My Tech Journey

I’m a teacher on a journey.  On the one hand, I realize that one shouldn’t rely on technology too much. On the other hand, I can’t keep from using it more and more, almost like an addict. I’m neither a webhead nor a noob, but I’m thrilled by technology’s potential in our profession, and I don’t think I’m about to quit exploring what’s possible with what’s available, becoming available, and still at this moment, though not for long, unavailable. I’m figuring it all out, and I’m fascinated. It wasn’t always like this, though.

Six years ago, I was teaching at a private school where the most advanced technology I had available was the CD player we used to do coursebook listening activities.  Four years ago, while teaching my first in-company classes, I got the chance to use a laptop in classes, and we used that to do coursebook listening activities, watch BBC news and browse business company websites  — when we had an Internet connection. That’s it.  My knowledge and understanding of what I could do with tech in classes was very limited and very unimaginative.

Things went on like this for a while, but as I began to explore more a light began to go off in my head. About a year ago, that light became so bright I simply had to get my students involved and I over-excitedly plunged them into a technological world with a kind of hyper-zest. I introduced them to social media, web 2.0 tools, various applications, mobile learning solutions, numerous resources of numerous kinds and the wealth of materials available online. Following those early unimaginative days, I wanted desperately to make up for what I’d been missing and I simply had to take my students with me.  Don’t worry, though. That was last year.

I have now calmed down a bit, and will share with you the more measured ways I’ve used technology with my university students this term.

• We used a Vkontakte (the Russian equivalent of Facebook) group for announcements, course requirements, links, lesson materials, and interactive home tasks. This was our online learning hub.

• We used Google Docs.  Once a week my students watched a Youtube or TED video and copied the link into the spreadsheet I prepared. Each Monday we started the lesson with 2-minute timed summaries of the videos. We found some real Internet diamonds that way and have a nice record of them all.

• We kept a class blog on which we made short mobile phone recordings that we posted. Students drew posters, supplied these with recorded descriptions, and posted those as well. We also posted student work – with permission.

• We used Linoit once to recap a discussion, and I shared a list of web 2.0 tools to try when preparing a presentation. Some of my students used Prezi, Go Animate and Voicethread.

• During lessons, there wasn’t much chance we could use the Internet, so we explored the possibilities of mobile devices: taking pictures, playing podcasts, recording stories, using dictionaries, Googling things, and the like.

When I stop to think about how I’ve used technology, I realize that I went from not having it, to not using it imaginatively, to using it excessively, to now using it more judiciously. I hope that every time I encourage the use of this or that app or resource it is justified and appropriate. I hope it does not look like I force the use of tech as it is, in most cases, just one of the options available.

I know that what I’m doing is feeling my way through the abundance of possibilities, but I want to see what works and what fits into my teaching style and my learners’ learning styles. As I figure it out, I’ll be able to make better choices. By experimenting, I will find what’s best. It’s a journey, and the journey continues.

 

New Technologies and Traditional Values

Please view these slides before reading the article.

Computers will never fully replace teachers in the classroom, but teachers who know how to use computers and other forms of new technology will replace those who don’t.

I had frequently heard words to this effect said in university courses and the various seminars I attended, but I never quite believed it to be true. That was until I actually got centrally involved in education and got to experience for myself how quickly the profession is evolving. Now I do believe it to be true. Teachers who are unwilling to follow and adopt at least some of the novel practices made possible by advances in technology – the practices most suitable for their students at least – are going to be left far behind.

In the slides I’ve provided, I have tried to go beyond what is commonly said about EdTech by illustrating the ways I have employed it to encourage a traditional value: the reading of books in the foreign language. Yes, a technological innovation can and should be used to support a traditional value, such as the reading classical or modern English and American literature. Let me explain:

Why read books?

Because reading enables the learner to pay attention not only to each word individually, but also to the combination of words in a phrase and subsequently in a sentence. Learners do so at their own pace, which allows them to absorb new grammatical and lexical phenomena as well as consolidate the ones already seen. Through constant reading, not only do students practice the language, but they also sharpen their critical thinking skills.

Why teach reading by means of technology?

