Lifelong learning

If I have ventured wrongly, very well, life corrects me with a penalty. But if I haven't ventured at all, who can help me then? Kierkegaard
— Philosophy Muse (@philosophy_muse) May 14, 2014

My classroom days of language teaching in secondary schools date back to the days before league tables and SAT targets, back to the 1980's. My objective as a language teacher, whether my students were high flying enthusiasts or reluctant "I 'ate French" types, was to find whatever ignited their interest and engage them in the sort of activities that allowed them to experience the power of using the language of another culture. For some that meant song, others written word, drama, cookery. In one year 8 class where I was teaching modal verbs the students had to decide what I could or couldn't do - amazing how quickly you can find infinitives with that incentive :) We used GRASS databases to report and record lost property and used the CD-ROM package Granville to visit France for an hour or so in our rural Warwickshire IT suite. All a long time before the internet was available almost everywhere.

Without the pressure of producing a fixed number of A-C grades, I would reflect daily, weekly, annually on the nature of the progress of my 1,000 or so students (several of whom remain in touch to this day). I learned from my mistakes, their mistakes and their triumphs as all teachers can. I saw that those who were motivated only by the grade could nonetheless be won over to the intrinsic reward of self improvement by finding their own connection to the language. Not all of them became French enthusiasts of course, but many became more open to foreign culture and more still had a better understanding of their own language and identity. That, I have always considered to be my role : to light the blue touchpaper of their interest, even if the urge to take off only happens years later. 

In my current blended learning context, it is clear to me that the same varied diet, the same crafted combination of experiences informed by student interest and enquiry can ignite engagement and passion. Our Institution Wide Language Programme welcomes students from all disciplines and they are undertaking language learning for many and varied reasons - they may be motivated by the need to amass credit, the desire to build on school language learning, the awareness of language as a useful skill in a competitive jobs market... Our VLE facilitates the provision of resources giving instant feedback such as quizzes and online games, consolidation and extension can be provided through video, slides and more. I can to some extent use the reporting to see how these are used by individuals and use that to inform my planning for our face to face sessions. Using these tools I can reach further beyond the classroom walls, connect my students with native speakers of the language they are learning and they can access these opportunities from their room or even on the bus! 

It is my role and my responsibility to offer a range of "ways in" to my students. I ensure they have a chance to find the experiences that will move them from a focus on grade or badge in the short term to a deeper approach through fostering autonomy and control of their learning. Ultimately how they respond and connect will be their decision, conscious or otherwise. It will be influenced by all sorts of factors, some of which are beyond my control. I can provide the conditions for learning and encourage intrinsically motivated exploration of my subject area, ultimately the learning is up to the learner. 

In my online courses I try to close the psychological distance between us through a series of activities which provide immediate feedback and encouragement. After all, they are my guests in the online space, I need to acknowledge their presence and make them feel at home. I found Gilly Salmon's 5 stage model is a very useful tool for designing effective online communities:

5 stage model of online development. Gilly Salmon, 2001.

As a co-learner working alongside my students with access to a wide range of real language use, I must ensure that they venture in, gradually moving beyond their comfort zone if they are to experience the many opportunities for learning that await them. 




 

Reflecting on my practice

So here I am again, my head stuck in the waters of my practice whilst at the same time having an out of body experience trying to better understand what I do and why. I found this week's webinar really helpful even though it overlapped with another important one for me (on eportfolio practice). This meant participating live for the first 30 mins then reviewing the rest of the session from the archive. A little disjointed but it is great to be able to return to the recording.

