Tài liệu Skkn teaching reading through the integration of related multi subjects

Teaching reading through the integration of related multi- subjects PART A: INTRODUCTION 1. Why was the research paper written? Nowadays, Vietnam, on the process of the international integration and cooperation, has been expanding the relations in many areas and creating fundamental premise for industrialization and modernization. The premise, in its turn, has made Viet Nam confident to join international life in both scope and scale. English is a powerfully communicative tool that helps to make these relations better. It is widely used in such a variety of areas as science, international business, information technology, transportation, and so on. Seeing how important English is, the Ministry of Education and Training has been carrying out the renovation in English books with the communicative method focusing on teaching four skills as listening, speaking, reading and writing. These skills are taught integrally by the other language components as grammar or structure, vocabulary and pronunciation. Currently, with the project of comprehensive renovation process in the curriculum and books adopted by the Congress, the Ministry continues to order teachers to make reforms in teaching methods and testing, assessing to meet the trend of developing students' ability. It is for this goal that the integration of various subjects in teaching in schools has been reinforcing and encouraging. English is one of the school subjects that is in need of this method. English teachers, therefore, have to change their traditional teaching method "mono-subject" to the new one "related multi-subjects". This aims at training a future generation to be more skillful and to be able to have a more comprehensive knowledge. 1 Teaching reading through the integration of related multi- subjects Furthermore, not only teachers but students themselves can see the fact that all the knowledge in life is related to each other. School subjects are different from each other but connected and supportive during the process of English teaching. Only the new approach "Integrating many subjects into teaching English" is an advanced method suitable for the current time and necessary to both teachers and learners. Hence, being a teacher of a high school, especially a school in a remote and mountainous area, I do have much care for the questions “The renovation of teaching method”, “What can I do to make Reading lessons … less or even not boring?", "What can be done to help students have a wide range of knowledge when learning English?" and "How can students get more information or details about Math, Chemistry, Geography and ... from an English lesson?". With such questions and thoughts, based on my experience, I wish to introduce the method which I have been using with the highest result named "Teaching reading through the integration of diverse subjects" 2. What is the actual situation of teaching and learning English? and who is the study for? Most of the English learners understand that English language has been playing a leading role in communication in every single aspect of the world. Especially since Vietnam integrated with the world, there have been influences of the English language on the people’s business and educational access. These learners really want to communicate outdoors; they need English as a means of communication. They are motivated and always active in learning. 2 Teaching reading through the integration of related multi- subjects Additionally, a number of positive students who are quite modern humans can keep pace with the latest information, changes. Realizing the necessity and the importance of the reforms, they immediately update it for themselves. By providing learning opportunities beyond the traditional classroom, students are able to experience a much broader spectrum of knowledge and skills necessary to gap the transition from school to work, from school to community, or from school to further educational endeavors. However, there are still some different ideas from the rest in schools. Some think English is a huge pile and complex chain of knowledge, which makes them confused and embarrassed to find out the best ways to learn it and it is not easy at all. They always have difficulty remembering what a language means, and sometimes they can’t remember how to make a correct utterance, don’t know how to set up a structure grammatically, and even forget it. For them, it is too much to be able to digest all. Yet, many teachers still apply traditional methods to teaching. They introduce the language mechanically and pay no attention to the thoughts, opinions and needs of today's students. With no intention, they make their students become out of date and out of the new approach of teaching and learning language. Teachers control all activities of students and students become completely passive in the classroom. Consequently, students lose not only their activeness but their creativeness, which makes the lesson worse. Thus, this research, as I believe, points to the power of teaching and learning a variety of involving subjects. It will help students engage in challenging communication and meaningful learning. By using the integrated knowledge that foster creativity, flexible thinking, problem solving and real life 3 Teaching reading through the integration of related multi- subjects applications to gather information, students develop critical thinking and writing skills. The integration of diverse subjects invites inquiry, construction, communication, and expression. This research also supports demands that educators prepare our young people to become independent and life long learners. In this sense, the majority of suggested activities presuppose that the students acquire the necessary learning skills for a given activity on their own and not through orthodox methods of skills delivery. The teacher will have to adopt the role of a resource person who encourages independent learning. 