Because students, especially the younger ones, may not find reading English books to be the best pastime in the whole world! But what if this book is read on an electronic reader? Even better, it may be one of the new interactive kind of e-books which allow the reader to tap on the characters and listen to something or find out the meaning of an unknown word online. Then, book reading stops being a chore or dull homework and turns into an exciting game! An educational game, nonetheless.

How it all works.

The slides I’ve provided contain pictures and links to posts describing how the book reading experience can be enhanced by the use of social media and other Web 2.0 applications together with a mobile device — such as the iPad, in my case.

After choosing a suitable story or book for a particular reading stage and age group, teachers can urge students to:

Conduct online research before reading and try to predict what the story will be about

Exchange ideas through emails or blog/ wiki posts about which books to read next.

Post comments on the class blog while reading a story.

Narrate the story they have read on the class blog using as much of the new words as possible.

Participate in reading competitions (which could, for example, be organized together with their e-pals as we have done with our French friends and their resourceful teacher, Aniella Lebeau)

Record their voices when acting the story.

Collect links and thoughts in a wiki dedicated to that purpose.

Create projects which combine texts and images concerning the book (depiction and description of their favourite scene is one of my students’ top preferences).

Prepare activities on the story as if they were the teachers so as to test their classmates. These will be finally published on a wiki or Issuu, turning the document into a beautiful online magazine.

Fill in handouts describing cause and effect relationships, the course of the story and its climax, character qualities and so on which can and will be published on the class blog for further discussion

You can find most of the book activities I have implemented here.

I hope you will feel free to add your own ideas by leaving a comment. Use your imagination. Given your imagination combined with what’s possible with technology, there are no limits to how creative we can be in ELT.

 

Technology is anything that wasn’t around when you were born.

Alan Kay

I remember when video cassette players were the new tech toys in teaching. Schools wanted teachers to use videos in class in order to provide an edge in attracting students.  Teachers wanted to use videos because they were a new and exciting way to teach. The problem was, no one really knew how to use the things to do anything but watch passively. It took time for teachers to move beyond watching movies in class to using video as a tool to improve teaching practice.

Technology –in whatever form –is just one of many resources available to me as a teacher.  Since I only see my students for short time each week, I want to make the best use of that time.  A bit part of this is using my resources in the most effective way possible, whether I’m deciding to include a card game or an interactive website in a lesson. When I evaluate lesson resources, I always ask two questions: Is this appropriate for my students?  Does it improve on what I’m already doing in class?

Is it appropriate?

Sometimes it’s easy to tell if a something is appropriate for your students. You don’t give young learners unsupervised access to social networks, or you don’t ask students who haven’t learned the English alphabet to input large amounts of text. Tools can be appropriate or inappropriate because of the ages and skill levels of your students.

Sometimes, the decision about which tool is most appropriate depends more on which one makes the best use of your preparation time and your students’ class time. I’m a digital immigrant (who often feels more like a tourist than an immigrant) so every technology tool I consider has a learning curve. Before I can use something in class, I need to learn how to use it myself. I want to focus on tools that are simple to use, and rich enough that I can use them again and again. Generally, I want use tools to support the skills I’m trying to reinforce, rather than tools that become the focus of our lesson.

Finally, appropriate can refer to which tools are the best for a specific teaching context or group of learners. For example, I teach a few classes for senior citizens at a local community center. There’s no Internet available, and most of my students haven’t even applied for a tourist visa to the digital realm. However, they all have mobile phones, and most have electronic dictionaries. In this case, the tools they have available and are comfortable using are the most appropriate. Students can send English messages with their phones, we can compare English translations of Japanese words between different dictionaries (or compare pronunciation, or even check the built in encyclopedia). I can use my smart phone to find photos on Flickr to illustrate something we’re talking about, or do an online search to answer a question in class. I can bring in a digital recorder and my computer and we can use Power Point to create a narrated digital book. Or I can bring in a camcorder and we can record a video that I can upload from home. Rather than lamenting what I don’t have, it’s fun to figure out how to make the most of what is available.

Does it improve on what I’m already doing in class?

Pedagogy comes before tools. Teachers can and do have great lessons without technology. If my students are already speaking, and listening, and reading, and writing, and thinking, it makes sense to include a technology tool only if it will enhance what’s already going on. On the other hand, it would beequally silly to overlook any available resource that would help me do my job better. I’ve found that including even small amounts of technology can significantly improve my students’ learning experience.

