The Beit Berl English Times 5th Issue 2013 - 2014 The Faculty of Education English Department Student Conference, the English Department - 2014 Book of Abstracts PARALLEL WORKSHOPS A Taste of Debate - Learn How to Argue Like the Boss Alon Cohen, Bar Ilan University, Netanya Academic College, YCI Center for Debating and Rhetoric Abstract: In this workshop we will briefly learn how to construct a convincing claim and then practice it in different ways. Alon Cohen is the project director at the YCI center for debating and Rhetoric. He has been coaching and teaching debate for the last five years and was the chief adjudicator of the first English tournament for high school students in 2012 conducted by the Ministry of Education. He teaches debating in Bar Ilan University, Netanya Academic College and coaches the Israeli national high school team. Debating achievements: Winner of the 2012 national championship in Hebrew, Winner of the 2011 English Open in Israel. (Biggest English tournament held in Israel preparing for the European Universities debating Championship) Quarter finalist in 2011 EUDC in Galway. Semi Finalist in the 2010 Red Sea Open. Winner of the 2010 Shantou University debating tournament (Held in China as part of the University's English Festival) The Assessment Battery of Basic Literacy in English kit (ABLE) Dr. Susie Russak, Beit Berl Academic College The Beit Berl English Times 5th Issue 2013 - 2014 The Faculty of Education English Department Abstract: The Assessment Battery of Basic Literacy in English kit (ABLE) The focus of English as a foreign language (EFL) instruction in the early elementary years is on acquiring basic literacy skills. These skills include awareness of the sounds of language, awareness of print, knowledge of the relationship between letters and sounds, vocabulary, word decoding, and spelling. These basic literacy skills constitute a critical foundation for the pupil to be used in developing higher order literacy skills, such as reading comprehension. Unfortunately, many pupils find it difficult to acquire such basic literacy skills, and this has far reaching impact on her/his general language and reading development, a phenomenon known in the literature as Mathew Effect (Stanovich, 1986). A sensitive teacher is usually aware of struggling pupils. Yet, she or he may not be able to identify the specific areas of difficulty, the sources of the difficulties or the appropriate tools to help pupils deal with them. In what follows, we describe the rationale and the development of a testing kit that has been developed with the aim of helping teachers achieve the above mentioned goals. This kit is called the Assessment of Basic Literacy in English kit (ABLE). ABLE is made up of two tests: a whole-class administered Screening Test and an individually administered Diagnostic Test. The aim of the Screening test is to identify the pupils who may have trouble acquiring literacy in English as a foreign language after the first year of literacy instruction. The aim of the Diagnostic Test is to identify the specific literacy skills that these students have difficulty with. The tests have been prepared in two versions: one for Arabic-speaking pupils and another for Hebrew-speaking pupils. In our talk today we discuss rationale behind the ABLE kit and we will present its component parts. Dr. Susie Russak, PhD. was the head writer on the ABLE kit project. She is a lecturer at Beit Berl Academic College in the English Department and a pedagogical advisor. She is also the coordinator of support services at the Support Center for Students with Special Needs at the college. She has written several text books for teaching EFL to struggling pupils and pupils who have learning disabilities. Her areas of interest include teaching EFL to struggling learners, learning disabilities and the acquisition of additional languages, and cross-linguistic studies of literacy acquisition. All you wanted to know about teaching vocabulary, but were afraid to ask Dr. Tina Waldman, Kibbutzim College Abstract: The Beit Berl English Times 5th Issue 2013 - 2014 The Faculty of Education English Department This talk presents research based best practices about teaching vocabulary to foreign language learners. I will discuss how vocabulary is learned, which vocabulary items are important to teach and when to teach them, how to teach vocabulary and how to test it. Dr. Tina Waldman teaches applied linguistics and writing in the English Teacher Training department at Kibbutzim College, where she is also the head of the English for Academic Purposes department. Her research interests are vocabulary acquisition, applied corpus linguistics and translingualism in the classroom. Her recent publications include: ולדמן ט. )4102(. רכישת אוצר מילים בשפה זרה: ידע קולוקציות בקרב לומדים ישראלים. בתוך דוניצה-שמידט, ס וענבר-לוריא, ע.. סוגיות בהוראת שפות בישראל. תל אביב: הוצאת מכון מופת. Waldman, T. (2013). Collocation use in writing among Israeli learners of English Humanizing Language Teaching Journal, http://www.hltmag.co.uk/dec13/sart03.htm Laufer, B. and Waldman