequently used in the courses they will be taking in the future. The materials

will need to be chosen and focus on these particular vocabulary items (Nation, 2010).

References

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