Blended learnig

Students who have grown up using interactive technology always feel that teachers’ methodology is not good enough. Nowadays students expect a more suitable experience that would motivate them. The incorporation of communication technologies in the classroom may change the learning process completely.

Blended learning means to rethink and to redisign thoroughly the educational environment and learning experience. According to Garrison, R. and Vaughan, N. (2008), “blended learning is a coherent design approach that openly assesses and integrates the strengths of face-to-face and online learning to address worthwhile educational goals.”[i]

In other words, it embodies a totally new approach mixing classroom and online activities according with the aims of specific courses or programs. In a blended-learning classroom, for instance, learners might come to regular lessons taught by a teacher in a traditional classroom, and at the same time they complete independently online tasks and excercises outside the classroom.

Also called hybrid learning and mixed-mode learning, blended learning takes into account a variety of options revisiting the way in which students learn deeply and meaningfully. This can be done if the teachers consider the important things and bear in mind the time that learners should spend inside the classroom.

Nowadays this new method became more popular and it is used in many schools and programs. Although many teachers are afraid of new tachnology and the implementation of these new developments in the classroom, it would be profitable to incorporate this approach and be able to make a balance between face-to-face and online learning since it may allow teachers to enhance and extend learning and offer designs to manage large classes.

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[i] Garrison, R. and Vaughan, N. (2008). Blended Learning in High Education. Framework, Principles, and Guidelines. Jossey-Bass.

Going Mobile

Nicky Hockly has been involved in EFL teaching and teacher training since 1987. She is Director of Pedagogy of The Consultants-E, an online teacher training and development consultancy. She is co-author of How to Teach English with Technology, Learning English as a Foreign Language for Dummies and Teaching Online. She is currently working on a new book on Digital Literacies, and also on an e-book –Webinars.

Some weeks ago we had the opportunity to participate in the seminar “Going Mobile” where Nicky gave a talk about the use of a range of handheld devices across a range of contexts, and both inside and outside the classroom. There, she emphasized that mobile learning is learning that takes place via portable, often WiFi enabled, handheld devices. This includes things like smartphones, e-readers, small laptop computers, among others.

 Photo: Julieta Grassino Oliva

On her work Mobile Learning: what is it and why should you care?, she emphasizes that using mobile flashcards for vocabulary, watching video podcasts or listening to audio podcasts, using dictionaries on phones,etc are all mobile language learning activities that many learners already do. She also asserts that it’s up to teachers to let their students know about the mobile options and apps which are increasingly available to them, many of them for free, and which they can download and use for their own out-of-class learning.

According to our point of view, we should take advantage of the use of technology in the classroom (instead of avoiding its use). Nicky showed us a very interesting example of using the mobile phone in a grammar lesson: In pairs, students must look for images in their cell phones that contains:

_A pet.

_A very close friend.

_A celebration.

_An amazing view… etc.

They must then take it in turns to show their classmate the photographs and the other one will ask some questions related to it.

Why do we think that the activity is very interesting? Because we’re almost sure that students will have a photograph of each topic, and they will be exited of showing that photographs and talk about them. What is more, students will have the opportunity of using grammar in a very entertaining way.

After doing the activity, students must keep the cell phones in their bags. The objective of doing this, is to concentrate in what’s going on in the classroom and not to be distracted. (We can value a lot the idea that Nicky gave to us because maybe we wouldn’t realize that the cell phones can be a distraction once the exercise is over).

Another exercise that Nicky talked about is to take ‘selfies’ with the cell phones at a certain hour, about three times in a day. Then, students will talk about what they have done at that specific time. In this exercise, students can talk about routines in a very dynamic way.

All in all, despite the fact that the seminar was not very long, we collected examples of exercises we could use with our students employing their mobile devices and obviously, we can create our own exercises having in mind those examples.

It was a great opportunity and we enjoyed it a lot.

Thank you Nicky!

Web 2.0

According to the University ofMelbourne (2008), “Web 2.0 is the term used to describe a variety of web sites and applications that allow anyone to create and share online information or material they have created”.[1] There are different types of web 2.0 applications including wikis, blogs, social networking, folksonomies, podcasting & content hosting services such as Wikipedia, YouTube, Facebook, MySpace, Flickr. Since students become more entrenched in technology, teachers need these tools to create virtual extensions of their classrooms, promote new avenues of communication and “offer learners a more participatory experience of learning in which individuals have increased opportunities to interact with more learners and with more learning resources.”[2]

Build your wild self

After trying some resources we found two interesting webpages you can use to teach English. If you are teaching the parts of the body for example, this web site is a good resource to make it funnier and easy going. There you can create your own monster including parts of the body of humans and animals. It would be profitable if you ask your students to describe the monster they have created.

