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Database of Teaching Sources

A database of selected, reviewed, tested, assessed and validated e-learning based language teaching sources addressed to Higher education students for the learning of 18 different European languages.

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Best Places to Visit in Poland

Date of Publication

13.08.2020

Target Group

Lecturers
Students

Domain Area

Journalism & multimedia
Tourism

Learning Scenario

Autonomous learning
Classroom Context

Target Language

Polish

Language of Instruction

Any language

CEFR level

B2
C1

Type of Material

Video

Linguistic Features

Vocabulary
Pragmatics

Skills

Listening
Speaking
Critical Thinking
Reading

Description

Easy Polish is an online video series that provides Polish learners around the world with authentic learning material. The authors show the Polish language as it is spoken on the street and among friends at home. Videos are regularly published on the channel on Thursdays at 7:00 p.m. and contain interviews with people from different cities in Poland, covering a wide range of topics and fluency levels. Videos are subtitled in both English and Polish, allowing learners to follow along even as native speakers talk at their regular pace.
On the youtube channel presented on the portal, students and teachers can easily access materials subtitled in Polish and English.
https://www.easypolish.org/

Case study

The proposed material can be viewed on the Youtube channel and is based on questions asked to ordinary Poles of various ages on the street. It is useful for people with an advanced knowledge of Polish, but the teacher should draw attention to some pronunciation peculiarities and even to some mistakes in expression. He should invite to watch the material in sequences (the material is about 9 minutes long), explaining vocabulary and grammar after each sequence. Because the responders are not philologists but ordinary people, learners are thus exposed to the spoken language.
An interesting aspect that needs to be highlighted is the differences in mentality. For some Poles, the places worth visiting for foreigners are mountains, lakes, nature reserves (natural beauties). For others, it's cities with their cultural offerings.
Video material is useful for developing conversational skills, but it should be accompanied in the teaching scenario by explanations of phonetics, vocabulary and grammar.

Guidelines

The teacher announces the discussion topic (Best Places to Visit in Poland / Nailepsze miejsca do odwiedzania w Polsce) to the students and gives them the YouTube address.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGo_roKimzw
1. Students watch the material (about 10 minutes) and write down, using Polish and English subtitles, expressions, difficulties.
2. The teacher invites the students to think about the answers given by the interviewees and to choose the answer which, in their opinion, is the most interesting.
3. Next, the teacher initiates a guided conversation, asking students to think about: a) the age of the respondents, b) their occupation (as they can guess from the video). How has the pandemic changed the situation in tourism? What are some of the consequences of restrictions? What are the new opportunities?
4. Students are challenged to think about how ‘Best places to visit’ is understood in the cultures from which they come and to give an answer each. What cultural differences can they see? Which do they find most important?
Other activities
1. Students are invited to work in groups of 3 or 4, in the roles of interviewer, respondents and to record material (audio, video) of 5 minutes each, about a place they think is worth visiting.
2. Together with the teacher, students search online and analyse a presentation of one of the places mentioned by respondents.
3. They are invited to think about and discuss the topic “What is interesting for Poles can attract foreign tourists as well?”.
https://wawel.krakow.pl/co-zwiedzac

Review

Category
Rate
Comprehensive approach
Capacity to match the needs of lecturers and students

4

Added value
The provided tangible improvements

3

Motivation enhancement
The capacity to motivate students to improve their language skills

3

Innovation
Effectiveness in introducing innovative, creative and previously unknown approaches to LSP learning

3

Transferability
Measurement of the transferable potential and possibility to be a source of further capitalisation/application for other language projects in different countries

3

Skills assessment and validation
Availability of appropriate tools for lecturers to monitor students’ progress and for students to assess own progress and to reflect on learning

4

Adaptability
Flexibility of the contents and possibilities for the LSP lecturers to adapt the contents to their and to students’ need

4

Usability
Assess the technical usability from the point of view of the lecturer and the student

4

Accessibility
Assess the accessibility from the point of view of the lecturer and the student

4

Comments:
The videos are generally 6- 10 minutes long and are made with spontaneity and sometimes even humorously. They have the advantage of allowing learners to listen to the Polish language spoken on the street while showing them images of different towns and people of different ages.
Not all the episodes are equally interesting, some of them show that the interviewees have difficulty expressing themselves in their mother tongue. But even these videos can be interesting for learners of Polish, as they dismantle the stereotype of the linguistically competent "native speaker" and provide students with real-life communication situations.
The filmed episodes can be used from the Polish B2 level for both individual and class study.
Website of the Teaching Source:
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