Category: GRETA Journal — 2006, Volume 14, Numbers 1-2

This article -based on practical experience at University- intends to show how students training as Modern Foreign Language Primary Teachers can be helped to understand and appreciate poetry and then use it for teaching purposes at Primary levels. The paper presents the way the subject “Text Analysis” has been redesigned in order to fit the trainee’s specific needs. Therefore, attention is paid not only to linguistic and literary aspects, but also to professional necessities, which includes becoming familiar with specific material for children, and the way it can be used in Primary lessons.

La convergencia de las titulaciones universitarias dentro del Espacio Europeo de Educación Superior tiene claras repercusiones organizativas y curriculares. Adaptar una asignatura supone un reto para el profesor, así como una gran oportunidad para innovar y evaluar nuevas propuestas; adaptar todas las asignaturas de un grupo de primer curso con el objetivo de mejorar el proyecto formativo exige, además, la implicación del profesorado, alumnado, dirección del centro y de la Universidad como estamento.

En este trabajo se presenta la propuesta global de la Escuela Universitaria de Ingeniería Técnica de Telecomunicación de la Universidad Politécnica de Madrid de adaptación al EEES para todo un grupo de primer curso resumiendo, en este caso, cómo afecta el cambio a una de las asignaturas que participa en el proyecto: Inglés Técnico. ¿Cómo se adapta un grupo a las nuevas metodologías y a los nuevos créditos? ¿Cómo se organiza el profesorado en la fase de movilización? ¿Qué carga extra de trabajo supone para el profesorado? ¿Cuál es el alcance de esta propuesta a efectos organizativos y curriculares? ¿Cómo afecta al desarrollo de una asignatura concreta? ¿Cuáles son los resultados? Son algunas de las preguntas que se responderán en este trabajo.

Antonio Bueno González. GRETA Journal — 2006, Volume 14, Numbers 1-2. Interview. pp. 5–13

GRETA Journal — 2006, Volume 14, Numbers 1-2. Reviews section. pp. 96–103

María Luisa Pérez Cañado; Ana María Ortega Cebreros. GRETA Journal — 2006, Volume 14, Numbers 1-2. Editorial. pp. 3–4

Pragmatics has been regarded as one of the grounding linguistic theories for developing the notion of communicative competence, which has been implemented in a series of second language acquisition models (Bachman, 1990; Celce-Murcia et al., 1995; Usó-Juan and Martínez-Flor, 2006). Within these models, the component of pragmatic competence has been highlighted, since in order to make learners communicatively competent in a second or foreign language, not only their grammatical knowledge needs to be fostered, but also their pragmatic competence. To achieve that end, scholars in the field of interlanguage pragmatics have emphasised the need to integrate pragmatics in language teaching (Rose and Kasper, 2001; Martínez-Flor et al., 2003; Alcón and Martínez-Flor, 2005; Tatsuki, 2005). Taking this assumption into account, the goal of this paper is to contribute to this area of research by presenting different classroom techniques designed to teach learners pragmatic competence in English as the target language at university level.

Cooperative Learning has been defined as “a body of literature and research that has examined the effects of cooperation in education. It offers ways to organize group work to enhance learning and increase academic achievement.” (Olsen and Kagan, 1992: 1). Olsen and Kagan’s definition will be used as a springboard to expand on the different and intertwined aspects cooperative learning consists of. The “body of literature and research” in the above definition will set the path to explore different cooperative learning methods and its background history will be analyzed by examining the “effects of cooperation in education”. It will be stated that group work is not the same as true cooperative academic experiences and, finally, the philosophy behind cooperative learning which is said to “enhance learning and increase academic achievement” will be reviewed.