#ocTEL is just one of several online communities (or are they really collectives as defined by Thomas and Seely Brown in A new culture of learning: Cultivating the Imagination for a World of Constant Change, 2011) and I discover and experience a great richness of discussion and debate around education and learning in online communities through these. So compelling sometimes that it is really difficult to stop and look around above the water level! This week I have been struck by the similarities in the 4 way diagram shared by Sally Chapelle (and others) as they reflect upon their teaching and course design and the one provided by Ernesto Macaro in 2003 representing the polarisation of theories of language acquisition, crucial to my M.A. a few year's ago:

The horizontal axis represents the polarisation between theories of language input. Implicit input arises from natural exposure and sub-conscious processing, explicit from teaching and conscious processing. The vertical axis represents the concept of how language input is processed. Nativist implies that language learning is an innate skill, interactionist that language is a specialised form of knowledge that is acquired through interaction with the environment. This goes to the very heart of what it means to be a language teacher. Thinking through all these quandrants and realising that learning can and does happen best when we have the opportunity to activate all the areas - the informal learning that happens through social interaction as well as the formal directed space, the autonomous self directed activities we do alone or with others - only then do we optimise our learning potential. This has huge implications for the role of the tutor and in my own practice I have been working to support language tutors in considering their place in the learning of their students, facilitating the adoption of technologies for interaction to help redress the balance in favour of the social and the interactionist, the self directed and the personal . 

In #ocTEL it was good to come across other language teachers with similar concerns such as @dustinaced in the language teachers group  and we have produced a couple of shared docs together, a work one shared in my last post and this #eurovision themed one for fun-It remains open, hispanists welcome :)

My reflections lead me to remind myself of the importance of play in learning. We're born to learn, we can potentially learn desirable and undesirable things from the world around us. One of my other communities (or collectives) twitter, reminded me of this today and I shared the source (RSA):

analogy from theatre applies well to education 14 mins http://t.co/TKWzyZY9AH all that counts are the actors
— Teresa MacKinnon (@WarwickLanguage) May 11, 2014

We are all actors in our learning and the learning of others. Taking everything else away (yes, including the technology) what matters are the relationships we build together and the nature of the interactions we have. This I believe needs to be central in our learning design, we need to connect and collaborate with our students and each other with open minds if we are to grow together if we are to be ready for the challenges of the future. The models have lines and limitations, human interactions can transcend these and create truly inspirational learning. 

BTW, had such a good time on twitter with my PLN during #Eurovision last night !

References:


Macaro, E., (2003). Teaching and Learning a Second Language. London: Continuum.

Thomas, D. and Seely Brown, J., (2011). A new culture of learning: Cultivating the Imagination for a World of Constant Change. (Downloaded to my kindle http://www.amazon.com/New-Culture-Learning-Cultivating-Imagination/dp/1456458884/)

 

Reflection on collaboration.

When I looked at the small group reflection task set in week 0 I knew it would not be a quick activity to sort out. I have been connecting and collaborating with international networks for some years now, and during past 4 years I have been building up an international virtual exchange network #clavier which has completely transformed my teaching practice and the experiences I can offer our students - but it took time...

• time to find people with shared interests
• time to find overlapping interests and shared purpose
• time to build a relationship of trust and mutuality
• time to locate preferred tech communication channels
• all of the above in the virtual dark of computer mediated communication

I knew very few people in the #ocTEL course so first came the challenge of finding people with an interest in language education. I was delighted to find that a group already existed on the ocTEL site. I used the groups function of the wordpress site but my lack of familiarity with the interface meant that my first post was incorrectly placed in the the status update for the group. Schoolgirl error! Scanning my twitter feed (much more familiar with this channel) for #ocTEL participants was helpful though and soon I had found a few connections. I made a forum post suggestion and thanks to the encouragement from new connection @damon_tokyo who is based in Japan we decided to set up a shared document to edit asynchronously:
shared doc

Now we are under way but a further issue is apparent, a familiar one in my context. The google doc I set up was deliberately planned to be as open and available as possible in order to reduce any barriers to collaboration. There have been several edits and contributions but none of them signed in with google accounts so the revision history just shows anonymous contributions. It would be much easier to move this asynchronous document into a proxy for making further connections and more in depth reflection if, on arrive, contributors would sign in. I don't want to force this by changing the permissions though so we will see how it goes. In my context we have a similar situation when our students of French write collaborative stories with their virtual exchange partners in Clermont Ferrand. A really interesting and engaging activity that could be even more useful if we shared connections through google apps for education accounts. Preserving the student identity to be managed as they feel is appropriate and providing a real life opportunity to interact internationally and acquire the many transversal skills they will need in their future. A wasted opportunity. 

