Success beyond class: Critical thinking skills and academic english

Christina Cavage
A young boy in a room full of books thining with his hand to his head, there is a lightbulb graphic above him

English for Academic Purposes (EAP) classes are designed to prepare students for higher education delivered in English. Students are expected to hold their own among a class full of fluent English speakers. So it’s essential that they have not only the language skills, but the academic and social skills that tertiary education demands today. And it’s up to teachers to ensure our students develop these skills – but that requires a balancing act.

Many EAP courses lack the authenticity of the college classroom experience. Lectures are generally relatively short, only 5-10 minutes long. Reading is scaffolded, and the content is very structured, even overly structured. Then, our students move into their academic courses where they encounter two-hour lectures, 50+ pages of reading, and content that is far from scaffolded. So, how do we bridge these academic, linguistic and social gaps? Let’s look at some techniques to help students succeed in higher education.

Bridging the linguistic gap

Linguistics gaps may involve content-specific language, or the informal language students encounter when they work with other students, or the connotative and denotative meanings and contexts of a word. To bridge this gap, we need to build deep conceptual vocabulary knowledge. We Dz’t want students only to have label knowledge. Label knowledge allows students to pass a vocabulary text where matching or multiple choice is present. But that is not enough in an academic environment. Deep conceptual knowledge means truly knowing a word.

So, what does it mean to know a word? Well, according to linguistics scholar Paul Nation, a student needs to know the following:

  • The spoken and written form
  • The parts of the word that have meaning
  • The word's forms and their meanings
  • The concepts and vocabulary associated with the word
  • The grammatical function, any collocations
  • The register and frequency of the word

That is a whole lot!

To build this extensive knowledge, we need to do so in an intentional manner. We need to build various activities that develop and foster critical thinking skills and engage students.

Here is an example:

“Hello! I am so glad to see so many of you at our special lecture today. Today, I am going to describe how a mixed community is planned and built. First, let’s look at what a mixed purpose community is, and then we will discuss the planning and building. As many of you know, a mixed purpose community is a neighborhood that includes residential spaces, business spaces, services and green spaces. How about the planning? First, when planning mixed purpose communities, architects, city planners and builders work together to plan where everything will be located. Because they want the community to be a fully walkable one, they need to think about how far homes are from schools, services and other businesses. Then, they carefully look at what kinds of businesses and services are needed. Next, they must design sidewalks so people can easily get to anywhere in the community, and not worry about car traffic. Today, planners are even looking at including bicycle paths, as more and more people are riding bicycles to work. Lastly, they need to consider the different types of residential space they will need. They build homes and apartments to attract all a wide variety of residents. These communities are becoming more and more popular, but planning them still takes time and a team of people.”

The terms mixed and community are bolded. You can engage students with a simple noticing activity of how these words are used, the forms they take, the words around them, their collocations and the concepts associated with these words. An exercise like this will help students develop a deep understanding of these words. And that deep understanding will enable students to make connections and draw conclusions around these terms.

Bridging the academic gap

EAP students move from very scaffolded EAP courses to courses where they must listen and take notes for 50 minutes or read 50+ pages before class. Additionally, their professors often do not build background knowledge, or scaffold learning, as they expect students to enter their classrooms with this understanding. And this can create an academic gap.

When it comes to bridging this gap, content can be the vehicle for instruction. Exposing students to the language of academic disciplines early on can build background knowledge, and be highly motivating for students who crave more than rote language instruction.

Bringing the social gap

When students enter their university courses they will be expected to work with peers, engage in group activities, negotiate, take turns and assert their own ideas into a dialogue. These social skills require language which needs to be developed and practiced in their EAP courses.
You can do this by building instructional tasks and learning around developing and practicing critical thinking skills. Consider introducing project-based learning to your class. In project-based learning, students must work with their peers, learning how to prioritize, negotiate and assign responsibility. Bringing in these types of tasks and activities helps develop soft and critical thinking skills.

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    Four motivating activities to teach core values through reading

    By Nicola Schofield
    Reading time: 4 minutes

    Teaching ourchildren corevalues is so important in helping them to becomehappy,well-balancedcitizens who will make a positive contributiontoour future society.

    Values are present and visible everywhere and they arethefoundation or starting point from where we make our decisions, which ultimately determine our futures. It is,therefore,important that our children learn a strong, moral set of values that will help guide them as they grow older,inform their decisions,help them toknow right from wrong, solve problems, assert themselves and build self-esteem and confidence.

    Values can bebuilton apersonal level or evenshared ata group level such as a family and friendship group.However, we often see them on a larger scale within communities, countries or even the whole world.

    Having a shared set of values connects peopleon a deeper leveland helps us to all work towards the same goals and standards – they caneven encourage people to see the similarities between each other, rather than thedifferences.

