Rationale Methodology 4: Curriculum Design
OAEN-HVAKD4-21 + link to my page: https://meth42022.weebly.com/land-
pollution.html + unit 3: Land pollution
1. Target group 10%
A. How is your topic relevant, interesting and meaningful for the target group?
The topic is about an ongoing issue in all communities, and that is environmental pollution. It is
important that students learn about pollution and its types because this will contribute to a clean
environment in the future. We, as a group, focused on the 4 main types of pollution (land, water,
air, and plastic pollution). The target group is VWO 3 which means their level of English is pretty
much high and thus the topic is meaningful because they will understand all the aspects of the
topic. VWO students are more interested in theory and learning new information, so a topic like
pollution will definitely be one of their interests (Deci & Ryan, 2000).
In each lesson, there is an educational video on how to reduce each type of pollution. The students
have to produce an output at the end of each lesson to show their understanding.
We promised as a group that we would present authentic materials and expose students to real-
life situations in the warmup activities and the output. The real-life situation is that they live in a
world full of pollution and see pollution around them everywhere.
B. How are your lessons CLIL?
All lessons have implemented content and language learning through the various activities that are
offered on the website. The implementation of CLIL improves the students’ thinking skills as it also
helps them gain deep understanding of the target language (Brandl, 2008). Students are exposed
to grammar and vocabulary that relate to the topic of the lesson, and which enhances their
understanding of the topic. For example, in unit 1 lesson 2 students are to learn vocabulary from
context, but this will help them understand better in unit 4. By doing so, students not only
enhance their vocabulary skills, but they are able to fully understand the upcoming units.
Implementing vocabulary in lessons achieves fluency in writing, which allows students to be
flexible in writing (Mahmudah, 2014) students are later exposed to learning grammar from context
which will help them later in producing the output, which is a speaking activity. For example in unit
3 lesson 3 students learn about adjectives, and they have to extract 6 adjectives from the text and
then do a presentation using the adjectives they extracted.
B. Constructive alignment: Goals and output (Westhoff) 10%
, How are your goals SMART?
Goals are specific and clear, so students know what they are capable of doing at the end of each
lesson, as it also shows the students what needs to be accomplished. It is achievable because at
the end of each lesson there is an output exercise that aligns with the goals of each lesson to make
sure that students have achieved the learning goals. Moreover, the input and processing content
help students achieve the lesson goals and present them in the output (Brandl, 2008). The goals of
each lesson are always relevant because they are related to the topic. Goals are measurable
because they can be measured in the output task (Boogaard, 2022) For example, in unit 3 lesson 4
students know that by the end of this lesson they will have to define chemical waste and identify
its negative impacts.
How are your goals related to the CEFR/qualification dossier?
The level of the lessons is A2-B1/B2. The goals are set for students to help them progress from
their current level of English to B1. For example, in unit 3 lesson 2 students first read a A2 text
followed by learning new vocabulary and then write a summary of the text they read. And this
aligns with B1 goal. Since it is a vwo class some students definitely have a higher level, so
challenging activities and materials were added. To give these students the feeling that they are
challenged and introduced to new materials (Geerts & Kralingen, 2018)
How are the goals and output of each of the lessons interlinked?
All the lessons have goals that match with the product that students produce and must meet in
the output task. Learning goals let students know what is expected of them at the end of each
lesson (Westhoff, 2018). The output task informs the teacher about the students’ learning process
and if they have achieved the goals or not. Teachers can anticipate from the output tasks if the
goals of a specific lesson are going to be achieved (Ur, 2012) For example, in unit 3 lesson 3
students know that they are expected to create a presentation on the impacts of mining at the end
of this lesson.
How do your goals, activities and output align?
The output allows for the evaluation of the goals, and exercises are offered to assist students in
completing and comprehending the work presented in the output. Students are frequently
assigned a warm-up exercise initially, followed by other activities that will assist the students
prepare for the output that is expected of them. This is followed by the implementation of input,
an emphasis on forms, and techniques (Westhoff, 2018). Activities such as identifying types of
pollution (input). Learning new vocabulary and identifying the negative sides (forms and
techniques) are used to guarantee that students can apply their knowledge in their final output to
prepare them for the main goal of creating a presentation. For example, students have to
brainstorm, acquire knowledge themselves, then process the knowledge in reading or writing,
then learn new information from a video or a text, process the information, apply the knowledge
gained and then produce an output that shows that they have gone through all these steps.
(Brandll, 2007)
How did you ensure that goals, activities and output are communicative?
The goals are communicative because students have to define each type of pollution at the end of
the lesson in either spoken or written form. They have to record themselves speaking to someone
else or write an email to their friends. In the final lesson, there is group work on teams and there is
a communicative output. In the activities, they always have to listen to videos, which make
learning easier and smoother (Ur, 2012). Moreover, all the lessons apply learning by doing, since
the students learn vocabulary and grammar by doing the exercises or playing the games that are
offered on the website. And thus, their cognitive development is enhanced (Brandl, 2007).