Groups who are experienced in international collaboration such as #globalclassroom, soliya  classroom 2.0 and many more are familiar with the barriers presented by time and schedule differences, different technology preferences, language and intercultural barriers etc., they achieve a great deal because their shared passion drives them on, they are resilient, flexible and most importantly willing to put in the time.

Big and little questions #ocTEL

I get the feeling that this cMOOC organised by ALT could be a good opportunity for me to reflect and engage with the wider learning technology community, learn new things and clarify my priorities as a new CMALT holder. The process will probably require writing a blog post every week for the next few weeks, that level of discipline is something I will be exploring but I make no promises that it will last. I don't think the wider world is ready to hear from me that often!

So what are my big and little questions relating to the use of technology enhanced learning? The main one is of course related to my research into computer-mediated communication and the technologies used to facilitate it. The context here has changed enormously in recent years. When I first wrote my M.A. dissertation and identified challenges in the adoption of voip for language teaching it was unusual for institutional computers to have sound cards at all. I was told that using headsets would be unhygienic and that speaking into a computer would be distracting for others. Now of course I regularly pass students sitting in corridors having skype chats from their laptops free from wired internet connections and institutional machines, or overhear snippets of their conversations on mobile phones as they stand in the queue at the café. My son's generation (he's 20 btw) are always interacting through some gadget or another, by voice, text, exchanging images and sharing youtube clips. 

The big question? When are educators (particularly language educators) going to accept that CMC is a vital area of investigation which has direct relevance to our young people? Not just a curiosity to be dismissed by those who are "not into computers" but a vital realm already inhabited by others. 

The little questions - which are as important to the growth of CMC include:

• how do we share the existing growing body of knowledge around engagement in CMC?
• how do we mainstream the many great ideas for CMC which could help to address so many issues such as student mobility, transversal skills acquisition, intercultural awareness, the need for constant CPD for educators?
• how do we ensure that technical infrastructures provided by institutions give best value by prioritising effective ways of supporting CMC? 

Looking at the questions here, maybe they are not so little but I do at least have some directions and clues for answering some of these. If you are also interested in these questions please connect with me in the #ocTEL site or through twitter @warwicklanguage
and maybe together we can make a difference?

Labelled and dismissed.

"Generalisations are always dangerous" said my English teacher to our class when I was about 12 year's old. The joke was not wasted on me, I have often had call to remind myself of this in the past 40 years or so...

The recent reporting of comments from Sir Michael Wilshaw have sent shockwaves through the education community. You can read them here.

So let's do some amateur discourse analysis on the oft repeated soundbite from Sir Michael's pronouncements as reported by the press and tweeted:

Wilshaw 'enraged' by suggestion that inspectors 'lefty-child-centred ideologues'. Says Ofsted 'in a very different place now.' #oprah
— Tom Bennett (@tombennett71) March 21, 2014

"lefty"  adj, leaning to the party political left. Overtones of insult.


"child-centred" adj., refers to an approach to teaching that prioritises the needs of the recipient. 

"idealogue" n., someone who theorises. 


So, he felt the need to refute the labelling of Ofsted inspectors against these stereotypical perceptions of the profession and yet:

What has someone's political choice to do with their employment? To cast someone as a "lefty" comes from the perspective of someone who does not respect that individual's party political choices. 

We are learning more each day about teaching and learning thanks to the emerging work of cognitive neuroscience. What is rapidly becoming clear is that learning happens despite our best efforts, probably through a process that attaches emotional information to experiences being processed by our memory systems. As communicated recently by Dr. Terry Lamb, Professor of Languages and Pedagogy at the University of Sheffield:

#ECMLconference we must think about learning and then review what we mean by teaching (Terry Lamb) pic.twitter.com/lOMffFqi3h
— pestalozziprogramme (@pestalozziprog) March 21, 2014

If the child isn't at the centre of education, who should be? Is the individual less important than their ability to generate statistics for analysis by others? Seems to me that learner centric learning is all that exists. Should teachers not want a child to learn? Should lesson planning not prioritise the learning needs of individuals ?

