Please excuse my Oncourse message to slide in before the deadline!! Here is the same info in the right place!!
Reflection on Egbert (2005)
As I read the Egbert (2005) article, I found myself nodding my head often in agreement and also actually saying, “Yes!” from my experiences as a language learner and a language teacher. I especially identified and agreed with the 8 points - actually from Egbert and Hanson-Smith (1999):
1.
Learners have opportunities to interact socially and negotiate meaning.
2. Learners interact in the target language and with an authentic audience.
3. Learners are involved in authentic tasks.
4. Learners are exposed to and encouraged to produce varied and creative language.
5. Learners have enough time and feedback.
6. Learners are guided to attend mindfully to the learning process.
7. Learners work in an atmosphere with an ideal stress/anxiety level.
8. Learner autonomy is supported.
First of all, I like that the subject of the above sentence is ‘learner’ – it’s not about what we teachers are doing, but it’s about the students. I absolutely agree with Egbert that student need to feel personally involved and invested in what they are doing and understand why they are doing it. I also especially liked the focus on authenticity and practicing in social situations.
Overall, the article helped to talk the broad concept of CALL, and make it more clear and tangible with actually examples. I better understand the scope and variety of what falls in the realm of CALL.
Reflection on Warschauer (2010) article
Warschauer walks us through the evolution of approaches to CALL from structural to cognitive to sociocognitive approaches in a clear and easy-to-follow way. A key component of the sociocultural approach is that the object of communication is other real, live language users via the computer but the computer is not simply the medium for grammar or other practice as it had been in the past. The applications of this today in the world of Skype, Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, and the internet in general seem limitless. Our students could probably teach us a thing or two!
Multimodality is a key point of network-based language teaching (NBLT), and this is good not only for language learning but also for keeping students interest and helping them become more autonomous learners – let’s teach them how to fish. This is one appeal of blogs because the students are writing and communicating in the target language with their peers instead of the teachers because they are required to. I think we all can understand how this catches the students’ interest more than teacher-student forced homework communication.
This article, like the Egbert article, helped to broaden my understanding of what CALL was, is, and can be. I definitely feel more motivated to try out different mediums with my students. One point to keep in mind is that different people have different communication styles. For example, I have some friends with absolutely no interest in Facebook at all. Some post on occasion, and others post every thought, food choice, TV choice, general ponderance, and random thoughts. Students also have different communications styles, so we need to keep this in mind and provide a variety of options for students demonstrate their language abilities.
I haven’t been able to properly access the Warschauer video, so my comments on that will be forthcoming.
I as well thought Warschauers explanation of the various kinds of technology that can be used in the classroom was very helpful. I have only used software that was provided by a textbook that I was using with the lesson along with powerpoints that I had made. I wasn't able to watch the video as I had trouble opening it but the reading definitly opened my eyes to different forms of technology that I had never considered using in a classroom. What I liked most though about the article was how it stressed that we need to take our students into account when we tailor our lesson plans. We must use technology in a way that best suits our student's needs. Overall, great introduction to CALL and in what lays ahead for everyone this semester.
ReplyDeleteI agree. I sometimes think teachers think that if the 'go to the computer lab', that that means they are using technology, but it really depends on how it's used and how the students are engaging. Indeed, we really need to think about the students' needs and interests to keep them going!
ReplyDeleteI'm sure many of our students could be considered the "content area expert" of technology in our classrooms. Our technology director is applying for grant funding to pilot an iPAD project for my ELL's, even my kindergarteners. At first, I thought that it wouldn't be very appropriate for my students in K-2. But the longer I thought about it, I thought of many appropriate applications that even these young students could use. Even my 4yr old son and my 6 yr old daughter are currently using technology in ways that took me a long time to learn.
ReplyDeleteDenise,William, and Nathan,
ReplyDeleteMe too, Egbert's article and Warschauers' presentation has made me more motivated to incorporate different medium into my instructional design while always ensuring my self that I use the media to facilitate earning. Denise, you're absolutely right that the meaning of using technology to support our class really depends on how well we design to use it.
Nathan, yes, I learn a lot abut computer-related technologies from my students. So, it would be challenging and interesting both for me and my students to design Wiki or Blog projects in our EFL reading or writing classes. I like the idea of using Blog, Wiki, and Twitter explained by Warschauers. I think you're lucky to have technology director in your school. Wow, Korean kidergarteners learning English with iPAD! Would like to read more about this :)
Retno
let’s teach them how to fish.
ReplyDeleteThis really sums it up for me. Teaching students how to become more autonomous makes sense and puts students at the center of the discussion. When this happens I think students have the ability to be more productive and engaged in their own pursuits leaving room for the teacher to act as a facilitator. Do you have any suggestions for doing this in larger university classes?
Nathan -
I have heard of schools buying up large number of ipads for classes as well. I also wondered about the appropriateness of it, but like you suggested, maybe just learning how to use the devices will be beneficial for the students. Hopefully the prices will drop a lot and more students will get a chance to use a tablet device for school work.
The comments about the iPads being bought in quantity made me think of several years ago when my school spent a ton of money buying tablet computers. As far as I know, very little has been done with them. For me that is a wake-up call, urging us to remember that we have to be sure that we follow through with these wonderful tools that we have available. It seems like sometimes our administrators believe that just buying the stuff is enough and forget that it will take training and support to make the investment worthwhile.
ReplyDeleteOver the weekend, I participated a workshop for using technology in English teaching and a conference for primary English teaching. A presentation at the conference talked about using/developing apps for iphone. I agree that there still are people who believe that having hardware ready is the ultimate goals of CALL, ignoring the important roles of software.
ReplyDelete