MASTERY LEARNING IN LISTS

Making lists has to be a most poorly understood skill, particularly among company Human Resource Managers and high school and business college students. Read the local media to see the mess that some companies make with advertisements in the Positions Vacant column.

The successful candidate will be required to:

a. controlling accounting systems,
b. reconciliation of daily balances,
c. maintain registers of accounts,
d. advice to the manager, and
e. preparation of annual reports.

We need to understand that each item in a list has to run grammatically from the head sentence:

The successful candidate will be required to a. control accounting systems.
The successful candidate will be required to b. reconcile daily balances.
The successful candidate will be required to c. maintain registers of accounts.
The successful candidate will be required to d. advise the manager.
The successful candidate will be required to e. prepare annual reports.

The successful candidate will be required to:

a. control accounting systems,
b. reconcile daily balances,
c. maintain registers of accounts,
d. advise the manager, and
e. prepare annual reports.

or

The successful candidate will be responsible for:

a. control of all accounting systems,
b. reconciliation of daily balances,
c. maintenance of registers of accounts,
d. advice to the manager, and
e. preparation of annual reports.

But the first list has smaller words - good for advertising space.

In my Business Communications courses at the local Business Colleges over the years, there has been a Mastery Learning sequence of 40 lists. In a 17 week course, students completed 4 a day over 6 weeks.

They revised 5 a week just to make sure that they did not forget. There were 5 in a final achievement test. That was classical Mastery Learning. No one failed.

Such Mastery Learning should be included in the English curriculum of Grades 9, 10, 11 and 12. This will prepare them for grammatical accuracy in reports and later appplications for employment.

You are required to:

a. opening the doors,
b. checking the ID cards,
c. to lock the windows each afternoon,
d. communication with security guards.

You are required to:

a. open the doors,
b. check the ID cards,
c. lock the windows each afternoon, and
d. communicate with security guards.

Now you try one:

The economy was in difficulty because of:

a. decline occurred in the currency
b. there was inflation in the world economies,
c. people were unemployed.
d. economic downturn. and
f.  consumers were overspending.

Did you get it right?

The nation was in difficulty because of:

a. decline in the currency,
b. inflation in the major world economies,
c. people unemployed,
d. economic recession, and
f.  consumers overspending.

or

The nation was in difficulty because:

a. decline had occurred in the currency
b. there was inflation in the world economies,
c. people were unemployed.
d. the economy was in recession. and
f.  consumers were overspending.

This must be difficult for people for whom English is a second language.

Try one more.

There was a drought in Papua New Guinea due to:

a. El Nino affected ocean currents,
b. There has been global warming,
c. Forests have been cut down.
d. There are changes in world temperature patterns.

Did you get it right?

There was a drought in Papua New Guinea due to:

a. effect of El Nino on ocean currents,
b. global warming,
c. forests cut down, and
d. changes in world temperature patterns.

There were 38 more. This requires considerable knowledge of sentence patterns.