Make beliefs comix

But if you are teaching routines for example, this web page is great since it allows your students to make comics and share them or even print them. The comic would go together with a script explaining what the characters usually do on a common day. It works as an illustration and it can be shared using a projector and the student reading aloud the script.

In short, since students are active on the Internet, teachers need to open their minds and try to include web 2.0 resources in their teaching for many reasons. For instance, to make learning relevant, to provide them with opportunities to develop communication skills that are appropriate and authentic, to expand the classroom, to foster creativeness among others.

Giuli and Virgi :)

Comment: while we were looking for information about web 2.0 we realized that we are using many of those resources all the time. But there are also thousands of other resources we are not acquainted with or we don't even know that they exist and that they could be really helpful when designing materials for teaching and learning. Now we can profit from them and keep on searching new ways of improving our lessons with technology.

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[1] Wikis, Blogs & Web 2.0 technology, V.1-21/05/08

www.unimelb.edu.au/copyright 03 8344 6647

[2] Technology Enhanced Learning. Education 2.0? Designing the web forteaching and learning. (2007). Page 10.

Let's get to work!

Considering what we mentioned in our previous post, we want to share our experience about the designing of materials for teaching. We had to create a didactic sequence in which by the use of a Power Point presentation and any other technological resource we can teach the “love/hate/like+ing” construction in relation with free time activities. We thought of a presentation showing a trip to Mendoza, Argentina together with a script describing every activity we like/love/hate doing there in our spare time. In order to demonstrate how far every destination was from our point of departure, we used the Google Earth program. As a final task, students had to make a similar presentation (they could choose their destination).

Following the TPACK model, we needed to know the content very well. We tried to represent it in an innovative way using information technology and adapting the materials to the students’ prior knowledge (we assumed they already knew how to use Power Point and in this case Google Earth; if they didn’t, we would have shown them how to deal with those devices). We think we could adapt the contents to the technological devices we had. So far, we consider we included a representation of concepts using technology, pedagogical techniques using technology, knowledge of the content and the use of technological devices to facilitate the learning process, and we took into account students’ prior knowledge about content and technology.

As regards the SAMR model, we have substituted the use of pictures alone in a PP presentation with short videos taken from Google Earth showing the places we will visit. Students should have to use Microsoft Word instead of paper and pencil to write their scripts and will have to make use of any technological device or resource to present their trip to the class instead of a poster.

Why using technology? Well, we think that this kind of presentation would lose the purpose of showing exactly the distance between the destinations and the possibility of perceiving the places from a 3D perspective. Using Google Earth we are providing students with authentic and up-to-date images from different places of the world. It is true that instead of using that program we could have used only the images taken from the Internet or books, but in that case it would have been just another common PP presentation with no modification in the use of technologies and consequently no transformation in the learning process.

To sum up, students have to use technology to create a task based on a previous model.

The experience was a challenge for us considering that we are not used to this kind of activities including technology. It was really hard work since we were four peolple trying to understand how to use those digital devices. It took long hours to finish our presentation but we finally could manage the programs. Now that it is done, we think it was really interesting because we are learning something that we'll profit from when teaching and it's not that hard as it seems. Try it out!

Virgi and Giuli :D

TPACK and SAMR

Since the use of technology has become a major issue in everyday lessons, we consider really important to mention two significant models all teachers should take into account when designing their units including technology.

One of these is TPACK (Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge). In this model there are three main components of teachers’ knowledge: content, pedagogy, and technology. According to Koehler, M. J., & Mishra, P. (2009), "equally important to the model are the interactions between and among these bodies of knowledge." They assert that:

Content knowledge (CK) is teachers’ knowledge about the subject matter to be learned or taught.

Pedagogical knowledge (PK) is teachers’ deep knowledge about the processes and practices or methods of teaching and learning.

Pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) is when the teacher interprets the subject matter, finds multiple ways to represent it, and adapts and tailors the instructional materials to alternative conceptions and students’ prior knowledge.

Technology knowledge (TK) enables a person to accomplish a variety of different tasks using information technology and to develop different ways of accomplishing a given task.

Technological content knowledge (TCK) is an understanding of the manner in which technology and content influence and constrains one another.

Technological pedagogical knowledge (TPK) is an understanding of how teaching and learning can change when particular technologies are used in particular ways.

"Then, TPACK is the basis of effective teaching with technology, requiring an understanding of the representation of concepts using technologies; pedagogical techniques that use technologies in constructive ways to teach content; knowledge of what makes concepts difficult or easy to learn and how technology can help redress some of the problems that students face; knowledge of students’ prior knowledge and theories of epistemology; and knowledge of how technologies can be used to build on existing knowledge to develop new epistemologies or strengthen old ones." (Koehler, M. J., & Mishra, P, 2009).

