Educational Wikis

 

The article “Educational Wikis: Features and Selective Criteria” by Linda Schwartz gave me an understanding about the role of wikis in education and identify the differences between blogging and wikis. The quote “A wiki can be a blog, but a blog does not have to be a wiki” led me to see all the features that wikis can have. What was a significant distinctive feature was that while in blogs it is easy to identify contributions or establish the authority of the content. From a teaching perspective, wikis can be used for interactive activities which can foster collaboration and build communities of practice.

To be able to understand how wikis can be implemented for effective classroom practice, I think, Ts should read the research on discussing the factors contributing to Ss’ involvement in a wiki project. Nature of the tasks, student presence of  working style, quality of S contributions, and instructor attitudes are all factors that can affect  the effective use of wikis in collaboration. This particular research shows that certain factors such as share of workload, appreciation of different opinions, constant communication facilitated S engagement; while factors like asynchronous communication, time pressure, personal incapability, roles not taken seriously hindered this collaboration. Hence, I would agree that first of all it’s necessary to create a mandatory collaborative environment, and through time Ls will be motivated not just to fulfill a task, but to build a sense of community, to sustain good collaboration without delays.

I will use wikis in the classroom for collaborative tasks, because they can enhance such higher order skills as group problem solving, brainstorming, critical evaluation, synthesis, idea refinement, and group consensus.

 

Podcasting in Language Learning

The reading and listening materials on podcasting gave me a new insight in implementing podcasts for language learning purposes. The research paper by Palitha Edirisingha revealed the three main features of podcasts identified as facilitating student learning. I think the first benefit, that is learner choice and flexibility, provides a unique opportunity for learners to shift the control over the pacing of learning activities from the teacher into their own hands. This means they can listen to podcasts at a place, time and pace of their choice, even on the move. What is very attracting is that they can replay the podcast in case they missed some part of the speech or didn’t attend the lecture. The second benefit is that learners have access to peer knowledge. They can listen not only to their tutor’s voice but also the real conversation between peers and tutors. This friendly tone can really attract students’ interest. Besides, as Manning states, voice humanizes and personalizes, and helps the listener connect with the speaker. There is also potential for students to create their own podcasts for peers. And the third benefit which I find no less important is the possibility of carrying out formal learning through informal processes which motivates students more in the academic context.

I believe that podcasting can serve well for improving learners’ study skills. As was found out in the research, podcasts helped students in the preparation for workshops, presentations and portfolio development. Taking into account all the advantages of podcasting, I myself am going to implement it in my classroom. Jeff Mehring’s paper on Recipe Exchange Podcasts was helpful from the practical point of view. To be able to use the activities described in his paper, first I will need to set up a webpage or weblog where students will post their podcasts and listen to their peers. The RSS feed will allow to easily track down their work. Students will need a computer with Internet access and a microphone to create and listen to podcasts. Next, it’s important to introduce them to podcasts – where they are located, how students can access them, and how podcasts can be used for their learning.

Christopher Shamburg’s interview presented in the ISTE Podcast added to my general understanding of the role of podcasts in language learning. Thus, kids learn how to synthesize, identify, and choose different mediums, how to develop ethical skills and knowledge on the rights and responsibilities in the digital world, how to connect their personal interests with real-life activities. Podcasting allows for meaningful participation not just in the classroom but in the world and makes learners effective and ethical consumers of media.     

How I would use blogs and twitter in an EFL class

An increasing interest to using blog for pedagogical purposes suggests its application in teaching and learning English. As an EFL T, I am going to use this tool for pedagogical purposes as I acknowledge its benefits which include: fluency and accuracy in writing, collaboration, social learning, authenticity, sharing ideas, real communication, increase in sense of responsibility and self-improvements, motivation, peer-reviewing, online portfolio, different levels of language proficiency, etc. For example, I will use blogging with undergraduate students studying English at the university. First, I will explain to them the purpose for and application of blog writing and Twitter in their language learning. Then, they will have practice over one semester when on a regular basis they will have to produce both personalized and reflective writing on the content around which the interaction should happen. The evaluation of the Ss’ work will be based on process and post-process approach and on certain criteria, such as evidence of supplementary reading , style transference, self-quotation for clarification, and organization of content.

With the help of RSS, I can easily keep track of my Ss’ blog activities in one site without manually visiting every individual weblog.

