A guide to the types of Student Access tasks available - how to use them, and for which educational purposes. 

But first of all, a reminder of how to handle the system in order to set up tasks for the students...

'Reading'

The value of setting a Student Access reading task is that students can read in their own time, at their own pace. This means that...

• students will have time to reflect - indeed, many TASKS pages emphasise the reflection element, supported with guiding questions to encourage critical thinking
• asking students to read at home means that they will come to the next lesson better prepared, thus saving time in the lesson itself
• reading the stimulus text can then be usefully combined with Quiz or Short answer tasks, which provide reading comprehension practice, and ensure that they really have thought carefully about the stimulus text

Note that once students have opened a page which provides a Reading task, they should click on the button at the bottom to register that they have completed the task.

I offer three basic types of reading task appropriate to English B

Read & reflect

Many 'TASKS' pages start with a task which is simply 'read & reflect'. Students are asked to read the stimulus text, and think about their reactions, their opinions, what questions they might ask, etc.

Often, the task includes making notes about their responses, for students to focus, develop and record their ideas.

e.g. TASKS Elitist Britain?  

Such student notes may be for the student's own use; or they may be checkable - you can set the notes as a task under 'Writing' (below), so that the student writes the notes online, and then submits them for your view.

And of course, you can require the 'read & reflect' activity to lead to a specific writing task. Once the students have read the page, they can be set the task of writing something related to what they have read. You then follow the standard procedure as shown under 'Writing' (below) -

> use the 'Writing' tool to set a subject or task, set the word limit, give relevant instructions, and set the deadline for submitting the work

Detailed reading

Many of the 'TASKS' texts come with detailed comprehension exercises. You can set these by using the Quiz and Short answer tools (below).

Reading literary works

The student access system allows you to direct and monitor how your students read a literary work. This can be done in various ways, by setting the following tasks:

• targets for reading - you can communicate to the students which page they should reach, and by when
• writing tasks - use the tool of 'Writing' (below) to set a subject or task, set the word limit, give relevant instructions, and set the deadline for submitting the work
• discussion groups - define an issue to be discussed, set the target date for completion, and let them get on with it

'Writing'

You can set your own Writing task in any way or form you want. You just have to enter...

• a title
• instructions / written production question
• minimum & maximum numbers of words
• a deadline for completion

... and then, when you click on 'Send', the task is automatically sent to all students in that group.

Many TASKS pages include a Writing task relevant to the material on that page - you can enter that under the instructions before you set number of words + deadline.

Many of the student access pages contain ready-to-use writing tasks (e.g. 'Task #C - Writing ... Write a blog about...'). So,...

> use the 'Writing' tool to refer the students to the relevant page and Task, set the word limit, give relevant instructions, and set the deadline for submitting the work

...OR, you can devise a task of your own, and under 'Add tasks'...

> use the 'Writing' tool to set a subject or task, set the word limit, give relevant instructions, and set the deadline for submitting the work

When a student has completed the task, you can then see it online ... mark it online & add comments as required ... the student can then see your marks & comments online ... and reply online if necessary.

'Discussion'

The 'Discussion' tool is essentially an online chat, in written form. You set an overall topic for discussion ... perhaps define specific aspects, or suggest how students could address the subject ... decide who will take part ... and click 'Send', to inform the students.

Consider these notes on how to use the 'Discussion' tool -

>  In setting the topic, you can choose a wide topic to generate an open, free-ranging discussion; or choose very specific aspects, which will generate a more focused, concentrated discussion.

(Myself, I would choose the more focused approach, since free-ranging discussions are best handled in class where the teacher can monitor what's happening and guide digressions back to the central issue)

>  In selecting students, you can involve the whole group, or select individual students from the class list to form smaller sub-groups.

(Myself, I would tend to favour the sub-group approach - there is more chance of a few students having a genuine and productive exchange, than if they have to fight to get their comments in among a dozen other competitors.)

>  You can set a follow-up Discussion to build on discussions in small sub-groups - require the sub-groups to report their ideas to a Discussion which involves the whole class

(You can set up two or more Discussion tasks at the same time - with different deadlines, and suitable instructions to explain the sequence.)

You can of course mark each student's contributions to a Discussion, probably using the Oral Criteria in some way. The text of the Discussion will be available for all to see, and so you can comment on each student's performance, personally.

(If you use the Oral Criteria, I would use Criterion A Language and Criterion B2 Message - this would cover how students express themselves and what they have to say.)

Quiz

Many TASKS pages come with online quizzes, centred on the stimulus text that forms the basis of the page.

A 'Quiz' for English B essentially means 'tick-the-box' reading comprehension questions - MCQs and gap-fill questions, which have discrete, unambiguous answers, and can be marked automatically. The value of such a Quiz for online Student Access study is that...

• it provides practice in handling such question types in Paper 2
• students get rapid feedback and help - as soon as they have done each question, they can click on 'Check', which tells them whether they are right or wrong, provides the correct answer, and often provides notes to help understand why that answer is correct and other answers are wrong
• when students have done all questions, they click on 'Submit quiz' , which indicates to you that they have completed the task, and automatically generates the total mark in the gradebook
• most Quizzes are designed to focus attention on key points of the stimulus text - so requiring students to do a Quiz about a text that has been set as a Reading task helps to make sure that they really have read the text, and read it thoughtfully.

There are various forms of such online quizzes, all centred on developing reading comprehension skills - students may be asked to...

>  select correct answers (e.g. in MCQs)

e.g.  ...   TASKS Cosmopolitans  

>  click-&-drag the right words into the appropriate gaps (e.g. cloze-type exercises)

e.g.  ...  TASKS Class, jokes & linkers

>  click-&-drag correct answers about content or text-structure analysis

e.g.  ... TASKS Scottish independence? 

Short answer

This tool provides a format for students to write in answers to questions. This system is not marked automatically - you have to mark them yourself - but model answers with expected wordings are provided for feedback. The value of this for Student Access purposes is that...

• it provides practice in the Paper 2 question types Short Answer and (in particular) True/False + Justification
• it teaches the important exam technique that 'short answers' should be short
• it allows the setting of interpretive questions, involving literary commentary, where there may not be fixed 'correct' answers

What about 'research'?

An obvious and important task that students can be set to do outside class time is to research the background to a topic that is going to be discussed in class - or indeed to explore more deeply into a topic that has already been introduced in class.

Research tasks can be enabled by using the following elements of Student Access:

Discussion - this can be the vehicle for reporting back on the results of research. Students can be asked to (i) summarise briskly what they have found individually; (ii) comment on other students findings and reports; (iii) propose directions for further research, leading to a second round of reports and comments (in a repeatable sequence).

In addition, the teacher can have an overview of of students' discoveries, and then pick out elements to develop further activities in class. (Always a good idea to get students to do your research for you!)

Writing - A writing task can be set requiring students to report, or draw on and apply, the results of their research. This can either be based on the 'Discussion' procedure outlined above, or can be based directly on each student's own research. Whichever you choose, the writing task will make good research more useful and important for the students.

Of course, a value inherent in doing online research through Student Access is that links can easily be inserted and followed up by whoever reads the results ... encouraging the use of well-chosen support material, and of critical thinking.

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