"Absolutely Intercultural" is Absolutely Fantastic

'Absolutely intercultural!' is a podcast that explores various aspects of cross-cultural communication. Since globalization and continuous advances in technology are bringing different cultures closer together, it is important that teachers and students students develop a sense of multicultural awareness for the purpose of becoming a global citizens. Podcasts like 'absolutely intercultural!' also provide ESL students with an abundant amount of opportunities to sharpen their listening skills and digital literacy skills, in addition to learning about cultures that they find interesting. Depending on the ELLs' level of L2 proficiency, ESL teachers can create worksheets that contain written scaffolding to facilitate ELLs' comprehension while listening to the podcast.

Using 'absolutely intercultural!' as a model, ELLs can also create their own podcasts that describe their native culture(s). The ESL classrooms of today are comprised of students from various diverse cultural backgrounds. Other students in the class who may not be familiar with a particular students culture can then listen to the podcast to learn more about their fellow classmate and where they come from. When ELLs become acquainted with their peers, they are able to feel more comfortable in the L2 classroom, which ultimately facilitates authentic intercultural communication and the acquisition of a second language.

ESL teachers can also use these podcasts as assessments to determine the areas of students oral language production that may need more development. Once ESL teachers identify these areas, they can then adjust their instruction in order to help their students improve their speaking skills.

In Episode 104 of 'absolutely intercultural,' Anne Fox discusses a unique method to English language learning. In the UK, Jason West has developed an approach to English language learning, called 'Language Out There,' that requires students to go out in public and communicate with native English speakers. After having practiced a particular language function in the classroom, the teacher then accompanies students on excursions to places where people are socializing, such as cafes and public squares. The students then tell the native English speakers that they are learning English and would like to ask them a few questions. Most of the time,  native English speakers are very willing to participate in these interactions. According to Jason West, this approach helps to make teaching and learning the English language more relevant to a, "local people, area, and culture." In addition, this approach also provides English language learners with an opportunity to improve their speaking skills and overall language proficiency by communicating with native speakers.

Cross-Cultural Understanding Through ePals

If I were teaching English abroad in China, I would use global communication tools, like ePals, to connect my students with Chinese language learners of the same age in English-speaking countries. I like how ePals provides students from different cultures and parts of the word with opportunities to engage in authentic cross-cultural communication and collaborate on discovery-based learning projects. Global communication tools not only facilitate the language development of all of the parties involved, but they also cultivate a sense of cultural awareness and tolerance that, in turn, promotes both academic and personal growth. I like how global communication tools allow students from different cultural backgrounds to relate to one another, as well as develop a sense of empathy for one another during the language-learning process. In a world where globalization and technology are bringing different cultures closer together, it is fundamental that younger generations learn to appreciate the unique cultural differences that make the world such a dynamic place in which to live.

"Show Me The Photos!"

I used Stupeflix to create a photo show about my trip to Egypt. As a future ESL teacher, I would use phto show tools such as Stupeflix to introduce particular content area topics to my students at the beginning of a new unit. Using a photo show for such a purpose is similar to doing a picture walk with students to familiarize them with what they will be learning in a particular lesson, day, or week. Photo shows allow teachers to provide their students with the comprehensible input necessary to develop complex concepts through language. Students can also use photo shows as a medium for creating presentations on particular topics as well. For example, students can use photo shows to create a presentation about an experiment that they conducted in Science class. On each slide, students can add a picture and corresponding text detailing each stage of their experiment according to the Scientific Method. These are just a few ways in which photo shows can be used in the classroom.

It's All Greek To Me!

Photo by: infrogmation
As a future ESL teacher, I would use my story, "It's All Greek to Me," as an example of a time when I had to adjust to living in a new place and culture. My students will most likely be from other places and cultures, and may have gone through similar experiences when they moved to the United States. It would be an opportunity for me, as a teacher, to relate to my students and have them, in turn, relate to me. I would also have them create digital stories of their own, describing the differences between their native country and the United States. I would have my students present their stories to the class. By presenting their experiences of adjusting to a new culture, as well as listening to the experiences of their peers, students will feel a sense of solidarity when confronted with the challenges of learning a new language and living in a new place. My objectives for this lesson would be:
1. Students will use bookr to write digital narratives
2. Students will orally present their digital narratives to the class
3. Students will listen to the presentations of their peers
4. Students will take part in a class discussion on culture shock

Flickr

Photo by: Rosana Prada

The site,  “The Educational Uses of Digital Storytelling,” defines digital storytelling as, “the practice of using computer-based tools to tell stories.” Through digital storytelling, teachers and students can add images, audio, and video to create a story about virtually everything. L2 Teachers can use digital storytelling to provide their students with the comprehensible input necessary for their students to understand particular concepts in any of the content areas. For example, ESL teachers can create a digital story as part of a social studies content lesson on the Civil War. By adding photographs of the Battle of Gettysburg and audio recordings of former slaves describing their lives, ESL teachers can use digital stories to bring the Civil War to life for their students. Due to the limitless number of possibilities that digital story telling brings to the L2 classroom, it is important that L2 instructors provide their students with specific criteria and explicit instructions regarding the creation of their stories.