Certain challenges I might encounter in this process can be: Ss’ lack of interest, inappropriate peer feedback, correcting Ss’ errors, the selection of appropriate topics, and distraction. To avoid these challenges, using blogs should be customized to the needs of the program, pedagogical design, the interest of Ss and proficiency level. It is essential that Ss be explained the purpose of blogging and how it is used.  Also, they need to learn how to give effective feedback to each other. Ts must use this tool in the way that meets Ss’ needs and interests.

Blogging and Microblogging

After reflecting upon the materials for the previous blog posts, I felt the need to more deeply understand the use of each technological tool for educational purposes. Thus, I had the chance to get more exposed to blogging and microblogging which affected my beliefs about teaching, learning, and schooling and gave me more confidence about how to implement them in my EFL classroom.

As Will Richardson states in his book “Blogs, Wikis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms”, there are still too many students for whom these opportunities occur only outside the classroom walls. The ways in which we connect and learn continue to look less and less like what happens in the classroom. I completely agree that kids continue to have very few people in their lives who are modeling and teaching the safe, effective, and ethical use of all the Internet has to offer. Therefore, in order to prepare our students for networked learning and fully understand the pedagogical uses of these tools, we must first experience those environments for ourselves.

The audio presentation “Weblogs in School” by Will Richardson offered me a helpful insight in blogging. The combination of the theory and the practice that I am doing now enabled me to see the rationale behind implementing blogging in my classroom. Blogging is a space where more learning and more investigation happens in contrast to an archive of ideas. It’s a hyperlink which requires more intellectual engagement in the content around which the interaction happens. I totally agree with Will Richardson arguing that although blogging is a writing tool, it starts with reading, what I am experiencing myself now. I read from different sources and put them together in my blog linking back to them in the post. Thus, this is a tool which enables learners to synthesize critical thinking and critical reading before they write, and allow for continual learning. It’s necessary to know about blogging policy and guidelines on how to use this tool well, about what successful bloggers do, and what is a good post.

Having gained information about the use of blogging, I became more curious about the assessment of blog writing. Murran Etal’s research paper “Blog Writing Assessment” enabled me to draw some parallels between our course and the researched course in terms of the provided framework for blog assessment. The article revealed certain important issues for me: process and post-process approaches were considered in the assessment of writing. Learners had to produce content that was both personalized and reflective. They wanted the learners to personalize their content in order to place more emphasis on their roles as learners in the language learning process, to allow them to become more creative and reflective. It was hoped that the post-process reflection would help learners to monitor their sense of focus and commitment. Another point that I found important in the article was the list of criteria used in the assessment of blog writing. It includes: evidence of supplementary reading, style transference, self-quotation for clarification, discourse, and organization of content. With all this in mind, I feel more confident to say that I will implement blogging in my EFL classroom which will make the distinction between ‘recreational’ and ‘academic’ blogging where the student self-expresses and reflects upon self-expression.

I will definitely try using Microblogging tools, such as Twitter, which enable users to post short messages that are distributed within their community. As it is stated in the research article on microblogging by Kerstin Borau, microblogging allows for a chance to actively produce language and the chance to use English as a tool of communication. The study found out that it is suitable to train communicative and cultural competence anytime anywhere without face-to-face interaction. I believe that online communities enable the exchange of information and motivate the individual to conform to the community’s learning behaviors.

 

The Connection between the Digital Youth Portraits, "The World is Flat", and "The Hole in the Wall"

While and after watching all the materials assigned for homework, I had to reevaluate my teaching philosophy and come up with new ideas or concepts. One general teaching value of these stories is that language learning through technologies goes far beyond just learning the language; it fosters the development of a personality both culturally and socially. I myself uncovered a lot through this assignment, and I would like to discuss their meanings for me as a TEFL professional.

