Podcasting in ESL class!

Podcasting (or non-streamed webcast), is a new and popular way to share and watch shows or create your own program episode. Recently it has become a more popular and acceptable way for students to learn. The word "Podcasting" stands for “Personal On Demand Casting”, you can download the show, all you need is a show catcher like iTunes, then when you can subscribe and download it on your computer or mobile device and pocket it with you and enjoy the show when every you want. This of course can be used in education; a teacher can post his or her show on the podcasting and allow students or other teachers to download it.

I would use ESL Podcast 743 – Writing a Story for an example for the students. It not only talks about how to create a story, it also introduces the meaning of the idioms used in the short conversation; what is more, it is spoken in an unnaturally slow speed so students will have no problem catching on. With this podcast, I can ask them how to create a good story, I can even assign them to write their own story and list out the settings like what he mentioned in the conversation for a big project. I can ask them to either write their own story or do cooperative writing. I can also ask them to listen and repeat the conversation with the podcast and try to write them down, then I can ask them the meanings of the idioms used in the conversation and tell them to make sentences with them. There are so many ideas of how I can do with podcasting, and this is only the starting of everything.

Web group for teachers

I have to say Classroom 2.0 really is an amazing web group. I have yet to read all the post or be familiar with all the functions, but I can already say that it is a great web filled with priceless treasures of experiences. More than sixty thousands of people from all fields and all over the world visit and contribute on this site and share their experiences, knowledge and engage in discussions with others. For a teacher, a student or a learner eager to immerse and explore new aspects and share their own experiences, what can be better than getting involved in such a great and organized web group?

I think this web group will be very useful for me because for a teacher, staying in a lab or studying theories is never the case. Especially for language teachers who require constant interactions with students. Teachers learn by a mass amount of experiences and communications of teaching, sharing, evaluating and reconstructing. For example, I can post my lesson plan, and activity I would like to do during class, videos filmed in classes, or a question I don’t understand on the board to ask for opinions and suggestions. I can also read through other posts and find new ideas or give my own opinion. Classroom 2.0 allows all these communication for teachers from all fields to stay updated and share information for improvement and suggestions.

Connecting and evolving

A teacher is becoming more like the internet in these days, especially a homeroom teacher. Asides from giving knowledge and being able to answer all kinds questions asked by the students, they are also being required to “stay updated” in their knowledge and being able to function all kinds of technologies so they are able to help him or herself and the students to stay in current.

Just like what George Siemens said in Connectivism: A Learning Theory for the Digital Age :“Experience has long been considered the best teacher of knowledge. Since we cannot experience everything, other people’s experiences, and hence other people, become the surrogate for knowledge. ‘I store my knowledge in my friends’ is an axiom for collecting knowledge through collecting people”. The jobs of teachers are not only to teach them the knowledge on the textbooks, but also to give and share the experiences students couldn’t have as many as possible. They need to learn how to stay updated, to learn about the rapidly changing world and how to survive in it. What teachers can do is to feed them the experiences, knowledge and wisdom so they could learn, like an on-lined computer that has abundant of information to share and explore whenever students need them.

In The Changing Nature of Knowledge, George Siemens said that “another important thing is to have a strong emphases on the manner of which knowledge is rapidly evolving. So it’s not just what we know today is important, it’s our ability to continue to stay current as knowledge changes.” The internet is one the most rapidly updated and changing nature of things. Just like the internet, teachers are asked to stay in current of their knowledge and constantly add or change their teaching style according to the temporary life.

Hence, I think teachers are like the ever growing internet the evolves with time and constantly connecting to others and absorbing new information.

Group projects and creative learning

      I commented on the post What does learning feel like? in the blog What Ed Said created by whatedsaid. It is actually a large student projects including What does learning look like? Year 6 PYP exhibition unit, the PYP exhibition is a large student project that allows students to chose a favorite filed and do research in groups, a creative way to let student engage in their own studies.

    I really like the idea of students research because this is a rather novice idea in my home country. The only group work students are familiar before university is their study groups which only serves the purpose to academic grades. The PYP activities will allow students to actively engage in the study because the field was picked by their own choice of interest, and not just sit there and be fed the knowledge by teachers.

