1. Exploring pre-service and in-service teachers' perceptions about early foreign language learning and dyslexiaMilena Košak Babuder, Saša Jazbec, 2019, original scientific article Abstract: This contribution addresses Slovenian in-service and pre-service foreign language and general education teachers' awareness of dyslexia in the foreign language classroom. The authors examine and analyse the levels of familiarity with dyslexia among foreign language teachers and primary school teachers (in-service teachers) and foreign language students (pre-service teachers), their perceptiveness regarding the particularly demanding areas of language learning, and their willingness to engage in additional training to obtain the appropriate skills for teaching children with learning disabilities, particularly dyslexia. The results reveal noticeable differences in answers to individual research questions provided by the participants based on their profiles. The majority of participants stated that they were familiar with dyslexia from a theoretical point of view but also indicated that they were aware of the need to further improve their individual specialist-didactic knowledge and skills in order to give successful support to dyslexic pupils engaged in foreign language learning. The authors also predict the necessary extent of additional training measures in which foreign language teachers, primary school teachers, and foreign language students should engage.
Keywords: pouk tujega jezika, zgodnje učenje, disleksija, dislektični učenci, učitelji tujega jezika, razredni učitelji, empirične študije, foreign language teaching, early learning, dislexy, dislexic pupils, foreign language teachers, pre-service teachers, in-service teachers
Published in DKUM: 21.05.2024; Views: 248; Downloads: 17
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2. The Use of Storybooks in Teaching English as a Foreign Language at Primary Level (2nd AND 3rd Grade) in Slovene Primary Schools : master thesisBarbara Maher, 2022, master's thesis Abstract: This Master’s Thesis deals with the topic of teaching English as a foreign language to young language learners with the use of storybooks/a story-based approach. It has been produced with the intent to encourage and persuade English teachers of young language learners (in Slovenia) to introduce this approach to their early foreign language lessons, by offering a detailed overview of the advantages a story-based approach brings to the context of foreign language instruction, and to serve as a handbook, guiding them through the recommendations for the selection of appropriate storybooks, the preparation for storytelling/storyreading and its implementation, with additional emphasis on the importance of choosing and incorporating suitable story-related activities to each stage of the storytelling/reading act. Moreover, concerns teachers might have when first starting to use this approach, such as whether or not the learner's first language should be used in the story-based lessons, and how many times the same story can be presented to the learners, have been touched on, as well. Furthermore, the Master’s Thesis provides a selection of ready-to-use story-based lesson plans, prepared around chosen storybooks, all made to fit the goals/aims of foreign language instruction at primary level in the 2nd and 3rd grade in Slovene primary schools.
Keywords: Storybooks, Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL), Young Learners (YL), Teaching English to Young Learners (TEYL), Story-Based Approach to Teaching English as a Foreign Language to Young Learners, Story-Based Lesson Plans
Published in DKUM: 03.08.2022; Views: 888; Downloads: 91
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3. The use of Past Simple and Present Perfect Tense and common errors of students in 9th gradeKaja Podgoršek, 2021, master's thesis Abstract: In master's thesis entitled The Use of Past Simple and Present Perfect Tense and Common Errors of Students in 9th Grade theoretical part thoroughly presents English as a global language, language acquisition and language learning, teaching English as a foreign language, grammar and its correlation to education, deductive and inductive approach, the two tenses – Past Simple and Present Perfect and the most common errors in learning English grammar.
The empirical part is based on a research where 100 9th graders from 6 different schools answered questions from a questionnaire regarding English tenses. With the help of questionnaire which had 9 tasks in total, we were able to examine and research to what extent do the Slovenian 9th graders know and successfully use Past Simple and Present Perfect. The questionnaire was created accordingly to the syllabus.
The learners were the most successful when dealing with the theoretical part of the questionnaire. Even though they had some problem when choosing the correct tense when dealing with practical tasks, they had a higher success rate when dealing with the tasks that were theoretical.