As it was presented in Cameron’s story, there are different ways of communication most of which come off from screens. I was mostly struck by Cameron’s endless strive for technologies. It proved that the integration of technologies in education can improve creativity, problem-solving skills, and imagination. It can be more enjoyable and engaging. We shouldn’t be afraid of assigning learners creative tasks when they use all their strengths, become explorers for new ideas, research and investigate. Most importantly, they learn by doing and become learners-teachers. 
Dana’s story showed me that technology can really enable them to become autonomous learners. They do what is appropriate for them and follow their passion. This prompts that students should not learn the language just for the sake of learning it or because it is on their curriculum, but learn it for and by satisfying their language learning needs and interests. Hence, language should not be taught as a subject but as a means for meaningful interaction where all the dimensions of language use are explored. This will help learners better understand the importance of language learning. 
While watching the story about Dylan, I imagined how technologies can allow for interaction not only at a local, but also at a global level. Language learning is not limited to a textbook, but ranges from a textbook to a vast interactive learning environment where learners become more engaged and take more responsibility for their own learning. Furthermore, technology allows expressing their concerns through their own video materials, coming up with solutions and feeling the positive impact of their social role inside and outside the country borders. 
The other two materials about Nafiza and Olivia made me think of a role of technologies as a source of multi-skills development. They use and improve different skills at a time, relate their learning to real life, learn how to use the language via technologies and how to use technologies via language. Learners develop confidence and become leaders.

In his work “The World is Flat”, Thomas Friedman acknowledges that the global economic playing field has been leveled, meaning that a much larger group of people can compete for global knowledge. He argues that there are primarily ten forces that flattened the world. In my perspective, the most amazing of these flatteners is the workflow software, i.e.
technologies that allow work to flow and create a global platform for multiple forms of collaboration. The next six flatteners sprung from this platform. 
Quoting Friedman’s words “when the walls came down and the windows came up”, we understand that due to technologies, everything started becoming faster and faster, and more and more widespread. In terms of teaching and learning, one implication if this idea is that curiosity and passion are more important than intelligence now, which means individuals must possess the ability to learn how to learn. Hence, the role of technologies is tremendous in developing this ability. Another implication is that in the flattening world we need to be more open and willing to change our teaching and learning practices in order to have the best chance for success. Again, the adoption of technologies becomes a vital component in today’s education. Without this, the continuous process of world flattening will disempower people who are responsible for teaching and learning.

Sugata Mitra, in his project “The Hole in the Wall”, discusses certain factors that affect education. These are the remoteness and quality of education, integration of technology in schools, particularly in primary education, and self-instruction. His experiments revealed that unprivileged children in rural areas, not knowing any single word in English and being computer illiterate, had to learn the language through the exploration of the computer and the Internet, in groups, where mostly young kids taught the older ones how to use it; which means learning by doing and not by not doing. One final outcome from these experiments was that primary education can happen on its own; it can be a self-organizing system. 
Thus, my impressions about the connections of all the materials described above can be expressed by a brief conclusion that to succeed in this flat world the integration of technologies in the teaching/learning process is necessitated as it can stimulate curiosity and passion, and encourage people to learn how to learn. 

Introduction

I would like to start my blog discussions with some introductory points that are relevant to the issue of the integration of technologies in our language classrooms. There are various positive factors behind this process which will be discussed in the coming blogs. 
As stated in the research study from the EDUCAUSE Center for Applied Linguistics, Information Technologies are in a position to help students succeed, boost their academic persistence and performance, and enhance other key activities. The challenge of change in Armenian classrooms is imbedded in our culture, our governance, and in our capacity to suffuse the technology with a vision and with our passion for our mission. Another challenge might be the small number of funding sources for the implementation of technology platforms of higher levels. However, the research shows that an institution that has invested in more complex technology platforms is achieving better institutional outcomes. 
According to the article on Penetrating the Analytics in Learning and Education, technologies offer the prospect of bridging the divide between the physical and digital worlds. Similarly, educators can be integrated with data from learners’ activity in online environments, providing additional insights into factors that contribute to learners’ success. Technologies in education will obviously alter existing teaching, learning, and assessment practices. For example, instead of being an end of course activity, assessment will be performed in real time as learners demonstrate mastery of important concepts and ideas. Besides, learning content will not be provided in a textbook, but computed providing each learner with recourses relevant to his/her learning goals and the knowledge domain he is attempting to master.
In fact, technology adoption in education requires a consistent and challenging model. One, which I found worth implementing, suggested by SOLAR Society for Learning and Analytics Research is the integrated learning platform which provides an open infrastructure for researchers, educators, and learners to develop new methods. Learners are provided with information on their attendance at lectures, and online activities, participation rates in forums, pass rates on the online tests, and marks on formal written assignments. These are ‘visual mirrors’ that suggest ways in which they might become more effective learners. Educators can track and gain insight into the range of different factors known to impact sustained learner engagement.