3. How is the research paper organized? This research paper has five parts: Part A: Introduction Part B: Development of teaching reading through the integration of related multi-subjects. Part C: Demonstration of a typical example using the integration of related multi-subjects in teaching reading. Part D: The results and the effect of the study application Part E: Conclusion Despite much time and care have been given to writing this research paper, the research paper at which I have worked very hard to make it as best I could, I realized I could hardly make it to perfection without any shortcomings and mistakes. I gratefully acknowledge all the respectable professors, the fellowteachers, the readers who have contributed to my research paper with suggestions, criticisms, and information and help me have a better research paper for the next time. Appreciation is also elicited to the pilot teachers who 4 Teaching reading through the integration of related multi- subjects will field test and make suggestions to its merit as a valuable and viable teaching resource. PART B: DEVELOPMENT TEACHING READING THROUGH THE INTEGRATION OF RELATED MULTI-SUBJECTS 1. Theoretical background of the integration of diverse subjects Teaching through varied subjects results from the need of teaching goal "develop students' ability" which strongly ask them to apply the knowledge to solving true-life problems. When they solve such the factual things of either physical study or social one, the mixed information becomes absolutely useful. Definitions What is integration? It is the act of combining or adding parts to make a unified whole. To integrate things is to put them together to form something new. Integrated teaching is to bring related educational points in the process of teaching like the morality integration, the life-skills integration, etc. And the figure below shows how various subjects are combined in the teaching process. 5 Teaching reading through the integration of related multi- subjects Teachers have to determine ITEM what knowledge is ITEM ITEM related to two or even more two subjects to convey to learners. This prevents learners ENGLISH than INTEGRATED ITEMS ITEM HISTORY ITEM MATHS from repeatedly getting the same knowledge when ITEM ITEM ITEM they sit for other subjects. Across the nation there has been a growing interest in involving multi-subject integration as an approach to teaching in which this subject leverages learning in other subject areas such as science, language arts, mathematics, and social studies, etc. Related Multi-subject Integration is an APPROACH to TEACHING in which students construct and demonstrate UNDERSTANDING through a CERTAIN FORM. Students engage in a CREATIVE PROCESS which CONNECTS a certain form and another subject area and meets EVOLVING OBJECTIVES in both. 6 Teaching reading through the integration of related multi- subjects (deduced from “Defining Arts Integration” by Lynne B. Silverstein and Sean Layne © 2010, The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts) Rather, related multi-subject integration is an approach to teaching that is embedded in one’s daily practice. An “approach to teaching” refers to how something is taught rather than what is taught. Every teacher has an approach to teaching, whether or not they are aware of it. Approaches fall along a continuum from traditional, teacher-centered instruction to more progressive, student-centered instruction. Ultimately, our approach is based on our beliefs about how students learn. As an approach to teaching, related multi-subject integration relies heavily on the progressive, student-centered end of the continuum. This approach to teaching is grounded in the belief that learning is actively built, experiential, evolving, collaborative, problem-solving, and reflective. These beliefs are aligned with current research about the nature of learning and with the Constructivist learning theory. Constructivist practices that align with related multi-subject integration practices include:  Providing active hands-on learning with authentic problems for students to solve in divergent ways  Arranging opportunities for students to learn from each other to enrich their understandings  Engaging students in reflection about what they learned, how they learned it, and what it means to them  Using student assessment of their own and peers’ work as part of the learning experience 7 Teaching reading through the integration of related multi- subjects  Providing opportunities for students to revise and improve their work and share it with others  Building a positive classroom environment where students are encouraged and supported to take risks, explore possibilities, and where a social, cooperative learning community is created and nurtured Students construct and demonstrate UNDERSTANDING … understand (vt.) – (1) to get or perceive the meaning of; to know or grasp what is meant by; comprehend (2) to gather or assume from what is heard; to infer 3) to know thoroughly; grasp or perceive clearly and fully the nature, character, functioning, etc. (4) to have a sympathetic rapport with Constructing understanding of one’s world is an