The learners from 9th grade achieved overall positive success rate in all tasks which means that they successfully know, recognize and properly use Past Simple and Present Perfect Tense.
Keywords: English tenses, Teaching English as a foreign language, Language learning, English grammar, English as a global language
Published in DKUM: 07.10.2021; Views: 5694; Downloads: 67
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4. Teaching Culture Through English in Slovenian Primary and Secondary Schools: An Analysis of the Intercultural Element in TextbooksEva Hršak, 2019, master's thesis Abstract: Our thesis begins by discussing the concept of culture. Next, it considers the importance of incorporating culture into foreign language teaching and developing intercultural communicative competence. We have discovered that culture is an inevitable part of our everyday lives. It shapes our identities and helps in explaining our actions. Therefore, being unaware of the characteristics of other cultures may result in misunderstandings. As teachers, we must be aware of the importance of culture and should be able to familiarize our learners with its elements. By incorporating elements of culture into lessons, our learners will not only become competent English speakers, but will also know how to appropriately and effectively adjust to a variety of situations, and how to maintain and establish personal relationships. In the empirical section of the thesis, we have studied primary and secondary school English teachers’ views on teaching culture. The results showed that the teachers are aware of the importance of culture teaching since all the participants include various cultural elements into their English lessons. In addition, we have analysed the eight most frequently used English textbooks the teachers use in Slovenia in terms of the cultural elements they contain. We have decided to analyse textbooks as the main resource for teaching culture since textbooks are an indispensable and also a mandatory resource for every English teacher. The analysis showed that the textbooks contain a variety of cultural elements and are taught with the help of multiple strategies.
Keywords: culture, teaching culture, English as a foreign language, intercultural competence, textbooks
Published in DKUM: 07.09.2020; Views: 1673; Downloads: 151
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5. Use of animated songs in early teaching of English and GermanJanja Stariha, 2019, master's thesis Abstract: This MA thesis deals with animated songs and their use in early foreign language teaching. In the theoretical part I have described child development, first and second language acquisition, multimedia, foreign language teaching and the use of songs in the classroom. As the literature on animated songs has not yet been developed, I have turned to theory on multimedia, music and art to formulate a set of criteria for easier choice of animated songs for use in class. In the empirical part I have chosen some high quality, didactically apropriate animated songs. Content, sound, music, text, design, animation, multimedia learning theories, art theory and didactics were taken into account. The final part of the paper shows the results of a questionnaire that was forwarded to Slovenian teachers who teach children aged 3–11 to see to what extent they know and use animated songs. Nowadays acces to songs is no longer a problem so it is important for teachers to know how to evaluate multimedia materials. There are both favorable opinions and cautions regarding technology use in childhood, so good judgement is needed. The choice and use of animated songs in the young learner classroom should be didactically justified.
Keywords: animated songs, songs, young learners, foreign language teaching, English, German, multimedia, modern technology, didactics, preschool, primary school
Published in DKUM: 25.10.2019; Views: 1537; Downloads: 178
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6. Teaching vocabulary items related to the field of nursing at the secondary levelPetra Andrejašič, 2018, master's thesis Abstract: In the following MA thesis professional language is presented in detail. Professional language is based on general one and characterized by technical terminology. It is an essential part of the lessons in vocational programmes, as it forms the basis for students’ future profession. According to the curriculum, a part of English lessons (English as a foreign language) in vocational programmes should be dedicated to professional language in order to prepare students for their career paths/professional activities throughout Europe. To gain as good learning outcomes as possible, it is of great importance that foreign language teachers integrate professional language into the lessons gradually and in cooperation with teachers of vocation specific subjects. Teachers plan professional foreign language lessons in accordance with the curriculum, while taking into account the needs and wishes of their students. In this way, they aim at efficient and successful learning and at the same time exercise one of the key guiding principles of successful teaching and learning – learner-centred teaching. Choosing appropriate vocabulary is of key importance, as well as giving clear, short explanations of new or unknown vocabulary items that are accompanied by examples of their use and, if needed, also by translations/mother tongue equivalents. Teachers should inform students of different learning strategies that facilitate their learning or acquiring new vocabulary. They should also decide on appropriate teaching methods that motivate students and contribute to their independent learning, as well as teaching/learning materials. As learning foreign languages usually starts with reading, its main features are presented in the MA thesis, focusing on reading professional foreign language texts.
