2. Teaching and Testing Written English

 

2. Teaching and Testing Written English

The TSC Secondary English Curriculum focus on the development and assessment of written literacy, which includes reading and writing as secondary productive and receptive skills.

2.1. Teaching Reading Skills

Reading is a visual act of perceiving written text to understand its content and derive message.

• Principles of Teaching Reading: Teachers should encourage students to read as often as possible and ensure they are engaged with the material. Effective teaching involves giving hints for prediction, matching tasks to the specific topic, and exploiting texts to the full through discussions and presentations.
• Reading Techniques:
• Skimming: A fast-reading method to get the gist or general idea of a text without reading every word.
• Scanning: Rapidly looking through a text to find specific information like dates, names, or figures.
• Types of Reading:
• Intensive Reading: A detailed, line-by-line study of a text, typically done in class to focus on linguistic and semantic details.
• Extensive Reading: Reading longer texts (novels, magazines) for pleasure and general information, often done independently outside the classroom.
• Stages of a Reading Lesson:
• Pre-reading: Stimulating interest by showing pictures, guessing titles, and pre-teaching "trouble spot" vocabulary.
• While-reading: Students engage in actual reading to answer questions, make notes, and perform tasks like True/False or matching.
• Post-reading: Follow-up activities such as summarizing, retelling, debating, and relating the text to real-life experiences.

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2.2. Teaching Writing Skills

Writing is a productive language skill that is more formal, rule-governed, and author-centered than speaking.

• Stages of the Writing Process:
1. Planning: Involves brainstorming, consulting resources, and making an outline.
2. Drafting: The actual composing stage where the first version of the text is produced.
3. Revising: Reviewing the draft based on teacher feedback to improve style and information.
4. Editing: The final stage where learners check for spelling, punctuation, and grammatical accuracy before producing the final draft.
• Writing Techniques:

• Controlled Writing: High teacher guidance with no freedom of choice; includes tasks like sentence combining or fill-in-the-blanks.
• Guided Writing: Intermediate stage where students follow a model or skeleton but have some freedom to express ideas (e.g., parallel writing).
• Free Writing: Students are given a topic and are completely free to use their own vocabulary and structures.
• Major Approaches: The Product Approach focuses on imitating a model; the Process Approach emphasizes planning and drafting; and the Genre Approach teaches writing for specific real-world purposes (e.g., reports or letters).

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2.3. Preparing Instruments for Testing Reading and Writing

The test specification chart ensures that assessments measure the curriculum's learning outcomes accurately.

• Reading Test Items (40 Marks): These include one seen passage from the textbook (Reading 1) and three unseen passages (Reading 2, 3, 4).
• Item Types: Multiple choice, True/False, matching, ordering, and short answers.
• Cognitive Levels: Questions must cover Literal Comprehension (16 items), Reorganization (8), Inference (8), and Evaluation/Reflection (3).
• Writing Test Items (24 Marks):
• Guided Writing: Tasks include describing charts/tables, writing recipes, advertisements, or messages of condolence (10 marks).
• Free Writing: Tasks include personal letters, emails, essays (narrative/argumentative), or book reviews (14 marks).
• Considerations: Instruments must provide clear directions and avoid ambiguity or cultural bias.

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2.4. Scoring Answers in Reading and Writing Tests

Scoring is based on numerical scales provided in the curriculum to determine student performance levels.

• Reading Scoring: Items are generally objective; Reading 4 is specifically used to test vocabulary knowledge.
• Writing Scoring Criteria: Evaluators must use specific rubrics assessing organization, coherence, cohesion, subject matter, correctness of language, and layout.
• Reliability: Methods like Test-Retest or Split-half are used to ensure test scores are consistent and meaningful.

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2.5. Teaching and Testing Literary Texts

Literary texts (poetry, drama, short stories, essays) are artistic expressions used to enrich vocabulary and develop critical thinking.

• Teaching Poetry: Focuses on aesthetic qualities, rhyme, and rhythm.
• Activities: Predicting themes from titles, recitation with gestures, and matching words to meanings.
• Teaching Drama: Fosters oral communication and non-verbal skills.
• Activities: Role-playing, rehearsing scenes, and identifying language functions within dialogues.
• Teaching Short Stories: Uses plot and characters to teach narrative structures and past tenses.
• Activities: Retelling stories, arranging jumbled sentences, and analyzing character traits.
• Teaching Essays: Emphasizes persuasion, argumentation, and formal writing styles.
• Activities: Writing summaries, identifying topic sentences, and debating issues presented by the author.
• Testing Literature: Often integrated into reading comprehension through questions about theme, tone, and figurative language.

