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English is the language that allows global diverse races to communicate and it is
very important in various fields such as business, finance, industry and education.
Therefore a person who can master English sufficiently will be at an advantage to
compete in today¶s global market.
Language acquisition starts at an early age, and the best time to teach languages is
at the early ages. Thus, it is important to have quality English education in primary
school. It is important to have additional activities and programmes that could promote
the use of English, especially for those who not took English as their primary language.
This report paper will report on two English language programmes that had been
implemented in the school on year 2010. These programmes had significantly improved
the pupils¶ awareness of English language. By reviewing on this report, it is hopefully
that one can implement such programmes to encourage development of English language
for his or her school.
The first programme is the English Speaking Week, which English Story Telling
Competition and English Story Reading Competition will be held on the week. At the
same time, the teachers and pupils were encouraged to speak English only during the
week of the programme.
The second programme is the English Writing Week. The English Writing Week
will consist of Text Copying Competition and Sentence making Competition. During the
same week, all the pupils need to write a five days dairy in English and to submit to their
English teacher by end of the week.

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There are two aims of this programme. Firstly, is to create exposure of the English
language to the pupils, creating awareness of how important that English language is.
Secondly, to create conducive environment to allow the pupils to speak in English,
allowing them to use the language at their full potential without worrying.

 
 

The objectives of the English Speaking Week are mainly surrounding on pupils¶
listening and speaking, and reading skills.
The first objective, by conducting Story Reading Competition, it is able to
increase the reading speed and comprehension of an average reader, here refers to pupils,
who currently read well, but not fast, as well as pupils who read silently or below normal
speaking speed.
Second objective, the Story Telling Competition further promotes the capability
of a pupil in speaking fluently with appropriate speed, appropriate volume and suitable
tone, correct pronunciations, and appropriate gestures.
The main aspects that the both above mentioned competition tends to improve are
fluency, voice, pronunciations, and intonation.
Third objective, by emphasizing English speaking during the programme week,
the pupils where encourage to speak and listen to English, which maximize the daily used
of English language while eliminate obstacles that preventing pupils from exposing to the
language.






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The English Speaking Week had been conducted for a week of five days ± 20th
September 2010 to 24th September 2010. Below is a time table that shows the time line of
the programme.

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Forming of programme week committee. 6th September 2010
2nd meeting of committee. 13th September 2010
3rd meeting of committee. 16th September 2010
English Speaking Week: Day 1 20th September 2010
English Story Reading Competition for Year 1 and 2
English Speaking Week: Day 2 21st September 2010
English Story Telling Competition for Year 3 and 4
English Speaking Week: Day 3 22nd September 2010
English Story Telling Competition for Year 5
English Speaking Week: Day 4 23rd September 2010
English Story Telling Competition for Year 6
English Speaking Week: Day 5 24th September 2010
Prize give away Ceremony

   

 
 

 Below is the duration of each activity held during the English Speaking Week:
a English Story Reading Competition for Year 1 and 2 ± 1:40pm to 5:00pm
a English Story Telling Competition for Year 3 and 4 ± 8:00am to 12:00pm
a English Story Telling Competition for Year 5 ± 8:00am to 10:30am
a English Story Telling Competition for Year 6 ± 8:00am to 10:30am
a Prizes give away ceremony ± 7:30am ± 9:00am

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As mentioned above there are two aims of this programme. One of the aims is to
create exposure of the English language to the pupils, creating awareness of how
important that English language is. Therefore the purpose of speaking English during the
whole week is to target at those pupils who lack of exposure to English, or lack of
opportunities to speak English, and lack of awareness to English.
The second aim of the programme is to create conducive environment to allow the
pupils to speak in English, allowing them to use the language at their full potential
without worrying. Thus this action specifically targeted the groups of pupils who are
potential in English, but who are lack of confident to express verbally in English.






















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The committee was formed on 6th September 2010. The committee consists of 8
teachers who are teaching English subjects in the school. There was another 2 meetings
held on 13th and 16th September respectively. Both of the meetings were held to ensure all
preparations for the English Speaking Week fall in place accordingly. Below is a check
list that shows preparation works that had been done before the programme week.

