In her article, Lindsay Miller points out that it’s been traditionally assumed that listening was something that could just be “picked up”. Although it’s true that teenagers in general are more likely to “pick up” the language from songs, TV series and movies and, thus, to outperform adults when it comes down to listening comprehension, I agree with her on the fact that listening needs to be “taught”. In this way, planning pre- while- and post-listening tasks carefully is essential. Activating students’ schemata (prior knowledge on a certain topic), pre-teaching necessary vocabulary, having students listen with a purpose are some of the crucial steps to be taken into account. Besides, integration of skills is vital, so engaging students in extended discussion on what they heard integrates listening and speaking. Needless to say, reading and writing can and should follow as well, but they are not our focus in this task.
Regarding strategies, I’d like to add that adults, who are in general more prone to experience frustration when they do not understand, need to be told that they are not expected to understand every word, and that they should focus on understanding either the main ideas (gist) or the specific details that are being asked for. This reduces their anxiety.
Regarding the use of the Internet and computer software, I’d like to point out that in our country the government has been implementing the “OLP” (one laptop per child) project for the last few years. This project has given the chance to all the younger learners attending public elementary schools to own a laptop, for free, and use it in class. Wireless internet connection is provided at the school. After the initial challenge that making the most of this extraordinary benefit posed for educators, this tool has become a fantastic resource for both Spanish and English teachers. Without a doubt, what Lindsay Miller says about younger learners developing their computer skills along with their language skills is absolutely true in this case. The OLP project is now on the second stage and students in public high schools have started to have access to these laptops as well.
Undoubtedly, the use of CALL in EFL Teaching opens up a fantastic world of resources that enable teachers to facilitate the learning process and the successful development of the macro skills. Aside from the Internet, most textbooks nowadays include a CD-ROM, which students can access any day at any time, with multimedia files that are programmed to use text, images, audio and video to provide interactivity. In short, the table is set for us to help digital native learners enjoy the feast.
Margarita
Sunday, October 24, 2010
Sunday, October 17, 2010
WEEK 2: Reflections on Web Searching
Even though I´ve been fond of Google for a long time, I was amazed at the variety of search engines we can find in NoodleTools. I could check three of them so far, but I´m planning to keep exploring others from now on. I usually need to look for academic information related to EFL teaching for both the monthly coordination meetings with Regional Coordinators as well as for the Professional Development Days we organize for directors and teachers of the Alianzas located in the provinces (interior) of the country.
My job as a coordinator also implies helping directors manage their Centers and lead their own teaching staff more effectively. Thus, I also need to search for information related to leadership and management in the field of education.
I’d like to finish this reflection by highlighting Deborah Healey’s tips on Web Search Tools. It’s really useful. Thanks Robert for proposing this web searching task. It has helped me realize there’s a whole world of search engines other than ”Google”. Last but not least, I feel that stepping out of our comfort zone by trying out new ways of doing things helps us grow both in our personal and professional life.
Margarita
My job as a coordinator also implies helping directors manage their Centers and lead their own teaching staff more effectively. Thus, I also need to search for information related to leadership and management in the field of education.
I’d like to finish this reflection by highlighting Deborah Healey’s tips on Web Search Tools. It’s really useful. Thanks Robert for proposing this web searching task. It has helped me realize there’s a whole world of search engines other than ”Google”. Last but not least, I feel that stepping out of our comfort zone by trying out new ways of doing things helps us grow both in our personal and professional life.
Margarita
Saturday, October 16, 2010
WEEK 2: My Reflections on the ABCD model
It was interesting to read about the Pennsylvania State University's ABCD model (Audience-Behavior-Condition-Degree) to state learning objectives. Writing effective learning objectives for a lesson may not be easy. They may be either too broad or too brief. They may focus on the behavioral aspect, but overlook how that behavior will be evaluated. They may be aligned with a textbook or syllabus, but fail to meet the needs of a specific group of students.