    Learning values through reading

    Children learn about values through their families, friends, and teachers, through what they watch or listen to and through their life experiences. They also learn about valuesthrough the books they read.These lessonscan be subtle but are oftenextremely powerful andcanhave a significant impact and influence.

    As an example, let’s have a look at how shared valuesareexplored in thenew graded readers series for young learners,Disney Kids Readers, where special emphasis has been put on exploring values within a story.At the end, you will find severalvalue-based activitiesthat you can download for use in the classroom orasan activity at home.

    Howdo Disney Kids Readers teach core values?

    1. Learning through stories that are already familiar can help children to trust in and take on board the key messages much more easily. Familiarity can break down many barriers to communication and help us understand that values are often universal.
    2. Many children are also familiar with the Disney characters and can find inspiration from reading how they react to situations in life, make decisions and behave. Children often look up to characters and can see them as role models within their own lives. As a result, the readers can be a reference point on how to respond to key life moments and how to incorporate values into real life.
    3. Also, depending on the child's age, some values may be new and children may not yet have experience with them in the real world. Therefore, the Disney stories allow them to explore these key messages through their favorite Disney character’s point of view.

    Each Disney Kids Reader is linked to a key valueand contains a ‘Values’ page with ashortcomicstripthat brings to life a specific value.

    The list below detailsa selection ofkey values taught across the readers.You could askthe childrenin your classto talk about which values are most important to them and why. Ask them to give an exampleofa time when they have demonstrated this value in their own lives.

    Friendship, positivity, curiosity, confidence, open-mindedness, courage, determination, self-belief, responsibility, resilience, respect, honesty.

    Examples of key values inDisney stories

    InThe Jungle Book,friendshipis a keyvalue,and we learn that it is important to help our friends. Baloo helps Mowgli when he is alone in the jungle and scared. An angry tiger wants Mowgli to leave the jungle, but when Mowgli meets Baloo, he finds a friend in him. Baloo sees that Mowgli is scared and looks after him.We learn that it is important to help our friends when they are in need.

    Do:Ask the children when they have helped their friends.

    InInside Out, we learn aboutsincerityandhowimportantit is to talk about how we are feeling. Riley is a teenager struggling with a whole range of emotions and we learn that life isn’t about being happy all the time and that it is okay to be sad sometimes. The children learn that this is a normal part of life and that talking it through with a friend, a parent or a teacher can help.

    Do:Ask the children if they share their feelings with others.

    Here are some activities for you to use with your class to help put into practice the core values from the readers. You can use these activities with any book, in and outside the classroom.

    1. My Values Road Sign (L3-4)

    This activityisa great way of talkingtochildrenabout their values. By creating a road sign poster,it will help them to decide which values are most important to them and it is something that they canreferto again and again in challenging times. They can stick it on their bedroom wall, display it on the fridge or you could even make a classroom display of shared valueswhen children have finishedtheirbooks!

    Download the worksheet

    2. Kindness Calendar (L4-6)

    This activity can be done as a family, with friends or as a class. The children fill in the calendar with kind actions they are going to do for 7 days. They can cut them out and placetheminto a jar and ask a different family member/friend/classmate to choose one a day. Do this for a week and discuss how carrying out kind actions makes them feel.Chances areit will make them feel good!

    Download the worksheet

    3. Core Values Quiz (L5-6)

    Try this quiz with your class and test their values. The questions focus on the following values: sincerity, honesty, positivity, resilience and friendship. If they answer mostly As, then they already demonstrate most of the values in their lives. If they answer mostly Bs, talk to them about why it is important to be honest, positive, strong and kind. The quiz will start a meaningful conversation about their own values and how they react to common situations in life.

    Download the worksheet

    4. My future self (L1-2)

    The childrenfill in the crystal ball with pictures of who they would like to be in the future. Do they want to be smart, funny, have a good job, live abroad, have a family, be rich, be a good friend or help the planet? Which of the plans make one person(themselves)happyand which plans make the world better? Do they need to change any of them?

    Download the worksheet

    Read our blog posts 'Fostering self-care and wellbeing through the world of reading'and 'The importance of teaching values to young learners'.

  • two business people sat together in a meeting both looking at a laptop

    Enhancing workplace communication: The new role of language assessments in business success

    By Andrew Khan
    Reading time: 4 minutes

    The integration of AI tools into workplaces around the world is starting to change the way people communicate professionally. that the use of AI to help draft documents and emails is driven not only by convenience and efficiency but also by a desire to be clear and precise in language.

    While potentially useful, tools to translate, generate, or ‘correct’ written text won’t help with the effectiveness of the verbal communication that powers business relationships.

  • A teacher holding a tablet to a young student in a classroom sat at a table

    Talking technology: Teaching 21st century communication strategies

    By
    Reading time: 4 minutes

    When my son created a web consulting business as a summer job, I offered to have business cards made for him. “Oh Dad,” he said, “Business cards are so 20th century!”

