Centre for Applied English Studies, The University of Hong Kong

Week Four Lesson 2

Learning Outcomes
By the end of this lesson, you should be able to:

reflect more effectively on previous learning experiences

begin to decide what SALL goals you are going to work on during the course
identify strengths and weaknesses in your Learning Goals Plans using the SMART criteria

Task 1: Share Learner Profiles & Practice Reflections

Your lecturer will assign you a partner.

Greet your partner and find out his/her name.
Read your partners Learner Profile (learner type, motivation, learning purposes and
learning needs, learner history).
Now discuss your Learner Profiles together.
o Comment on how similar or different you are in terms of learner type,
motivation, learning purposes and learning needs.
o Then make some comments or ask questions about your partners Learner
History. Look not only for similarities but also striking and interesting differences.
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Centre for Applied English Studies, The University of Hong Kong

Task 2: Introduction to the Reflective Cycle

Step 1:
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Read through section 5.1 of the SALL Support Pack (pages 86 88) on Reflection.

Step 2:
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Read through and do Task: Practice Reflection in Section 1.1 Learner History of the SALL
Support Pack.
You will need to choose a recent activity you have done to improve your English (or
other language).
For each of the 6 sections there are a number of questions. Answer the questions which
are most relevant to your chosen activity. Make brief notes about these chosen
questions.

Step 3:
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Talk about your learning experience by using your answers to the questions on
reflection. Ensure that you say something for each of the 6 stages of reflection focusing
on what you think is insightful or interesting.
Note any similarities or differences you found in your Practice Reflections, particularly if
the activities you chose to talk about were similar or the same. Feel free to ask each
other more questions about your experiences if time allows.

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Centre for Applied English Studies, The University of Hong Kong

Task 3: Assess and comment on sample Learning Goals Plans

Step 1:
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Read Section 2.1 Setting SMART learning goals of the SALL Support Pack

Step 2:
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In your group, read the learning plans by three different students. Discuss what you
think of each part of the learning plan and in note form fill in the table below for each
part of the plan. Finally, make an overall judgment of each plan (good / okay / poor).

Learning Goal

(a) Bernie

(b) Joey

(c) Che

Rationale

Materials &
Methods
Anticipated
outcome or
progress
Estimated
Time
Other
comments
Overall

Good / Okay / Poor

Good / Okay / Poor

CAES9820 Academic English for Science Students: Week 4 Lesson 2

Good / Okay / Poor

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Centre for Applied English Studies, The University of Hong Kong

Learning Plan (a)

CAES 9820 LEARNING GOALS PLAN

FULL NAME: Wong Lai Pak

CLASS: CAES 9820

ENGLISH NAME: Bernie

GROUP: X5

STUDENT NO.: 20130xxxxxx

EMAIL ADDRESS: berniewernie@hku.hk

DAY(S) OF LESSON(S): Mon / Thurs

GOAL 1

Purpose
Highlight which purpose your learning goal will relate to.
Academic
Professional
Everyday
Creative
General Skills Area:
Highlight which general skills area(s) your goal relates to.
Listening Speaking Reading Writing
Grammar Vocabulary Exams / Assessments
Specific goal:
To improve my performance in the speaking part of the IELTS exam.
Rationale (In terms of one or more of the following: purpose, language needs, learner style,
motivation):
I intend to study abroad once I finish my degree and I will need to score at least 7 in the IELTS
speaking test in order to get into the university of my choice.
Possible materials (i.e. resources) and methods (i.e. activities, strategies, techniques). Refer to
sections 3.1 and 3.2 of the SALL Support Pack for ideas.
One-to-one chat with student tutor (CEDARS) on their Peer English Tutoring Programme.
I will book an appointment for several one to one chats with a student tutor through
CEDARS and will ask the tutor to help me practice for the speaking part of the IELTS
exam.
Anticipated outcome or progress (See sections 2.1 and 2.3 of the SALL Support Pack on making
goals measurable and achievable):
I expect to be able to score above my last score for the speaking part of the IELTS exam
(5.5) and aim to get a 7.
After several practice sessions with the student tutor, I will ask him or her to use the
IELTS band descriptor (public version available online) and give me a score. I will then ask
another tutor to score me again using the same descriptor and see if they agree with
that score.
I will also record myself at the beginning of the SALL and at the end and score myself
using the IELTS band descriptor.
Estimated Time Needed: 5 hours
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Centre for Applied English Studies, The University of Hong Kong

Learning Plan (b)