active, mind engaging process. Information must be mentally acted upon in order to have meaning for the learner. Related multi-subject integration provides multiple ways for students to make sense of what they learn (construct understanding) and make their learning visible (demonstrate understanding). It goes beyond the initial step of helping students learn and recall information to challenging students to take the information and facts they have learned and do something with them to build deeper understanding. “In the class students have central and active roles as meaning makers. This role demands that they not only acquire knowledge but they develop 8 Teaching reading through the integration of related multi- subjects the capacity to reflect on what they are learning and to use it as they interpret and create their own works: Students can and should have opportunities to construct and demonstrate their understandings in various ways. Nationwide, classrooms have become, and continue to become, more culturally, economically, and academically diverse. Students engage in a CREATIVE PROCESS… creativity (n) - an imaginative activity fashioned so as to produce outcomes that are original and of value The heart of related multi-subject integration is engagement in the creative process. Related multi-subject integration requires that students do more than repeat (a song), copy (an art project), or follow directions. They must create something that is original and of value. The creative process in the involving multi-subjects is a process not a single event. It includes many interacting phases and each phase is related to every other. There are many descriptions of the creative process. The one provided here is a synthesis of ideas from many different sources. In this diagram, the process is made visible as five open circles. Students imagine, examine, and perceive. They explore, experiment, and develop craft. They create. They reflect, assess, and 9 Teaching reading through the integration of related multi- subjects revise, and share their products with others. Arrows indicate the ways one can enter the process and the myriad ways the phases interact. When students engage in the creative process, they produce original work that communicates their ideas, insights, points of view, and feelings. The creative process can be “messy.” It is difficult to predict what will happen, be discovered, or emerge during the process. Learners engage in inquiry and experimentation as opposed to following rigid, step-by-step rules. Some ideas, once explored, do not work well, while other ideas that were not originally considered, may surface as the perfect solution. If teachers are overly concerned with a “neat” process and product, they tend to make the creative choices for students and direct the outcome. In these cases, the creative process is present, but only for the teacher. It is the teacher’s or teaching artist’s responsibility to set a creative problem or challenge for students to solve, but not to take over and solve the challenge for the students. …which CONNECTS an a certain subject and another subject area… connect (v) - to join, link, or fasten together; unite or bind A distinguishing aspect of related multi-subject integration is its interdisciplinary connections. Connections are made between a specific subject and a specific curriculum area. Connections can also be made between a specific subject and a school’s concern or need. Schools often identify a focus for improvement that is 10 Teaching reading through the integration of related multi- subjects sometimes outside the formal curriculum. For example, the reading text can connect to school concerns such as character education/bullying, collaboration, habits of mind, or multiple intelligences. By engaging in learning in one subject, learning in the other subject is reinforced and extended, and vice versa. Rather than imagining connections as two intersecting lines, mutually-reinforcing connections function as a cycle. ... and meets EVOLVING OBJECTIVES in both. evolve (v) -to develop gradually This final part of the definition underscores two ideas. First, related multisubject integration requires teachers to set objectives in both a certain subject and the other subject area. The dual objectives are balanced; students are accountable for significant learning in both subjects. Advantages and disadvantages For students Integrated themes are known to be true or genuine so it is quite interesting and attracts students' attention, which will predominantly motivate and encourage students to learn. Absorbing these themes, students have a chance of using the newly-created knowledge to deal with factual situations instead of memorizing the knowledge mechanically. For teachers 11 Teaching reading through the integration of related multi- subjects Teachers, at first, have some difficulties because of searching everywhere for the details and information of other subjects. Understanding other subjects is limited. However, this problem will be able to be resolved due to the two following reasons: Firstly, during the process of teaching, teachers themselves have to give their students the knowledge involving in other subjects. As a result, they are able to receive a deep understanding of integrated knowledge. Another reason is connected to innovating contemporary teaching method. Teachers' role has completely changed. No longer have they been centered in classrooms. They have been organizers and conductors learners' activities inside and outside the class. So teachers have opportunities to promote mutual cooperation in teaching. Therefore, this combination of various subjects helps to foster and improve teachers' understanding and pedagogic skills, which has a fully contribution to the progress of Vietnam's education system. 