TEACHING &

ASSESSMENT
OF THE
MACRO SKILLS
 UNIT I: AN OVERVIEW ON THE TEACHING OF THE MACRO SKILLS

I. INTRODUCTION
When we learn a language, there are four skills that we need for comprehensive
communication. When we learn our native language, we learn to listen first, then speak, then to
read, and lastly to write. These are called the four ―language skills‖ or also known as ―macro
skills. These macro skills are referred to listening, speaking, reading, and writing in the English
language.

II. OBJECTIVES
 Recognize important concepts in teaching the macro skills in English.
 Discuss the connection of teaching the macro skills with other language skills and
competencies.
 Identify appropriate methods and approaches to teach the English macro skills.
 List down qualities of an effective English teacher in the macro skills.

III. INSTRUCTION TO THE LEARNERS

Before we start any discussions or activities always remember the following:
 Be ready with a pen and writing pad or notebook. You will need these things in all your
activities.
 Follow all the instructions in every activity prepared for you. Look for assistance, if
needed. You may ask your instructor or classmates for further clarification.
 Study carefully the examples; keep in mind all the important concepts and discussions.
 In case you encounter difficulty, do not hesitate to seek help from others who are
knowledgeable on the topic.

IV. LEARNING ACTIVITES

Directions: Read the Macro Skills Competencies in the English K to 12 Curriculum of

Department of Education.
*copies will be given to the students

Directions: After reading, analyze and identify the appropriate activities for Listening,
Speaking, Reading, Writing, and Viewing competencies in English K to 12 Curriculum.

Appropriate Activities for the Macro Skills

Listening Speaking Reading Writing Viewing
 LESSON1: RECEPTIVE vs. EXPRESSIVE MACRO SKILLS

Receptive Macro Skills is the ability to understand words and language. This type of
skill is inferring communication from our environment and experiences. These skills are also
responsible for understanding concepts like size, shape, color, time, and sentence structure.
Expressive Macro Skills is the use of words, sentences, gestures, and writing to
create a message or convey a meaning. It is frequently associated with identifying objects,
describing events and how to do actions, create sentences and use correct grammar.

INPUT OUTPUT
SPOKEN
WRITTEN

There are four basic language skills: Listening, Speaking, Reading, and Writing. These
skills are related to each other by the direction of communication: receiving and expressing or
producing a message.
1. LISTENING. This is a communication technique that requires the listener to
understand, interpret, and evaluate what he or she hears. Listening effectively improves
personal relationships through the reduction of conflict and strengthens cooperation
through a collective understanding.
2. SPEAKING. Speaking can be an intimidating experience, even in your native tongue. It
is also the vocalization of human communication. Being able to express an idea,
concept, or opinion through speech is essential in the communicative process.
3. READING. Children learn to read by learning their ABCs first and sounding out the
letters to discover what sound they make. The phonetic approach in reading—using
 sound out the letters to discover words—is the best approach because, theoretically, if
you know the sounds you can read any word, regardless of the difficulty level.
4. WRITING. It is the most complex of the communication skills and takes the most time
to master. It is improved through practice and willingness to improve. Writing can be a
basic means of conveying information or it can be a tool to create elaborate new world.

LESSON 2: NEW MACRO SKILL: VIEWING

In the Canadian Common Curriculum Framework, VIEWING is an active process of
attending and comprehending visual media, such as television, advertising images, films,
diagrams, symbols, photographs, videos, drama, drawings, sculpture, and paintings.

Ways to represent ideas visually:

 Drawings
 Videos
 Photographs
 Multimedia
 Organizational graphs and charts

Why is viewing important?

As language teachers, it is important that we focus on the written and spoken word in
our classes as well as multimodal texts that use images. This is because of the fact that
majority of texts our 21st century learners are accessing outside the classroom are visual texts
and multimodal texts which use images that require analysis and evaluation.
Viewing is crucial for the students to become more effective, active, and critical viewers
in order to participate fully in the society. Among the 21 st century skills, information and
communication technology (ICT) literacy, media and internet literacy, data interpretation and
analysis, computer programming are deemed critically important to success in today’s world,
particularly in contemporary career and workplaces.

What do active viewers do?

