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Assignment 1 - Focus On The Learner v3

Maribel is a 59-year-old Spanish woman studying English at a B2 level. Through observations of her class and an interview, her teacher identified some areas of strength and weakness. She prefers speaking activities and gets frustrated when struggling to find words. Her writing is better than speaking, as she has time to think. Common issues include mixing tenses and pronouncing words with "h" like "ch". The teacher recommended exercises to practice past tenses and learning new vocabulary to improve reading comprehension and speaking fluency.

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Ian Kopelowitz
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72 views6 pages

Assignment 1 - Focus On The Learner v3

Maribel is a 59-year-old Spanish woman studying English at a B2 level. Through observations of her class and an interview, her teacher identified some areas of strength and weakness. She prefers speaking activities and gets frustrated when struggling to find words. Her writing is better than speaking, as she has time to think. Common issues include mixing tenses and pronouncing words with "h" like "ch". The teacher recommended exercises to practice past tenses and learning new vocabulary to improve reading comprehension and speaking fluency.

Uploaded by

Ian Kopelowitz
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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FOCUS ON THE LEARNER

Learner Profile

Through observations during Saturday morning class, a written profile which was provided by
Maribel, and a recorded interview lasting 20 minutes. I was able to find out the following basic
information.

Maribel is 59 years old, and her level of English is B2, recently verified by examination. Her
mother tongue is Valencian. She worked as a secretary in a company for most of her working
life and when the company closed approximately 10 years ago, she retired. She turned to
learning English, and other activities such as travel to fill her time. She joined an adult school
where she says the level was “quite low”, and then a few years later she started classes in an
“official school.” She enjoys her English classes, but it “depends on the year and the teacher.”
This concurs with the title paragraph “Sources of Motivation” (J Harmer 2015:C2). which states
that “The teacher, The method, and Significant others” effect Motivation. Maribel likes her
current teacher because they do lots of speaking exercises.
Currently her motivation is “Intrinsic “(Harmer 2015:C1). “Thus, a person might be motivated by
the enjoyment of the learning process itself or a desire to make them feel better.”
In terms of a learning style Maribel certainly prefers a more linguistic style of learning as
compared to a visual style, taking in to account the “seven intelligences” (Jim Scrivner 2011:85).
In a group class situation, she would benefit from “Edit’s” style of teaching with the role of the
teacher to “adapt class lessons to respond to many individual needs...” (J Scriverner 2011:85).
I observed Maribel in class and in a private lesson and noted the following. In the group lesson
she arrived late. But on first impression she appeared attentive and enthusiastic. She was
confused with the instructions and asked Joanne (tutor) “the exercise is the first?”. Again, in our
private lesson she struggled with listening to instructions. This is consistent with the view of
“senior” learners as Jeremy Harmer (referencing Mark Mckinnon and Sophie Acomat) explains
“They suggest that senior leaners are not especially good at responding to instructions....
(McKinnon and Acomat 2010a" (J Harmer 2015:85). Once Maribel undersands the instructions,
she is keen to speak and not afraid to learn from her mistakes.
In analysing her written profile it’s at the level of B2, but there is a tense issue at the start “I send
you this profile” She should have used present continuous. In addition, throughout the interview
there are numerous mistakes mixing up tenses and using the present simple for past events.
This is a general issue for Spanish speakers who confuse when to use the present tense
(Michael Swan and Bernard Smith 2001:102).
The written profile is of a higher level than the spoken part of the assessment where she had
time to consider her thoughts and write them down. When she reads although she will get the
general gist of the text, she feels she doesn’t get a "proper sense” or understanding.
When speaking she hesitates when grasping for a word or phrase which obviously causes her
frustration. She also makes grammatical errors. She is confused with using prepositions,
confusing the word “in” with “at” e.g. “In this time”. She also misses out pronouns in sentences
e.g.“I do not believe”. All typical issues with Spanish speakers (Swan and Smith 2001:97 –107).
Her pronunciation is sometimes incorrect and words that begin with the English /h/ she
pronounces like the ch in the Scottish loch e.g. “Maybe we have a bad connection”. In addition,
because the letter /a:/ corresponds to the Spanish Catalan /a/ she confuses words like start e.g.
“I start to study in adult school.” (Swan and Smith 2001:91)
Bibliography
Harmer J (2015) The Practice of English Language Teaching, Fifth Edition, Pearson ELT
(Ch 5)
Swan, M & Smith (2001) Learner English, Cambridge University Press
Jim Scrivener (2011) Learning Teaching (2011) MacMillan Education
Martin Parrot (2010) Grammar for English Language Teachers, Cambridge Press
English File Intermediate (2013) – Third Addition, Oxford Press

Language Problems and Activities to address these

1) Tendency to use the present simple instead of past simple whilst speaking. She will use
this tense when she should be using a past tense e.g. “I start to study English” and “I
decide to repeat the year.”. (Swan and Smith 2001:102). She needs to review the past
simple and the past tenses. I noticed she was confused in the interview when asked her
question in a perfect tense. I would recommend she does the exercises on The Past in
Grammar for English Language Teachers (Parrot 2010:230-232). This will be a review of
the differences in meaning of all the past tenses and enable her to practice them in
context.
2) Maribel struggles when reading written texts and when speaking as she has a limited
vocabulary. During our interview she complained she did not always have a complete
understanding of the text due to the vocabulary used. We discussed her learning some
vocabulary and she choose to learn the vocabulary of Personality. I would refer her
English File Intermediate (Latham – Koenig and Oxenden 2013:153). There is a gap fill
exercise matching definitions with words from the word bank. She would also learn the
opposites of these words and a couple of “false friends”.

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