1. Discuss the main characteristics of good paragraph? Also discuss with examples the basic steps you think are appropriate for teaching paragraph writing to the grade nine students? (4+6=10)

Paragraph writing at the secondary level is a fundamental guided and free writing skill that requires students to balance accuracy in language with the creative expression of ideas. For Grade 9 students, a good paragraph typically ranges between 100 to 150 words and must be built around a central theme.

Main Characteristics of a Good Paragraph

Based on the sources, a well-constructed paragraph is characterized by several key elements:

• Topic Sentence: This is the most crucial component, usually stated at the beginning, which introduces the main idea or the subject being discussed.
• Supporting Details: These sentences follow the topic sentence to develop it further by providing facts, reasons, or examples that prove its value.
• Unity: A good paragraph focuses on one main idea. All sentences within it must support this idea; any information that does not relate directly to the topic does not belong.
• Coherence and Cohesion: The ideas must flow logically. This is achieved through lexical and grammatical cohesion devices, such as connectives and pronouns, which show the relationship between parts of the text.
• Concluding Sentence: The paragraph should end with a sentence that summarizes the points made or reinforces the central concept.
• Correct Mechanics: A good paragraph adheres to the rules of punctuation, capitalization, and spelling to ensure the message is clear and unambiguous.

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Basic Steps for Teaching Paragraph Writing to Grade 9

To teach paragraph writing effectively, an ELT expert should employ a process-oriented approach that guides students through stages of development.

1. Planning (Pre-writing Stage)

The objective is to motivate students and help them generate content before they begin the formal writing act.

• Activity: Brainstorming and Mind Mapping on a familiar topic.
• Example: The teacher shows a picture of a polluted river and asks students to list words related to the environment. Students then work in groups to categorize these ideas into causes and consequences.

2. Drafting (Composing Stage)

In this stage, students act as active creators, organizing their planned ideas into sentences.

• Activity: Guided Writing using a model or skeleton provided by the teacher.
• Example: The teacher provides a model paragraph about a "Dancing Culture" in Nepal. Students then use this structure to write their own paragraph about a tradition in their specific community, such as Rodhighar or Chandi Naach.

3. Revising Stage

This involves looking at the global structure and content to improve the clarity and development of ideas.

• Activity: Peer Feedback or group discussion.
• Example: Students swap their drafts with a partner to check if the paragraph has a clear topic sentence and if the supporting details truly relate to that topic.

4. Editing and Polishing Stage

This final stage focuses on the "mechanics of writing" to ensure technical correctness.

• Activity: Proofreading and Punctuation Correction.
• Example: Students review their final draft specifically looking for spelling errors, subject-verb agreement (concord), and the proper use of full stops or commas to mark the end of thoughts.

5. Final Production

Students produce the final version for evaluation.

• Example: A Grade 9 student submits a 150-word paragraph expressing their views on a contemporary issue, such as the mental and social impacts of video games.

2. How do you teach syntax to the secondary level students? Describe at least five writing activities that can be used while teaching syntax.

Teaching syntax—the study of sentence structure and the specific rules governing word order—is essential for developing grammatical competence in secondary students. It ensures that learners can produce accurate and fluent language that "makes sense".

How to Teach Syntax to Secondary Level Students

Teaching syntax involves shifting from abstract rules to practical, meaningful application through the following pedagogical approaches:

• Inductive Approach: The teacher presents several examples of a specific structure first. Students observe these instances, analyze similarities, and infer the syntactic rule themselves before practicing it. For instance, showing several "if-clauses" allows students to discover the structure $If + present\ simple, will + infinitive$.
• Deductive Approach: This is a more traditional, teacher-centered method where the teacher explicitly states the rule or structure (e.g., $Sub + V1/V5 + Obj$) and then provides examples for students to memorize and apply.
• Functional-Communicative Approach: This modern method teaches syntax in relation to meaningful real-life functions. Instead of just learning word order, students learn how a specific syntactic form (like an interrogative) performs a function (like requesting permission).
• Consciousness-Raising (CR): Teachers design tasks that help students notice specific syntactic features in a text that they might otherwise overlook, helping them internalize the rules over time rather than demanding immediate mastery.

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Five Writing Activities for Teaching Syntax

The following writing activities, ranging from controlled to guided, are effective for reinforcing word order and sentence structure:

1. Sentence Reordering (Jumbled Words)

This activity directly targets the core of syntax: word order.

• Procedure: Students are given sentences where the words are out of sequence and must rearrange them into a grammatically correct form.
• Example: Rearrange "the / highest / in / Solukhumbu / lies / peak / Mt. Everest" into "Mt. Everest, which is the highest peak in the world, lies in Solukhumbu district".

2. Sentence Combining

This trains students to move from simple to more complex syntactic structures using connectives.

• Procedure: The teacher provides two simple sentences, and students must join them using a specific conjunction provided in brackets.
• Example: Join "I couldn't sleep" and "I was tired" using despite. Result: "I couldn't sleep despite being tired".

