Up�at 3 Teacher's Book podrecznik nauczyciela plus odpowiedzi ,testy,klucz answer key Page 025

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• Assess product(ve skills through classroom activities. Develop a set of criteria for the students’ performance while they are writing or speaking

in class. (e.g. How successful were they at communicating the message? How accurate were they in their use of grammar and vocabu!ary? How fluent were they? How intełligible?) Give the students feedback after the activity.

• Talk to students about their test results. By doing this, you can show them where they are strong and help them see in which areas they need to study morę.

Specific Learning Differences (SLDs)

Specific Learning Differences are conditions which make understanding and producing Information difficult. SLDs are not indicative of Iow intelltgence. In fact, students who have a learning difference are often very bright. However, their performance in class may hide their true potentiai and they may fail in formal assessments. Many of these students find it particularty difficult to leam in a formal classroom setting, but learn very well in morę informal, indMdualised settings. Not alf schools are able to provide additional support, and it is often left to the class teacher to deal with these students and support their learning,

Most class teachers are familiar with the classroom behaviour of SLD students. They will be the students who don't speak at all in the lesson, refuse to do written exercises, refuse to co-operate with peers in pairwork and rarefy do homework. These students are labelled variously as: ‘difficult', ‘lazy’, ‘spoiled’, ‘poorly drsciplined’, ‘a slow leamer’, ‘disturbed’ or 'stupid'. This labelling implies that there is nothing the teacher can do and if the students pick up on this message they may feel bad about themselves and develop Iow setf-esteem. However, identifying the problem, taking a positive attitude towards it and helping SLD students to develop appropriate strategies can make a huge difference.

Types of SLDs Dyslexia

Dyslexia is characterised by difficulties in reading and spelling. Dyslexic students have problems with both phonic and whole word recognition skills. The imtial, middle and end sounds of words are incorrectly identified, and sequencing of sounds is confused because they have collected them in the wrong order.

At other times they leave off the beginnings and endings of words as they rush their way through reading.

They invariably make mistakes with smali words, for example, replacing the article ‘a' with ‘the’. In many cases, students read from right to left, or sequence the letters from right to left. Sound-spelling rules are

Tips

• Identify students who might be dys!exic and modify what you expect from them accordingly.

• Ask them to prepare classroom texts before the lesson in their own time. Dyslexic students usually read much morę slowty than other students.

» Write a brief numbered outline of the day’s lesson on the board. Check off each stage as it is completed, so that they always know at what point you are in the lesson.

• Make surę you give very elear instructions. It is important that students understand exactly what to do. For this reason, instructions in the Upbeat Students' Book are kept as elear and simple as possible.

• Give students extra time to complete a task. While they are taking their time, you can keep faster students occupied by setting them the Extra practice exercises. These can be done by dyslexic students at their own speed at home.

• As there are exercises at two levels of difficulty in the Language Builder, students can concentrate on the easy exercise first to gain confidence.

• Make surę that students have access to the Students’ CD-ROM. This can be a motivating and accessible way for dyslexic students to do some extra practice in their own time.

• Avoid using smali handwriting and make surę any extra materiał you use is elear and legible. The simple layout and elear sign-posting of Upbeat makes it especially appropriate to use with dyslexic students.

• Use the red bookmark to al!eviate eye strain and help students to focus on the text. Notę that in the D lessons texts are printed on a pale beige background, which can help when dyslexic students have to read longer passages.

• Avoid giving complicated feedback on written work.

A discussion with the student about the content and errors may be morę helpful than a lot of red marks and a correction codę.

• AJ Iow extra time in tests and examinations. An extra 15 minutes per hour may be appropnate. Make surę a teacher is available to help with instructions.

• Share with other teachers your diagnosis of

a dyslexic student and discuss with other teachers how you can best help them.

Dysgraphia

Dysgraphia refers to specific problems in writing. You will often see a dysgraphic student gripping the pen very tightly, and trying to fix the pen to the page in order to gain control. There is a lack of fluency in moving the pen over the page and the writing is stilted and