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1 Confirmation of date and venue for the competitions.
2 Confirmation of funds, budgeting and allocating expenses.
3 Preparing sets of rules and marking schemes for the competitions
4 Checking and maintenance of the P.A. system.
5 Drafting flyers (for informing pupils and parents about the programme).
6 Approval of flyers for printing.
7 Distributing flyers to every pupils and competition notice to each class.
8 Confirmation of teachers to form judges¶ panel.
9 Ordering trophies for the competitions weeks.
10 Printing of marking sheets for judges¶ perusal.
11 Decoration of stages before the competition held.
12 Confirmation of contestants name from each class day before competition.
13 Draw lot for competing sequence on day before competition.

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On the first day of the programme week was the Year 1 and 2 Story Reading
Competition. The competition was held in the hall which allows Year 1 and Year 2 to
watch the performance of the speakers. The competition started from 1:40pm to 5:00pm.
There were total of 8 classes of Year 1 and 10 classes of Year 2, which made up total of
36 contestants (2 contestants from each class). It was observed that some of the Year 1
pupils experiencing stage fright where they could not finish reading their storybook.

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 On the second day of the programme week was the Year 3 and 4 Story Telling
Competition. The competition was held in the hall as well which allows Year 3 and Year
4 to watch the performance of the speakers. The competition started from 8:00am to
12:00pm. There were total of 8 classes each from Year 3 and Year 4, which made up total
of 32 contestants (2 contestants from each class). It was observed that some of the pupils
could not perform well as they should be due to tension.
 On the third day of the programme week was the Year 5 Story Telling
Competition. The competition was held in the auditorium as parents were invited to
watch the performance of their children. The competition started from 8:00am to
12:00pm. There were total of 8 classes of Year 5, which made up total of 24 contestants
(3 contestants from each class). The contestants from Year 5 performed equally well
therefore the judges had slight difficulty in putting in the marks for the contestants.
 On the fourth day of the programme week was the Year 6 Story Telling
Competition. The competition was held in the auditorium as well where parents and
guests from PTA were invited to watch the performance of the contestants. The
competition started from 8:00am to 12:00pm. There were total of 8 classes of Year 6,
which made up total of 24 contestants (3 contestants from each class). The contestants
from Year 6 performed amazingly and the parents and guests from PTA were pleased to
see such achievements that this programme had achieved.
The fifth day of the programme was the Prize Give Away Ceremony. VIP Guests
from PTA were invited to give some speeches and award the winner for the competitions.
Some parents were attended too as they would like to took pictures when their children
were awarded on the stage.
Throughout the English Speaking Week, it was observed teachers and canteen¶s
staffs have strived to encourage pupils speak in English by replying the pupils in English.
The result is quite satisfied as Chinese dialog was much lesser than usual.






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The programme was considered successful. All the teachers and canteen¶s staffs
have given full support in making the programme a success by insisting to speak in
English. The teachers who trained the pupils had also pour in great efforts in order the
pupils to deliver great performance.

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 The pupils who took part in the competition showed high commitment through
their performance. It is very encouraging to see the pupils attracted to the contestants¶
performance and this shows increasing interests of the pupils towards English language.
This could not be possible without the amazing performance from the contestants.

  
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Due to budget constraints, there were only trophies to give away to the winners. It
will be more encouraging to the winners and attract more interest for the coming
competition if more valued prizes were given away, for example stationary, storybooks
and school bags.

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 It was told by some class teachers that they have more than 3 potential pupils who
able to deliver a story equally well. Thus the limitation of 2 and 3 contestants from each
class seems to be quite narrow.

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Firstly, regarding to the issue of unattractive prizes, the committee was suggested
to had PTA or company to sponsor on the next coming English Speaking Week. By doing
so, there will be lesser budget constraints to worry for.
Secondly, the limit for each class contestants will be revised to at least 3
contestants each class. By doing so it will further extend the competition duration which
all teachers and the headmaster agreed with.
It is also recommend that on the next coming English Speaking Week programme,
there should be decoration and posters around the school corridors to create excitement
and encouragement to speak in English. This action will increase the impact of the
programme and making it a more successful programme.


