CPE Tutorial Task 2 Chart and Graph With Reading

The key to acing Task 2 is to complete the task in a logical and orderly step-by-step process. Work on each piece of the task separately before you try to integrate the ideas of the reading with the two pieces of visual data. You have one hour.

1. Short Reading Identify the main idea(s) in each paragraph. The exam directions ask you to state the “claims” made in the reading. What is a claim? It’s a statement of the author’s main ideas. In this 1999 article by Donald C. Kiraly (adapted by Dion Pincus and Bridget Orozco of QCC) there is a central, or controlling idea (major claim), and a few related important ideas (corollary claims). Identify them and write them in sentences, either using your own words, or by incorporating the author’s words as a full or partial quotation. (Remember to give full credit to the author if you quote him!)

2. Figure 1 (Pie Chart) Take a few minutes to study this pie chart. Whose perspective on teacher-centeredness does this chart represent: faculty or students? How many segments are there? What does each segment represent? Write one-sentence statements about what each piece of the pie (63%, 31%, 6% and 0%) describes.

3. Figure 2 (Line Graph) Now switch your focus to Figure 2 and study it carefully. Whose perspective on teacher-centeredness does this graph represent: faculty or students? What does the vertical (y) axis show? What does the horizontal (x) axis show? Write one-sentence statements describing the numbers of students (y axis) for each of the four responses listed on the x axis.

4. Reading + Figure 1 Write one or more statements describing the way(s) in which the information in figure 1 (the pie chart) does or does not support (illustrate) the claims made in the reading.

5. Reading + Figure 2 Write one or more statements describing the way(s) in which the information in figure 2 (the line graph) does or does not support (illustrate) the claims made in the reading.

6. Figure 1 + Figure 2 Write one or more statements describing how figures 1 and 2 are related to each other? (Hint: do both faculty and students agree or disagree about the role of a teacher in the classroom? To what degree do they agree/disagree?)

To pass Task 2 you must make a minimum of four complete and accurate statements about both the reading and the graph/chart. You must make at least two statements about the claims in the reading, and at least one statement relating the reading to each figure. Every additional accurate statement, whether about the reading alone, the reading as it relates to each figure, or how the information in the two figures is related, adds one point to your score. Obviously, you should try to make as many statements as possible to maximize your overall CPE score.

Note: You must pass Task 2 as well as Task 1 in order to pass the CPE. Also: you do not have to write your Task 2 answer in essay form, or in paragraphs. Making statements is sufficient, but you must write in full, clear and complete sentences using correct grammar and punctuation.

Directions

On the following pages, you will see a brief reading selection and two figures (graphs, tables, charts, maps, or other figures), all on the same or a related topic. Assume that all three came from different sources. Read carefully the reading selection and examine the data presented in the two graphs. Then, in a well organized response, state the major claims made in the reading selection and explain how data in the two graphs support and/or challenge those claims.

Be specific. Your essay will be evaluated for accuracy, completeness, and clarity.

As an aid to preparing for your essay, you might find it helpful to take notes on the reading passage or list the information presented in the figures. Your notes will not be evaluated.

Reading Selection B

In a prototypical teacher centered environment, the instructor assumes responsibility for virtually everything that goes on in the classroom except for learning itself. The teacher prepares the syllabus, chooses the texts, organizes all of the in class activities and homework, decides who will speak and when, and personally 'dominates the classroom discourse. This is the teacher's class, which the students attend. The teacher's teaching agenda is designed to become the students' agenda for learning. All in all, there is little room for students to help shape the outcome of the class.

Traditionally, throughout much of the 20th century, classes have been taught in this manner. As the Industrial Age comes to a close, many teachers have still been loath to give up their positions as "transmitters" of an established knowledge base. Today's students, however, see themselves differently. They are the pioneer learners of the Information Age. No longer content simply to be "products" of an industrial educational combine, students now see themselves as active participants in educational transactions.

In a student centered learning environment, teachers and students become members of a mutually supportive learning team. Although it is the teachers' purview to identify students' difficulties and weaknesses and provide them with tactical assistance, student centered teachers still learn from and along with their students. In such an environment, students can emancipate themselves from the teacher, and learn to make their own way along their own highly individualistic career path. This they must do if they are to emerge from the educational situation as self confident graduates, prepared to think for themselves, to work as members of a team, to assume responsibility for their own work, to assess the quality of their own performance and to continue learning once they leave the institution.

Adapted by Dion Pincus and Btidget Orozco from Kiraly, Donald C. (1999) "From teacher centered to learning centered classroom in translator education: Control, chaos or collaboration?" Intercultural Studies Group: Innovation in Translator and Interpreter Training.

Figure 1

Faculty Attitudes Toward Teacher-Centeredness, Fall 2000

Survey Question: "It is my responsibility to define what students must learn and how they should learn it"

Figure 2

Survey of 130 Community College English as a Second Language Students:
What is the Role of a Teacher?

Survey Question: "It is the teacher's responsibility to say what students must learn and how they should learn."