3. Sentence Transformation (Reproduction)

This develops structural flexibility by requiring students to rewrite sentences while maintaining meaning.

• Procedure: Students are given a base sentence and instructed to transform its syntactic form, such as changing active to passive voice or a statement into a 'wh' question.
• Example: Transform "Yamuna danced beautifully in the party" into a 'how' question. Result: "How did Yamuna dance in the party?".

4. Parallel Writing

This uses the Product Approach, where students use an existing text as a structural "skeleton" for their own content.

• Procedure: After analyzing the syntax of a model paragraph (e.g., a biography), students write a similar text about a different subject, imitating the original sentence structures.
• Example: Following a model about a character's habits, students write a paragraph about a classmate using the same descriptive syntax.

5. Sentence Completion (Gap Filling)

This focuses on syntax in context, requiring students to identify the correct grammatical categories to complete a thought.

• Procedure: Students fill in blanks with appropriate relative pronouns, modal verbs, or verb forms that fit the syntactic requirements of the sentence.
• Example: "The tiger _______ terrified the villagers was sent to the zoo yesterday." Students must identify that the syntax requires a relative pronoun like that or which.

3. How do you, as a secondary level English teacher, utilize the poem in developing making interference skill in the secondary level students? Discuss the basic steps of using poem at secondary level. (5+5=10)

Utilizing poetry at the secondary level is a powerful method for developing making inference skills, as poems are often indirect, symbolic, and possess "hidden and untold sides" that require readers to look beyond the literal text.

1. Utilizing Poetry to Develop Inference Skills

As an English teacher, I utilize poetry to develop inference—the ability to read between the lines—through the following strategies:

• Exploring Figurative Language: Poetry relies heavily on devices such as metaphors, similes, and symbols. I guide students to identify these devices and infer their deeper symbolic meanings, which often contradict or expand upon their literal dictionary definitions.
• Predicting and Guessing: During the reading process, I ask students to predict the theme from the title or guess what will happen in the next verse. This forces them to use existing textual clues to construct meanings that are not explicitly stated.
• Contextual Interpretation: I encourage students to read poems in relation to their social, cultural, and historical contexts. By understanding the poet's background and the period of composition, students can infer the speaker’s attitude, mood, and intent.
• Encouraging Multiple Interpretations: Poetry has an "ineradicable subjective core," meaning it does not have a single fixed meaning. I utilize this feature to let students produce and debate their own interpretations, justifying them with evidence from the text.
• Analyzing Paralinguistic Clues: When students listen to or recite poetry, they learn to infer meaning from intonation, stress, and rhythm, which often signal the emotional subtext of the poem.

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2. Basic Steps of Using Poetry at the Secondary Level

The instructional sequence for teaching poetry follows three standard pedagogical stages:

Stage 1: Pre-reading (Stimulation and Preparation)

The goal is to arouse interest and provide the necessary scaffolding for the poem.

• Predicting the theme from the title or related visual aids (pictures/maps).
• Providing essential background information about the poet and the historical or cultural context of the poem.
• Pre-teaching "trouble spot" vocabulary or unusual linguistic structures used in the poem.
• Asking students to imagine a situation similar to the one described in the poem.

Stage 2: While-reading (Actual Processing)

In this stage, students interact directly with the text to build understanding.

• Model Recitation: The teacher recites the poem with correct pronunciation and attention to musical elements, which students then imitate.
• Analyzing Structure: Activities like arranging jumbled words or verses to reconstruct the poem’s logic.
• Interpreting Meaning: Matching difficult words with their contextual meanings and discussing the figurative devices found in the verses.
• Predictive Reading: Reading one verse and having students predict the content of the next.

Stage 3: Post-reading (Follow-up and Extension)

This stage confirms understanding and encourages creative application.

• Comprehension Tasks: Completing True/False items or answering open-ended questions based on the poem’s theme.
• Critical Discussion: Deciding on the best interpretation and relating the poem’s themes to the students' own lives or contemporary society.
• Creative Production: Writing a summary, a review, or a similar poem (creative writing extension) to practice the newly learned structures and vocabulary.
• Final Performance: Asking every student to recite the poem aloud with appropriate gestures and expressions to demonstrate their emotional grasp of the text.

4. Discuss the problem of teaching short story to the secondary level students. How do you support your students to read and learn short story by overcoming those problems in grade 9?

Teaching short stories at the secondary level involves navigating various linguistic, cultural, and pedagogical hurdles. In the context of Grade 9 in Nepal, a short story is defined as a fictional narrative prose of concise length, typically focusing on a single incident or event that can be read in one sitting.