2. Teaching reading through the integration of related multi-subjects The days of believing that we could hand informational text or a novel to a student and assume he or she make full meaning of it on their own is a teaching mode of the past. Whether we like it or not, regardless of the content we teach, we are all reading instructors. We need to inspire both a love for reading and reading stamina in our students. What can teachers do to achieve this goal? 12 Teaching reading through the integration of related multi- subjects When designing an English lesson, teachers easily discover to what its content belongs so as to integrated suitable items. If the lesson is about geographical names like Unit 6 "An excursion" English 10, Unit 16 "Historical places" English 10, teachers can exploit the geography, the weather, human characteristics, fauna and flora ... in Hanoi. (Geography and Biology are mentioned). Students will certainly like engaging in activities because Hanoi with Huong pagoda, Thay pagoda is the tourist destination most of them visited. With the lesson about the marvelous structure of history and culture, Unit 16 "The wonders of the world" English 11, history or geography, arts integration is fully used. Who built that structure? Where? What is its geographic location? Is it about any famous historian or historical events? ... The lessons about sports, Unit 12 "The Asian Games" English 11, Unit 14 "The world cup" English 10, Unit 12 "Water sports" and Unit 13 "The 22 nd SEA games" English 12 gets much more exciting if teachers skillfully stimulate students' interest in showing their experience in favorite sports and talking about the advantages of regularly practicing sports. Life-skills integration is more and more efficient and competent in such lessons as Unit 2 "Personal experiences" English 11, Unit 1 "Home life" English 12. Here students will be able to know how to behave better in bad situations, what to do to help busy parents. Even in Unit 5 "Technology and you" English 10, informatics integration, the way to use culturally social web is imported. The class will be motivated with the so-called mail, chit-chat or facebook ... 13 Teaching reading through the integration of related multi- subjects Teachers could also expose students to different kinds of audio, such as a live recording versus audio recorded in a studio in Unit 12 "Music" English 10, and then pepper them with questions about the quality of the sound and how they would create that sound themselves. This can encourage students to use the problem-solving and critical thinking skills necessary for engineering. Rap can help students understand historical poetry. Students can read a passage from a poem and teachers can lead students in a discussion about how poetry relates to songwriting. Then students can engage in a rap battle to decipher In a word, it can be said that teachers can integrate a variety of subjects into teaching English language. And obviously, the effectiveness of the lesson, the creativity of learners and the lovers for the lesson is shown in detail. Students become much more positive and active to present what they know in different aspects, varied subjects in English classes. To collect this fruit, all English teachers should notice "The integration is an extremely necessary thing because it brings a nice outcome to both teachers and learners" PART C: DEMONSTRATION A TYPICAL EXAMPLE USING THE INTEGRATION OF RELATED MULTI-SUBJECTS IN TEACHING READING Being a teacher of English for many years, I myself have accumulated some of the so-called teaching experiences beside the previous method. It is the way to teach by integrating involving different subject into a new one. Take Unit 16 "The wonders of the world" English 16, Lesson 1"READING" as an example. In this lesson, Math, History, Geography and Physics are integrated. 14 Teaching reading through the integration of related multi- subjects Part 1: LEAD-IN (geography integration) Item 1: Video clip (wonders of the world) Item 2: A map (Giza, Egypt) Questions: What can you see from the map? (Ss: Giza) Where is it located? Part 2: WHILE-READING (physics integration) Item 3: Video clip (the process of building the pyramid) Question: 1. What are the three things used to help people carry big stones up to the pyramid? Ss: ramp, roller, water 2. What did people use "ramp, roller and water" to carry the stones for? Ss: to reduce friction Item 3: a photo (reduce friction) 15 Teaching reading through the integration of related multi- subjects Item 4: a photo (how to measure the height of the pyramid) (Maths integration) Questions: 1. How did people measure the height of the pyramid? (Thalés theorem) 2. Who found out how to measure? (Scientist: Thalés) Item 5: a photo of Thalés (give some information about this scientist) 16 Teaching reading through the integration of related multi- subjects Part 3: POST-READING (life-skills integration) Question: 1. Do you think these ancient constructions should be destroyed for modern blocks of building? 