WEEK 7: learner autonomy

          This week I have read an article by Thanasoulas Dimitrios and another one by David Little. Learner autonomy is the main point of their articles. I agree with both authors on one point: autonomy is highly desirable for learners if we want them to be able to use the language independently of teachers and outside the classroom, through life. However, I personally find it difficult to attain for many reasons: here in Africa, culture has always made the master the number one provider of instruction in the process of education. As a result, in most educational institutions, education is carried out vertically with the teacher above, feeding learners underneath. Secondly, curriculums themselves are so designed that they betray this vertical orientation of education. Finally, learners themselves are not prepared for taking charge of their own learning. I notice that every time I ask my learners to write some comments about what they have learned or even what they want to learn and how they want to learn it, they are shocked. Some even confess that they think that this activity is a trap while others view it as a weakness or incompetence of the teacher. The same occurs when I ask learners to form groups in order to work on projects: they want me to help them choose their group partners and even share job or responsibilities within the group. In front of such a situation I agree with David little that “autonomy is not an inborn ability but it can be brought in the learners by making them more responsible”. I think that what I can do to instill more autonomy within my learners is to start talking them into the benefits of autonomy for themselves. Then, as often as possible, I will have them do activities which cultivate autonomy.

          The article “Strategies and applications for the one computer classroom” suggest interesting activities for reinforcing learners’ autonomy with just the teacher’s computer. I am very much interested in group activities because I think that they are suited for large classrooms. With my 1st year students in business management we are currently dealing with the advantages and weaknesses of globalization. As a project I will ask them to write an argumentative article about business and human rights for the website of Amnesty international (www.amnesty.org). This activity will encourage their autonomy because it provides an opportunity of using the language for an authentic purpose (writing an article which will be published for real on a website for potential readers to see). Secondly, my learners will have to go online (using the teacher computer in turn) to retrieve alone the information which they find appropriate for their task. Then, they will have to interact and collaborate within their groups, negotiate meaning, distribute their time and set their own objectives. They will also evaluate their own performance in completing the project. Finally they will have to post the article alone on the website at the end of the project. I will just provide assistance for using the computer, I will organize group rotations for using the computer, and I will allow them to consult me if they face some difficulties. In this way they will become responsible for their own learning.

Week 6 and its engaging assignments

        Engaging students has always been a topic dear to me. It is even one of the main reasons why I registered with this course. I have made very clear from the beginning of this course that my students get easily bored with memorizing vocabulary and learning structures. It is true that our masters at the Teachers Training College taught us ways for engaging students: they taught us that we should avoid “one man shows” (this is how we ironically call teacher centered lessons); that we should vary stimuli; that we should challenge students with summary questions through the course; encourage debates among students; alternate be between the course and worksheet for activities.

        However, reading the articles submitted to us this week allowed me to learn that we can also engage students through technology. I was skeptical at the outset because I found that some of the many suggestions in the articles were just not implementable in my teaching environment because of the lack of time and resources. Interactive PowerPoints for instance require long hours of preparation, though they have a very engaging potential. Besides, slide projectors are not available in my school for using PowerPoints in my large classes. Even in the event of my contriving to purchase my own projector, I can’t rely on electricity supply in every classroom. However, I have just seen on the internet that some smartphones are now fitted with built-in projectors. I am very eager to explore this solution because, after reading the article Bestpractices in presenting with PowerPoint and Howto create an interactive quiz using PowerPoint Masters I have understood that I should no longer overlook PowerPoint If I want to increase students’ engagement in my different classes.

        I learned how to design PowerPoints two years ago through tutorials on line. Unfortunately I have never had the opportunity to use my presentations in class because of my particular teaching situation. Creating myinteractive PowerPoint game this week gave me the opportunity to rediscover my lost reflexes.

screen shot of my interactive powerpoint game.

Today, many websites offer free downloadable PowerPoints for teachers. My favourite is ESLprintables.com : It offers powerpoints about almost any topic. You can search by level, age or content. What I like with ESLprintable is that it is a contribution based site: you need to contribute your own PowerPoints if you want to download others’. If your contributions are not liked, you won’t have points for downloading other teachers’ presentations. As a result, ESLprintables is constantly supplied with quality and original presentations. Besides, new comers are offered tutorialsfor creating attractive presentations. A teacher who has basic skills at creating PowerPoints but who is tight on time can find ideas and inspiration on this site for creating presentations adapted to his own needs.