Problems in Teaching Short Stories

Based on the sources, several challenges inhibit effective short story instruction in secondary classrooms:

• Linguistic Barriers: Students often have a limited vocabulary base, making it difficult to comprehend the idiomatic expressions and figurative devices (metaphors, similes, symbols) frequently used in literary texts.
• Cultural and Contextual Gaps: Many stories are rooted in foreign social and historical contexts that students find unfamiliar, leading to a lack of empathy or connection with the characters.
• Pedagogical Constraints: There is often an over-reliance on traditional teacher-centered methods, such as the lecture or Grammar Translation Method (GTM), where the teacher simply translates the story while students remain passive.
• Abstract Themes: Students may struggle to grasp the hidden or untold meanings (reading between the lines) of abstract and complex themes.
• Exam-Oriented Approach: Teaching often focuses strictly on answering questions for exams rather than encouraging pleasure reading or literary appreciation.
• Psychological Factors: Many students find second language learning boring or full of pressure, leading to a lack of motivation and a fear of making mistakes during interactive tasks.

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Supporting Grade 9 Students: Overcoming Teaching Problems

To support Grade 9 students and overcome these challenges, I would implement a three-stage pedagogical framework (Pre, While, and Post-reading) that emphasizes student engagement and communicative competence.

1. Pre-reading Stage (Stimulation and Scaffolding)

The goal here is to bridge the cultural and linguistic gap before reading the text.

• Predicting from Visuals: Before reading a story like "The Ant and the Grasshopper," I would show the textbook pictures and ask students to guess the insects' actions and their fate in winter.
• Mingle Prediction: I would print key sentences from the story on strips and have students mingle to formulate a collective prediction about the plot.
• Pre-teaching Vocabulary: I would highlight "trouble spot" words and use realia or synonyms to clarify their meanings in context.

2. While-reading Stage (Active Processing)

This stage ensures students are actively deriving meaning rather than just reading words.

• Graphic Organizers/Mind Maps: To address character complexity, I would have students use mind maps to list adjectives describing a character's traits (e.g., the rickshaw puller in Unit 18).
• Jumbled Sentence Ordering: To help students observe narrative structure and the use of connectives, I would have them arrange jumbled sentences from the plot into the correct sequence.
• Aloud and Guided Reading: I would have students take turns reading aloud to practice pronunciation and fluency, providing immediate feedback on their articulation.

3. Post-reading Stage (Critical Extension and Production)

This stage focuses on higher-order thinking skills and relating the story to real life.

• Retelling and Perspective Shifting: For stories like the one in Unit 3, I would ask students to retell the story from a different character's perspective (e.g., making the queen the main character) to develop their creative imagination.
• Dramatization and Role Play: Students would act out specific scenes using gestures and appropriate language functions. This helps overcome shyness and reinforces the social context of the language.
• Creative Writing Extension: I would encourage students to write a similar story or a different ending to the one they read, fostering learner autonomy and original self-expression.
• Text-Based Discussion: I would facilitate debates on the moral of the story or the characters' decisions (e.g., whether Mahendra Yadav's decision in Unit 7 was wise) to promote critical thinking.

5. Discuss the functions of different stages of teaching reading. Also suggest possible activities that can be used to achieve the purposes you mention under each stage of teaching reading. (5+5=10)

The instructional process for teaching reading is systematically divided into three main stages: Pre-reading, While-reading, and Post-reading. Each stage serves a specific pedagogical function to ensure students move from simple word recognition to deep comprehension and critical analysis.

1. Pre-reading Stage (Preparatory)

The primary function of this stage is to arouse interest and motivate students before they interact with the text. It aims to activate students' background knowledge (schema), provide necessary context, and prepare them for the linguistic difficulties they may encounter.

Suggested Activities:

• Visual Analysis: Showing and discussing pictures, charts, or maps related to the reading text to stimulate interest.
• Prediction and Guessing: Asking students to guess the title, theme, or characters based on headings or photographs.
• Vocabulary Preview: Pre-teaching "trouble spot" vocabulary or new words that are essential for understanding the text.
• Contextual Briefing: Providing background information about the author or the historical/social context of the topic.
• Answering Pre-questions: Discussing oral questions that set a purpose for reading.

2. While-reading Stage (Active Processing)

This is the stage where actual reading and meaning-making take place. The function is to have students engage directly with the text to extract specific information, identify main ideas, and understand the internal relationship between sentences.

Suggested Activities:

• Comprehension Tasks: Answering text-related questions such as True/False, multiple-choice, or short-answer items.
• Information Extraction: Completing tables, charts, or diagrams based on details in the passage.
• Gist Identification: Writing the central idea or identifying the main point of specific paragraphs.
• Textual Mapping: Labeling pictures or ordering jumbled sentences to reconstruct the plot or logic of the text.
• Note-taking: Identifying and recording key vocabulary and specific details while reading.
• Scanning and Skimming: Rapidly searching for dates, names, or general themes.

