Needs Analysis Vwo 3

VWO 3 English requirements

Luisteren: A2/B1
Lezen: A2/B1
Gesprekken voeren: A2
Spreken: A2
Schrijven: A2
In the 3rd year of Vwo, students are required to possess a certain level of fluency with regards to the
subject English. They need to be able to read, listen, write and speak at A2/B1 level. Comprehension
of things that are closest to their universe is their goal, while teaching them to listen to, read ,write
and speak about topics close to them while expanding their horizons should be ours. By using the
topic The Crusades we take a historical event which still has relevance to this day and combine that
with English teaching in order to promote CLIL. The topic should not be seen as a lesson in Christians
vs Muslims (that could be seen as culturally inappropriate)but as a glimpse into a historical event and
the legacy that this event has created. The social aspect should also be used to teach students that
there are two sides to every conflict and the importance of objectivity. Because we are normally
confined to textbooks with language teaching , using a topic that covers the span of two or more
subjects can provide teachers with ample opportunities to use authentic , current modern materials.
When picking lesson materials we choose them according to the appropriate ERK level while at the
same time teaching our students (self-study) skills on how to tackle listening reading and writing,
how do we listen to a text? Why are we listening and has pre-knowledge been activated beforehand?
With the proper tools students can then learn new things in their free time about other subjects that
may interest them. The tasks chosen for the students will also incorporate the use of multiple
intelligences, done in way that can cater to a broader scope in the classroom. Students will work
individually, in groups and as a whole for certain activities, energizers and games, this series is made
to create a fun and less standardized atmosphere in the classroom where students can move freely
at times and express and support their opinions and thoughts. Grammar will be taught indirectly and
directly, the rules will be explained but the practice itself will be topic based. Vocabulary will also be
taught topic based and grouped into lexical sets. Testing will done in the form of small weekly
assignments and one large assignment. Taking their age into consideration, use of tools like dropbox
combined with firm deadlines should be enforced to make sure the whole group and project moves
forward.

Process report:
As a group the first order of business was trying to pick a topic that everyone would be comfortable
with and that would at the same time meet the course requirements. In order to maintain
communication we decided on making a mobile group app where we could interchange ideas. The
first ideas we had to choose from were: cross cultural society, capital punishment, the slave trade,
The UK, The Crusades and South Africa. After shrinking this list top a Top 4 we decided to show
Stephanie what we had come up with for feedback. Most of our ideas were shot down for being too
projecty(opinion) leaving us with: The Crusades. We then had to meet up and decide how to break
down this Big topic into smaller topics while finding a way to integrate English using CLIL. Easier said
than done. We encountered hardships finding the right way to use English to teach about the
Crusades and How to use the Crusades to teach English. After wandering lost for a while we spoke to
Stephanie and she gave some useful tips on how to better structure our lessons. We then started
working in reverse , first picking what we wanted to teach the students , to how we were going to
accomplish this. With the goal first everything became much clearer though it was tough finding a
suitable text and/or video with the goal already established. Another method we wanted to employ
was the Flipped classroom approach, semi flipped at least. We say semi, because we provide the
students with the material to watch and listen to individually at their own pace but we prefer that
this is done in a classroom and not so much at home most of the assignments are then taught by
having them do different activities some of which are done outdoors for example. The reason being
that we feel that full independence might be too much of a responsibility to hand over to a Vwo 3
class. By giving the students a lot a topical input we were also able to weave in a lot on language
input, grammatical as well as vocabulary. We then had them process it on two levels, content and
form, inductively as well deductively, which then should lead to them chucking out output! As for
task division, we chose to do the following: John would do the social aspects of the Crusades
,Mohamed the Historical, Vita the Cultural and Tim the Economical. We would then divide the rubric
assignments amongst ourselves and submit these to each other for peer feedback. Problems we
encountered along the way were; that us all being adults with our own private lives and issues found
it hard to coordinate everyone at the same time, we did although manage to do this for the most
part. We then went into the Dragons Den in week 7 for a ten minute presentation and for feedback
on our site, the feedback we received was then analyzed and incorporated into our final product. We
tried to make the subject more appealing to female students and tried to make the site more
uniform instead of four different interpretations. All in all we are satisfied with the progress we have
made.