Thus, the ABCD model can be a useful alternative tool to write learning objectives for teachers in general and for novice ones in particular. Although it may look simple or schematic at a first glance, it comprises specific and essential aspects that need to be taken into account when planning and teaching a class such as the students’ age, background knowledge and learning styles (Audience), what they are expected to do in the target language in that particular task or class (Behavior), what the learning context will be (group dynamics, methodology, materials, resources, etc, (Context) and the criteria for assessing and grading students’ performance (Degree).
In addition, I believe teachers should not only state the learning objectives in their lesson plan, but they should also make them explicit to students. Doing this makes the lesson purposeful for them, helps students become more aware of their learning process, and fosters students’ autonomy and self-assessment as well. Although seeing the need to share the lesson objectives with students may sound obvious, from my experience observing classes, it does not happen as often as it should.
Margarita
Thus, the ABCD model can be a useful alternative tool to write learning objectives for teachers in general and for novice ones in particular. Although it may look simple or schematic at a first glance, it comprises specific and essential aspects that need to be taken into account when planning and teaching a class such as the students’ age, background knowledge and learning styles (Audience), what they are expected to do in the target language in that particular task or class (Behavior), what the learning context will be (group dynamics, methodology, materials, resources, etc, (Context) and the criteria for assessing and grading students’ performance (Degree).
In addition, I believe teachers should not only state the learning objectives in their lesson plan, but they should also make them explicit to students. Doing this makes the lesson purposeful for them, helps students become more aware of their learning process, and fosters students’ autonomy and self-assessment as well. Although seeing the need to share the lesson objectives with students may sound obvious, from my experience observing classes, it does not happen as often as it should.
Margarita
Sunday, October 10, 2010
WEEK 1 - My Reflections on Blogging for ELT
I really enjoyed the article on blogging for ELT. I knew about the possibility for a blog to display photos, but it’s good to hear that nowadays a blog can also be used with audio and even video. I’d love to learn more about these features since they would allow for more integration of skills in our English classes, which would be fantastic.
Regarding writing, I have always favored using a process approach in my classes even at Basic levels. However, in the 80s and in the 90s it was not easy to motivate students to write a second or third draft even if there was some sort of ‘real audience’ other than the teacher, like their classmates or students from other groups.
Technology has made wonders in this sense. I completely agree that Blogs can give students a more real purpose for their writing and allow for more interactivity with the ”real audience”, which can go from their class, local high school or community to the whole world. Thus, students are by far much more motivated to write and more careful not only about what they say (content) but also about how they say it (form). They are more aware of the need and more willing to pay attention to certain subskills such as register, accuracy, organization, etc.
No doubt correction of the students’ blogs may be an issue. I think implementing guided peer correction at the computer lab, if there´s one available, prior to the post would work. Teachers can faciliate by monitoring, providing help and taking notes of repeated mistakes, which show the need for remedial work with the whole class afterwards.
About correction, I’d like to pose a question for you to share your ideas: how “accurate” should basic- or intermediate-level students’ posts be in terms of grammar and vocabulary? Would you accept certain mistakes to remain in the public post or not? What criteria would you use?
Finally, I loved the “mystery guest” activity suggested. It reminded me of the “20 questions game”, remember? One application could be to reinforce question formation at a Basic level. Students would be allowed to ask a maximum of 20 questions in their blogs to guess the guest’s identity. Project work would also be great to implement with our teenagers in the Access Program. There are 10 groups at the headquarters in Montevideo and 5 groups running in the interior of the country. They are 300 students in total. Aside from the linguistic purposes, we could foster their integration noticeably through this tool.
I look foward to hearing from you.
Best,
Margarita
Regarding writing, I have always favored using a process approach in my classes even at Basic levels. However, in the 80s and in the 90s it was not easy to motivate students to write a second or third draft even if there was some sort of ‘real audience’ other than the teacher, like their classmates or students from other groups.
Technology has made wonders in this sense. I completely agree that Blogs can give students a more real purpose for their writing and allow for more interactivity with the ”real audience”, which can go from their class, local high school or community to the whole world. Thus, students are by far much more motivated to write and more careful not only about what they say (content) but also about how they say it (form). They are more aware of the need and more willing to pay attention to certain subskills such as register, accuracy, organization, etc.