Finally, does Sir Michael really believe that those tasked with inspecting the delivery of education should be incapable of engaging with theory and connecting this to their practice? An intellectual idealogue is someone who can think creatively, a quality we know is important in order to function in a rapidly changing world and imagine the raft of skills that will be necessary for a future we are as yet unable to see. 

So I am at a loss to see Sir Michael's rationale for wishing to dismiss these terms in relation to his office. Surely, they are labels which could be considered badges of distinction for educators. 

A "lefty" must be an individual who knows their own mind and has made political choices which best represent their experience. As professionals, these would be part of a range of personal preferences that remain private in the sphere of work.

The rest is all about an approach to the teaching profession which is to be applauded. I am proud to be involved in learner centric teaching, my students tell me it works for them. It is demanding for them and for me, pushes their boundaries and engages them in new and important experiences. I engage with educational theory in order to better understand how the anecdotal experiences I have as an educator relate to wider conclusions based upon empirical observations. In order to do this I have to use reasoning, critical and analytical skills often referred to as higher order thinking. 

Labelling is a neat way of dismissing someone, it can be used as part of a polemic discourse to support a particular agenda. Sir Wilshaw's defence is worrying, I wonder if he has the metal to stand up for what matters in education?





  

window of co-presence

I have decided to write this post in order to support my presentation tomorrow at the #unicollaboration conference here in beautiful Léon, Spain. Having had a very interesting day listening to others explaining their telecollaborations I am very aware that 20 minutes is a short period of time to really convey the complexity of the many decisions, design factors and experiences of a telecollaborative project. Mine is also a large scale project which is now in its 3rd year so I know there will be many things I need to skate over tomorrow. This post therefore is by way of further notes for those who may be interested in parts of the project that I cannot unpack tomorrow. A collection of fragments of my professional identity as we have such a brief window of co-presence in which to connect. 

I will be presenting from my technical, platform design perspective and as an experienced language educator. For those who are interested in the pedagogical rationale for the Languages@Warwick platform, this can be seen in my M.A. dissertation available on academia.edu  . I also have a website that shows my current research interests and approach to language education. My credentials for platform development were accredited by the Association for Learning Technology community by e-portfolio.

I realise that I won't have time to go into detail about each of the technologies used but my youtube channel has playlists for each of them so please do find out more there. The e-portfolio assessment project is also available in more detail on scribd so please feel free to download and adapt. All my work is available online under creative commons licence. I am most active on twitter and always welcome new connections, there is so much I can learn from interacting.  

I hope by the time our window of co-presence closes we will have made some meaningful connections, but I would like to leave the window ajar through this blog post so that you can reach inside to get a closer look. 

Thanks to those who came along today, I will be in touch with those of you who spoke to me. Here is the link to my reflections presentation.

Better together

I am not a prolific blogger by any stretch of the imagination. I write when something moves me to write or when I feel I should in order to clarify my thoughts or make a public statement. Today is one of those moments and is borne of a few weeks mulling over....

Back in my school days at just 13 years old I remember telling my parents I wanted to be an English teacher. I had been inspired by my wonderful English teacher (probably now long gone, Mr Carduss, Leamington College for Girls back in the 70's). He would bring a record player into the classroom and play recordings of great plays and poetry, war poets, Shakepeare and Chaucer..)our discussions would be lively and contemporary and he encouraged us to argue with clarity and not be afraid of disagreement. Looking back now I see that the ethos he created was one of respect and reason. He tried to persuade my parents that teaching would be too boring for me, I may have disappointed him in that respect as it was and remains my passion. 

Of course I later found a language learning passion which lead me to become a teacher of French and I do not regret that for a minute. Later in my career however I became aware of tensions and divisions within language professionals which I find frustrating and make me hanker for the  lively but respectful debates of my youth. English specialists complain about the pedantry of modern foreign language teachers, those involved in languages in the UK also find themselves in different camps depending on the nature of their learners - undergraduates or IWLP students. 

Such divisions are not helpful to us as professionals and they certainly do nothing to inspire new members to join our communities. We may be many sub communities of practice but our overarching aim is to remain vibrant and relevant to the next generation. We should take heed of Wilfred Owen's words:

"One dies of war like any old disease.''