TESOL Studies

The course is designed to equip English majors with teaching methodology knowledge and skills in using different kinds of latest technologies as an effective tool in teaching English. With hands-on tasks, students will use these technologies to design lessons and practice teaching language aspects and skills.

This course is an additional support to improve pre-service teachers’ employment of materials in their teaching practice. The course centralizes on the role of materials within the English language training curriculum and how to deal with them. It primarily looks at the evaluation, adaptation, and development of materials for teaching and learning purposes. Specific pieces of materials and their usages in particular settings are analyzed and discussed. Learners’ experience from the teaching practicum periods is synthesized for critical reflections. The course fosters learners’ capability of using materials to facilitate their students’ learning quality and motivation.

This course prepares fundamental principles and best practice of testing and assessment for English language teachers at the undergraduate level. It considers a range of concepts and skills of assessing learners’ English language proficiency. Issues such as testing methods, testing techniques, and evaluation measures are brought into class discussions and analyses. Students are required to work on different types of testing for different skills, including pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary, and the four macro language skills. A critical perspective on common testing methods and procedures is employed for the exploration of their limitations on validity and washback effects.

Teaching practicum is an integral component of teacher education. This course provides the final year students with opportunities to make class observations and to practice teaching English as a Foreign Language in a real-life classroom. It is expected that student teachers are able to integrate theory and practice of teaching and learning English as a Foreign Language and their links. Through supervised teaching practice, student teachers will gain insight into the classroom teaching and learning, develop a range of teaching skills and understandings necessary to design lesson plans, conduct micro-teaching, actually deliver lessons as well as successful classroom management. Student teachers also have further ESP teaching practice.