Language awareness pedagogies
Educators can use specific techniques to develop language awareness for their students. Learners are encouraged to arrive at and justify their own solutions through interaction with others and self-reflection.
1. Dictogloss : is when students collaborate to recreate a text. Click here for step-by step instructions (PDF).
2. Developing oral language skills strategies and activities (Bilash, 2009).
3. Developing literacy skills strategies and activities (Bilash, 2009).
4. Foster 'noticing' by exploiting vocabulary acquisition experiences: after learning a new word, many students may be surprised by the number of times they encounter that new word in a variety of contexts (Thornbury, 1997).
5. Writing autobiographies: students write about experiences and events in their lives thereby promoting their cultures, languages and identities in addition to literacy skills (Benesch, 1993; Brisk, 1998, cited in Cummins, 2014).
|
"Also, to be effective, a focus on language must be linked to extensive input in the target language (e.g. through reading) and extensive opportunities for written and oral use of the language." (Cummins, 2000, p. 276).
|
6. Purposeful Discourse: ask students to discuss what kinds of people are or are not included in history books, such as people they know, which leads into writing a family history (Svalberg, 2007).