3. Post-reading Stage (Evaluation and Extension)

The function of this stage is to confirm understanding, evaluate student performance, and provide feedback. It also serves to integrate reading with other skills (speaking and writing) by allowing students to relate the text to their own lives and think critically about the content.

Suggested Activities:

• Summarizing and Reviewing: Asking students to write a summary report or a conclusion of what they have read.
• Critical Discussion: Engaging in debates or expressing personal views and opinions on the issues raised in the text.
• Creative Production: Writing a similar text (parallel writing) or changing the ending of a story.
• Role Play and Retelling: Acting out scenes from a drama or retelling a story from a different perspective to demonstrate deep comprehension.
• Real-life Connection: Relating the text's themes to contemporary society or personal experiences.
• Linguistic Games: Playing games that utilize the vocabulary or structures learned during the lesson.

6. Describe at least five activities that can be used to develop reading skills of the secondary level students. (5+5=10)

Developing reading skills at the secondary level involves moving beyond mere word recognition toward deep comprehension, critical analysis, and information extraction. Based on the sources, here are five effective activities to achieve these goals:

1. Skimming and Scanning (Speed Reading)

These are two distinct speed-reading techniques used for different purposes.

• Procedure:
• Skimming: Students are given a limited time (e.g., two minutes) to read a text (like a newspaper article or an essay) to get the gist or general idea without reading every word.
• Scanning: The teacher provides specific questions requiring facts, such as dates, names, or figures. Students must look through the text rapidly to locate this specific information.
• Purpose: These techniques help students become flexible readers who can adapt their reading speed based on their specific communicative or academic goals.

2. Prediction from Visuals and Titles

This activity utilizes a student's prior knowledge (schema) to create interest and set a purpose for reading.

• Procedure: Before reading, the teacher shows students the book cover, photographs, or headlines related to the text (e.g., looking at a picture of Taj Mahal before reading Unit 1 in Grade 9).
• Task: Students work in pairs to guess the theme, characters, and plot. This creates anticipation and helps them understand the content better once they begin reading.

3. Jigsaw Reading (Cooperative Reading)

This is a learner-centered technique that integrates reading with interactional speaking.

• Procedure:
• A longer text (like a short story or a news report) is divided into several sections.
• The class is divided into "expert groups," with each group assigned one section to read and understand thoroughly.
• Students then re-group so that each new group contains one "expert" from every section. They must report on their part to their peers to reconstruct the entire message.
• Purpose: It forces students to read carefully for information and promotes learner autonomy.

4. Para-orthographic Information Extraction

This activity involves transferring information from a written text into a visual or diagrammatic format.

• Procedure: After reading a descriptive or factual passage (e.g., about the "Water Cycle" or "Average Daily Attendance"), students are asked to complete a table, chart, map, or diagram.
• Task: For instance, after reading a biography, students might fill in a mind map identifying the subject's achievements, habits, and physical traits.
• Purpose: It ensures that students have grasped both the main ideas and supporting details while making abstract information more vivid and memorable.

5. Summarizing and Retelling

Summarizing is a high-level skill that requires condensing a text while keeping essential ideas intact.

• Procedure: After completing a reading passage (such as a short story or an essay), students are asked to write a concise summary report (about 50-100 words) or tell the "story in their own words" to a partner.
• Task: To help them, the teacher may provide a framework of questions (Who? What? Where? Why?) that the summary must answer.
• Purpose: This activity improves critical thinking by forcing students to distinguish main ideas from supporting details and paraphrase content using their own vocabulary.

7. Discuss the functions of different stages of teaching reading. Also suggest possible activities that can be used to achieve the purposes you mention under each stage of teaching reading. (5+5=10)

The instructional process for teaching reading is systematically divided into three main stages: Pre-reading, While-reading, and Post-reading. Each stage serves a distinct pedagogical function to ensure students move from initial engagement to deep comprehension and critical analysis of a text.

1. Pre-reading Stage (Preparatory)

The primary function of this stage is to prepare, motivate, and arouse interest in students before they begin reading. It aims to activate their prior knowledge (schema), provide necessary context, and lower anxiety by addressing potential linguistic difficulties.

Suggested Activities:

• Visual Discussion: Showing and talking about pictures, charts, graphs, or maps related to the text to stimulate interest.
• Prediction and Guessing: Asking students to guess the title, theme, or characters based on headings or photographs.
• Answering Pre-questions: Discussing oral questions that set a clear purpose for reading.
• Vocabulary Preview: Presenting and explaining "trouble spot" vocabulary items that are essential for understanding the text.
• Brainstorming: Encouraging students to share what they already know about the topic to connect new information to existing knowledge.