    Students will also gain the experience of cooperating with others, which is a main current of nowadays since more and more progressions require group working and brain storming. The feedbacks of many students said that they learn how to cooperate with other, showing that this project not only serves an academic purpose, but also teaches them how to work with others. Also, the research will let the students have a taste of real life instead of holing in their narrow world of schooling. In the post the students comment that they learn how to be grateful of what they have, which is an ethical issue parents and teachers find it harder and harder to teach children.

    Group projects may seem a waste of time in some people’s opinion because children may not be mature enough to see the whole picture; but everything needs a first start, and I think a big group project on social inequitiy is a good start for them to learn and cooperate with others and give them more insights on their subjects and on themselves.

Reaching students with technology

Now a day we live in a world of technologies, while we are bathing in the convenience of the technologies in hand, how should we prepare our next generation to face this ever changing world?

Pay attention to what children need

And what do students need

We are living in an era when mass media, information and technology expend in geometric progressions. Four or more decades ago computers were not popular because they were heavy and expensive, their function were mainly to calculate large statistic numbers. Two decades ago, the internet started to open up to publics, and the computer had shrank smaller. I remember when I was a kid the teacher took us to the computer room once a week, but we just went there and play some computer games and print some pictures. Twenty years later, the TV, iPod, iPhone, iPad, laptops, cell phones, DVD and CD ROMS, Bluetooth, optical network, Wii, wireless communication…and so on. Firefox, Google, Wiki, blogs, Podcasts, Online Collaboration, Skype, MSN, GPS and Google Maps, YouTube, e-Portfolios and countless others were born according to the internet and new technologies. Everything had advance so quickly that it became harder and harder to keep up with the trend. The question is, how are we going to prepare our children and students to use these new tools?

  Statistics show that unlike the generation of young people who probably started to use computers and cell phones in their high school or university, the younger generation started to get a hand on the technologies in an early age, some even started when they were infants. They inevitably will have a better hand on the new technology than their parents or teachers. As teachers or parents, the first issue we have to face is how are we going to reach to them? Students nowadays spend even more time on TVs, internets, texting, iPad, iPods, and Facebook and less time in studying because only some of them think studying is important, others don’t see why they need to learn the things that seem to have no use in the future. Needless to say about the students that have difficulties in graduating. Further disappointment will only drive them further away.

  The film suggests that we reach them with the tools they already have, like giving an activity about texting in class, Google Mapping the places we study in geography class, or YouTube some songs and operas in music classes. These are good way to reach out to them since they can feel the connection of the curriculum and everyday life, and perhaps more of them will be willing to study and reach back to the teachers. But first thing first, the teacher has to take the first step of the leads, so it is best for teachers to learn and master as much technologies as they can to use them as tools to reach out.



Is it a myth that technology can replace teachers?

I am interested in the myth saying that technology will replace teachers. In the first chapter of Brave New Digital Classroom: Technology and Foreign Language Learning, the author states that “technology will not replace teachers in the future, but rather teachers who use technology will probably replace teachers who do not.” This really intriguers me because I’ve been thinking about this for awhile.

It is true that technologies enables and strengthens teachers teaching, and those teacher that can use the technologies have a better chance to stay in jobs than those who cannot follow the footsteps of the trend. Take my parents for an example, they are great teachers and knew well how to teach in the traditional way: microphones, chocks and blackboards. Now a days the schools asked them to make Power Points of their lessons and put them on the e-learning platform for students to download and study, some lessons even ask them to record their voices in the Power Points.  My parents are having some difficulties getting a hand on the technologies because it is rather difficult for them to learn because of their ages, but they still have to meet the standard since it became a must nowadays, those who cannot follow the rules are in danger of losing their jobs.

But on the other hand, it is no myth that technology can replace mankind, let along teachers. While the teacher play a critical role in teaching and the technologies only serve as assisting tools, the importance of teachers may wane through time. A lesson can be videotaped and play over and over to students taking this course every year, in that way the teacher will not be needed to teach students so often. The day may come that teacher and school are no longer needed, people who want to learn can simply download the videos of the lessons and discuss it with others or mail to the experts for answers. This is a high possibility that cannot be overlooked as a myth.