According to the Canadian Common Curriculum Framework, active and effective viewers
would ask themselves a series of questions such as:
 What is the text representing?
 How is the text constructed?
 What assumptions, interests, beliefs, biases, and values are portrayed by the text?
 What is the purpose of the text?
 To whom is the text directed? Who does the text exclude?
 What is my reaction to the text? What causes this reaction?
 What personal connections and associations can I make with this text?
It’s important that students are aware that understanding the viewing process is as important
as understanding the listening and reading process. Active viewers engage in the following
procedure:
 1. Pre-viewing. Students prepare to view by activating their schema, anticipating a
message, predicting, speculating, asking questions, and setting a purpose for viewing.
2. During viewing. Students view the visual text to understand the message by seeking
and checking understanding, making connections, making and confirming predictions
and inferences, interpreting and summarizing, pausing and reviewing, and analyzing and
evaluating. Students should monitor their understanding by connecting to their schema,
questioning, and reflecting.
3. After viewing/responding. Students should be given opportunities to respond
personally, critically, and creatively to visual texts. Students respond by reflecting,
analyzing, evaluating, and creating.

Viewing Frameworks
Three viewing frameworks have been developed by prestigious institutions to help
students become better viewers. These models help to systemize viewing effectively into the
language classroom.
A. FILM and VIDEO: The 3Cs and 3Ss
This framework was developed by IntoFilm and is used in schools in the UK. The 3Cs
(Color, Camera, Character) and the 3Ss (Story, Setting, Sound) framework can be used
to help students discuss and analyze all the elements of a film text.

B. PAINTINGS and PHOTOGRAPHS: See, Think, Wonder

The See, Think, Wonder routine is one of the Visible Thinking Routines developed by
researcher-educators for ProjectZero at Harvard University. This helps students make
careful observations and develop their own ideas and interpretations based on what
they see when viewing a painting or photograph by asking these three questions:
a. What do you see?
b. What do you think about what you see?
c. What does it make you wonder?

C. The VISUAL THINKING STRATEGIES (VTS)

The Visual Thinking Strategies (VTS) approach finds meaning in imagery and
develops visual literacy skills through learning in the arts, fostering thinking and
communication skills through listening carefully and expressing oneself. The
approach works in the following way:
1. Students easily examine carefully selected art images
2. The teacher asks these open-ended questions:
- What’s going on in this picture?
- What do you see that makes you say that?
- What more can we find?
3. Students will…
- Look carefully at the image
 - Talk about what they observe
- Back up their ideas with evidence
- Listen and consider the views of others
- Discuss many possible interpretations
- Construct meaning together
4. The teacher will
- Listen carefully to each comment
- Paraphrase student responses
- Point features to describe the artwork throughout the discussion
- Facilitate student discussions
- Encourage scaffolding of observations and interpretations
- Validate individual views
- Link related ideas and points of agreement/disagreement
- Reinforce range of ideas

CLOSE VIEWING PROTOCOL

Close viewing of film media is the careful and purposeful viewing and reviewing of a film
clip in order to focus on what the filmmaker is trying to convey, the choices the filmmaker
made, the role of images, narration, editing, and sound, and what the film’s purpose might be.
PROCEDURE:
1. View the Film Clip Together
After watching the clip, ask students to write down their general thoughts and reactions. You
might prompt them with questions such as: What stands out for you? What resonated with
you? What do you have questions about?
Note: Before moving on to Step 2, it might be helpful to go over a few of these basic recall
questions with students:
a) Who are the characters/people involved?
b) What is going on? What is the basic storyline?
c) What is the setting? Time period? Physical location?
d) What is the point of view? Whose story is this?
e) What is the theme/mood?
2. Students Answer Film-Dependent Questions
After this viewing, a teacher could ask ―film-dependent questions‖ to focus students’
understanding of specific moments from the film. These are questions that students can answer
entirely based on information and evidence provided in the film.
3. Small Groups Practice Focused Viewing
Have each student or small group take notes based on only one of the following lenses to focus
their viewing of the film. Each lens includes ―questions‖ to ask oneself.
a. Sound: Focus on the music in the film as well as the sound effects. What do you notice?
What stands out to you?
 b. Editing: Focus on the way that the interviews, photos, and video are edited together.
What choices did the filmmaker make in terms of scenes or parts to show, represent, or
emphasize?
c. Images: Focus on the visual experience; do not pay attention to the audio but simply
take note of the images that are featured. What do you notice? What choices did the
filmmaker make? What is the impact of these choices?
d. Storyline/Historical Facts: How is the story unfolding? What are the objective, historical
facts that are portrayed in this film?
e. Human Behavior: How do you see the range of human behavior represented in this film?
Where do you see the theme of choices or decision making?
Have each group report on its lens and what its members observed. Ask each group to reflect
on the following question: How was your viewing of the film affected by the specific lens
through which you viewed it?
4. Debrief
Bring the small groups back together and ask that students take turns responding to the
questions below.
a. What is the purpose of this film? Is it to teach, entertain, or do something else? How
well is it doing this?
b. Who/what is left out of the message?
c. Whose interests are served by telling/showing the message in a particular way?
d. What motivations might the filmmaker have? How are these manifested in the film?
e. What do you already know about the topic? How might your prior knowledge of the
topic change how you experience the film?
LESSON 3: COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE
Communicative language teaching involves developing language proficiency through
interactions embedded in meaningful contexts. This approach to teaching provides authentic
opportunities for learning that go beyond repetition and memorization of grammatical patterns.
A central concept of the communicative approach to language teaching is communicative
competence.
Communicative competence is a term in linguistics which refers to a language user’s
grammatical knowledge of syntax, morphology, phonology, and the like, as well as, its social
knowledge about how and when to use utterances appropriately.