2. While-reading Stage (Active Processing)

This stage is where actual reading and meaning-making take place. Its function is to engage students directly with the text to extract specific information, identify main ideas, and understand how the author’s ideas are organized.

Suggested Activities:

• Comprehension Tasks: Answering text-related questions such as True/False, multiple-choice, or short-answer items to check understanding.
• Information Extraction: Completing tables, charts, or diagrams based on details found in the passage.
• Identifying the Gist: Writing the central idea of the text or identifying the main point of specific paragraphs.
• Textual Marking: Underlining main ideas or spotting key keywords and transition words while reading.
• Note-taking: Recording important points or specific details in a structured format.
• Sequencing: Arranging jumbled sentences or pictures to reconstruct the logical flow of the plot.

3. Post-reading Stage (Evaluation and Extension)

The function of this stage is to confirm understanding, evaluate student performance, and provide feedback. It serves to integrate reading with other skills (speaking and writing), allowing students to reflect on the content and relate it to their own lives.

Suggested Activities:

• Summarizing and Reporting: Writing a summary report, conclusion, or a concise version of what they have read.
• Critical Discussion and Debate: Engaging in debates or expressing personal views and opinions on the values and issues presented in the text.
• Creative Production: Writing a similar text (parallel writing) or changing the ending of a story to foster creative imagination.
• Role Play and Retelling: Acting out scenes from a drama or retelling the story in their own words to demonstrate deep comprehension.
• Problem-Solving: Participating in tasks where they must find solutions to issues raised by the author.
• Linguistic Games: Playing games that utilize the vocabulary or grammatical structures learned during the lesson.

8. Describe at least five activities that can be used to develop reading skills of the secondary level students. (5+5=10)

Developing reading skills at the secondary level requires moving beyond simple word recognition toward deep comprehension, critical analysis, and information extraction. The following five activities are effective for fostering these skills in a secondary classroom:

1. Skimming and Scanning (Speed Reading)

These are two distinct speed-reading techniques used for different communicative and academic purposes.

• Skimming: Students are given a limited time to read a text quickly to get the gist or general idea without reading every single word. They might focus on titles, subheadings, and the first sentences of paragraphs.
• Scanning: This involves looking through a text rapidly to locate specific information, such as dates, names, or figures, often to answer a particular question.
• Purpose: These techniques help students become flexible readers who can adapt their reading speed to suit their specific goals.

2. Prediction from Visuals and Titles

This is a core pre-reading activity that utilizes a student's prior knowledge (schema) to create interest and set a purpose for reading.

• Procedure: Before reading the text, the teacher provides hints such as book covers, photographs, or headlines.
• Task: Students work in pairs or groups to guess the theme, characters, and plot.
• Purpose: Predicting stimulates curiosity and passion for reading, ensuring students are cognitively engaged before they even begin the first paragraph.

3. Para-orthographic Information Extraction

This activity involves transferring information from a written text into a visual or diagrammatic format.

• Procedure: After reading a descriptive or factual passage, students are asked to complete a table, chart, map, or diagram based on details in the text.
• Example: Students might read a text about the "Water Cycle" and then label a provided diagram or extract data from a biography to fill in a character mind map.
• Purpose: This helps present information vividly and clearly, ensuring students have grasped both the main ideas and the internal relationships between sentences.

4. Summarizing and Note-making

Summarizing is a high-level skill that requires condensing a large selection of text into its most important points.

• Procedure: After completing a reading, students must identify the topic sentence and crucial supporting details.
• Task: They rewrite these ideas in their own words, keeping the meaning intact while ignoring irrelevant or unnecessary information.
• Purpose: This improves critical thinking by forcing students to distinguish main ideas from minor details and demonstrates a full understanding of the text.

5. The KWL Strategy (Know, Want, Learn)

The KWL chart is a structured instructional technique designed to improve comprehension and memory.

• Procedure: Students use a three-column table:
• Know (K): Students brainstorm everything they already know about a topic before reading.
• Want to Know (W): They generate a list of questions they hope the text will answer.
• Learned (L): After reading, they record the new information they acquired.
• Purpose: This strategy enhances self-motivation and curiosity, guiding students through the entire reading process from preparation to reflection.

Additional Strategy: Reading Aloud

While often used at the primary level, reading aloud remains significant for secondary students in Nepal to improve pronunciation, articulation, and rhythm. It allows the teacher to provide immediate feedback and helps students overcome shyness while internalizing the sound system of the target language.

