FOR EDUCATORS
HOW DO I TEACH MULTILEVEL STUDENTS IN EMI COURSES?
Ideally, your university has testing and possibly interview requirements to ensure students have a CEFR B2 level of English before studying in graduate programs in English.
If not, or if despite tests you still find you have students of different levels, try the following:
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Consider what skills you want your students to have in order to learn or complete tasks in your course.
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At the beginning of the semester, provide a diagnostic assignment — writing or speaking assignment in class that you can evaluate based on the skill criteria above.
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Concentrate on teaching both content and skills that the majority of students need. Give higher-level students more challenging tasks separately, and plan with lower-level students additional tutoring (by you or someone else), or if need be a shift them to a different medium of instruction.
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Give lower-level students more time to read, watch recorded lectures, and prepare class materials in advance of the class
SHOULD I USE STUDENTS’ MOTHER TONGUE IN EMI CLASSES?
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If your program is a multilingual program with students and teachers who know and use 3 languages, development in all these languages is necessary, Using these three languages can support development.
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This does not mean speaking in English and repeating everything in the L1. Rather the languages can be used freely in teaching and learning (Paulsrud, Tian, & Toth, 2021).
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Students need to see and feel a purpose in using multiple languages so they don’t think it’s a waste of their time
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You can use other languages in class, for example, to help students see connections in content and skills among languages
HOW CAN I STOP MY STUDENTS FROM PLAGIARIZING ASSIGNMENTS?
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Make sure your university has a policy on plagiarism and enforces it.
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Make it clear to students: a) what plagiarism is b) why it’s a problem c) writing and speaking techniques they can use to avoid plagiarism.
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Ask your university for access to software (e.g. Turnitin) to help detect plagiarism
WHAT IS GENRE-BASED PEDAGOGY?
HOW CAN I USE IT TO TEACH ACADEMIC SKILLS?
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Genre-based pedagogy goes beyond teaching grammar to teaching students to produce different types of texts for different purposes (persuading, informing), different audiences, and different structures
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Genre-based pedagogy also focuses on developing subject-specific knowledge, and knowledge of the process of producing different types of texts (Tardy, 2009)
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Genre-based pedagogy means teaching students to look at a text and understand the different parts of a text in order to produce a similar type of text
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As a process, genre-based pedagogy invites students to draft, review peers’ drafts and get feedback, revise, and submit to a teacher or public audience for further comment and feedback
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Genre-based pedagogy can use multiple languages for input and output
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Genre-based pedagogy is often taught by academic language course instructors in collaboration with subject teachers
WHAT RESOURCES CAN HELP ME TEACH IN MULTIPLE LANGUAGES, AND TEACH SPEAKERS OF MULTIPLE LANGUAGES?
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Plurilingual Lab—From McGill University in Canada, a site with research and ideas for using students’ multilingual language abilities for teaching, learning, and identity formation
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“Enhancement of Student Learning in Courses with English as the Medium of Instruction” https://www.eduhk.hk/moi/index.php
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City University of New York-NY State Initiative on Emergent Bilinguals Translanguaging Resources https://www.cuny-nysieb.org/translanguaging-resources/
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CLIL4U (http://languages.dk/clil4u/)
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Purdue Online Writing Lab (https://owl.purdue.edu)