95
DESINGNING A COURSE AROUND BIOGRAPHY-BASED UNITS
Nurbekova Shakhnoza Sheralievna
Tashkent Institute of Textile and Light Industry,
Department of “Uzbek and foreign language”
https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.15524421
Entire courses have been successfully designed around biographies. In 1999, our university
began offering intensive, one-month, noncredit courses for English language study. After initial
experimentation with various themes, we decided to develop each course around a series of four
week-long biography-based-units. Biographies gave students rich language to talk or write about
life, specific vocabulary related to certain professions, and themes and topics related to their
experiences and cultures. They also provided authentic contexts for review and recycling of
important vocabulary in each successive week. We chose biography subjects who were famous in
their field-so that it was easy to find information-but whose life stories were not very familiar to
our students-so the students were learning new information no matter what their background,
level, or prior education had been. Some of the most successful units were created around the lives
of Frank Lloyd Wright (architect), Wilma Rudolph (athlete), Estee Lauder (businessperson), and
Milton Hershey (confectioner and philanthropist) [1,2,3].
We wrote two biographies for each person, aiming one at the high-beginner/low-
intermediate level and the other and intermediate and above. We also found, adapted, and wrote
materials that would work with a range of proficiency levels. Where possibly, we tried to draw
comparisons or make connections with previously studied themes and topics. The students were
engaged, and their language skills progressed. They also gave positive feedback about the course
materials. We became convinced of the beauty of biographies [4,5,6].
Other teachers have also found biographical content to be and effective and engaging focus
for a course. Wyle (2009) describe a course entitled Exploring the English-Speaking World
through the Biography, developed for a university English class in Japan. The rationale for the
course is to use methods and materials different from the typical grammar-and-four-skills
instruction used in most English classes while acquainting students with a variety of international
figures. Wolf (1994) describes revamping a world civilization course for a freshman university
class in the United States by using biographies that he wrote. For each unit, he compares two
figures whose stories depict the ideas and sociopolitical issues of a certain historical period. His
goals were to make the course more engaging and relevant to the students while leading them to
use higher-order thinking skills. People are the center of every field-from astronomy to zoology-
and from every place-from Andorra to Zanzibar. Thus, content learning in nearly any subject can
be introduced through biographies. Similarly, biographies provide and effective means to
introduce both local and global themes in an English course [7,8,9].
Finding biographies and biography-based materials
Teachers who want to use biographical texts will find a wide range of resources, from free
online materials to photocopiable teacher handbooks and collections of biographies available
from reputable publishers including Cambridge, MacMillan, Oxford, Penguin, and Pro Lingua
Associates. Teachers might also consider using quality books originally written for young or
adolescent English speakers (Malu 2013). The moderate length texts, simple narratives, concrete
language, and compelling stories (Cho and Krashen 1994) found in such literature can serve as a
bridge to more complex academic language for high school and adult EFL readers (Temple,
96
Martinez, and Yokota 2011). Online biography collections provide useful background reading for
teachers, inspiration for materials developers, and pleasure or self-study reading for individual
learners. Examples are listed here, along with brief annotations based on our experience
[10,11,12].
Biography.com
is a affiliated with a television network, so
it is commercialized. Nevertheless, there are dozens of biographies in print and mini-video format
about famous (in famous) people throughout famous the ages and around the world. Print
biographies are illustrated and include both a synopsis and a full text. They are not written with
language learners in mind, but they could be used as a teacher resource or for self-study by
advanced students. The mini videos are action-packed and engaging, an perfect for introducing a
subject of study or for closing class [13].
Biography online
http://www.biographyonline.net/
was created by Tejvan Pettinger, a
developer of educational websites in the United Kingdom. His biography collection athletes,
entrepreneurs, and scientist who are (ore have been) influential, inspirational, or successful
despite personal hardship. While not designed specifically for language learners, these
biographies can be used to challenge intermediate-level leaners, extend learning in students who
have some background knowledge about certain career or personality, and give teachers ideas
about interesting biographical subjects [14].
Infoplease
at http: //www.infoplease.com\people.html is a online encyclopedia. It is
biography page contains links to over 30,000 entries categorized by occupation. This resource is
useful for teachers or students who want to browse for names in a particular category. However,
the entries themselves are probably too difficult for most EFL classroom use [15].
Stories About people
at http: //www.manythings.org/voa/people/is a collection of over
250 biographies and accompanying MP3 files from the Voice of America series by the same name
Stories are about two pages or 15 minutes in length [16,17].
CONCLUISON
The beauty of biographical texts is that they can serve as stand-alone lessons or provide the
starting block for a thematically focused unit. They can also become the core of an entire course.
At the outset of this article, we gave three reasons for using biographical texts in English classes:
their universal, story-like appeal; their transparent organization; and their capacity for review.
Teachers who use biographies in any or all of these three ways will discover that biographies are
also ideal for differentiating instruction in multilevel language classes because biographical
passages for the same subject are readily available on various levels.
They foster both language-focused learning and fluency development. They lend themselves
to integrated-skills practice with authentic or authentic-like texts. Finally, they provide repeated
opportunities for noticing and reviewing target-language features in subsequent biography-based
lessons. Biographies have all these benefits-and they provide pleasurable reading about people
who are interesting and often inspiring to students and teachers alike.
References:
Используемая литература:
Foydalanilgan adabiyotlar:
1.
Komarovskaya T.E., The issues of poetics of historical novel in American literature of XX
97
century. Abstract of a thesis. Dr. of Philological Sciences - M .: MPU. 1994. – p6 (36 pages).
2.
VipperYu.B., (answer ed.), History of World Literature. In nine volumes.Volume four. -
Moscow: Nauka, 1987.p559 (688 pages).
3.
The capture and release of Captain John Smith, including his rescule from death by
Pocahontas, in his own words from The general historie of Virgina as published at London
1964.[Ann Arbor]: Reprinted for the Clements Library Associates [by University of Michigan Print.
Ogg], 1960.www.books.library.org;
4.
Gilenson B.A., History of US Literature. In 2 parts.Part 1. - M .: Yurayt Publishing House, 2018.
- pp 9-14.
5.
Nesmelova O.O., Karasik O.B., History of American Literature. - Kazan: Kazan. University,
2017 .--pp 5-6 (80 pages).
6.
Brigham C.S., History and bibliography of American newspapers, 1690-1820.
www.books.library.org.
7.
Franklin B., Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin. 1781. Reprinted 2005. – p
230.www.Livlib.ru.
8.
Korenova M.M., Literatures of the American Continent / History of World Literature. - In nine
volumes. Volume five. - M .: Nauka, 1988. – p 431 (423-436).
9.
Irving W., History of Muhamet and His Successors. – 1849. http:// librebook.org.A History of
New York / http://pda.litres.ru.
10.
KovalevYu.V., Irving // History of World Literature. - In nine volumes. Volume six. - M .:
Nauka, 1988 .-- p 556 (531-581).
11.
Ikromkhonova F.,Boymanov X., Vaxabova Y., Rakhimov F., “The system of images in a
historical novel (on the example of a novel of “Joan of Arc”. Journal of Critical Reviews.ISSN-2394-
5125. VOL 7, ISSUE 11, 2020. – pp 3119-3124.
12.
Mukhamedova Kh.E., Typology of a female character in the works of Charles Dickens.
Abstract of a thesis. Dr. of Philological Sciences 2019. - p 54.