T. (2011). Verb-noun collocations in second language writing: a corpus analysis of learners’ English. Language Learning 61 (3), 647-672. Music, the Body, and the Posthuman Dr. Keren Omri, University of Haifa Abstract: This talk proposes to identify a shift in contemporary popular aesthetics – particularly musical outputs of the past decade. From the aural matrix of Amon Tobin’s sound (and the skeleton fairies made of bee wings and electronic music in his collaborations with Tessa Farmer) to the galactic travels of Bjork’s Moon and her lesbian androids, from Kutiman’s innovative piecemeal YouTube composition to Beck’s The Beit Berl English Times 5th Issue 2013 - 2014 The Faculty of Education English Department non-performed new-album, we can begin to recognize a shift from a holistic or organic view of musical narratives, inherited from a Classical model of art, to a distinctly SFnal one where a principal aim of the production is the on-going, ever-shifting, composition of new worlds. All thoroughly enmeshed in the sci-fi effects and aesthetics that pervade Western popular culture, these musicians – both through their production techniques and the motifs of their music – acknowledge the inextricable penetration of technology, even in its most sophisticated forms, into the commonplace. Dr. Keren Omry, Assistant Professor of American Studies, in the Department of English Language & Literature at the University of Haifa, specializes in contemporary popular culture, jazz aesthetics, literature post-9/11, and science fiction. She holds an MA & PhD from the University of London and BA from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, Israel and until recently also taught in the English dept. in Beit Berl College and in the English & American Studies dept. at Tel-Aviv University. Keren is the author of Cross-Rhythms: Jazz Aesthetics in African-American Literature (Continuum, 2008). Areas of interest on which she has written and published include: 20-21stC American literature & culture; science fiction & gender; Israeli SF; post-9/11 aesthetics; post humanism; and music in a digital culture. STUDENT PRESENTATIONS Session I – Focus on English Literature Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift-A brief overview of the novel, the author and the historical social context in which it was written Zev Ordower Course: Introduction to English Literature Instructor: Dr. Pamela Peled Abstract: I will talk about the author, an Anglo-Irish priest, satirist, and political essayist whose masterpiece Gulliver’s Travels satirizes the human condition, the political events in England and the socio-economic events in Ireland during this period of British history. The work is a powerful critique of what Swift considered the misguided thought of the dawning era of Enlightenment. The presentation will include a The Beit Berl English Times 5th Issue 2013 - 2014 The Faculty of Education English Department description of the journeys of Lemuel Gulliver, and the circumstances which led to him being marooned on four different islands. I will talk about the inhabitants of each island, how they looked, aspects of their behavior, their particular outlook on social issues and how these characteristics represent Swift's ridiculing the burgeoning philosophical outlook of the age. Swift believed humankind was mistakenly being guided by modern science and reason and that progress beyond the established mores was leading humankind to possess an inflated sense of themselves and creating a morally debased political culture. Was Shakespeare anti-Semitic? An analysis of The Merchant of Venice Sheila Glick Course: Shakespeare Instructor: Dr. Pamela Peled Abstract: In an international climate in which anti-Semitism is significant once again, it is particularly urgent to examine whether the works of one of the most influential people in cultural history was tainted by anti- Semitism. A superficial reading of The Merchant of Venice seems to the average reader like old fashioned anti- Semitism. Jews are depicted as cruel and ruthless. However, there is another interpretation. The Jewish anti-hero character has, for the first time, a motive for his behavior. We wish/seek to prove that the play can be interpreted either way, as anti-Semitic or not. The results are inconclusive, and depend on the audience and the director's agendas. Still, we have to note that the main speech on which base our claim was omitted when the Nazis produced this play. This seems to prove that the play is NOT anti-Semitic. Introducing Shakespeare, a multisensory and technological unit- “Romeo and Juliet” Karina Ebrani Course: Didcactic Seminar - Juniort High The Beit Berl English Times 5th Issue 2013 - 2014 The Faculty of Education English Department Instructor: Dr. Susie Russak Course: Shakespeare Instructor: Dr. Pamela Peled Abstract: This unit is a basic introduction to Shakespeare and I have chosen “Romeo and Juliet” to accompany it as it is one of the world's greatest romances. Four hundred years later, and in spite of its "Shakespearean" language, the play is still relevant to teenagers today.