College English Syllabus

College English

2011 syllabus

Course Description

In this course, students will develop their oral and written communication strategies through study and discussion of English lectures of certain topics involved in textbooks. Emphasis will be placed on developing reading strategies through analyzing text and supplementary materials, writing strategies (from sentence to paragraph to passages), listening and speaking strategies in forms of individual work, pair work and group work. Other skills like note taking, information searching and so on will also be developed. Activities will include watching and listening to lectures in class, reading passages before/while/after class, taking structured notes, discussion, asking and answering questions, and writing summaries. This course will be mainly presented into two parts: First, Reading and writing strategies development. This part would consist of teacher lectures and students practice. Basic reading and writing strategies would be introduced and practiced on every other week in 2 class hours.

Second, Oral communication strategies development. These strategies would be developed mainly through project research based on the topics in the text book. Students will learn to ask questions, to cooperate with partners, to carry out research, to present results and so on.

Specific strategies developed in this course are listed as follows:

Course Goals and Criteria

(G1) [Content comprehension] Comprehend lectures of foreign teachers; Comprehend texts and supplementary materials on certain topics in text book or beyond.

●Listen to lectures and answer questions about its main points and details;

●Comprehend academic texts related to certain topics to get its main idea and

detailed information;

●Understand language points involved.

(G2) [Structure comprehension] Understand the structure of different lecture types (chronology, process, classification and definition).

●Listen to and read a lecture or articles and understand its structure;

●Learn to use what have been presented in speaking and writing.

(G3) [Note taking] Take notes of sufficient detail to ask and answer basic comprehension questions about the lectures and reading materials.

●Listen to a lecture and take notes of its main points and details;

●Read passages to clarify the main ideas and supporting details;

●Write a summary with the notes taken.

(G4) [Q&A] Ask and answer questions about a lecture and reading materials.

●Form questions about general or detailed information to check comprehension

and provoke critical thinking;

●Answer questions related to listening or reading materials.

(G5) [Vocabulary] Attain about 2000-word vocabulary.

●Answer vocabulary questions from the textbook and supplementary materials. (G6) [Writing] Students develop and illustrate their own opinions derived from class activities.

●Set up the main arguments;

●Provide the supporting details to the argument by using examples, statistics and

experience ect.

●Summarize main points and conclude.

Course Schedule

Each Unit will be covered in two weeks. The course schedule is as follows:

Week 6-7: Orientation；Unit 5－Lifelong education

Week 8-9: Unit 1 – Caring for Our Earth

Week 10-11: Unit 3 – Famous Brand Names

Week 12-13: Unit 6 –Travel Around the World

Week 14-15: Unit 7- Drug Abuse

Week 16-17: Unit 4 –Cloning and Ethics; Oral test

Grading

Grades are determined based on Student Performance Record (30%), Course Essay (15%), Oral Communication Test (15%) and Final T erm test (40%).

●Student Performance Record consists of two parts: Students’ performance in foreign

teachers’lecture class (6%), Chinese teachers’class (24%). Grades will be given according to students’ attendance, participation, assignment and their contribution to both in class and in Moodle.

●Course essay: Students are required to write an essay of 800 words based on any

topic they’ve learned in this semester. Grades will be given according to both language accuracy and content organization.

●Oral communication test: Students are required to discuss with a partner or a group

partners on certain topic, and make appropriate presentation. Grades will be based on both accuracy and fluency of language, flexibility and cooperation will also be considered in grading.

●Final Term Test will be unified and comprehensive test including listening

comprehension test, reading comprehension test, vocabulary test, translation and writing test.

Textbook and Materials

1. 大学体验英语综合教程（3），高等教育出版社, 2007

Experiencing English Integrated Coursebook (3)，Higher Education Press, 2007

2. 大学体验英语扩展教程（3），高等教育出版社，2007

Experiencing English Extended Coursebook (3)，Higher Education Press, 2007

3. 大学英语视听新体验(1)，重庆大学出版社，2010

College English New Experience Viewing and Listening (1), Chongqing University Press, 2010 4. 大学英语视听新体验(2)，重庆大学出版社，2010

College English New Experience Viewing and Listening (2), Chongqing University Press, 2010

Appendix 1 Basic Communicative Strategies Involved in Each Unit