Stephen van Vlack

Sookmyung Women`s University

Graduate School of TESOL

Discourse Analysis (Teaching Speaking)

Spring 2006

Winter Reading Project

For this course students are expected to read one small book over the winter break. The purpose of this reading is to keep the students academic skills primed as well as to provide them with what is seen as a valuable information for the course. The book the students will read for this course is a fairly simple, easy to read book focussing on the role of discourse in developing thought.

♦     Mercer, Neil. (2000). Words & minds. London: Routledge.

Now, what I expect you to do with this book at first to read it and secondly to answer this one simple question about the reading.

Question 1

Mercer (2000) makes several claims about the nature of speaking and the effects it has on general cognition and knowledge, but little claim is made about how we might easily make use of this knowledge in the foreign language classroom, or even why this might be important in second or foreign language learning. Therefore, this is precisely what I want you to think about. How do you think this idea might be applicable in your own language teaching situation? Explain in some detail how some of Mercer (2000)`s ideas can be implemented here in Korea for ELT.

Your write up should be about 1,500 words in length and follow APA format as closely as possible. Citations and quotations from outside academic sources are not necessary for this write up. More I want you to focus on your own experience and beliefs based on this experience. The personal nature of this project, however, must not be an excuse for sloppy writing. Your writing should be clear and well-organized.

On the first day of class all students are expected to come with a rough draft of her/his project write up as we will be discussing the materials and what students found interesting. The final version of your write up will be handed into class on the second week (March 9th).

Good luck!!