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The aim of this English Writing Week programme is very directive, which is to
encourage pupils to write in English. To speak in English is consider easier than writing.
Grammar and vocabulary are the most common obstacles that faced by the pupils, and
with sufficient writing experience it is likely that pupils can improve on these aspects.
Therefore the programme aims to encourage pupils to write to achieve this purpose.

 
 

The objectives of the English Writing Week is surrounding solely to writing skills.
The first objective of conducting Sentence Making Competition is to improve the
writing skills of pupils in grammatical and vocabulary capabilities. Higher proficiency of
grammar and vocabulary of pupils will allow them to deliver the meanings clearly
through the sentences they wrote.
The second objective of the Text Copying Competition write is to encourage and
promote pupils to write with neat legible writings, and write with speed and accuracy.
Copying is a very important learning skill throughout the learning process. It is
unavoidable for a student to keep on copying notes from their mentor during stages of
primary school, secondary school, university or colleges. A pupil who proficient in
copying in English is not only equipped with speed and accuracy, grammatical skills will
obtain by a pupil indirectly as well.
The purpose of writing dairy during the programme week carries the third
objective which is to have other pupils who had not participate in the competition to write
in English during the progamme week. Writing a five days¶ dairy also provides
opportunities for pupils to work for precision, purposefulness, and originality. It allows
the pupils to write with a purpose and express their feelings.




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The English Writing Week was conduct from 14th June 2010 to 18th June 2010 for
a total of 5 days. Below is a time table that shows the time line of the programme.

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Forming of programme week committee. 31st May 2010
2nd meeting of committee. 8th June 2010
3rd meeting of committee. 11th June 2010
English Writing Week: Day 1 14th June 2010
English Text Copying Competition - Year 1 and 2
English Writing Week: Day 2 15th June 2010
English Sentence Making Competition - Year 3 and 4
English Writing Week: Day 3 16th June 2010
English Sentence Making Competition - Year 5
English Writing Week: Day 4 17th June 2010
English Sentence Making Competition - Year 6
English Writing Week: Day 5 18th June 2010
Prize give away Ceremony

   

 
 

 Below is the duration of each activity held during the English Writing Week:
a Text Copying Competition for Year 1 and 2 ± 1:40pm to 3:00pm
a English Sentence Making Competition for Year 3 and 4 ± 8:00am to 10:30am
a English Sentence Making Competition for Year 5 ± 8:00am to 10:30am
a English Sentence Making Competition Year 6 ± 8:00am to 10:30am
a Prizes give away ceremony ± 7:30am ± 9:00am




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The target of this English Writing Week programme was generally all the pupils
of the school. But it could be narrow to specific group which the impact felt most to. By
conducting different competition, we had defined which specific group of pupils to target.
The pupils who took part in the text copying competition were Year 1 and Year 2
pupils who had well performance in word spelling, writing speed, and neat legible hand
writing. These groups of pupils has no obstacles in spelling a word but they are on a
process of learning to put words into a long sentence, and making sentences into
paragraphs. Thus by having Text Copying Competition, these groups of pupils will learn
how a text was constructed through the experience of copying a full text.
For Year 3 to Year 4 Sentence Making Competition, the programme was targeted
to pupils who already equipped with certain amount of vocabularies. This group of pupils
must have proficient basic grammatical skills that allow them to combine words to form
meaningful sentences. The competition was to create motives for the contestants to learn
more vocabularies and improve their grammatical skills. The competition was to create
motives for the contestants to learn more vocabularies and improve their grammatical
skills.
The Year 5 and Year 6 Sentence Making Competition was the competition with
highest level of competency. The contestants was given related pictures that shows a
story, thus the pupils who took part in this competition must equipped with rich amount
of vocabularies and have proficient grammatical skills that allow them to combine words
to form meaningful sentences, and able to make connection between the sentences.








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The committee was formed on 31st May 2010, which consists of 8 English
teachers. The posts of the committee are as below:
1.a Chairman
2.a Secretary: Prepare minutes of meetings and approval paper works
3.a Vice Secretary: Prepare entry forms and handle contestants¶ sequence.
4.a Treasurer: Allocating budget
5.a Technical 1: Venue, P.A. System and equipment
6.a Technical 2: Competition materials, setting competition rules, and prizes
7.a Publicity: Design and printing of flyers, notice, posters and banners
8.a M.C.

