Hangzhou Zhejiang Education Guide 2019-2020

SCHOOL FEATURE
Show and tell - ‘I Do, We Do,
You Do’
This is the most common form
of instruction in scaffolding, and
it is commonly referred to as a
gradual release of responsibility.
Typical steps are as follows:
1. Teacher shows what to do
by demonstration: "I do it".
2. Teacher and student go
through together: "We do it".
3. Student practises doing
it: "You do it".
In one of our IELTS classes, a
student in a mini VIP group was
finding paraphrasing statements,
from given prompts, in writing
task 1 overwhelming even after
explanation, instruction and
drilling.
Consequently, this prompted
reviewing the steps involved
with the student twice. To prove
that paraphrasing is indeed
not as daunting as what he
thought, I had to write the first
few words of the topic sentence
on the board. I could see how
delighted he was seeing it is
not that hard. I encouraged him
to come up with the remaining
part which he did with some
assistance in the form of eliciting
and concept checking. I did
the same with the rest of the
18 Zhejiang Education Guide 2019-2020
sentences in the first paragraph.
After a little more practise, he
became proficient at penning
complex sentences, and six
months later, he aced his IELTS
with an impressive 7.0 average
(achieving 6.5 points in writing).
Guided practice
It is imperative for language
educators to not only provide
opportunities for students
to practise, but also to do it
correctly, so they can internalise
what has been learnt. One way
to do this is to provide focused
support for learners who
need extra assistance so they
can reach the learning goals.
Guiding instructions can be in
form of reminders, questions,
cues, prompts, explanations
and modelling. While providing
guidance, teachers should try
as much as possible to elicit,
concept check and correct
students’ mistakes as this fosters
skills development and mastery.
Some examples of guided
practice
1. Learners follow guided
reading procedures as
they are instructed by their
teacher.
2. Learners practise reading or
writing with the help of the
teacher.
3. Learners edit and rewrite
an essay as per teacher’s
feedback.
Pre-teach vocabulary
The traditional way is to explain
or have students look up
difficult words in the dictionary.
This can be confusing as well
as frustrating for learners, if for
instance, a word has several
meanings or the L1 (Chinese)
translation is not accurate. The
good news is, with scaffolding
instructions, the teacher can
make understanding words’
meanings more fun through
contexts. The teacher can
also use a spider diagram. For
example, the teacher writes one
of the keywords in the spider
diagram on the board and then
have students brainstorm other
words, that come to mind. This
way they can learn other related
words via synonyms, antonyms,
prefixes and suffixes, thereby
expanding their vocabulary and
understanding the words indepth.
Plus, it’s more fun!
Personal connections
Teachers can help students
take advantage of the concepts
and skills they have previously
learnt to complete a task that
has to do with their personal
experiences. For example, a