Didactic Unit REPORT Castilla y Len

DIDACTIC UNIT REPORT CASTILLA Y LEN

UNIT 12: HEALTHY FOOD
Following the Order of Announcement ... part B2 of the present examination procedures can
be replaced with a report if the candidate has been working as a supply state teacher at
Primary Education level since ... Thus, this is the presentation of didactic unit number 12
corresponding to the 1st year of Primary Education syllabus elaborated for this examination.
This document begins with the basic data corresponding to the foundations of the unit. These
foundations will be followed by the specific elements around which this didactic unit is
constructed: objectives, competences, contents, didactic resources, learning and teaching
activities, and evaluation. This document concludes with a compilation of the essential
measures to cater for students diversity, as previously identified in the syllabus.
DIDACTIC UNIT FOUNDATIONS
The syllabus designed, and consequently this didactic unit, will be implemented in an Infant
and Primary Education School located in a medium-large size town. We have recently seen a
growing percentage of immigrants in the area (approximately 20%) that is primarily comprised
of Eastern Europeans and South Americans. The socio-cultural level of the families is middle
to lower working-class. The relationship between the community and the school is positive.
The group of students addressed is comprised of 28 pupils in the 1 st year of Primary
Education (6-7-year-old children). They all have the corresponding level of maturity and
knowledge for their age and school level. Although most students are Spanish-born, there are
2 Romanian, 2 Chinese, 2 Dominican, and 1 Moroccan student. The presence of a student
with specific educational support needs can be highlighted. It is a student that presents
(explain the case selected).
In order to design this unit, the following legislation has been used: Organic Law 2/2006 of
Education (LOE); RD 1513/2006, which establishes the minimum requirements for Primary
Education; and D 40/2007, which lays down the Primary Education curriculum in this region;
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Didactic Unit REPORT Castilla y Len

and other specific legal documents that will be mentioned in the corresponding sections.
DEVELOPMENT OF THE DIDACTIC UNIT
Once the unit has been grounded on contextual and legal bases, each of the elements in it
included will be identified and specified.
Basic competences:
The LOE establishes the Basic Competences (BC) as a curricular element (article 6).
Competences can be defined as capacities or abilities to carry out tasks or face diverse
situations efficiently in a variety of contexts (Zabala 2007); from a curricular standpoint,
competences are a point of reference for evaluation and promotion. These capacities or
abilities are grouped around 8 nuclei in Spanish curricula (RD 1513/2006, D 40/2007):
Linguistic competence (BC 1), Mathematical competence (BC 2), Knowledge about and
interaction with the physical world competence (BC 3), Treatment of information and digital
competence (BC 4), Social and civic competence (BC 5), Cultural and artistic competence
(BC 6), Learning to learn competence (BC 7), Autonomy and personal initiative (BC 8). In this
unit students will develop all the basic competences, but especially:

Linguistic competence will be developed through the expression of likes and dislikes,
and the dramatisation of a role play.

Mathematical competence will be practised by using logical thinking to solve

communication problems and indicating the price of food items and meals.

Knowledge about and interaction with the physical world competence by becoming
aware of the importance of developing healthy habits related to diet.

Cultural and artistic competence by becoming aware of typical dishes in other cultures.

Autonomy and personal initiative by selecting the most useful strategies to search for
information and making ones own decisions for effective communication.

The rest of the competences will also be developed by means of:

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Using new technologies such as the Internet to consolidate language.

Cooperating in group activities trying to solve communication problems that might arise.

Objectives:
The proposal to be developed in the following pages aims at helping students distinguish
between healthy and unhealthy food and eating habits, express their likes, dislikes, and
preferences regarding food, and acquire vocabulary items related to this topic. Moreover,
students will have to develop other capacities and abilities, such as:

To use correct pronunciation when singing a food song.

To recognise and reproduce core vocabulary and basic grammar structures.

To become familiarised with the usefulness of ICTs to consolidate knowledge.