Being able to create a digital comic strip as a final writing project makes the revision process complaint-free for my young teens. When my young learners see a camcorder, practice becomes rehearsal rather than repetition. Self-introductions become performance rather than speaking practice. Creating digital books makes writing fun for my emergent and reluctant writers. Putting book reports in blog posts gives students a real audience. Creating a collaborative alphabet book teaches my kindergarteners that English comes in many accents, and that children around the world are learning the same things.

In every case, adding a touch of technology improved on what I was already doing in class. And, because digital projects are online, they’re easy to share with parents, grandparents, and other teachers. If you’d like to see examples some of my students’ projects, please explore the workshop pages on the Teaching Village wiki [http://teachingvillage.net] or on our class blog, My Corner of the World. [http://mycorneroftheworld.edublogs.org]. If you’ve used a technology tool to enhance your lessons, please share your experience in comments. I’d love to learn how you’ve incorporated technology in your own lessons!

 

The Real Revolution

I teach in a classroom in 2012 that’s not all that different from the one my grandmother taught in almost 100 years ago.  She taught her lessons in a one-room schoolhouse equipped with slate boards, not quite enough chalk, and uncomfortable seating. The room I work in has chalkboards, not quite enough chalk, and uncomfortable seating. I do not have to fire up a wood stove in the morning the way she did, but my room is always either too hot or too cold.

My grandmother had a radio to sort of bring the world into the classroom. I have a TV monitor with a DVD player and a projector connected to a sound system. My grandmother told me that she only played the radio in class to provide atmosphere. I do the same thing with the songs I’ve stored on my Apple computer — only less effectively because at least the radio in my grandmother’s classroom provided an ever-changing mix of music punctuated by talk from somewhere far away. I have never played a DVD in class.  I do not have Internet access in my classroom — or if I do, it’s just too complicated to figure out how to connect to it. My grandmother did not need to think about such things.

In both of our rooms, almost 100 years apart, an amazing assortment of people with the usual assortment of issues, ideas, dreams, and goals have gathered to work their way into the future. There is nothing different really in the work she did then and the work I do now.  We are both teachers — which is to say the work she did and the work I do is a combination of dream weaving and storytelling mixed with community building and acts of pure magic.

My grandmother’s magic trick was to get the farm kids in her class to believe they could do anything. I do exactly the same thing with kids who are not that different. Her students in 1909 felt invisible and powerless. So do mine in 2012.  My grandmother did her trick with her heart alone. I use my heart as well, but I also have a few magical tools at my disposal to make it all seem dreamlike.

Though our classrooms and students are similar, my grandmother never got to teach a group of students who had the world in their pocket without even knowing it was there. Pearl Sandy, my grandmother, would love that and so in her honor, I help my students unpack and unleash that power.

Recently, we have been working on telling stories in my classroom, making use of the blackboards, some paper, a lot of ideas, and each other. One day, when the room got a little too hot, we headed outdoors and told our stories under a shady tree.

 

All of these activities so far are ones that I’m sure my grandmother did with her students. Here’s where things get very different. I gathered my students together and said “How many of you have a smart phone in your pocket?”  Eighteen out of twenty-four had one that could record video. Six out of eighteen had enough battery and memory left to record videos of their classmates telling stories.

We broke into six groups of four, with one filmmaker in each group. Then we videoed our stories and loaded them onto our private class Facebook page. Next week we’ll critique each other’s work before uploading our stories more publicly in a place where we can share widely and exchange stories with students around the world. That’s magic and it’s the real revolution.

The question is not should we or shouldn’t we use technology. That’s a silly question. The real question is: how can we use the magic available to us to give voice to everyone and get the world connected in real and wonderful ways.

The students in my grandmother’s class are now silent. My students never will be. My students are not isolated in a room in the middle of nowhere. Their voices carry and will be heard everywhere.

I know that Shiho won’t mind me sharing her story with you. It’s a dream. It’s coming true, and it’s getting better every day.

Grandma, this is for you:

How do you use technology in your classes? Click on any of the author thumbnails to see their post:

Barbara Sakamoto	Christina Markoulaki	Nour Alkhalidy
Tamas Lorincz	Anna Loseva	Chuck Sandy