TESL 0150: Unit 3: Applying effective principles for adapting resources

For this activity, I chose Scenario 3 in which students are preparing for an IELTS exam and the focus of the activity is to practice matching paragraph headings to the corresponding paragraph.

Here is the link to the activity: https://www.ieltsbuddy.com/paragraph-headings.html

Principles for materials development:

Following are the principles that I have selected and are important for material development in this context.

Set achievable challenges, which help to raise the learners' self-esteem when success is accomplished. It is very important that students self-esteem is maintained or raised and that can be ensured by setting the target which is achievable. If the students are unable to understand the activity or it is way above their current level, it can discourage them.

Make use of activities that help the learners to reflect on their mental activity during a task and then to try to make more use of mental strategies in a similar task. This principle is very important especially in this context where the students are preparing for a test and they are likely to get a similar type of questions. In this way, they will learn their own strategy and understand their own way to address these type of questions because students may have different approaches.

Try to ensure that opportunities for feedback are built into output activities and are provided for the learners afterward. This principle is important because, without the opportunities for the feedback, they will not know the underlying reasons behind the answer to a particular question which will not result in any progress. While on the other hand, discussing the answers and feedback can let students be aware of what they need to do and how they need to approach a particular question to get the answer correct.

Material Adaptation:

As I am teaching the students for preparation course, I assume that I am aware of the student’s level. If not, I would conduct needs assessment about this particular topic at the beginning to get an idea about their understanding of the topic and level. This needs to be done to ensure that the students are being provided with the appropriate material.

I would add a few more example paragraphs in this activity where the teacher is helping students to find the answer to the question. It will help them understand the strategy better and train their mind to use that strategy when working on their own.

Also, it is very important to have a discussion at the end which is already there in the activity. I would make it extensive and not only the questions which were marked wrong, but also the correct answers will be discussed and students will be asked why they marked that answer to a particular question.

About involving students in the adaptation process, I would not do that as the preparation courses are time bound and if the students have the opportunity to go through the content once, it can affect their true performance.