E accomplishment and failure

1. LESSON PLAN
Accomplishment and Failure
A. FACTUAL INFORMATION
• My name: Hui Ling Yang
• Day, date, and time of lesson: Thursday, February 19, 2015, 8:30-9:45
• Grade and level of students: regular secondary 3, advanced level
• Brief description of students: students of a science group, well disciplined, coming from
various linguistic and cultural backgrounds.
B. OBJECTIVES AND PROBLEMS
• Topic area/theme: accomplishment and failure
• General aim: The goal of the lesson is to create opportunities for students to practice
English in a meaningful way through oral interaction and reading. It also aims to help students
develop personalities of perseverance and resilience in the face of adversity.
• Specific objective(s): By the end of this lesson, the learners will be able to express opinions
related to accomplishment and failure with arguments supported by personal experiences.
They will also be able to negotiate the methods of dealing with failure. In addition, they will
be able to have conversations with basic vocabulary of equitation.
• Evaluation criteria: Competency 1 Interact orally will be evaluated, and the evaluation focus
is participation and pertinence. The teacher will be moving around in the classroom to
evaluate students during their discussion time.
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2. • Related content/essential knowledge:
– Functions: agreement, disagreement, opinions
– Grammar/structure: the Present Simple tense, the Past tense, the Modals
– Vocabulary: sports (equitation), personality, health and well-being,
– Anticipated language: I think that…Do you agree? I agree with you. I can’t agree with
you. In my opinion… We should…You have to… You need to…
• Anticipated problems and solutions: Students may switch back to L1. The teacher will
supervise and remind students to use English only. Students may have difficulty using the
concept graphic organizer- placemat. The teacher will teach and model how to use it.
C. COMPETENCIES COVERED
• ESL-specific:
Competency #1: Interacts orally in English. Students negotiate in groups and using problem
solving skills to complete the task.
- Key Features: engages in oral interaction, constructs meaning of the message
Competency #2: Reinvests understanding of texts
- Key Features: constructs meaning of texts, carries out a reinvestment task
• Cross-Curricular: Competency #2 – Solves problems.
Competency # 3- Exercises critical judgment.
Competency #7 – Achieve his or her potential
Competency #8 – Cooperates with others.
Competency #9 – Communicates appropriately
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3. D. MATERIALS AND AIDS
• Textbook: Viewpoint by Angelo Georgakatos
• Multimedia: smartboard, computer, the Internet, PowerPoint
• Handouts: the equitation vocabulary worksheets A+ B (Appendix 1)
the concept graphic organizer – placemat ( Appendix 2)
E. STRUCTURE OF THE LESSON
Activity
And
Timing
What the teacher does? What the students do? Rational
HOOK
5
MINUTES
1. Before the students come to the
class, the teacher puts the poster
of Chinese New Year on the
smartboard. After the bell rings,
the teacher introduces the
Chinese New Year and
expresses New Year wishes to
students in Chinese. The teacher
explains the meaning s of the
wishes.
2. The teacher introduces the
Chinese zodiac sign and
explains why the horse is not the
first animal.
Students repeat the
Chinese New Year
wishes.
To create a warm
and positive
environment.
To raise students’
awareness of world
cultures.
To bring in the
concept of failure
DEVELOP
-MENT
1. The teacher plays the video for Students work in groups To relate students
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4. 10
Minutes
15
Minutes
the students : 10 Successful
People Who Failed at First
https://www.youtube.com/watch
?v=jeeX9N3Qhlk . She asks
students about the message of
the video. She reminds students
that there are also many people
who never make it to success
after failures. She asks students
to discuss if they believe that
failure is the mother of success.
She explains the evaluation
criteria for C1which focus on
participation and pertinence for
this class. She evaluates C1.
2. The teacher organizes the split
information activity which is
called Listen and Identify for
students to learn vocabulary
about equestrian. She distributes
the worksheets A and B which
contain the same picture but
different words (Appendix 1).
of four to discuss
whether they agree or
disagree and explain
why with 2 arguments.
Students work in pairs.
Students cannot see each
other’s worksheet. When
one student describes the
vocabulary on his/her
sheet, the other student
listens and identifies the
objects being described
to the previous
lesson about
influential people
and their
accomplishments.
To help students
practice making
critical judgment.
To create
opportunity for
students to interact.
To prepare students
for the reading
task.
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5. 20
Minutes
She distributes dictionaries to
students in need.
She also asks students to learn
the four gaits of horse with the
help of dictionaries.
She checks the answers with the
whole class.
3. The teacher introduces the poem
describing a moment of
accomplishment of a teenager
girl. She asks students to read
the poem and highlights the
passages that they can
personally relate to.
She asks students to answer
reading comprehension
questions.
4. The teacher asks students to talk
about experiences of personal
failure. She evaluates C1.
5. The teacher asks students to
on his or her worksheet.
Students number the
speeds of horse gaits.
Students read the poem
individually
Students discuss in pairs.
Students work in groups
To develop
students’ reading
skills.
To create an
opportunity for
students to show
vulnerability and
build connection.