Contents:
The contents are the indispensable and specific means by which students will develop the
objectives and competences proposed. They are the direct object of the teaching and learning
process. In this didactic unit, students will acquire contents of the four blocks in D 40/2007:
BLOCKS 1 and 2: COMMUNICATIVE SKILLS
-

(L) Identifying specific information in simple oral texts.

(S) Exchanging information about favourite food.

(R) Scanning for specific information and reading for the main idea

- (W) Writing words from previously introduced models.

BLOCK 3: LANGUAGE AWARENESS
LINGUISTIC KNOWLEDGE
Functions and language use: Asking and expressing preferences; Participating actively in
oral exchanges; Discussing the importance of having healthy habits.
Grammar: Receptive structure: present simple (affirmative and negative sentences).
Vocabulary: Food: meat, fish, omelette, cheese, spaghetti, hamburgers
Pronunciation: Relationship between the graphic representation of words and their
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Didactic Unit REPORT Castilla y Len

pronunciation; Production of correct stress on individual words and on longer stretches
depending on the meaning the student wants to convey (whether s/he likes it or not).
REFLECTIONS ON LEARNING: Development of a lively and enquiring mind; Interest in
participating actively in group tasks.
BLOCK 4: SOCIO-CULTURAL ASPECTS AND INTERCULTURAL AWARENESS
-

Understanding of the importance of having a healthy diet.

- Interest in using the foreign language to communicate.

These contents will also give students the opportunity to develop the common elements
established in the curriculum (contents that all areasregardless their specific contents
must introduce). In this unit, students will learn education in values (the importance of having
a healthy diet, and the value of ones cultural traditions), develop reading habits, improve their
oral and written skills in communication and use ICTs to consolidate knowledge.
Didactic resources:
In this didactic unit, I will take advantage of the following types of resources:

Methodological resources such as starting from students level of development,

encouraging students capacity for learning to learn, fostering meaningful learning, and
promoting students active participation in class.

Human resources by taking advantage of different grouping techniques to carry out

tasks successfully and in a friendly and cooperative atmosphere, and by adopting
different roles as a teacher depending on the task to be performed (mediator, resource...).

Material resources by making use of different printed, audiovisual, and ICT resources
such as those mentioned in the presentation of the activities of the unit.

Environmental resources like the computer room and the regular classroom, in which
there is a reading corner with books in English at different levels of difficulty and a display
area where students can place their creative projects for public enjoyment, and learning.

Activities:
This didactic unit will be developed in six school days in the third term of the year, more
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Didactic Unit REPORT Castilla y Len

specifically in the first two weeks of May.
LESSON 1
Pre-listening / reading (10 approx.): In the computer room, I will put a chart on the board
with all my students names and different types of food. I will ask students what their favourite
food is in order to complete the chart.
Sample chart:
fruit burgers pizza macaroni chips fish vegetables chocolate chicken
Isabel

Andrs

Mario

...
I will then tell my students that they are going to listen to and read online a story about a girl
whose favourite food is chocolate. Together, we will check how many students ticked
chocolate as their favourite food and I will tell them to be particularly attentive towards the
story and what happens in it. By doing this, I will arouse my students curiosity.
While- listening / reading (20 approx.): I will guide students during the listening and reading
of the story The Chocolate Shock at www.candlelightstories.com. During the first
listening/reading, I will pause to support students understanding. The story includes two
songs, so I will encourage students to pay since they will be encouraged to sing later. The
second listening/reading will be done without pauses. Students will have to sing the songs.
Post-listening / reading (20 approx.): Students will be given the worksheet of a menu
(appetiser, first course, second course, dessert, and drink) and will have to find pictures of
their

