STUDY GROUP OUTLINE

1. Who are these learners?
2. Why is a course or workshop needed?
3. When is a time that is the most convenient for everyone concerned?
4. Where will learners feel most comfortable (safest)?
5. For What (What For) purpose (verbs) is the information needed and how will learners and teachers be accountable to each other for establishing that learning has taken place?
6. What specific information (nouns) do learners need at this time?
7. How can a course be created that meets the needs of the learners and allows them to become proficient at using the information they learn within the time frame allowed?

Using the Seven Steps of Planning make an outline for one of the following scenarios:

1. You teach a pre-literacy class with 20 students. Fifteen of your students have lived in the United States for more than five years; only one student is a recent immigrant. Most have held jobs, although mostly as maids or gardeners, before attending your class.
2. Your large beginning ESL class has a wide range of abilities with some students eager and almost ready to move up to a higher level but with other students simply filling the seats, meeting the minimum attendance requirement. They all want to learn "English grammar" but don't really understand what grammar involves, nor do they integrate what grammar lessons you do teach into their spoken and written grammar.
3. You teach a high (or low) intermediate ESL listening and speaking class. Some of your students are college educated in their native language; some are just beginning to read and write coherently in English.
4. This has been a difficult year for the students in your class. You are the fourth teacher they have had in four months and each teacher has started teaching something different.
5. Your students have one goal - to "get" their GED. You realize that they need to learn far more than just how to pass the GED test if they are to be able to cope with a rapidly changing world, which will require that employees undergo retraining many times in their lives if they are to stay employed. Your students want to focus just on passing the test with the minimum required score.
6. An employer in a small community has just announced that it is closing its doors and all 50 employees will be unemployed in six months. A community development grant allows you to provide 25 weeks of instruction to employees who now have an average of an eighth grade education, although the actual literacy scores range from second to eleventh grades. Some of the employees also have weak English language skills.
7. An employer invites you to teach an ESL class for his employees on-site. The plant is expanding and the employer wants to help his employees get ready for the change. Consider this question: Would your course be any different if the employees came during work hours and received wages for attendance OR if they came after work hours and purchased their own text materials?

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