Podcast for EFL Students

Podcast for EFL Students

· Description of intended students

Like babies, the first abilities that people must learn and manage about a language are ORAL and LISTENING skills, and this podcast is supposed to be the continuation of a series of videos that explain elementary contents about English. Spanish native students of ANY level of English can use this podcast; even those adults that want to learn English owing to their jobs require knowing about this language. The objective of these videos (series) is to go step by step for learning the use of the oral language, and a good way for starting is through learning the most common vocabulary in terms of nouns and adjectives. Everyone who is interested in learning English as a Foreign Language can use these videos, and it could be a way for mastering the correct use of adjectives and nouns, and clarify the differences between L1 Spanish and L2 English.

· Description of language objectives and content objectives

Language objectives for series

- Learning vocabulary and grammar in relation to nouns and adjectives, and some others. Improving listening and speaking are the main point of the series of podcast.

Content objectives for the series

- Developing oral skills and using concepts about like/dislike and requirements like “I need”, “I want” (The video is an introduction of the series of podcast, and in this case is just the elementary things for managing these grammatical structures)

- Developing listening comprehension, because the instructions are given in English in the video.

Language objectives for the individual podcast

- Listening the main differences between English and Spanish, and put them into practice. The video podcast created by myself is about the use the grammatical structure ADJECTIVE + NOUN.

Content objectives for the individual podcast

- Identifying the adjectives and nouns in the podcast, and use them at the moment they are required to use English

· Description of the elements that make the podcast comprehensible

The introduction of the video is a dialogue in which several adjectives and nouns are correctly used. That shows the use of the language in natural everyday life. The purpose is Teaching Through Content, because in any situation the language can be used. Also, comprehensible input is used for describing the activity and the content of it, for instance the students should not have problem for understanding the lesson, because as I said before, this video is the continuation of a series of podcast that explained most elementary use of language, specially nouns and adjectives; but this lesson is for them to know the correct use of them, and how they can use them in an appropriate way. In addition, their native language (Spanish) is also used for translating some sentences and gives them a guide for using adjectives and nouns correctly.

· Description of the strategies that we have covered that have informed the choices that you have made with the podcast and how you will use it with students

In my own experience, most students (independently of their age) struggle with the use of adjectives, because as the video explains, in English adjectives are used before the noun. Giving some comprehensive explanations and using just a couple of sentences translated could be a good way for students to understand the differences between the languages. Also, they can see a natural conversation between two people that shows the use of language in everyday life, not necessarily either complex situations or occasions that require specifically speak English. The idea of this video is to give support to contents that students should know about, because these are contents that they have already learned at school, or it could be a guide in case that they are learning for other reasons (jobs, required courses at university, etc).

By Felipe Rodríguez González

EWU, United States / UPLACED, Chile