Twitter me this...

In the L2 classroom, teachers can utilize the social networking and microblogging service, Twitter, for a variety of purposes in order to enhance both learning and instruction. As a language teacher, I would integrate Twitter into writing assignments as a great way for students to hone their digital writing skills. The articles “28 Ways Teachers Are Using Twitter” and “Twitter for Academia” both mention how the 140-character limit requires students to be both creative and concise when conveying their intended message to an audience. Students can even write short stories or poems over Twitter, which would allow them to receive real-time feedback from their peers and instructors.

Additionally, Twitter is an excellent medium for language teachers to actively engage students in a Word of the Day. (see "28 Ways teachers Are Using Twitter") L2 teachers can tweet the Word of the Day to their students and require them to send a reply in which they use the word in a sentence. Students can also use the Word while interacting with each other over Twitter. In addition to encouraging students to use the Word of the Day outside of class, L2 teachers can also integrate the word of the day into classroom activities and assignments. Using Twitter to promote the use of a Word of the Day is an excellent way for students to incorporate new words into their vocabulary. 

Be sure to check out the two aforementioned articles for more ways to use Twitter to improve instruction both inside and outside of the classroom. 

2 Thumbs Up for Teacher 2.0

Teacher 2.0 is a space where educators from various different backgrounds can come together to share ideas and discuss ways in which they can improve their instruction by utilizing technology in the classroom. The site is easy to navigate and full of relevant information to accommodate the teacher of the 21^st Century. The site provides a list of related social networking sites, as well as book recommendations to further support teacher who desire to implement the use of technology in the classroom. Although this site is not specifically for L2, it contains an abundance of useful information that could benefit teachers of any discipline. It also doesn’t hurt that it is one of the best-designed social networking sites for teachers that I have come across thus far in my web browsing. 

The Weaver

A teacher today is like a weaver. Just as a weaver intertwines the threads of a fabric, the teacher weaves together information, ideas, and people in order to facilitate learning. Each thread, no matter how small, creates new nodes, or connecting points with other threads, and contributes to the overall quality of the fabric. In his YouTube video, “The Network is the Learning,” Siemens argues that, “adding a node to a network increases the entire network exponentially.” The more threads that a teacher is able to weave together, the stronger the fabric.

The teacher’s role as the weaver is to help students to recognize the patterns used to create the fabric and to encourage their students to add their own thread to the fabric. It is also the teacher’s responsibility as the weaver to stay current with the evolving methodologies of their field in order to continuously improve their craft. As students become accustomed to the patterns used to make the fabric by adding their own thread, they will be able to take control over their learning and make their own fabric. Over time, students will eventually be able to alter these patterns to create entirely new connections or patterns. In his article, “Connectivism: Learning in the Digital Age,” Siemens writes: “Our ability to learn what we need for tomorrow is more important than what we know today.” By teaching our students how to recognize patterns and digitally collaborate with others, it is our aim as teachers to help our students develop into independent thinkers and life-long learners. 

"Bueller?...Bueller...?"

In his most recent post, “It’s not 1985,” Dean Shareski, author of the blog, Ideas and Thoughts, describes the failure of teachers to teach their students digital writing skills in this day and age as being “educational malpractice.” He’s right. It would be an understatement to say that teachers who neglect to incorporate digital writing into their pedagogy are simply shortchanging their students. It’s as if teachers who dismiss digital writing believe that the quality of their students’ writing will diminish as a result of the Internet. Actually, quite the opposite is true. Of course, teachers must still teach their students the conventions of good writing, but they do not have to do so at the expense of teaching their students how to write in the digital world. Teaching students how to effectively incorporate blogs and wikis into the writing process actually serves to enhance the overall quality of their writing. Moreover, students who possess such digital writing skills will also be better prepared to navigate and thrive in the ever-changing, technological world of tomorrow.

“So What Does It All Mean?”

I was blown away by the YouTube video “Did you know?” The rapid pace of technological advancement has changed the world and the way we live in it. The world is not only changing at a breakneck speed technologically but linguistically as well.  For instance, there are currently 540,000 words in the English language. This amount is five times the amount of words that existed in the English lexicon during Shakespeare’s time. Moreover, who would have thought twenty years ago that China would soon become the largest English speaking country in the world?

So what does this mean for language teachers?

It means that language teachers, and teachers in general, who are unwilling to adapt to the changing times will become obsolete. They will simply be out-teached by teachers who know how to effectively use technology as a pedagogical tool in the classroom. Although technology is changing rapidly, there is an abundant amount of resources for teachers to deepen their technological knowledge and improve their skills in regard to implementing technology in the classroom.