9. Differentiate between test and examination. List different types of instruments that can be used to test reading comprehension. Explain any two of them used for testing reading skills at the secondary level. 2+4+4 [TSC- 2079]

In the context of secondary level English language teaching and evaluation in Nepal, the distinction between tests and examinations, the instruments used for assessing reading, and the specific procedures for two such instruments are detailed below:

1. Difference Between Test and Examination

• Test: A test is a specific process or method used to assess, measure, or evaluate a learner’s skills, knowledge, or performance at a particular time. In the Nepalese secondary curriculum, tests are often formative, occurring frequently as classroom, weekly, or monthly activities to provide feedback and scale student progress.
• Examination: An examination is a more formal and comprehensive summative evaluation, typically conducted at the end of a term or course (such as terminal exams or board exams). Its primary purpose is to certify competence, rank students, and provide a final grade based on a set specification grid.

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2. Instruments to Test Reading Comprehension

Based on the test specification grid for Grades 9 and 10, the following instruments (test items) are used to assess reading skills:

• Multiple Choice Questions (MCQs)
• True/False Statements
• Fill in the Gaps (Completion items)
• Matching Items
• Ordering (Sequencing jumbled sentences)
• Short Answer Questions
• Vocabulary Tasks (Synonyms/Antonyms/Meaning matching—specifically in Reading 4)

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3. Explanation of Two Instruments at the Secondary Level

I. Multiple Choice Questions (MCQs)

• Description: This instrument provides a question or an incomplete sentence followed by four alternative choices. Students must select the single best option that accurately reflects the information in the reading passage.
• Application: At the secondary level, MCQs are used to test literal comprehension, the ability to reorganize information, and vocabulary knowledge. They are highly objective and allow for quick, reliable scoring. An example would be asking, "What does a barometer measure?" with options for temperature, humidity, and pressure.

II. Short Answer Questions

• Description: This instrument requires students to provide brief, concise written responses (usually no more than a few words or a single sentence) to specific questions based on the text.
• Application: Unlike objective items, short answer questions allow students more freedom to demonstrate their understanding of the gist and their ability to extract specific details. They are included in all four reading passages of the Grade 10 examination. For example, after reading a text on weather devices, a student might be asked, "Where is an alcohol-filled thermometer mostly used?". These questions help evaluators gauge if a student can produce meaningful language rather than just recognizing a correct option.

10. What is meant by 'Scoring answers'? List out the possible techniques used for scoring subjective answer. Develop a rubric that can support scoring various aspects of writing answers. (2+4+4) [TSC- 2080]

Scoring answers refers to the systematic process of evaluating a learner's performance and assigning a numerical value to their work based on a prescribed scale. In English Language Teaching (ELT), this process measures a student's real skills and linguistic ability to determine their rank, level, and quality of learning. For productive skills like writing, scoring involves observing specific criteria such as clarity, grammar, organization of ideas, and content development.

Techniques for Scoring Subjective Answers

Subjective answers, such as essays or reports, do not have a single correct response and require evaluators to use specific techniques to ensure fairness and reliability:

• Holistic Scoring: The evaluator assesses the overall quality of the written text as a single unit rather than analyzing individual components. It provides a general impression of the student's proficiency.
• Analytic Scoring: This involves breaking down the writing into specific components (e.g., grammar, vocabulary, organization) and awarding separate marks for each area. This is more detailed and helps identify a student's specific strengths and weaknesses.
• Primary Trait Scoring: This technique focuses on how successfully the student achieved the specific communicative purpose of the task, such as whether they effectively persuaded the reader or followed the correct format for a letter.
• Rubric-Based Scoring: Evaluators use a predetermined set of criteria and performance levels to guide the marking process, which helps reduce subjectivity and ensures consistency across different markers.

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Scoring Rubric for Writing Answers

Based on the assessment criteria prescribed in the secondary level curriculum, the following rubric can be used to score various aspects of writing:

Criteria	Excellent (4)	Good (3)	Satisfactory (2)	Needs Improvement (1)
Organization & Layout	Perfectly organized with a clear introduction, body, and conclusion; correct layout.	Well-organized with minor layout errors.	Basic organization but lacks a clear flow or proper layout.	Disorganized and fails to follow the required format.
Coherence & Cohesion	Smooth logical flow; excellent use of connectives and cohesive devices.	Logical flow is generally maintained with few errors in connectives.	Ideas are connected but the flow is often interrupted or repetitive.	Lacks logical connection between sentences and paragraphs.
Subject Matter/ Content	Highly relevant to the topic; ideas are fully developed with original insights.	Relevant to the topic with good idea development.	Related to the topic but lacks detail or sufficient depth.	Irrelevant or very limited content development.
Language Accuracy (Grammar/Spelling)	No significant errors in grammar, spelling, or punctuation (mechanics).	Occasional minor errors that do not hinder communication.	Frequent errors in grammar and mechanics that affect clarity.	Severe errors that make the text difficult to understand.
Range of Vocabulary	Uses a wide range of sophisticated and appropriate academic vocabulary.	Good choice of words; vocabulary is mostly appropriate for the context.	Limited vocabulary; relies on simple or repetitive words.	Inappropriate word choice or significant lack of vocabulary.