No doubt correction of the students’ blogs may be an issue. I think implementing guided peer correction at the computer lab, if there´s one available, prior to the post would work. Teachers can faciliate by monitoring, providing help and taking notes of repeated mistakes, which show the need for remedial work with the whole class afterwards.
About correction, I’d like to pose a question for you to share your ideas: how “accurate” should basic- or intermediate-level students’ posts be in terms of grammar and vocabulary? Would you accept certain mistakes to remain in the public post or not? What criteria would you use?
Finally, I loved the “mystery guest” activity suggested. It reminded me of the “20 questions game”, remember? One application could be to reinforce question formation at a Basic level. Students would be allowed to ask a maximum of 20 questions in their blogs to guess the guest’s identity. Project work would also be great to implement with our teenagers in the Access Program. There are 10 groups at the headquarters in Montevideo and 5 groups running in the interior of the country. They are 300 students in total. Aside from the linguistic purposes, we could foster their integration noticeably through this tool.
I look foward to hearing from you.
Best,
Margarita
Saturday, October 9, 2010
WEEK 1 My first post: Managing Stress
Hi everyone,
Please allow me to make my first post a little personal and share with you some reflections about how I felt this first week. When the course was lunched, it seemed to be an overwhelming challenge for me. As mails from Oregon kept coming with many instructions to be followed, I feared the worst. I started to wonder how I was going to cope with all my responsibilities: my job as an Academic Coordinator, my classes at the university every day after work and this new course. To make things worse, I had a test on Oct.4, so I really needed to study hard over last weekend. By the way, I'm studying to become a Public Translator at the State University. It's a four-year career.
However, today, near the end of Week 1, it’s very rewarding for me to see that I could make it. How? I had to resort to several techniques such as acknowledging my feelings in first place, talking my concerns over with colleagues and superiors, prioritizing, breaking objectives into small, step by step achievable goals, doing relaxation exercises in the morning, managing my time even more efficiently, delegating more and asking for help whenever I needed to. In short, I could do it by applying a concept learned in a recent workshop I attended at the Alianza about “Adapting to Change”: the problem for us, human beings, is not the change itself, but the transition stage and the internal resources we need to develop to deal with the new situation.
Now I have a feeling of achievement. The initial despair and distress gave way to self-control and fulfillment. I’m happy to have created my first blog, which was much easier than expected and to have posted on Nicenet, which gave me the chance to meet you guys. I'm impressed by your backgrounds and comments. It's going to be very enriching to discuss academic issues with such committed professionals from so many different parts of the world.
Margarita
Please allow me to make my first post a little personal and share with you some reflections about how I felt this first week. When the course was lunched, it seemed to be an overwhelming challenge for me. As mails from Oregon kept coming with many instructions to be followed, I feared the worst. I started to wonder how I was going to cope with all my responsibilities: my job as an Academic Coordinator, my classes at the university every day after work and this new course. To make things worse, I had a test on Oct.4, so I really needed to study hard over last weekend. By the way, I'm studying to become a Public Translator at the State University. It's a four-year career.
However, today, near the end of Week 1, it’s very rewarding for me to see that I could make it. How? I had to resort to several techniques such as acknowledging my feelings in first place, talking my concerns over with colleagues and superiors, prioritizing, breaking objectives into small, step by step achievable goals, doing relaxation exercises in the morning, managing my time even more efficiently, delegating more and asking for help whenever I needed to. In short, I could do it by applying a concept learned in a recent workshop I attended at the Alianza about “Adapting to Change”: the problem for us, human beings, is not the change itself, but the transition stage and the internal resources we need to develop to deal with the new situation.
Now I have a feeling of achievement. The initial despair and distress gave way to self-control and fulfillment. I’m happy to have created my first blog, which was much easier than expected and to have posted on Nicenet, which gave me the chance to meet you guys. I'm impressed by your backgrounds and comments. It's going to be very enriching to discuss academic issues with such committed professionals from so many different parts of the world.
Margarita
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