Language II (English or a language other than Language I)
Language II tests English - or another language that is not your Language I - as a second language: your own command of it and your ability to teach it to young learners whose home language is different.
Principles of second-language teaching
- English is a skill, not a content subject; the goal is communicative competence (Hymes): fluency, accuracy and appropriateness together.
- Approaches suited to primary classes: Communicative Language Teaching, Total Physical Response (commands plus movement), task-based learning; the older grammar-translation and direct methods are examined as historical options.
- Lesson shape: presentation, practice, production - oral drill before written form.
- Vocabulary: teach in context, roughly 6–8 new words per lesson, using realia, flashcards, pictures and word games.
- Grammar: inductive (examples first, rule later) rather than deductive rule-giving.
Language content examined
- Phonemes: /θ/ in think, /ð/ in this, /ʃ/ in ship, /tʃ/ in chair.
- Stress shift: REcord (noun) versus reCORD (verb).
- Articles, prepositions, tense consistency, subject–verb agreement and question formation.
Worked example
Pupils write "She don't like mangoes." Reasoning: this is a developmental error from over-generalising the regular present-tense pattern, not carelessness. Response: contrast I don't with he/she doesn't through oral substitution drills, then a short controlled writing task. Correction should be selective and delayed so that fluency is not blocked.
Traps that cost marks
- Explaining grammar rules before learners have heard the pattern in use.
- Correcting every error during a speaking task.
- Confusing an error (systematic, evidence of learning) with a mistake (a slip).