Teaching foreign language for specific purposes

2.Contextual Activities
One of the main goals of contextual learning is to develop an authentic task to assess performance. Creating an assessment in a context can help to guide the teacher to replicate real world experiences and make necessary inclusive design decisions. Contextual learning can be used as a form of formative assessment and can help give educators a stronger profile on how the intended learning goals, standards and benchmarks fit the curriculum. It is essential to establish and align the intended learning goals of the contextual task at the beginning to create a shared understanding of what success looks like. Self-directed theory states that humans by nature seek purpose and the desire to make a contribution and to be part of a cause greater and more enduring then oneself.⁴ Contextual learning can help bring relevance and meaning to the learning, helping students relate to the world they live in. [4]
Does the task fulfill the intended learning goals? Does the task involve problems that require the students to use their knowledge creatively to find a solution? Is the task an engaging learning experience? Is the audience as authentic as possible?
Does the task require students to use processes, products and procedures that simulate those used by people working in a similar field? Is the task inclusive? Are there clear criteria for students on how the product, performance or service will be evaluated? Are there models of excellence which demonstrate standards?
Are the students involved in the assessment process? Is there a provision made for continuous formative feedback, from oneself, from teachers and peers to help the students improve? Is there an opportunity for student choice and ownership to the extent that would be. More modelling is needed at beginner levels. Hence, there are activities like communicative drills and dialogues. At advanced levels, wider parameters can be provided. But since intermediate levels are somewhere in between, we can have general conversations around relatively common topics. This helps students gain more confidence speaking freely. And, it takes them outside the boundaries of limited exchanges found in dialogues.[⁵]For our sample activities, let’s offer our class members the subject of ‘favorite restaurants.’ This is not an uncommon topic in life. As such, you can use it to get intermediate-level learners talking.
Notice we didn’t go straight to the punch with: “What’s your favorite restaurant?” That’s pretty much a beginner-level question. Try getting creative with your questions. Lead them down a path of new words. Scaffold from what they know to where they want to go.Ideally, these questions would be given to pairs who would converse. If that isn’t possible, create a two-way exchange between yourself and the class members rather than the typical one-way, interview-type conversations we’re all familiar with. The ultimate idea is to let this thing take off while you are free to observe areas for feedback after.⁶ at the intermediate level. For this sample Communicative Approach activity, we’re going to choose the context of ‘eating out.’ Now, learners have a framework to build on. You can offer them the following working vocabulary: Categories of food: Appetizer, beverage, main course, dessert. Food items: Bread, soup (of the day), chef salad, baked potato, well-done steak (rare, medium-rare), seafood platter, etc. As an extra feature of the lesson, you can show class members images of food and have them categorize the images. There are a wide variety of options for vocabulary-building activities.[6] They might also benefit from the following structure when ordering:
I would like + noun phrase (e.g. I would like a roast beef sandwich.)
Finally, you can offer them a couple of useful expressions such as:
Would you mind giving us just a moment to decide?
I think I’ll order the.Now that they have a working language. You can break them into teams where one person is the server and the other is the customer. Teach them what they might expect a server to say. A sample menu would be nice too.⁷
Another option is breaking them into teams of three, where two customers decide together what they would like. There are many possible variables.