Dell Hymes concludes that a linguistic theory must be able to deal with heterogeneous
speech community, differential competence, and the role of socio-cultural features. Hymes coins
a term “communicative competence” and defines it as ―a knowledge of the rules for
understanding and producing both the referential and social meaning of language.‖
According to Hymes, "We have then to account for the fact that a normal child acquires
knowledge of sentences not only as grammatical, but also as appropriate. He or she acquires
competence as to when to speak, when not, and as to what to talk about with whom, when,
where, in what manner. In short, a child becomes able to accomplish a repertoire of speech
acts, to take part in speech events, and to evaluate their accomplishment by others. This
competence, moreover, is integral with attitudes, values, and motivations concerning language,
its features and uses, and integral with competence for, and attitudes toward, the interrelation
of language with the other code of communicative conduct."

CANALE AND SWAIN’S MODEL OF COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE

Michael Canale and Merril Swain identified four components of communicative
competence:
1. Grammatical Competence includes knowledge of phonology, orthography,
vocabulary, word formation, and sentence formation.
2. Sociolinguistic Competence includes knowledge of sociocultural rules of use.
It is concerned with the learner’s ability to handle for example settings, topics
and communicative functions in different sociolinguistic contexts.
3. Discourse Competence is related to the learners’ mastery of understanding
and producing texts in the modes of listening, speaking, reading, and writing. It
deals with cohesion and coherence in different types of texts.
4. Strategic Competence refers to compensatory strategies in case of
grammatical or sociolinguistic or discourse difficulties such as the use of
reference sources, grammatical and lexical paraphrase, requests for repetition,
clarification, slower speech, or problems in addressing strangers when unsure of
their social status or in finding the right cohesion devices.
 LESSON 4: BASIC INTERPERSONAL COMMUNICATIVE SKILLS (BICS) vs.
COGNITIVE ACADEMIC LANGUAGE PROFICIENCY (CALP)

What are BICS and CALP?

These terms are commonly used in discussion of bilingual education and arise from the
early work of James Cummins (1984) in which he demonstrated his ideas about the two
principal continua of second language development in a simple matrix. BICS describes the
development of conversational fluency (Basic Interpersonal Communicative Skills) in the
second language, whereas CALP describes the use of language in decontextualized academic
situations (Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency).

Basic Interpersonal Communicative Skills

(BICS)
This aspect supports and encourages
natural communication in social situations. This
form of language is practiced outside of the
classroom. It can take place at recess, the
lunch room, during sports and other extra-
curricular activities, and any other social events
in the personal lives of learners.
Communicative interaction is conducted in a
social context, and it’s more often familiar and
less nuanced than academic communication.

Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency

(CALP)
This aspect puts a greater focus on the
learner’s ability to demonstrate proficiency in
the academic sense. CALP refers to the
learner’s ability to read, write, and
communicate on a level effective enough to
exceed in their academic pursuits. It goes
beyond those basic attributes of the language,
extending how they use it to make decisions,
comprehend learning, compare, contrast,
evaluate, and classify their lessons in the classroom.

The horizontal axis of the BICS/CALP matrix represents a continuum from 'context-
embedded' to 'context-reduced', ranging from the situation in which the learner uses external
clues and information, such as facial gestures, real objects and pictorial representation to
enable understanding where the learner must rely on linguistic cues, and knowledge about
language and text to understand meanings.
 The vertical axis relates to the degree of active cognitive involvement in a task; moving
from tasks that are not very demanding to increasing cognitive challenging activities. So, an
activity in the upper left corner (cognitively undemanding and context-embedded) such as face
to face conversations might be appropriate for a beginner, but tasks in the lower right corner
(more cognitively demanding and context-reduced) such as writing a standardized test, would
be a task for advanced learners. Cummins’ model has proved helpful in identifying and
developing appropriate tasks for bilingual learners.