The second model, but not less important is SAMR (Substitution, Argumentation, Modification, and Redefinition). A team of teachers from Canada, in their blog Educational Technology and Mobile Learning, states that it is a framework through which you can assess and evaluate the technology you use in your class. In a substitution level, teachers or students are only using new technology tools to replace old ones. Though augmentation is a different level, we are still in the substitution mentality but this time with added functionalities. At the modification level technology is being used more effectively not to do the same task using different tools but to redesign new parts of the task and transform students learning. Redefinition means that students use technology to create imperceptibly new tasks.

The first time we heard about these models, we though they would be impossible to accomplish. It is really hard work, but they are not impracticable. Designing a lesson including technology and taking into account these guides is time consuming but worth it. You need clear objectives and purposes, plan everything according to the students' needs and take into account every detail as regards technology in the classroom and the various ways in which you can profit from it. They are extremely useful and will improve the teaching and learning process for sure!

We hope it helps!!!

Virgi and Giuli

Sources:

Koehler, M. J., & Mishra, P. (2009). What is technological pedagogical content knowledge? Contemporary Issues in Technology and Teacher Education, 9(1), 60-70.

http://www.educatorstechnology.com/2013/06/samr-model-explained-for-teachers.html

Reviewing Websites

Hi there! We´ve been working on the analysis of two websites (Pearson ELT and MES English), as regards their potential usefulness in the classroom and as resources for material design. 

Since nowadays there are too many webpages where you can find help or information in connection with teaching and learning English, we think it is really important to evaluate their reliability and validity before using them. Why? Because any content you provide to your students have to be appropriate, up-to-date, clear, without mistakes, accurate and relevant. 

If you are going to use any website in the classroom, make sure that the content is well-written, with an appropriate format and legible font. The links provided in the page should be accessible and the information should be clearly presented. Advertisements also play a role here: they sometimes interfere and affect the aesthetic part.

So every time you want to make use of an internet resource, have a careful look at it; its purpose, its author, if there is a bias reflected, among others.  

In this link you will find more information as regards what to take into account when you have to analize a website in terms of their potential usefulness in the classroom.

These are the two webpages we have analized (you will also find the links).

Pearson ELT

MES English

Giuliana and Virginia :)

Digital Natives and Digital Immigrants

"We are students, but also future teachers"

When we start to reflect upon our role at school today, we think that we are in a special period in which teachers know less about technology than their students. Some time before, teachers didn't have to worry about those things because they didn't even exist. Later on some computers started to appear, but students only used them to do practical works on "Word". But what happens today? There are not only new devices and programs, but also a lot of new applications and "Digital Immigrants" feel that they will never be up-to-date.

Who are the "Digital Immigrants"?

According to Marc Prensky (2001), "Digital Immigrants learn to adapt to their environment, they always retain, to some degree, their "accent", that is, their foot in the past. That's way they need to print out a document written on the computer in order to edit it (rather than just editing on the screen) or bringing people physically into your office to see an interenting web site (rather than just sending them the URL)."

            On the other hand, we have "Digital Natives":

• They are used to receiving information really fast.

• They like to parallel process and multi-task.

• They prefer their graphics before their text rather than the opposite.

• They prefer random access (like hypertext).

• They function best when networked.

• They thrive on instant gratification and frequent rewards.

• They prefer games to "serious" work.

So, we can say that we need to be prepared to teach to this new generation because we cannot consider ourselves "Digital Natives" as they are.

Are we "Digital Immigrants or Digital Natives"?

In fact, we think that we are in the middle, because we share some characteristics of both. For example, if we compare ourselves with our parents, we realize that we use the technology devices much better than they do (even we have to teach them how to use them). We sometimes read books on the computer, and know how to use a lot of programms and devices; like telephones and tablets. But if we compare ourselves with "Digital Natives", we realize that they know a lot of things as regard technology that we don't.

So, as future teachers we have to carry on working with technology, take advantage of all programs and devices we are used to using, and also let the new generations teach us some things. 

To take into account:

We as future teachers consider that the age of the person is not the only condition to take into account when we talk about a "Digital Native" or a "Digital Immigrant".

We should bear in mind and recognize that there are lots of students who don't have a computer or another technological device, or maybe they don't have internet access. In fact, there are lots of children who don't even have electricity in their houses. 

Source: Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants by Marc Prensky. From On the Horizon (MCB University Press, Vol. 9 No. 5, October 2001)