WEEK 5: HALF THE BATTLE IS WON !

      It is now five weeks since we have started this course on Webskills. I can already say that half the battle is won judging by all that we have learned so far.

      This week I have been acquainted with Alternative Assessment Methods for evaluating my students. I have even created my first rubric for assessing my 2^nd year administrative assistants. I will implement it next week when I ask them to prepare a role-play which they will have to perform in front of their classmates. This is the project they will have to prepare through the study of the text “answering a telephone call”. I have learned that such projects are appropriate for students learning English in vocational schools. They lead students to work on realistic tasks that they will have to perform in professional situations. Hence it is important to allow learners to prepare Project Based Learning activities in the long run. As for the teacher, he should behave like a facilitator, not a master during students’ projects preparation.

      I have also written a reflection about the issues I raised last week concerning my school. Last week, I laid an emphasis on the lack of documents and materials in my school, which makes teaching and learning very difficult task, both for teachers and learners. This week I have made some suggestions on how I intend to use technology to overcome the difficulties my students and I face in the CBCG. I explained that I am going to use the web for finding cheap and quality documents and materials, which will  raise students interest for my English lessons.

WEEK 4: Let's C A L L it a week !

      This week, I have read Larry J Mikulecky's « Using Internet-based Children’s Literature to teach EFL”. Like many classmates, I go along with the writer that there are many profits to be derived from child books. They facilitate comprehension because of their low level and illustrations. They also ease anxiety in the classroom as they give learners a sense of mastery (learners are proud they can read a whole book in English). However I have also read anarticle by Ciaran McCloskey which warns teachers that “children books may appear dull and trite to some adults”. Therefore, the books chosen by teachers should use a language which is slightly above the level of the learners. They must also address mature themes or convey universal messages in order to raise the interest of the learners. For this same reason the teacher must also take into account the cultural context of the book. This exercise of assessing the level and interest of the book may be more difficult for teachers than it seems. One site which could alleviate the task of teachers is “Database of Award-Winning Children’s Literature”  (DAWCL ). I found this site through Delicious.com by searching the tag “children’s_literature”. Thank you Delicious for coming to my rescue again.

      As its name suggests, “Database of Award-winning children’s literature” has over 10 000 titles from 112 awards across 6 English speaking countries in its database. Though it does not give a direct access to these books, the purpose of the site is to help users create reading lists of QUALITY children's literature TAILORED to the needs of the readers. Therefore it offers up to 15 search parameters for users to fine-tune search until they achieve the best search results. You can even go as far as to narrow the search to the sex of the protagonists in the book, to their ethnicity or nationality, to particular keywords or phrases in the book.

screen shot of the search parameters of DAWCL.

       Here is how I personally used this formidable site this week for my 1^st year accountancy students: Right now, I have reached the chapter about MONEY AND BARTER in the syllabus of 1^st year finance and accounting students. Unfortunately many of my students have difficulties understanding the concept of barter. So I decided to look for an award winning child book which level would not be too high for first year students but where the keyword “barter” would be correctly illustrated for them to read at home before the course. I searched with the parameters of DAWCL and it returned a list of 5 child books topped by “A New Coat for Anna” By Ziefert Harriet. It is the story of  Anna, a girl who needs a new coat, but it is after the war and there is no money. Through bartering and patience, Anna and her mother get the girl a new coat, then celebrate Christmas with all the people that helped.

      Since the site does not offer a printable version of the book, I used the search tips suggested by Deborah Healey in her excellent “Better Web Searching” submitted to us by Sean last week. Here is what I found:

v  Aprintable version of "A New Coat For Anna";

v  A video version of "ANew Coat for Anna";
v  A study guide for "A New Coat for Anna"

      Thus, I have been able to gather all the materials I will need for my next week’s lesson. I feel confident now because I have started using technology for enhancing my teaching. Here is the link to the technology enhanced lesson plan I have writen for this book: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BzeZhQo9cPgDallwaEc5SXI5QVU/edit?usp=sharing