ESL Program Features
The academic curriculum focuses on all areas of language acquisition: reading, writing, speaking, listening, grammar/structure, and culture. Overall, we focus primarily on speaking and listening skills, which most students lack, while also sharpening skills in the other areas. TOEFL Preparation is an important part of our program.
Speaking and Listening
Speaking and Listening is an important aspect of improving both fluency and accuracy. Pronunciation is a special focus and individual attention is given to each student. Oral presentations are required and students are expected to work with Power Point. There are discussions and many conversation topics in this course.
TOEFL Prep/Grammar
The focus is on grammar, structure, and getting students prepared for the TOEFL exam, depending on which level the students place into. Practice tests and quizzes are given so that students can see their strengths and weaknesses. Parts of the course are often held in the computer lab. Since UNCW uses the iBT system, we also focus on TOEFL speaking and listening tasks.
Reading and Vocabulary Development
This course focuses on reading comprehension and vocabulary development. Students will actively read, relate what is read to their own experience, and then discuss it either verbally or in writing. Students will learn a variety of methods for vocabulary development, by using different types of dictionaries and study skills.
Writing Skills
Depending on the level of the student, this course goes into various writing skills: from beginning sentence constructions to academic essay writing that students would need when they attend degree classes in an American university. The higher levels of this course also address TOEFL Writing. Students also read samples of literature to base their writing tasks on.
Additional Features
- Classes meet daily, Monday – Thursday
- On Fridays or Saturdays, we have excursions which are also covered by the program cost
- International Student Health Insurance is not covered by the program cost
- A Semester Break trip, which usually costs between $200-$300, depending on the destination and number of participants
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