What are some examples of BICS and CALP?

Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency
(BICS) (CALP)
BICS describes social, conversational language CALP is the context-reduced language of the
used for oral communication. Also described as academic classroom. It takes five to seven years
social language, this type of communication offers for English language learners to become
many cues to the listener and is context-embedded proficient in the language of the classroom
language. English language learners can because:
comprehend social language by:  non-verbal clues are absent;
 observing speakers’ non-verbal behaviour  there is less face-to-face interaction;
(gestures, facial expressions and eye  academic language is often abstract;
actions);  literacy demands are high (narrative and
 observing others’ reactions; expository text and textbooks are written
 using voice cues such as phrasing, beyond the language proficiency of the
intonations, and stress; students); and
 observing pictures, concrete objects, and  Cultural/linguistic knowledge is often
other contextual cues which are present; needed to comprehend fully.
and
 asking for statements to be repeated,
and/or clarified.

How can we determine if a task falls within BICS or CALP continua?

CONTEXT-EMBEDDED LANGUAGE:
Language that is supported by contextual clues in the environment such as objects,
props, manipulative, pictures, graphs, charts and so forth helps the second language learner
make meaning from the spoken or written world. Context-embedded language is also a result of
students interacting with each other to get interpersonal clues to further construct meaning. A
"here and now" context is a necessary ingredient if the input is going to be comprehensible.
CONTEXT-REDUCED LANGUAGE:
In decontextualized language there are few if any clues present to support the spoken
or written words to help make the language comprehensible. Context-reduced language is
abstract and the context is usually known only to the author i.e., textbooks, a novel, a lecture,
etc.
LESSON 5: CONTENT-BASED INTRUCTION
Content-Based Instruction is an approach to second language teaching based on
content or information that students will acquire rather than around a linguistic or other type of
syllabus.
Theory of Language:
 Language is text and discourse-based.
 Language use draws on integrated skills.
 Language is purposeful.

Theory of Learning
In CBI, second languages are best learned when the focus is on mastery of content rather than
on mastery of language per se – which contrasts with traditional language teaching approaches.

Additional assumptions that derive from CBI:

 People learn a second language most successfully when the information they are
acquiring is perceived as interesting, useful, and leading to a desired goal.
 Some content areas are more useful as a basis for language learning than others.
 Students learn best when instruction addresses student’s needs.
 Teaching builds on the previous experience of the learners.

DESIGN
In CBI, language learning is typically considered incidental to the learning of content. Content is
important:
1. To activate and develop existing English language skills.
2. To acquire learning skills and strategies that could be applied in future language
development opportunities.
3. To develop general academic skills applicable to university studies in all subject areas.
4. To broaden students’ understanding of English-speaking people.
Types of learning and teaching activities:
 language skill improvement;
 vocabulary building;
 discourse organization;
 communicative interaction;
 study skills; and
 synthesis of content materials and grammar.
The role of teachers
Instructors must be more than good language teachers. They must be knowledgeable in
the subject matter and able to elicit that knowledge from their students. (Stryker and Leaver
1993:292) Teachers are responsible for:
 selecting and adapting authentic materials to use in class;
 create truly learner-centered classrooms;
 keep context and comprehensibility foremost in their planning and presentations; and
  contextualize their lessons by using contents as the point of departure.
Essential skills for an instructor (by Stryker and Leaver 1993:293):
1. Varying the format of classroom instruction.
2. Using group work and team-building techniques.
3. Organizing jigsaw reading arrangements.
4. Defining the background knowledge and language skills required for students success.
5. Helping students develop coping strategies.
6. Using process approaches to writing.
7. Developing and maintaining high levels of students’ esteem.
The role of materials:
 Materials must contain the subject matters of the content course.
 Materials must be ―authentic‖ – like the ones used in native language instruction.
Examples of sources and of realia: newspapers, magazines, any media materials, tourist
guidebooks, technical journals, railway timetables, newspaper ads, radio and TV
broadcasts, etc.
 Linguistic simplification to adapt texts and promote comprehensibility.
Learner Roles
 become autonomous
 support each other in collaborative models of learning
 ―learn by doing‖
 be active interpreters of input
 be willing to tolerate uncertainty along the path of learning
 be willing to explore alternative strategies
 be willing to seek multiple interpretations of oral and written texts

LESSON 6: COMMUNICATIVE LANGUAGE TEACHING

Theory of language: language is for communication and linguistic competence and the
knowledge of forms and their meanings are part of the communicative competence. Another
aspect of this knowledge is to learn the use of the language.

