jTELS/TELSa – Pre-Intermediate Award in English as a Second or Other Language (ESOL) EQF/MQF Level 2 – 10 ECTS credits – Equivalent to A2 of CEFR

• The course is designed for Middle and Secondary level students and adult individuals who, for educational purposes, or for reasons relating to work or other personal issues, wish or need to gain a certificate which represents their actual level of English. The course certificate provides proof of the holder’s ability to use English to communicate in simple situations.
• Total Qualification Time is approx. 250 hours, split up as follows:
  • 80 ‘guided learning’ hours (i.e. contact hours)
  • 163 hours – active self-study
  • 7 hours – Assessment + feedback
• The design of the course is based on a ‘continuous-improvement’ process, with interconnected components in each of its seven modules.

Entry Requirements:

Learners joining the course will need to sit a Placement Test which will determine their actual current level of performance.

As a minimum, a learner joining this course should have a basic ability to communicate and exchange information in a simple way. S/he should be able to …

• introduce himself simply and use basic greetings,
• tell where he and others are from and give a basic description of his/her city,
• talk simply about family and colleagues, describing their appearance and personalities,
• discuss clothing at a basic level and ask simple questions about it,
• talk about favourite foods and make simple orders at a restaurant or take-away,
• talk about daily activities and arrange meetings with friends and colleagues,
• describe current weather conditions and suggest activities according to the weather forecast,
• talk in general terms about his/her health and describe common medical symptoms to a doctor,
• describe the location of his/her home and give simple directions,
• demonstrate an understanding of simple directions,
• talk about his/her hobbies and interests and discuss related plans with friends or colleagues,
• complete basic transactions at a hotel, including checking in and checking out,
• discuss common products, make basic purchases and discuss basic problems relating to faulty goods,
• demonstrate correct pronunciation of individual sounds in order to form intelligible words
• demonstrate an understanding of short, simple instructions
• understand basic notices and instructions, as well as information in short, simple texts
• demonstrate an understanding of simple grammatical structures and an awareness of proper sentence structure

Programme Objective:

• This course focuses on building the learners’ language knowledge and developing their basic competence in the four skills of Reading, Listening, Writing and Speaking, with regard to the English language, ensuring that they can achieve a level of competence which allows them to carry out simple language tasks as fluently and accurately as possible, whilst working or studying under direct supervision in a structured context.

Learning Outcomes

• This course focuses on building the learners’ language knowledge and developing their basic competence in the four skills of Reading, Listening, Writing and Speaking, with regard to the English language, ensuring that they can achieve a level of competence which allows them to carry out simple language tasks as fluently and accurately as possible, whilst working or studying under direct supervision in a structured context.
• Additionally, the course encourages methods of learning which help learners build up the knowledge, skills and attitudes needed to become more autonomous in their language acquisition journey.
• By the end of the course, learners will be able to ….
  • demonstrate an ability to exercise good control over basic grammatical and lexical structures and an understanding of some more complex structures encountered during the course,
  • understand simple information presented in relatively short texts such as notices, posters, catalogues, articles relating to the most common everyday situations,
  • identify the appropriate basic strategies required (skimming or scanning) to read, with a degree of independence, short informational texts, dialogues, messages, etc., at reasonable speed in order to understand the general idea and key information, referring to any accompanying titles, visuals and/or data which can help with the understanding of gist
  • establish the meaning of unfamiliar words from surrounding context or information, and analysis of form
  • find their way about a text by scanning for specific information and by locating linkers, basic signposting, and key references
  • predict the content of simple texts through an initial analysis of title and opening sentence/paragraph, as well as any related visuals
  • understand common words, simple set phrases and formulaic chunks relating to areas of personal or immediate relevance, and full sentences in short recordings, albeit with some/occasional repetition
  • respond to questions about personal everyday activities
  • make themselves understood in simple contributions, demonstrating a repertoire of simple language – and some memorised, more complex set phrases &/or formulaic chunks – which enables them to function in simple situations and handle routine entry-level tasks or jobs
  • write short, relatively simple paragraphs/texts, containing a series of simple phrases and sectences which are linked with a variety of basic connectors, and demonstrating some control on grammatical structures, capitalisation and punctuation.  Their writing generally includes a number of basic mistakes, although meaning is usually clear.
  • attempt to evaluate his/her own written work for coherence, accuracy of structures, meaning and arrangement of words and phrases (i.e. Semantics and Syntax), demonstrating an increasing ability to adopt useful strategies to proof read their work before submitting for assessment.
  • explore learner dictionaries during guided learning hours and/or during self-study session, so as to (i) understand the meaning of new/ ’problem’ words in a text or a recording, and proceed to (ii) ‘store’, (ii) activate and (iii) recycle newly-learnt vocabulary. (Note: Dictionaries facilitate learner autonomy; therefore, guided discovery during contact hours is pivotal in facilitating ‘learning-to-learn’ strategies.)
  • demonstrate an awareness of communication aims in relation to reading/listening material used as input material, as well as in their own output (i.e. Speaking and Writing)
  • demonstrate an increasing awareness of the key skills required in different forms of communication, and of social behavior when interacting with others on a 1-1 basis, and during group/team work in class, such as simple discussions, group work, and class projects,
  • establish an after-school learning programme, under the guidance of the teacher/tutor,  targeting a variety of structures, skills and themes covered during guided-learning/contact hours (e.g. Methods of ‘storing’ and activating vocabulary, such as spidergrams, word maps, collocation, and word families, etc. //  Recalling, recording, recycling and/or activating earmarked grammatical and lexical structures// Drilling of newly learnt forms and structures // Expanding their vocabulary bank through personal learner diaries and vocabulary books // Recording phonetic symbols for individual problem sounds , etc.// Practising newly acquired reading and listening strategies// Practising (and developing further) new genres of output, as indicated by the teacher, etc.)

The above-indicated course objectives are mirrored in the overall aims of the relative syllabus for the jTELS/TELSa Level A2 examinations which are the earmarked instruments for the assessment of (i) progress registered during the course, and (ii) language proficiency at course termination. Assessment during the various stages of the course is meant to endorse the candidates’ competence in the four language skills, specifically targeting their ability to use English to communicate in simple situations.

To apply for the next available intake or to register your interest for the programme, kindly contact us on  info@esatqualifications.com