2. What should you do to preserve them? PART D: THE RESULTS AND THE EFFECT OF THE STUDY APPLICATION After using this technique of teaching reading, I have collected considerable results from the two surveys which I fulfilled in the classes as follows: 1. Collecting students’ opinions about being taught by the integration of related multi-subjects A short interview was conducted to find out the attitude and opinions of students towards the use of this method to teach reading. The interview was carried out among all the students of all levels. I collected some responses to the questions below: Question 1: Do you know what the integration of related multi-subjects is? Question 2: What are the effects of involving knowledge on you in learning reading? Question 3: What are the difficulties in learning with so many subjects at the same time? Question 4: Do you want to learn reading with the related multi-subjects? Here are the students’ responses to the four questions: 17 Teaching reading through the integration of related multi- subjects Question 1: All of students’ answers were YES. Some students added that this expression were quite the same to what they thought of them before. At least, after the lesson, students knew some main features of the process of integrating many subjects into one lesson. Question 2: With this question, there were different answers. Student 1 said that she could remember the knowledge in the whole easily for a longer time after the lesson. Student 2 added that when she did any kind of test, learn any subjects, she imagined the knowledge provided and tried to recollect her knowledge. In short, students agreed that the integration of related multisubjects helped them a lot in learning. Moreover, there was one student added that he felt more enjoyable to learn with this integration because it was new, funny and creative. He loved showing his creativity in doing the task given by the teacher. Question 3: For the next questions, student 4 thought that she was not good at imagination and summarizing the knowledge. It took her more time to understand the mixed items and she sometimes misunderstands the items taught by this way. She couldn’t even draw a certain line of knowledge. So she came to a conclusion that learning through this way is just impossible. Many other students just kept silent with this question because they all believed that the integration brought them more advantages than disadvantages in learning. Question 4: The last question was to check if students wanted to learn with the integration of related various subjects, too and was to determine if I, an English teacher, should use this technique in teaching. “Oh, what a right choice I have!” I shouted in happiness. Nine out of ten students wanted to be 18 Teaching reading through the integration of related multi- subjects taught in this way. They even asked the writer to conduct more trial lessons and they would be willing to take part in those. However, some of these students added that it was unnecessary to welcome this technique all the time. They also shared that they wanted to have more time for the lesson so that they could understand the lesson more. From the interview, I knew that my method of using the integration of related multi-subjects to teach had the full support of many students in my school. 2. Using statistics of students’ studying result Being an English teacher to teach a foreign language which is difficult to most of students, I have met a number of difficulties in teaching. Here all the students know almost nothing about English because most of them come from the schools very far from the centre, many including ethnic minority ones come from remote villages, they have no condition to learn. Their knowledge gradually disappears without the teacher’s enthusiastic help. With thirteen years of experience, I have tried my best to save the situation. I renew my teaching method with effective techniques. As a result, I have harvested considerable fruits as follows: Grade 11 10 Students (Total) 43 43 126 123 T1/T2 Poor Weak Average Good Excellent T1 T2 T1 T2 17 11 105 76 24 17 19 33 2 13 2 12 0 2 0 2 0 0 0 0 Over average 2 15 2 14 Above is the comparison of students’ learning result in the first test (T1) done at the beginning of the academic year and the one (T2) in the first-term test. 19 Teaching reading through the integration of related multi- subjects Obviously there is a noticeable difference between students who were taught by integrating many subjects into teaching and the ones who were not. After analyzing the data, I find out that the achievement of the students taught by my technique is better than that of the one without my technique. Based on the above statistics and explanations, the achievement in the experimental class indicated that teaching English using the integration was effective. Nevertheless, there were still many students who get low marks. I think that they are really not interested in English and it is difficult for them to learn the material, because of having no support from their facilities or because of their lack of awareness of learning English. PART E: CONCLUSION Teachers are guides rather than dictators; imposing ideas on students is an oldfashioned teaching method, which is likely to blunt students’ sharpness and creativeness. Teacher’s guidance or guiding teaching using the technique mentioned above will work well. An effective technique required flexibility and creativity. In other words, teaching English using the integration is more effective than just giving information with "mono-subject", especially in teaching English. Teachers who process the way to teach with the integration can create a good atmosphere especially for the students to make them enjoyable and well motivated in learning English, because of the interesting features of these various items and different subjects. Contributions of the study 20