MY REFLECTIONS ON WEEK 7

Hello Robert and Other Participants,

This week, we have gone through “Learner Autonomy” and “One-Computer Classroom”.

After reading the documents provided, and from my own experience as an in-service teacher, I will argue that learner autonomy is very important – even indispensable in a learning process. And this learner autonomy can be promoted through active practice on the part of the learner, and by the means of activities such as pair work and group work. These kinds of activities will enable students to acquire more confidence and knowledge through self and peer assessments.

In this same week, we were taught what Wallwisher is, and how to create a wall for instance.

Another aspect of what I did in Week 7 is that, on Thursday February 21, I resumed the implementation of my technology change after the four-day holiday that was granted to students. In my Grade 10 class, I did a lesson on “Making Suggestions”. At the end of the lesson in class, I gave students a follow-up activity related to “Making suggestions”. It had to be performed out of the class, on Nicenet, in its “Conferencing” section.

Since it was the very first time my students would perform such an activity with the Web, I decided to conduct a survey, after the students had finished doing the activity. The survey was about the use of the Web, and especially Nicenet. The “rubric” for the survey had three (3) “dimensions”, namely “Satisfied”, “Not Satisfied” and “No Opinion”. In the end, 68% of the students were satisfied, 7% were not satisfied, and 25% had no opinion.

To put it in a nutshell, the vast majority of the students were satisfied with the technology change that was brought in. Even some of the students came to me, and asked for the day the next activity would take place. I noticed a certain satisfaction on their part, and a challenge they were willing to take up in order to become computer literate for using Web materials.

Best regards,

Dagnogo

MY REFLECTIONS ON WEEK 6

Hello everyone,

Well, Week 6 was as rich as the other weeks we have already experienced. And this in terms of learning.

This week, I was really interested in one of the main subject matters, namely teaching in large classes. I was interested, especially as I have been teaching large classes since I entered the teaching profession. I had my own techniques to deal with some of the problems encountered in large classes, but with the reading I was recommended about large classes, I ‘m now aware of some new and interesting techniques I’ll certainly implement to make my activities more interactive. This change will bring learners to be more interested, moving from the status of passive students to that of active ones. Relating to the problem of “shortage of time” during lessons, I think that things like discussion boards, Emails, blogs, etc. are appropriate solutions as far as a good time management is concerned.

This week, we were asked to start the implementation of the technology change as solution to the specific problem we’ve pointed out earlier in Week 4.

Thus, to start the implementation of the technology change in my Grade 10 class, I found it important to talk about what the change will consist in doing and my expectations. Since the vast majority of the students (90%) are not computer literate, I had to give them a theoretical and a bit practical course related to the use of a computer. For that, I had to bring in my class a desktop and my laptop. The objective was to show them the different parts of a computer with their corresponding uses. To make sure that the message would go through, I decided to give all the explanations in French - our official language - so that everything would be clear in their minds, and that they could be able to ask me some questions. Then, I connected my laptop to the Internet to show them what a “Nicenet” page looks like. After creating a class on Nicenet, I gave them the URL of the website, the class key and asked all the students to join the class, after I had given them some explanations about the different stages to join the class. It is useful to recall that my technology change is about how to deal with the problem of time constraints during a lesson (time management). To ensure that things move ahead quickly, I gave the students a deadline to join the class.

As observations, I noticed that some of the students were a bit “scared” about the idea of using a computer without assistance. Others were very excited because they were looking forward to discovering new things thanks to the use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs). It’s at that time that the students were granted a four-day holiday on the basis of the schedule of the Ministry of National Education. So I have to wait for next Tuesday to keep on doing the implementation of my technology change.

Best regards,

Dagnogo

MY REFLECTIONS ON WEEK 5

MY REFLECTIONS ON WEEK 5

Hello everyone,

This week, we have tackled some other aspects of our training, that is to say Alternative Assessment and Rubrics, Project-Based Learning (PBL) and WebQuest.

To start, I would like to say that I came to understand that Alternative Assessment uses activities that reveal what students can do with language, especially the students’ strengths instead of their weaknesses. It is based on authentic tasks that demonstrate learners’ abilities to accomplish communication goals.

Another aspect I found very interesting is the Project-Based Learning (PBL) in the sense that PBL enables students to work together, to create a sense of belonging to a community. And this leads to motivation among students. Susan Gaer thinks that projects must be geared to students and students must see value in projects. I completely agree with her because students are more motivated when they see that what they are doing represents a valuable thing for them personally or for their community. PBLs proved to be integrative tasks because, in such a task, all the four skills of language learning are implemented.

The week was also enriched with the introduction to rubrics. I appreciated that introduction because when I was a school boy, I was wondering the criteria on which I was assessed. Rubrics give me today the opportunity to alleviate the anxiety of learners at this point. In fact, I had been more or less scared since the day of an assessment in class till the day I had my paper back in my hands. For the younger generations, rubrics allow them to be aware of the criteria which guide the assessment of students, which can permit learners to have a certain idea of their final marks. If he/she has a bad mark in a given task, the existence of rubrics can be a source of motivation in the performance of that particular task so that he/she can catch up.

The final point I would like to mention for this week is related to WebQuests. Frankly speaking, I found the creation of a WebQuest very challenging, but I understood later that it can be a useful tool in language learning. However, I would argue that the use of WebQuests can be a little bit difficult in schools and learning centers where access to the Internet is difficult or if the learners are not very much accustomed to computers. I’m looking forward to entering Week 6.

Best regards,

Dagnogo

                                                                                   

SUMMARY OF MY REFLECTIONS ON WEEK 4

 Hi dear Instructor and other participants,

  

 Week 3 is gone. Long live Week 4! This week was a very fruitful week in the image of the other weeks we’ve already gone through. This week, I read the articles “Using the Internet in ESL Writing instruction” by Jarek Krajka and “Three Extensive Reading Activities for ESL/EFL Students Using E-books” by Mei-Ya Liang.  According to Mei-Ya Liang, the objectives of this lesson is to guide students to read authentic e-texts once they leave the classroom, and to enhance their reading, writing and thinking skills. Jarek thinks that three different elements are indispensable in teaching writing, namely web pages, e-mail connection and creating websites. I have to say that both articles added something to my knowledge. This week was also very rich in links and websites as far as reading, writing and Grammar are concerned.

   For Week 4, the last but not the least was the “Tips and Advice from the Webskills Team: Writing a Technology Enhanced Lesson Plan”. I found in the tips a valuable support for dealing with the task that was related to how to write a technology lesson plan.

   Despite this interesting aspect, I found the task related to how to write a technology enhanced lesson plan the most challenging thing this week. Firstly, because this is the very first time I have prepared a lesson plan with the introduction of technology in the task. And secondly, I was a bit confused because in the tips to write such a plan, it is clearly stated that the objectives of the lesson should drive the technology to be introduced and not the contrary. It was quite challenging, but I hope I tried my best.

I’m looking forward to starting Week 5.

Thank you

Dagnogo