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Leonardo project English. Progress Report 16th April 2012. What has been achieved since the last meeting. Level 3: Completed (except the 3 units which had to be reassigned due to developer illness) Level 4: Planned, assigned to developers and partly completed
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Leonardoproject English Progress Report 16th April 2012
What has been achieved since the last meeting • Level 3: Completed (except the 3 units which had to be reassigned due to developer illness) • Level 4: Planned, assigned to developers and partly completed • Level 5: 20 units completed, 20 in planning • Trained a team of 10 developers, with 3 more starting this month • Feedback from 20 pilot units incorporated into level 3
Challenges that have arisen • Many existing units did not have a coherent skills theme. • Grammar and vocabulary was not being tested and recycled throughout whole unit. • The material in each level does not cover an adequate range of business skills. • Material content and style of presentation is not sufficiently engaging for learners • Language is not suitably graded for the level. • Developers and uploaders don’t stick to deadlines!
Challenges we have overcome • Unit cohesion addressed (skills theme and grammar) • Quality, style and presentation of material improved. • Strong team of developers • The team of developers was constantly reviewed, and new developers sought (some are still in training)
Unit cohesion • Existing activities were assessed on an individual basis, and any usable activities were re-arranged by skills theme. • Clear instructions were then given to developers for the content for each activity where a new activity had to be written. • Each unit theme was given a skills tag. New units were developed to cover skills which had been inadequately covered. • Developers were instructed to use the grammar and vocabulary throughout the unit. Where existing activities are used, these are modified to include the target language of the unit. • This also made group speaking classes much easier to write for the units, as the grammar and vocabulary could be more easily practices as was ready-themed.
Quality, style and presentation of material We overcame this challenge by giving Instructions to developers to make material of a more consistent quality and more engaging: • Guidelines for what each type of activity should and could include were updated. • Developers were asked add introductions to each activity explaining the relevance to the learner of the material. • Developers were asked to write in less ‘dry’ language ('chattier' style). • Developers were asked to add self-study tips, in particular to the vocabulary and listening activities. • The use of photos and images has been encouraged, e.g. as discussion starters in speaking activities, or as the basis of self-study exercises.
Which challenges are left to deal with? • Unit theme: Due to work flow issues, it was not always possible to know the unit theme before e.g. the grammar activities were completed • The language used in the learning objectives and activities titles needs to be standardised and agreed upon. • Terminology used in the grammar activities needs to be agreed by everyone (grammar wiki) • Developers need to be made more aware of the importance of deadlines
What’s next: looking ahead • Getting feedback on level 3 units and incorporating this into levels 4 and 5 • Making suggested modifications to level 3 units, proofing them and having them signed off • Planning levels 6 and 7
Summary • Significant improvement in quality in terms of skills and language theme throughout unit and a more engaging style. • Clear improvement in range of skills covered at levels 3 and 4. • Need to plan ahead further in order that the unit themes be decided before any work needs to be done on the grammar activities.