CAES 9820 LEARNING GOALS PLAN

FULL NAME: Chan Wei Pang

CLASS: CAES 9820

ENGLISH NAME: Joey

GROUP: Z2

STUDENT NO.: 20130xxxxxx

EMAIL ADDRESS: funnyjoey45@hku.hk

DAY(S) OF LESSON(S): Tues/Fri

GOAL 2

Purpose
Highlight which purpose your learning goal will relate to.
Academic
Professional
Everyday
Creative
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General Skills Area:

Highlight which general skills area(s) your goal relates to.
Listening Speaking Reading Writing
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Grammar Vocabulary Exams / Assessments

Specific goal:
To increase my range of passive vocabulary about geochemistry to help me with readings and
lectures in my Geochemistry elective course
Rationale (In terms of one or more of the following: purpose, language needs, learner style
motivation):
My major is Geology and I have found some of the texts and lectures for my elective
geochemistry course very challenging. This is due to the large amount of unfamiliar terms. I
spoke to my CUE English teacher last year about vocabulary and she told me about active and
passive vocabulary. She said that when we learn vocabulary in university, we often only need to
recognize and understand certain words for listening and reading (i.e. passive vocabulary). Since
I will rarely use many of these terms in my spoken and written assessments, I only need to focus
on learning the vocabulary passively.
Possible materials (i.e. resources) and methods (i.e. activities, strategies, techniques). Refer to
sections 3.1 and 3.2 of the SALL Support Pack for ideas.
Core reading texts and journal articles from my geochemistry course (e.g. selected
readings from Applied Geochemistry Journal)
Online geology dictionary at: http://geology.com/dictionary/glossary-b.shtml
Wikipedia / Google
Google docs
Flashcard Machine App
at: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.flashcardmachine.app
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Centre for Applied English Studies, The University of Hong Kong

- Two of my classmates are also taking this geochemistry course, and so we will work together
on this same goal. I am also a communicative learner and from my learner history I have
realised that I prefer learning with other people rather than just by myself.
- Using the online Geology dictionary, Google and Wikipedia for definitions, we will write a
glossary on Google docs for each article or reading that we do. We can then update the glossary
on our smartphones anytime, anywhere. We will also look out for word roots that may help in
the meaning of other words (e.g. tuff and tuffaceous).
- As we are all visual learners, we will then turn these glossaries and word roots into a set of
flash cards on the Flashcard Machine app so that we can memorize the words quickly.
Anticipated outcome or progress (See sections 2.1 and 2.3 of the SALL Support Pack on making
goals measurable and achievable):
I believe that after a few SALL sessions following this goal plan above I will be better able
to understand more vocabulary in my readings and lectures on geochemistry and
recognize the terms I have memorized in other lectures and readings.
We aim to record and successfully memorize about 60 terms / word roots. We will test
and score each other using the flash card app.
We will test and score each other orally by reading out the definition and scoring the
other person for saying the correct term or saying the term and giving an accurate oral
definition.
We will also make gapfills by copying sentences from the original readings (or other
readings where I find the same term) and blanking out the word. We will test and score
each other by completing each others gapfills. Again, I will score myself on how many
gapfills I can answer correctly.
Estimated Time Needed: 6 to 8 hours
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Centre for Applied English Studies, The University of Hong Kong

Learning Plan (c)

CAES 9820 LEARNING GOALS PLAN

FULL NAME: Ernesto Fidel Guevara

CLASS: CAES 9820

ENGLISH NAME: Che

GROUP: Not sure

STUDENT NO.: 20130xxxxxx

EMAIL ADDRESS:

DAY(S) OF LESSON(S):

GOAL 1

Purpose
Highlight which purpose your learning goal will relate to.
Academic
Professional
Everyday
Creative
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General Skills Area:

Highlight which general skills area(s) your goal relates to.
Listening Speaking Reading Writing
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Grammar Vocabulary Exams / Assessments

Specific goal:
To improve my listening skills and to be able to listen and hear things more clearly and
understand what is said especially for my studies
Rationale (In terms of one or more of the following: purpose, language needs, learner style
motivation):
At university I have to do a lot of listening. For example, I need to attend lectures and
speak to my classmates. Some of my classmates are from America so I have to speak to
them in English and they use a lot of slang that I dont understand. I also think some of
my lecturers are boring and they dont make the topics very interesting. It would be
better if they made their lectures more visual and then we would be more interested. If
we were more interested then we might listen more and that would improve our grades.
Listening is a very import skill and if I cannot listen then I will not get the information I
need and so I will not really understand what I am studying. If everyone listens better
then we can solve many of the worlds problems. As the English saying goes: listen and
learn. I totally agree with the meaning of this saying. I also think that practice makes
perfect so the more practice I get then the more perfect my English will be.
Possible materials (i.e. resources) and methods (i.e. activities, strategies, techniques). Refer to
sections 3.1 and 3.2 of the SALL Support Pack for ideas.
Movies in the ELRC
YouTube clips
Online English TV games
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Centre for Applied English Studies, The University of Hong Kong