OAEN-HVAKD4-21 + link to my page: https://meth42022.weebly.com/land-
pollution.html + unit 3: Land pollution
1. Target group 10%
A. How is your topic relevant, interesting and meaningful for the target group?
The topic is about an ongoing issue in all communities, and that is environmental pollution. It is
important that students learn about pollution and its types because this will contribute to a clean
environment in the future. We, as a group, focused on the 4 main types of pollution (land, water,
air, and plastic pollution). The target group is VWO 3 which means their level of English is pretty
much high and thus the topic is meaningful because they will understand all the aspects of the
topic. VWO students are more interested in theory and learning new information, so a topic like
pollution will definitely be one of their interests (Deci & Ryan, 2000).
In each lesson, there is an educational video on how to reduce each type of pollution. The students
have to produce an output at the end of each lesson to show their understanding.
We promised as a group that we would present authentic materials and expose students to real-
life situations in the warmup activities and the output. The real-life situation is that they live in a
world full of pollution and see pollution around them everywhere.
B. How are your lessons CLIL?
All lessons have implemented content and language learning through the various activities that are
offered on the website. The implementation of CLIL improves the students’ thinking skills as it also
helps them gain deep understanding of the target language (Brandl, 2008). Students are exposed
to grammar and vocabulary that relate to the topic of the lesson, and which enhances their
understanding of the topic. For example, in unit 1 lesson 2 students are to learn vocabulary from
context, but this will help them understand better in unit 4. By doing so, students not only
enhance their vocabulary skills, but they are able to fully understand the upcoming units.
Implementing vocabulary in lessons achieves fluency in writing, which allows students to be
flexible in writing (Mahmudah, 2014) students are later exposed to learning grammar from context
which will help them later in producing the output, which is a speaking activity. For example in unit
3 lesson 3 students learn about adjectives, and they have to extract 6 adjectives from the text and
then do a presentation using the adjectives they extracted.
B. Constructive alignment: Goals and output (Westhoff) 10%
, How are your goals SMART?
Goals are specific and clear, so students know what they are capable of doing at the end of each
lesson, as it also shows the students what needs to be accomplished. It is achievable because at
the end of each lesson there is an output exercise that aligns with the goals of each lesson to make
sure that students have achieved the learning goals. Moreover, the input and processing content
help students achieve the lesson goals and present them in the output (Brandl, 2008). The goals of
each lesson are always relevant because they are related to the topic. Goals are measurable
because they can be measured in the output task (Boogaard, 2022) For example, in unit 3 lesson 4
students know that by the end of this lesson they will have to define chemical waste and identify
its negative impacts.
How are your goals related to the CEFR/qualification dossier?
The level of the lessons is A2-B1/B2. The goals are set for students to help them progress from
their current level of English to B1. For example, in unit 3 lesson 2 students first read a A2 text
followed by learning new vocabulary and then write a summary of the text they read. And this
aligns with B1 goal. Since it is a vwo class some students definitely have a higher level, so
challenging activities and materials were added. To give these students the feeling that they are
challenged and introduced to new materials (Geerts & Kralingen, 2018)
How are the goals and output of each of the lessons interlinked?
All the lessons have goals that match with the product that students produce and must meet in
the output task. Learning goals let students know what is expected of them at the end of each
lesson (Westhoff, 2018). The output task informs the teacher about the students’ learning process
and if they have achieved the goals or not. Teachers can anticipate from the output tasks if the
goals of a specific lesson are going to be achieved (Ur, 2012) For example, in unit 3 lesson 3
students know that they are expected to create a presentation on the impacts of mining at the end
of this lesson.
How do your goals, activities and output align?
The output allows for the evaluation of the goals, and exercises are offered to assist students in
completing and comprehending the work presented in the output. Students are frequently
assigned a warm-up exercise initially, followed by other activities that will assist the students
prepare for the output that is expected of them. This is followed by the implementation of input,
an emphasis on forms, and techniques (Westhoff, 2018). Activities such as identifying types of
pollution (input). Learning new vocabulary and identifying the negative sides (forms and
techniques) are used to guarantee that students can apply their knowledge in their final output to
prepare them for the main goal of creating a presentation. For example, students have to
brainstorm, acquire knowledge themselves, then process the knowledge in reading or writing,
then learn new information from a video or a text, process the information, apply the knowledge
gained and then produce an output that shows that they have gone through all these steps.
(Brandll, 2007)
How did you ensure that goals, activities and output are communicative?
The goals are communicative because students have to define each type of pollution at the end of
the lesson in either spoken or written form. They have to record themselves speaking to someone
else or write an email to their friends. In the final lesson, there is group work on teams and there is
a communicative output. In the activities, they always have to listen to videos, which make
learning easier and smoother (Ur, 2012). Moreover, all the lessons apply learning by doing, since
the students learn vocabulary and grammar by doing the exercises or playing the games that are
offered on the website. And thus, their cognitive development is enhanced (Brandl, 2007).