favourite

dishes

on

the

Internet

(websites

like

www.mes-english.com,

and

www.eslflashcards.com can provide students with attractive and colourful pictures and with
the written form of food words), select, print, and glue them on their worksheet. I will monitor
and help learners. At the end, I will collect all the menus for the following lesson.
LESSON 2
Warm-up: (5 approx.): I will ask students what they remember from the previous lesson. I will
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show them the menus they designed. I will ask them if they think this food is HEALTHY or
UNHEALTHY. I will write the two words on the blackboard and explain their meaning with the
help of a food pyramid. I will try to introduce the importance of having healthy habits. I will tell
them that today we are going to work on one type of healthy food: FRUIT.
Presentation (10 approx.): The aim of this activity is to introduce fruit words. With the help of
picture flashcards I will introduce the aural form of the words. The word cards will be used to
introduce their graphic representation. I will show a picture flashcard and ask students if they
know how to say the fruit in English. If they do, I will put it on the blackboard; if they dont I will
introduce the word and give them a model of pronunciation. I will continue this process until
all the picture flashcards are on the blackboard. Then, I will introduce the spelling of fruit
words. I will show pupils a word card and ask them if they can read what it says. The person
who guessed right will blue tack the word card next to the picture card on the blackboard. I
will continue this process until all the picture cards have their corresponding word card.
Practice (10 approx.): In order to help students memorise the vocabulary previously
introduced we will play a guessing game. I will tell students that I am going to take a fruit
picture card and not let anyone see it. They will have to guess which fruit it is. I will give them
clues related to the colour, spelling, etc. I will show the picture flashcard and ask the child who
guessed the word to find the word card that matches it on my desk. Both flashcards will be
put on the blackboard again.
Production (25 approx.): My students will make their own fruit mini books. For that purpose, I
will give my students the black and white templates downloaded from http://www.dltkkids.com/nutrition/fruit-book.htm. To make it more interesting, I will have eliminated the fruit
words from the mini book so that students colour the pictures and write the name of the fruit
represented. The flashcards will be on the blackboard for students to check the spelling of the
words and write them correctly on their mini books. I will help them glue the pages in the
correct order. Fast finishers can add extra pages to their mini books by drawing a different
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Didactic Unit REPORT Castilla y Len

piece of fruit, colouring it, and writing the appropriate sentence under the picture.
LESSON 3:
In this lesson I will introduce other healthy food: vegetables. I will try to make this lesson
attractive for students so that they develop a liking towards vegetables. For this purpose, this
lesson will take place in the ICT room and will include online games like the following:
-

At http://learnenglishkids.britishcouncil.org/en/language-games/easy/fruit-and-vegetables,
students will have to colour fruit and vegetables in different colours using their mouse.

At http://learnenglishkids.britishcouncil.org/en/fun-with-english/trolley-dash, students will

play a game. Students have 60 seconds to collect everything on their shopping list. First
they have to remember what is on the shopping list. Then, they must get all the items on
the list in less than 60 seconds. Students have to use their mouse to move their trolley.

