WEBVTT

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Design a task step by step.

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You want to write a paragraph, and this is just an example I want to give you.

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Write a paragraph about your winter break.

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Your prewriting would be build subskills.

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What are some of the subskills that students would need?

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>> Vocabulary. 
>> Vocabulary.

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>> Grammar. 
>> Grammar points.

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>> In this case, maybe past tense.

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>> Past tense?

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>> Maybe also adjectives to describe a winter break.

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>> Adjectives, exactly.

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Now this is where--and you have some little guidance here

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and none of you read the one that focuses on writing as a main skill.

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>> Topic?
>> Exactly.

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Yes, background knowledge.

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And we listed what we are very comfortable with, vocabulary, grammar and language, right,

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when in fact you really wanna focus on the topic

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What exactly does that mean to build the subskill with the topic?

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>> To get them to answer the question "what is your paragraph about",

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what do you want to write about. And if you could write one sentence

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to answer how was your spring break. 
>> My spring break was--

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>> Yeah. We often--

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>> So essentially, what is getting them to think about a topic sentence for their paragraph?

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>> Exactly. What is the idea that you wanna write about?

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What are some notions that you want to put in--on paper, right?

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We always start backwards.

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Vocabulary should be mapped onto a topic.

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Grammar should be mapped up to the function of the language you want to use,

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not necessarily write so that you can practice,

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but what is it you wanna convey to your audience?

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What is interesting about your winter break?

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Was winter break at all interesting?

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So we need to have the students think about that.

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How can you do that? You can do that with associograms or brainstorming.

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You can do prompts, and I will show you examples of these in a second.

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You can do images, you can do music, and you can use realia, right?

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Or you can have interviews, where the students just generate a lot of ideas, a lot of thoughts.

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All of these are good both for thought, topic generation, ideas for writing.

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They are also very good for building vocabulary which is something you really want to do

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especially on topics where it can go in every direction and they really need some more guidance, a little focus,

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and this helps them organize vocabulary that matches particular subtopics.