Theory of learning:
 Activities that involve real communication to promote learning
 Activities in which language is used for carrying out meaningful tasks promote learning
 Language that is meaningful to the learner promotes learning.

Role of the teacher: the teacher facilitates the communication in the classroom, and he/she also
acts like an adviser and a guide.
Role of the student: Students are communicators. They are actively engaged in trying to make
themselves understood and in understanding others.
Use of the mother tongue: It can be used. However, whenever possible the target language
should be used.
Activities:
 Scrambled Sentences
 Language Games
 Picture Strip Story
 Role Play

Techniques: Communicative language teaching uses almost any activity that engages learners in
authentic communication. Like functional communication activities in which communication is
involved, and social interaction activities, such as conversation and discussion sessions, dialogues
and role plays.

Materials: Language materials authentic to native speakers of the target language. (Newspaper,
radio and television broadcast, menus, weather forecast, timetables). For beginner students it is
possible to use realia without a lot of language.

Evaluation:
 A teacher can informally evaluate students’ performance in his role as an adviser or co-
communicator.
 For formal evaluation an integrative test is used which has a real communicative function.
 In order to assess students’ writing skill, a teacher might ask them to write a letter to a
friend.

Modes of Interaction
 Teacher-Student
 Student-Student
 Student-Teacher

Students’ feelings: Students are given an opportunity to express their individuality by having
them share their ideas and opinions on a regular basis. Students work with language at the
discourse level.

Students’ errors: Errors of form are tolerated during the fluency-based activities and are seen as
a natural outcome of the development of communication skills. The teacher may not the errors
during fluency activities and return to them later with an accuracy-based activity.

LESSON 7: QUALITIES OF AN EFFECTIVE ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHER

1. Socio-Affective Skills. It is crucial that teachers have some basic socio-affective skills to
interact with their students and maintain the educational process effectively. These skills include
a wide range of items such as motivating students, sparing time for students, responding to
students’ needs and providing a stress-free classroom atmosphere. It’s important for teachers
to establish and maintain positive relationships with students.
2. Pedagogical Knowledge. In order to conduct any kind of job properly, one should have the
knowledge of how to do it. He/she should be aware of the procedures and the strategies to
follow in the process, which is pedagogical knowledge.
In his study, Velez-Rendon (2002) defines pedagogical knowledge as what teachers
know about teaching their subjects. He also claims that without pedagogical knowledge,
teachers cannot convey what they know to their learners. To deliver the content in the best
way, an effective teacher needs both field specific knowledge and knowledge of how to present
it.
Different studies refer to numerous dimensions of pedagogical knowledge such as
providing students with an environment in which they can be relaxed in order to learn and
produce well, guiding students, having the ability to organize, explain and clarify, as well as
arousing and sustaining interests, motivating students, giving positive reinforcement, allocating
more time to preparation and delivery, and teaching with effective classroom materials by
integrating technology.
3. Subject Matter Knowledge. Velez-Rendon (2002) regards subject matter knowledge as what
teachers know about what they teach. Buchman (1984) also suggests the use of subject matter
knowledge in different phases of the educational process such as using target language
effectively in class, integrating lessons based on students’ background and preparing effective
lesson.
Subject matter knowledge enables teachers to make use of audio-visual materials when
possible, guide students to get some learning strategies, teach a topic in accordance with
students’ proficiency levels, and watch and inform students about their progress in language
learning.
4. Personality Characteristics. People who work in any profession indispensably bring their
personal characteristics in the working environment. This is also valid for teachers who not only
are human beings but also deal with human. Teachers are supposed to have some essential
personal characteristics to teach effectively and to be successful in their profession. Effective
teachers should have the following personal qualities:
 Being challenging and having reasonably high expectations
 Having sense of humor
 Being enthusiastic and creative
 Tolerant
 Patient
 Kind
 Sensible and open-minded
 Flexible
 Optimistic
 Having positive attitudes towards new ideas
 Caring for students
 Do the following activities below.

1. Draw a Venn diagram differentiating Receptive vs. Expressive Macro Skills.

2. List down at least 5 examples each of activities in BICS, CALP, CBI, and CLT.

Activities for Activities for Activities for CBI Activities for CLT
BICS CALP
1. 1. 1. 1.
2. 2. 2. 2.
3. 3. 3. 3.
4. 4. 4. 4.
5. 5. 5. 5.

3. As a future educator, do you think you have already acquired the needed qualities to
become an effective English Teacher? Right a short reflective essay.
4. Write a detailed lesson plan for the macro skill viewing.