 

11.  Analyze the importance of integrating reading and writing skills while teaching English at the secondary level. Discuss four different techniques of testing the reading skill of the 9^th graders with examples.(4+6) [TSC- 2081]

Integrating reading and writing is a core pedagogical principle in the secondary English curriculum, emphasizing that language is learned most effectively when receptive and productive skills are taught in an integrated manner.

Importance of Integrating Reading and Writing Skills

• Models for Production: Reading texts provide authentic models for English writing, demonstrating how to construct sentences, paragraphs, and whole texts logically.
• Linguistic Reinforcement: Reading has a direct positive effect on a student's vocabulary knowledge, spelling, and grammatical accuracy, which are essential components of effective writing.
• Content and Context: Extensive reading provides the necessary subject matter and background knowledge that students need to express their own ideas and opinions in writing.
• Building Competency: Integrating these skills allows one set of skills to build upon another, creating meaningful connections and helping students understand the wider contexts of language use. For instance, studying the narrative structure of a short story in reading directly supports the ability to write original stories.

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Four Techniques for Testing Reading Skill (Grade 9)

Based on the test specification grid and Grade 9 curriculum, the following techniques are used to assess reading comprehension:

1. True/False Statements

This technique evaluates a student's ability to identify literal information and determine its accuracy based on the text.

• Example (Grade 9, Unit 3): After reading the story "Thomas and Jerry," students decide if statements like "Jerry did not use to get letters from his son" are True or False.

2. Multiple Choice Questions (MCQs)

MCQs test a student’s ability to recognize the correct meaning, fact, or conclusion from four alternative choices, ensuring objective scoring.

• Example (Grade 9, Unit 11): After reading a text on weather instruments, students answer: "What does a barometer measure? (i) atmospheric temperature, (ii) atmospheric humidity, (iii) atmospheric pressure".

3. Matching Items

This technique is often used to test vocabulary knowledge (synonyms/antonyms) or the relationship between different parts of a text.

• Example (Grade 9, Unit 12): Students match words from a text about international organizations, like "prestigious" or "stunning," with their corresponding definitions in another column.

4. Ordering (Sequencing)

This requires students to arrange jumbled sentences or events in the correct chronological or logical sequence to demonstrate an understanding of textual structure and flow.

• Example (Grade 9, Unit 10): After reading the story of Suren and the spaceship, students are given a list of events (e.g., "They gave Suren a tiny computer") and must put them in the correct order as they occurred in the plot.

12.  What are the key stages of the writing process? Briefly explain any three with suitable examples for Secondary level learners. Critically evaluate the pros and cons of using analytic versus holistic scoring methods in assessing students' writing performance. (3+3+4) [TSC- 2082]

The writing process at the secondary level is a systematic, conscious, and thought-engaging act of translating tentative ideas into readable graphic symbols. The key stages of this process include planning, drafting, revising, and editing.

1. Explanation of Key Writing Stages with Examples

• Planning (Pre-writing): This stage involves motivating students to generate content through brainstorming, consulting resources, and making outlines.
• Example: Before writing about "Ecology and Environment," Grade 9 students might use mind mapping to list causes of deforestation and categorize them into an outline.
• Drafting (Composing): This is the actual act of writing where students organize their information into sentences and paragraphs for the first time.
• Example: A student uses their planned outline to write the first version of an essay about "Our Culture, Our Pride," focusing on getting their ideas down on paper without worrying excessively about perfection.
• Editing: This final stage focuses on technical correctness, including checking spelling, punctuation, subject-verb agreement (concord), and the proper use of prepositions.
• Example: After completing a letter to an editor about road safety, a learner reviews the text to ensure full stops and commas are correctly placed and that there are no spelling errors before producing the final draft.

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2. Analytic vs. Holistic Scoring Methods

Evaluating productive skills like writing requires specific scoring techniques to ensure fairness and reliability.

Analytic Scoring

• Pros: This method breaks writing into specific components—such as grammar, vocabulary, organization, and cohesion—awarding separate marks for each. It provides detailed feedback, helping students identify exactly where they need to improve (e.g., syntax vs. layout).
• Cons: It can be highly time-consuming for teachers, especially in large classrooms, as every aspect of the text must be scrutinized individually.

Holistic Scoring

• Pros: The evaluator assesses the overall quality of the text as a single unit, providing a general impression of the student's proficiency. It is a much faster and more efficient method for ranking large numbers of students.
• Cons: It lacks diagnostic depth; a student receives a single score but does not know if their weakness was in grammatical accuracy or content development. Additionally, it is more prone to evaluator subjectivity and bias.

Conclusion: While holistic scoring is efficient for large-scale certification, analytic scoring is pedagogically superior for formative assessment as it guides student improvement through specific criteria.