To ensure the members of the committee carried out the tasks as planned, two
meetings were called to confirm the completion of tasks, which was on 8th and 11th June
2010 respectively.
On the first day of the English Writing Week was the Year 1 and 2 Text Copying
Competition. The competition was held in the hall which accommodated 90 contestants
(5 contestants from each class). The competition started from 1:40pm to 3:00pm. The
contestants were given 5 texts which contains 300 words each. The pupils were required
to copy them as much as they can by according to sequence within one hour. The judges¶
panel who form by 5 teachers will judge the contestants¶ performance by completion,
legibility, spelling and tidiness.
On the second day of the English Writing Week was the Year 3 and 4 Sentence
Making Competition. The competition was held in the hall and on that particular day it
had accommodated 80 contestants (5 contestants from each class). The competition
started from 8:00am to 10:30am. The contestants were given a sheet which contains total
of 100 words. The pupils were required to make sentences according to the words as
much as they can within two hours. The judges¶ panel who form by 5 teachers will judge
the contestants¶ performance by spelling, grammar, and punctuations..
The third day of the programme week was the Year 5 Sentence Making
Competition. There were total 40 contestants (5 contestants from each class). The

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competition started from 8:00am to 10:30am. The contestants were given sheets which
contains pictures that show a story line. Some words were state beside the pictures as hint
and to aid the pupils in making the sentences. The pupils were required to make sentences
according to the pictures and words within two hours. The sentences made must be
interconnected to deliver complete meaningful story. The judges¶ panel who form by 5
teachers will judge the contestants¶ performance by spelling, grammar, punctuations and
contents.
Day four of the programme week was the Year 6 Sentence Making Competition.
There were also total 40 contestants (5 contestants from each class). There were less
differences comparing to Year 5 competition except the story line given to them were
more complicate and much difficult vocabularies were given, thus it is more challenging
compare to Year 5.
The final day of the English Writing Week programme was the Prize Give Away
Ceremony. The vice chairman of PTA was invited to give some speeches and award the
winner for the competitions. Parents were attended to witness their children awarded with
trophies on the stage.
On the final day of the English Writing Week, all the pupils were required to
submit a five days¶ dairy to their English teacher. The pupils were told to feel free to
write anything they wish to as long as it is not less than 50 words per day. Most of the
pupils were exciting about this and they discussed it among them. The pupils were
curious about what did their friends written. They shared their experience and feelings
through words, and this created a healthy and competitive atmosphere where the pupils
urge to write better than their friends. 









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The programme will never be successful without the cooperation and supports
from the teachers. The teachers had been emphasizing the importance of writing in
English throughout the English Writing Week. The teachers also consistently paid
attention to the progression of the pupils¶ dairy and this creates enthusiasm for the pupils
to write the dairy.

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 The committees of the English Writing Week programme were very experienced
teachers in organizing events. Most of them were experience in organizing fund raising
events for the school and competitions at district level. Thus every details of this English
Writing Week programme were being attention and fulfilled by the committees to ensure
the programme run smoothly.

  
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There were minor groups of pupils who had less participation, or less enjoying the
English Writing Week due to their incapability in English writing. This group of pupils
was not equipped with writing skills to perform in writing dairy. The activities of the
English Writing Week were designed with English proficiency that these pupils do not
acquired.

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It is suggested that there should be activities that cater for the pupils who had least
English proficiency. Such activities could be Spelling Bee, Cross Word Puzzle, Solving
Missing Words and others. With a vast programme such as this which involved every
individual at the school, it is ideal that no one were left out from enjoying and benefit
from it. Thus it is important to cater activities that suit to the capability of different pupils.


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 By implementing such programmes, it is hoped that it effectively encourage the
pupils in learning and using English more often. It is a vital task for all the primary
school to implement various programmes in order to lift the English standards of our
nation into a higher level. And only with such our nation could be at an advantage
position to compete in today¶s global market.

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