Course syllabus

SEMESTER 2, 2017
Course Information

• Course Coordinator 

Lizzy Roe - l.roe@auckland.ac.nz

• Course delivery format

4 hours of class per week, 2 hours on consecutive days (Monday and Tuesday, or Thursday and Friday)

(Timetable and room details can be viewed on Student Services Online)

Summary of Course Description              

ACADENG102 aims to develop listening and reading skills, and English language abilities so students can meet their academic listening and reading needs at university. Using a range of strategies students unlock meaning in written and spoken texts by focusing on text organisation, main ideas, discourse structure, vocabulary, and ways to outline and note down key points. After completing this course students should feel more confident about listening in lectures and reading academic texts for their mainstream courses. The University expects that students will spend 10 hours per week on each course, inclusive of class meeting times. Students are expected to attend all scheduled classes and to actively participate during class including pairwork and group activities. 

Restriction: ACADENG102 is available only for students with English as an additional language.

Course outcomes

At the end of the course the students should be able to:

1. use strategies to make the reading and listening processes faster and more efficient
2. understand and identify or summarise the main ideas in an academic text (written or spoken)
3. take notes from a text (written or spoken) in order to create an outline of key points
4. be aware of the author’s/speaker’s purpose, and critically evaluate the content and issues arising
5. answer questions relating to overall structure and detailed meaning of a text (written or spoken)
6. know what to listen for in terms of the delivery of spoken information i.e. word stress, intonation, lecturer’s signals, predicting content etc.
7. make the process of listening and note-taking faster and more efficient by using symbols, abbreviations, and labelling
8. have an increased vocabulary of ‘academic’ words from the ‘Academic Word List’ and other input sources
9. guess the meaning of unfamiliar words by using ‘word attack’ strategies e.g. reference words, linkers, synonyms, word families (prefixes, suffixes), dictionary skills etc.
10. look for relationships between words/ideas in sentences and across paragraphs/sections of text

 Weekly Topics

Practical reading and listening activities, and text analysis tasks, are completed in class each week.
Texts use ‘academic’ style and cover a range of disciplines. 

Week 1: academic text organisation & structure, strategies for surveying & outlining, lecturer’s signals
Week 2: vocabulary strategies, word forms, technical vocabulary, note-taking,reading strategies
Week 3: listening for intonation/word stress, dictionary skills, paraphrasing ideas, reference words
Week 4: ’cause & effect’ text, long text processing, reading comprehension
Week 5: paraphrasing, listening to video/audio
Week 6: predicting content, recognising coherence, ‘compare and contrast’ text
Week 7: predicting content, making inferences, vocabulary collocations
Week 8: surveying, summarising, academic text structure
Week 9: ’problem-solution’ texts, ‘technical’ lecture listening
Week 10: reading ‘graphic’ texts, ‘problem-solution’ and ‘cause & effect’ texts
Week 11: ’research and evidence’ texts
Week 12: review, exam practice/preparation

Prescribed Texts: textbook provided for enrolled students

Workload:

The University of Auckland's expectation on 15-point courses, is that students spend 10 hours per week on the course. Students manage their academic workload and other commitments accordingly. Students attend four hours in class each week. This leaves six hours per week outside the classroom to prepare for class, assignments and the exam.

Deadlines and submission of coursework:

Deadlines for coursework are non-negotiable. In extreme circumstances, such as illness, you may seek an extension but you will be required to provide a doctor's certificate before the assignment is due. All late assignments without a pre-approved extension will be penalised 5% per day late.