Online dictionary of slang Urban Dictionary

at: http://www.urbandictionary.com/popular.php?character=A
Chatting to friends
- I will watch a lot of movies which have a lot of slang and look up the meaning of the slang
words in the urban dictionary. I will memorize the slang words so I can remember them more
easily.
- I will watch YouTube clips and write down all the ideas in the clips. This will help me
understand what they are saying.
- Me and my classmates will play online games and we will use the English mode of play. When
we are talking to each other in the game we will use the slang we learned from the movies.
- I will chat to my non-Chinese friend and say all the slang that I can remember.
Anticipated outcome or progress (See sections 2.1 and 2.3 of the SALL Support Pack on making
goals measurable and achievable):
I think I will be able to understand everything after I have finished this SALL component
of the course and I will be get higher grades in all my classes.
I will measure my progress by asking my friends if they think my listening skills are
better.
I will also do some IELTS listening practice exams and note the score.
With my English-speaking friends I will listen more carefully and compare how much
more I can understand than I did before.
Estimated Time Needed: A couple of days

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Centre for Applied English Studies, The University of Hong Kong

Task 4: Start working on your Learning Goals Plan (optional)

Start to complete your learning plan. If you have any questions, you should ask your lecturer for
assistance or refer to the relevant sections in the SALL Support Pack. The Word Document of
the Learning Goals Plan can be found on the Moodle site.

CAES 9820 LEARNING GOALS PLAN

FULL NAME:

CLASS: CAES 9820

ENGLISH NAME:

GROUP:

STUDENT NO.:
EMAIL ADDRESS:

DAY(S) OF LESSON(S):

GOAL 1

Purpose
Highlight which purpose your learning goal will relate to.
Academic
Professional
Everyday
Creative
General Skills Area:
Highlight which general skills area(s) your goal relates to.
Listening Speaking Reading Writing
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Grammar Vocabulary Exams / Assessments

Specific goal:
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Rationale (In terms of one or more of the following: purpose, language needs, learner style,
motivation):
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Possible materials (i.e. resources) and methods (i.e. activities, strategies, techniques). Refer to
sections 3.1 and 3.2 of the SALL Support Pack for ideas.
U

Anticipated outcome or progress (See sections 2.1 and 2.3 of the SALL Support Pack on making
goals measurable and achievable):
U

Estimated Time Needed:

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Centre for Applied English Studies, The University of Hong Kong

GOAL 2 (Optional)

Purpose
Highlight which purpose your learning goal will relate to.
Academic
Professional
Everyday
Creative
General Skills Area:
Highlight which general skills area(s) your goal relates to.
Listening Speaking Reading Writing
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Grammar Vocabulary Exams / Assessments

Specific goal:
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Rationale (In terms of one or more of the following: purpose, language needs, learner style,
motivation):
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Possible materials (i.e. resources) and methods (i.e. activities, strategies, techniques). Refer
to sections 3.1 and 3.2 of the SALL Support Pack for ideas.
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Anticipated outcome or progress (See sections 2.1 and 2.3 of the SALL Support Pack on
making goals measurable and achievable):
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Estimated Time Needed:

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Centre for Applied English Studies, The University of Hong Kong

Out-of-class Learning for Week Four Lesson 2

Task

Deadline

By Sunday Week 4
Read Sections 2.1 to 2.6 of the SALL Support Pack and then complete
th
your Learning Goals Plan. Remember that you have to allocate 15 hours (15 February)
total for your whole plan. This means you can spend all 15 hours on
one goal or you could have two goals of roughly equal length (i.e. 7.5
hours each) or of different duration (e.g. 10 hours for one goal and 5
hours for the other).

Submit your Learning Goals Plan to Moodle by Sunday of this week so

that your lecturer can suggest any changes that might be necessary
before you begin on your SALL learning.
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By Sunday Week 4
(15th February)
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Ongoing
Once your Learning Goals Plan has been approved by your teacher
(i.e. after uploading it to Moodle and receiving feedback from them),
you are allowed to modify and change your Goals Plan as much as you
like in line with the SMART criteria. It is strongly recommended that
you note down the reasons for the changes that you make to your
Learning Goals Plan after it has been approved. This will help you with
the SALL Oral Report and the SALL Written Reflection.
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