LESSON 4:
In this lesson, I will introduce junk food. I will try to raise awareness of the importance of
having a healthy diet, but I will do it in a fun way. The song Pizza and Chips will be the core
of this lesson (from http://learnenglishkids.britishcouncil.org/en/songs/pizza-and-chips).
LESSON 5:
Students will be required to practise the constructions Do you like? Yes, I do / No, I dont; I
like and I dont like. For this purpose, they will have to complete a questionnaire.
LESSON 6:
The last lesson of this didactic unit will try to put together all the elements introduced in this
didactic unit by means of performing a role play set at a restaurant. Students will have to
decide the kind of restaurant they want to eat at, and the food they want to have.
Evaluation procedure:
The evaluation principles, techniques and instruments to be presented here are adjusted to
the guidelines established in Order 1951/2007, which regulates the organisation of the
evaluation of Primary Education students learning in Castilla y Len.
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Evaluation of the learning
Evaluation is a continuous, systematic, flexible, formative, criterial, and personal process
which manifests itself in self-, co-, and hetero-evaluation situations.
What to evaluate: The evaluation criteria here proposed will facilitate the evaluation of
students fulfilment of objectives and development of basic competences. The evaluation
criteria selected for this unit are:
1. To be able to carry out communicative activities based on the information gap principle.
2. To be able to recognise and reproduce core vocabulary related to food.
3. To be able to use appropriate pronunciation features when saying a chant in English.
4. To be able to make a clear distinction between healthy and unhealthy food by
understanding the information presented in a food pyramid.
5. To be able to make use of Information and Communication Technologies to learn and
consolidate vocabulary.
How to evaluate: The evaluation process will be carried out by means of specific techniques
and instruments. Among the techniques are observation and analysis of tasks and periodical
tests. The instruments to be used are a control list and a classroom diary. The control list will
register the acquisition of conceptual and procedural contents, and the classroom diary will
register any activity, incident, etc. that will take place during the sessions.
When to evaluate: (i) At the beginning of the didactic unit (initial evaluation), a review of
students previous knowledge will be carried out. (ii) Throughout the development of the unit
(formative evaluation), students daily work and mastery of contents will be assessed. This
type of evaluation will enable the adjustment of all the aspects of the didactic unit to students
learning process. (iii) At the end of the didactic unit (summative evaluation), students learning
progression and fulfilment of objectives will be assessed.
Evaluation of the teaching
The evaluation of the teaching practice will also have a formative character so as to facilitate
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the decision-making process that will lead to the introduction of those modifications to the
planning that might be necessary to improve the teaching and learning process.
What to evaluate: I will establish evaluation indicators to systematise the evaluation of the
teaching. These indicators include: Were there activities to determine students previous
knowledge and experiences? Were incentives used to facilitate motivation? Were unplanned
activities introduced? Was the timing adequate? Were students interested in collaboration?
How to evaluate: The main technique to be used is the observation of students since their
behaviour and reactions will provide valuable information about the teaching process. As
evaluation instruments, fact-files will be used to register the feedback obtained.
When to evaluate: For evaluation to have a formative character, an initial, a process, and a
summative evaluation have to be carried out. In this manner, evaluation will contribute to
guarantee educational quality and efficiency, something which explains why an evaluation of
the assessment process itself is also necessary.
Attention to diversity
General measures
The objectives proposed in the didactic planning are the main point of reference for all the
students in the group. Thus, the changes and adaptations for those students who show a
slower rhythm of acquisition of contents may materialise in procedures of the following type:
Change of the material resources with which the contents are presented; Positive
reinforcement of students successes; Exemplification, by the teacher or classmates, of the
functional value of the contents; Creation in the classroom of an atmosphere in which the
student has no fear to express his/her difficulties; and Stress procedural contents that are the
working tools for the student.
The system of continuous evaluation makes it possible to adapt the work of those students
who show a faster rhythm of acquisition. In such cases I will adopt the following measures:
Suggest activities that enable them to deepen in the concepts, procedures and attitudes;
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Invite learners to decide in which fields they want to deepen; and Implication in programmes
of tutorial action with classmates that have shown retardment in their learning processes.
The presence of students from other cultures makes it necessary to adopt specific
measures such as the promotion of these students contribution in relation to the contents
being developed (typical dishes, diet from their countries of origin, etc.).
Measures to attend to students with specific educational support needs
(measures to attend to the student with specific educational support needs selected).
To conclude, I would like to stress the emphasis that I am going to place on students
understanding of the importance of having healthy eating habits, and to their ability to
distinguish between healthy and unhealthy food. Moreover, I intend to make students aware
of different traditions related to typical dishes and mealtimes in different countries. To these
ends, I have designed the objectives or capacities that students will have to fulfil, the
competences they will have to develop, the contents that will guide the activities, and a varied
selection of methodological and material resources to be used in class.
For the elaboration of this document, apart from the previously-mentioned legal documents,
the following sources have been consulted:
CUENCA ESTEBAN (2000): Cmo motivar y ensear a aprender en E. Primaria.
Barcelona: CissPraxis.
RGEZ. MORENO, M LUISA (2008): Revista Espaola De Orientacin y Psicopedagoga,
Vol. 19 n 2.

http://www.educa.jcyl.es/educacyl/cm/zonaalumnos

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