ENGLISH

JAWAHARLAL NEHRU TECHNOLOGICAL UNIVERSITY ANANTAPUR

B.Tech. I Year (common to all branches) T-2 C-4

INTRODUCTION :

The sweeping changes in the world have elevated English to the status of a tool of global communication and transformed it into e-English. The syllabus has been drafted to improve the competence of students in communication in general and language skills in particular. The books prescribed serve as students’ handbooks.

The teacher should focus on the skills of reading, writing, listening and speaking while using the prescribed text and exercises. The classes should be interactive. The students should be encouraged to participate in the classroom proceedings and also to write short paragraphs and essays. The main aim is to encourage two way communications in place of the one-sided lecture.

The text for non-detailed study is meant for extensive reading by the students. They may be encouraged to read some select topics on their own, which could lead into a classroom discussion. In addition to the exercises from the texts done in the class, the teacher can bring variety by using authentic materials such as newspaper articles, advertisements etc.

2. OBJECTIVES:

• To improve the language proficiency of the students in English with an emphasis on LSRW skills.
• To equip the students to study academic subjects with greater facility through theoretical and practical components of the syllabus.
• To develop study skills as well as communication skills in formal and informal situations.

3. SYLLABUS :

Listening Skills:

Objectives:

1. To enable students to develop their listening skills so that they may appreciate its role in the LSRW skills approach to language and improve their pronunciation

2. To equip students with necessary training in listening so that they can comprehend the speech of people of different backgrounds and dialects.

Students should be given practice in listening and identifying the sounds of English language and to mark stress , right intonation in connected speech.

• Listening for general content • Listening to fill up information

• Intensive listening • Listening for specific information

Speaking Skills :

Objectives

1. To make students aware of the role of ability to speak fluent English and its contribution to

their success.

2. To enable students to express themselves fluently and appropriately in social and professional contexts.

• Oral practice • Describing objects/situations/people

• Role play – Individual/Group activities • Just A Minute (JAM) Sessions.

(Using exercises from all units of the prescribed text)

Reading Skills:

Objectives:

1. To develop an awareness in the students about the significance of silent reading and comprehension.

2. To develop the ability to guess the meanings of words from context and grasp the overall message of the text, draw inferences etc.

• Skimming the text • Understanding the gist of an argument

• Identifying the topic sentence • Inferring lexical and contextual meaning

• Understanding discourse features • Recognizing coherence/sequencing of sentences

The students shall be trained in reading skills using the prescribed text for detailed study. They shalll be

examined in reading and answering questions using ‘unseen’ passages which may be taken from the

non-detailed text or other authentic texts, such as articles from magazines/newspapers

Writing Skills:

Objectives:

1. To develop an awareness in the students the skill to write exact and formal writing
2. To equip them with the components of different forms of writing.

• Writing sentences • Use of appropriate vocabulary

• Paragraph writing • Coherence and cohesiveness

• Narration / description • Note Making

• Formal and informal letter writing • Editing a passage..

4. TEXTBOOKS PRESCRIBED:

In order to improve the proficiency of the student in the acquisition of the four skills mentioned above, the following texts and course content are prescribed and divided into Eight Units:

For Detailed study: ENJOYING EVERYDAY ENGLISH, Sangam Books (India) Pvt Ltd Hyderabad, 2009

For Non-detailed study: INSPIRING LIVES, Maruti Publications, Guntur, 2009

Unit –I :

• Heaven’s Gate from ENJOYING EVERYDAY ENGLISH
• Mokshagundam Visvesaraya from INSPIRING LIVES

Unit –II :

• Sir C.V.Raman from ENJOYING EVERYDAY ENGLISH
• Mother Teresa from INSPIRING LIVES

Unit –III :

• The Connoisseur from ENJOYING EVERYDAY ENGLISH
• Dr. Amartya Kumar Sen from INSPIRING LIVES

Unit –IV :

• The Cuddalore Experience from ENJOYING EVERYDAY ENGLISH
• Gertrude Elion from INSPIRING LIVES

Unit –V :

• Bubbling Well Road from ENJOYING EVERYDAY ENGLISH
• Vishwanathan Anand from INSPIRING LIVES

Unit-VI :

• Odds Against Us from ENJOYING EVERYDAY ENGLISH
• Charlie Chaplin from INSPIRING LIVES

Unit – VII : Exercises on

• Reading and Writing Skills, Reading Comprehension, Letter writing, Report writing

Unit – VIII Exercises on

• Remedial Grammar covering Common errors in English, Subject-Verb agreement, Use of Articles and Prepositions, Active/Passive Voice, Reported speech, Tenses Vocabulary development covering Synonyms & Antonyms, one-word substitutes, prefixes & suffixes, Idioms & phrases, words often confused.

Evaluation: The question paper shall contain two parts, Part A containing questions from Units I- VI and Part B containing questions from units VII & VIII. The student is required to answer five full questions choosing at least one from Part B.

REFERENCES:

1. Technical Communication , Principle and Practice, Meenakshi Raman and Sangita Sharma, OUP, 2009
2. Essential Grammar in Use, (with CD) 3/e, Cambridge University Press, 2009
3. Resumes and Interviews, M.Ashraf Rizvi, Tata – McGraw Hill, 2009
4. Everyday Dialogues in English by Robert J. Dixson, Prentice-Hall of India Ltd., 2006.
5. Communication Skills for Technical Students, Farhathullah, T.M., Orient Blackswan, 2008
6. Developing Communication Skills, 2/e. by Krishna Mohan & Meera Banerji , Macmillan, 2009
7. English for Technical Communication, Vol. 1 & 2, by K. R. Lakshmi Narayanan, Sci tech. Publications.
8. Basic Communication Skills For Technology, Andrea J Ruthurford, Pearson Education , Asia.
9. Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English with DVD, Pearson Longman.

Sources :

JNTU Anantapur website (http://www.jntuanantapur.org)