    It was an embarrassing reminder that communication norms are constantly changing, as are the technologies we use. Younger generations share contact information on their phones’ social media apps, not with business cards. A similar shift has been the move away from business cards featuring fax numbers. “What’s a fax?” my son might ask.

    Fax machines have had a surprisingly long life–the first fax machine was invented in 1843–but they have been largely retired because it’s easier to send images of documents via email attachments.

    More recent technologies, such as the 1992 invention of text messages, seem here to stay, but continue to evolve with innovations like emojis, a 1998 innovation whose name combines the Japanese words e (picture) and moji (character).

    The 55/38/7 rule and the three Cs

    Changing technologies challenge language teachers who struggle to prepare students with the formats and the strategies they need to be effective in academic, business, and social settings. These challenges start with questions about why we have particular norms around communication. These norms form a culture of communication.

    The artist/musician Brian Eno defines culture as what we Dz’t have to do. We may have to walk, but we Dz’t have to dance. Dancing, therefore, is culture. Communication is full of cultural practices that we Dz’t strictly need to do, but which make communication more successful. These include practices based on the 55/38/7 Rule and The Three Cs.

    The 55/38/7 rule is often misinterpreted as being about what someone hears when we speak. It actually refers to the insights of University of California professor, , who looked at how our attitudes, feelings, and beliefs influence our trust in what someone says.

    Mehrabian suggests words only account for seven percent of a message’s impact; tone of voice makes up 38 percent, and body language–including facial expressions–account for the other 55 percent. The consequence of this for our students is that it’s sometimes not so important what they are saying as how they are saying it.

    Another way of looking at this nonverbal communication is in terms of The Three Cs: context, clusters, and congruence.

    Context is about the environment in which communication takes place, any existing relationship between the speakers, and the roles they have. Imagine how each of these factors change if, for example, you met a surgeon at a party compared to meeting the same surgeon in an operating theater where you are about to have your head sawn open.

    Clusters are the sets of body language expressions that together make up a message; smiling while walking toward someone is far different than smiling while carefully backing away.

    Congruence refers to how body language matches–or doesn’t match–a speaker’s words. People saying, “Of course! It’s possible!” while unconsciously shaking their heads from side to side are perhaps being less than truthful.

    How does a culture of communication practices translate to new technologies? Mobile phone texts, just like 19th-century telegraph messages before them, need to be precise in conveying their meaning.

    In virtual meetings (on Teams and Google Hangouts, for example), students need to understand that tone of voice, facial expressions, and body language may be more important than the words they share.

    Politeness as one constant

    An additional key concern in virtual meetings is politeness. Once, in preparation for a new textbook, I was involved in soliciting topics of interest to university teachers. I was surprised that several teachers identified the need to teach politeness. The teachers pointed out that the brevity of social media meant that students were often unwittingly rude in their requests (typical email: “Where’s my grade!”). Moreover, such abruptness was crossing over to their in-person interactions.

    Politeness includes civility, getting along with others, as well as deference, showing respect to those who may have earned it through age, education, and achievement. But politeness is also related to strategies around persuasion and how to listen actively, engage with other speakers by clarifying and elaborating points and ask a range of question types. Online or in person, if students cannot interrupt politely or know when it is better to listen, whatever they have to say will be lost in the court of bad opinion.

    This is particularly important in preparation for academic and business contexts where students need to interact in groups, such as seminar settings and business meetings. Within these, it’s necessary for students to be able to take on a variety of roles, including leadership, taking notes, and playing devil’s advocate to challenge what a group thinks.

    Engaging students with project work

    Role-play can help raise awareness of these strategies among students, but it’s not enough to just take on a variety of roles found in common academic and business exchanges; students need to be able to reflect after each role-play session and infer what strategies are successful.

    Technology-based projects can also help students engage in a range of communication strategies. For example, a app series, StartUp, embraces technology in each unit by sprinkling various text messages and web-based research tasks. There are also multimedia projects where students use their phones to collect images or video and share the results in presentations that develop their critical thinking.

    For example:

    Make your own video

    Step 1 Choose a favorite restaurant or meal.

    Step 2 Make a 30-second video. Talk about the meal. Describe what you eat and drink. Explain why you like it.

    Step 3 Share your video. Answer questions and get feedback.

    This simple project subconsciously reinforces the unit’s vocabulary and grammar. It also allows students to personalize the project based on things that they need to talk about in daily life–their local foods in this case. This means that each student’s presentation is unique. Unlike with essay assignments, students tend to work hard to craft several versions until they are satisfied because they know their work will be seen by other students and that they will be asked questions that only they can answer.

    All this forces students to consider speaking strategies, as well as strategies for appropriate facial expressions and body language. Similarly, they have to use active listening strategies when listening to others’ presentations while asking questions. As technology continues to evolve, teachers need to integrate new applications into their teaching so students learn how to communicate with the tools they have at their disposal.