By the time we start teaching, our future students will have been exposed to a profusion of technology and media. Although they will not be raised by technology, it will be a significant part of their lives. They will have an in-depth knowledge of the various forms of technology and media as well as their various uses. So there is no better time than now for teachers to familiarize themselves with technology in order to more fully engage this generation of students in the classroom. 

People vs. Technology

During this week’s reading, I was most interested in the research of Reeves and Nass regarding the nature of interactions between humans and computers. In their research, Reeves and Nass (1996) propose the following claim: “People’s interactions with computers, television, and new media are fundamentally social and natural, just like interactions in real life.“ (p. 5) Prior to reading this chapter, I had never viewed computers, in and of themselves, as being “social actors.”

While I agree that our interactions with computers are social to a degree, they are not social to the extent of communicating with others in-person. Although I believe that technology, when used appropriately, can be an effective learning and instructional tool, I do not think that social forms of technology will ever diminish the value face-to-face interactions in the target language.  

Nonetheless, the perception of computers as being social objects bodes well for the use of technology in language teaching. The social nature of our interactions with technology will allow the language acquisition process to occur more naturally. While in-classroom interactions are ideal, technology allows students to go beyond the spatial and temporal limitations of the classroom, providing them with additional opportunities to learn. 

Heads-up on Internet Safety

Dear students,

Although the Internet can be an excellent resource for sharing ideas, obtaining information, and socializing with peers, it can also be a dangerous place, which can potentially cause you harm if you are not safe. Here are some tips that will help to keep you out of harm’s way while surfing the web. 

1.     Do not share your passwords with others, even if it’s with your best friend. Friendships can change and, regardless, you don’t want anyone to imitate you online. Passwords exist for a reason: to protect you! So try to choose a password that is difficult for others to guess but simple for you to remember. Here is a link to help you create a secure password.

2.     When interacting with others on the Internet, be sure to always remember the Golden Rule: treat others as you would like to be treated. So be nice! Kindness can go a long way…

3.     Be careful about what you choose to post online. Posting suggestive photographs and private information can get you into big trouble and can be used against you in the future.

4.     At all costs, do not react to cyberbullying. The purpose of bullying is to provoke a reaction from you. Reacting to bullies only causes the situation to escalate. Don’t give a bully that power. Here are some tips for bringing an end to cyberbullying:

a.     Ignore, block or report the bully. If a bully does not get the reaction from you that they want, they will usually just become bored and stop.

b.     Reach out to a friend, parent, or teacher for help. It’s not tattling. You need to look out for yourself.

c.      Be sure to save the evidence of bullying. Even if the bullying is insignificant at first, it’s always useful to have a record of the bullying in case it escalates.

d.     Be a good friend. If someone you know is being cyberbullied, help them by reporting the bullying.

e.     Finally, don’t BE a bully! It’s really not cool. 

Teaching and Learning Language through Blogs

1. In my own teaching, I would use blogs as a tool to provide my students with written feedback on their writing. I would also require my students to use blogs to provide written feedback on the writing of their peers. Giving and receiving feedback is a crucial part of the writing process. As an online community of learners, blogs are an excellent format for students to become comfortable with giving and accepting feedback for the purpose of improving their own writing and the writing of their peers. 

College and Career Readiness Anchor Standards for Writing

Standard 6: Use technology, including the internet, to produce and publish writing and to interact and collaborate with others.

2. As a future ESL teacher, blogs would allow me to facilitate cultural awareness and understanding among my students. Since many ESL classrooms contain students from a wide variety of cultural and linguistic backgrounds, it is important that ESL teachers cultivate a sense of cultural sensitivity and appreciation among their students. Students can research topics related to their own culture or foreign cultures. They can post links to articles, pictures, videos, music, and even provide their own commentary on the cuisine, everyday life, and traditions of a particular culture. Through the sharing of information and ideas, teachers and students can use blogs to promote cultural awareness in a multiculturally diverse classroom setting.

College and Career Readiness Anchor Standards for Writing, Grades 9-10

Standard 7: Conduct short as well as more sustained research projects to answer a question (including a self-generated question) or solve a problem; narrow or broaden the inquiry when appropriate; synthesize multiple sources on the subject, demonstrating understanding of the subject under investigation. 

a.    Explore topics dealing with different cultures and world viewpoints.

3. Teachers can also use blogs to develop portfolios of their students’ written work. As a result, blogs provide students with the means to observe and reflect on their progress over time. They also allow students to share a history of their development with their parents, teachers and peers.  For these reasons, the collection of students’ best work across wide variety of writing formats serves to validate the written work of students.

College and Carreer Readiness Anchor Standards for Writing

Standard 10: Write routinely over extended time frames (time for research,

reflection, and revision) and shorter time frames (a single sitting or a day or two) for a range of tasks, purposes, and audiences.

All of the standards in this post were taken from the NYS P-12 Common Core Learning Standards.