English Language II. Unit 5: Disasters and the Environment. Handout of Language Practice

Impresiones FL de Natalia Rondini

Lugar: Córdoba; Año: 2010 p. 90

978-987-1591-82-4

This is the third in a series of four handouts intended to be used as supplementary material in the English Language II course at the National University of Córdoba, Argentina. This handout is organized into four learning sessions which include a variety of reading, vocabulary, grammar, listening comprehension, speaking and writing tasks dealing with the main topics included in the fifth unit of the current English Language II syllabus: Disasters and the Environment. This material is based on previous versions designed and piloted in the courses we have taught. Some of the activities included in this handout have been designed by the authors themselves, while some others have been adapted or taken from widely used textbooks in EFL teaching. In addition, we have incorporated some activities based on the film documentary An Inconvenient Truth to provide students with up-to-date information on environmental issues. Articles for extensive reading are included in the last section. As most present-day language teachers, we view language learning as a holistic, integrated process, and we consider students as active participants of the learning process; therefore, we hope students engage in the activities suggested in this handout from a critical, independent and strategic perspective. To this end, we present a variety of learning tasks intended to foster communicative and cooperative language development, critical thinking, and strategic language learning. Some strategy instruction is included to help students become more successful and autonomous language learners. All in all, this material aims at providing EFL learners with an opportunity to understand not only what they can learn in the language classroom, but also how they can learn the language they are studying more effectively and efficiently. We hope students can profit from the activities presented in the handout as they work to improve their mastery of the English language.