To encourage
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6. 20
minutes
work in groups of 4 to solve the
problem of how to deal with
failure.
She models how to use the
concept graphic organizer –
placemat- to structure their
discussions (Appendix 2).
She evaluates C1.
of 4 with the placemat.
They share their
solutions with the class
after discussion.
student cooperative
learning.
To scaffold
students’ learning.
CLOSURE
5
MINUTES
1. The teacher wraps up the class
by sharing the quote- I’ll never
lose. I either win or learn.
2. The teacher assigns homework:
write a poem about what really
matters.
To emphasize the
value of
perseverance and
resilience.
Appendix-1
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7. 7
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8. 8
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9. Appendix-2
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10. Reflection on the Lesson Accomplishment and Failure
Lesson description
The topic of this lesson was accomplishment and failure. The goal of the lesson is to create
opportunities for students to practice English in a meaningful way through oral interaction and
reading. It also aimed to help students develop personalities like perseverance and resilience in
the face of adversity. The learners were expected to be able to express opinions related to
accomplishment and failure with arguments supported by personal experiences, negotiate the
methods of dealing with failure and have conversations with basic vocabulary of equitation by
the end of this lesson.
Given the teaching situation, was the plan realistic?
The lesson plan was realistic, given the English level of the students and their compliance with
discipline. This lesson was given to a group of 32 Secondary 3 students in core ESL program.
Some students are Anglophone, and the majority of students are advanced in all four skills of
English. Therefore, the learning content about accomplishment and failure was not too difficult
for most students. I had no classroom management concern with this group as the students were
very well disciplined, so it was feasible to carry out several group activities. The teaching
situation enabled me to follow the lesson plan as intended.
What could/should I have anticipated?
 I could have planned to use the video clip The 10 Successful People Who Failed First better.
This clip was used as a hook to connect the students to the learning content about success
and failure. The students were really paying attention to the video. I should have asked the
students more questions about the people in the video, for example, “Who do you recognize
in this video? What do you know about this person?” to provoke them to think and express
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11. themselves in the target language.
 I should have anticipated that strong students would finish the work of the reading activity
fast. I should have planned extra challenging work for these students, for example, creating
quotes or writing poems about success and failure, to avoid that they had free off-task time.
If it were a class with discipline problems like my other groups, the free off-task time would
have been perfect for chaos. I should consider how to meet the needs of different students
when planning lessons in the future to help individual students to reach their own potentials.
What did I do that worked well?
 What worked the best in this class was cooperative learning. I provided 4 opportunities for
the students to do pair or group work, so they got to interact with each other a lot in the
target language. First, it was a group activity where the students shared different opinions
about the saying that failure is the mother of success. After, it was a split information activity
in which the students worked in pairs to negotiate the meanings of vocabulary about
equitation. Then, the students shared their experiences of failure in pairs. At the end, the
students worked in groups of 4 to carry out a place mat activity to solve the problem of how
to deal with failure. These four activities allowed the students to learn cooperatively from
each other for about 55 minutes out of a 75-minute period, and the students all participated
in the activities very actively. In other words, not only the cooperative learning structures
were there but also the students benefited from the structures.
 Instead of explaining what to do, I modelled activities before the students start to do work in
order that they could understand instructions well. It was the students’ first time doing the
split information activity. I invited one student to work with me to demonstrate how to do it.
After the demonstration, I also checked the students’ comprehension of the activity
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12. instruction. I then circulated in the classroom after the students started to work to provide
help if needed. I noticed that there was only one pair that didn’t fully understand what to do.
I did the same things with the place mat activity. Modelling activities greatly helped me to
keep my students on the right track.
 I integrated Chinese culture into this lesson, which enriched the students’ knowledge of
world cultures as well as helped me build my identity. It was a coincidence that this lesson
was given on the day of the Chinese New Year. At the beginning of the class, I gave the
students the best wishes of the Chinese New Year in Mandarin and made them repeat the
best wishes. I also introduced the Chinese zodiac to the students. By incorporating Chinese
culture, I definitely got all students’ attention and set their minds ready for the class.
 I managed to open up the students for sharing their personal failure experiences by giving
my own anecdote. I find that students are always interested in knowing about teachers. We
can use anecdotes about ourselves which don’t necessarily have to be true to feed their
curiosity once in a while. I feel that on top of getting students interested to learn, this
technique also helps teachers to bond with students.
What do I still need to work on?
 I spoke too fast. I usually talk fast, and I was talking even faster in this class because I was
nervous about being filmed. I need to keep in mind that I teach ESL learners. My high
speech speed is not a big problem for this class as the students are at an advanced level. It
might even stimulate the students more since they have to pay more attention to what I say.
However, I also teach students at lower English levels who wouldn’t be able to follow me as
well as this group. I need to talk more slowly in general and adapt my speech speed to
weaker students.
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13.  How effective was my teaching overall?
Overall, my teaching in this class was effective. All students participated in the learning
activities, and the majority of them did good jobs with their work. At the end of the class, all
teaching objectives were met. The most important is that both I and the students enjoyed this
lesson.
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