In the empirical part our research into the importance of learning professional language in foreign language classes is presented. The survey was carried out among third year students of the nursing school. The findings shows how important they consider learning a professional foreign language, how motivated they are for learning it, and if professional language test results were better compared to all the other foreign language tests.
Keywords: professional language, teaching professional foreign language, curriculum, teaching/learning materials, reading
Published in DKUM: 08.01.2019; Views: 1246; Downloads: 134
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9. Students' attitudes towards the use of Slovene as L1 in teaching and learning of business English at tertiary levelNataša Gajšt, 2017, original scientific article Abstract: Over the past decades, the monolingual (English-only) approach to English language teaching and learning has prevailed. In recent years, however, the trend of using students' first language (L1) in teaching and learning English as a foreign language has re-emerged. However, the research on the use of L1 in teaching English for specific purposes is far from extensive. The aim of this study was to investigate the use of Slovene as the students' L1 in teaching and learning Business English at tertiary level. The specific objectives were to determine the students' attitudes towards the teachers' and the students' use of Slovene during Business English lessons and the students' use of Slovene in learning Business English. The present study was quantitative, with data gathered via a questionnaire. The results show that, on the one hand, there is some inclination towards the use of L1 both in class and during their study of Business English. On the other hand, the preference towards the use of predominantly (or exclusively) English in class is also present and is positively correlated with the level of students' knowledge of English. The results are of value to English language teachers as they suggest the contexts in which students' L1 could be used in the process of teaching and learning English for specific purposes.
Keywords: business English, foreign language study and teaching, Slovenian language, native language, didactics
Published in DKUM: 09.08.2017; Views: 1866; Downloads: 370
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10. Developing academic vocabulary with AWL gapmaker and corpus dataAgata Križan, 2009, original scientific article Abstract: There is a growing need for the development of at least some academic vocabulary in students of EFL (studying English for teaching and non-teaching purposes), if one of the main aims of EFL study is to produce competent users of English. Students are expected to read and understand advanced professional texts, not simply to successfully complete their degrees but to become a part of educated society, and to be able to meet the demands placed upon their knowledge in a prefessional environment. The reading and understanding of professional texts can be a highly demanding activity because of the number of academic and professional terms such texts include. This paper exemplifies the usefulness of a gap-fill exercise, as one among a range of options for developing and testing academic vocabulary in a professional context. The exercise was compiled with AWL gapmaker based on a professional review text, which includes academic items of vocabulary. The gap-fill exercise was used with two groups of EFL students in the same year of study and installed at two difficulty levels for two reasons: to test students' existing knowledge of academic vocabulary, and to enrich it through the analysis of words in context/co-text relation using a concordancing program. The paper compares the answers of both groups to determine the most problematic entries (incorrect answers), and to provide the possible reasons for them. Further, contextual clues are taken into consideration as a helpful source for determining correct entries, and tested with the concordancing program. Besides the emphasis on the usefulness of such gap-fill exercises combined with corpus for the development and enrichment of academic vocabulary, the paper also emphasizes the importance of guiding students in how to search for different grammatical and other contextual clues to make correct inferences, and how to use concordances to support or reject the claims.
Keywords: English, foreign languages, scientific language, scientific vocabulary, academic vocabulary, corpus linguistics, academic teaching, didactics
Published in DKUM: 18.05.2017; Views: 1942; Downloads: 445
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