Hi all, since one of our readings was describing blogging's benefit for language learning as an opportunity and space to record thoughts and later go back to them, I'll try to summarize to the best of my ability and time available, what I see as the main point of the readings. You can skip it and go to the comment paragraph, if you're reading this at all!
Computer technology is revolutionizing education. It is seen as valuable by teachers but not really used in its full potential in the classrooms. The reasons seem to be institutional and ideological, i.e. cultural: lack of equipment, technical support and training; lack of decision-making power by teachers (the power is in the admin); lack of understanding of the actual apps, their potential pedagogical uses and benefits, as well as inadequate teaching philosophies to actually see and embrace IT's potential for education (its use is limited to be supplemental to instruction and not actually a fundamental part of it).
This might be obvious but given what seems (from the readings) a slow progress towards full "integration" of IT into l2lt maybe still relevant. I feel that whatever teacher training is happening trying to bridge this gap should be very aware and knowledgeble about teachers' specific contexts in terms of acces to IT, their levels of digital literacies, prior knowledge and beliefs about technology, i.e., the usually complex network of institutional or contextual factors around pedagogical practice and innovation. Approach to training should be very informed, dialogical (not lectury) and aimed at facilitating a process of awareness of teachers' own attitudes and feelings towards technology and its adoption in class, of course with the least judgement possible. If I put on my instructor hat what I also would also approeciate a very concrete, experiencial and situated approach: these are a few (as we read, on aspect of technology at a time) things we can do, this is how we use them and these might be their impact on learning when looking at learning this way. I tend to get overwhelmed by the idea that there is a million things out there that I could (should! and that makes it more overwhelming of course) do, that they are incredible and revolutionary, and by the fact that I (think) don't really know how to find them, where to start. I'm sure there's a list out there of those "aspects" of technology some of the authors we read recommended to take on one at a time. One of my expectations for this course is to leave with that list and maybe begin exploring one or two items. I guess by starting this blog, I've already started, right?
This brings me to the issue of translating identification of applications into actual lesson material or ideas. We've read a lot that there is already a lot developed out there and that there's no need to reinvent the wheel. But in practice laying hands or keystrokes/mouse? on it is not that easy in my experience. As a teacher with the best of attitudes towards contributing to tech integration into l2lt I would also appreciate guidance on building a clearer and usable picture of what and where those materials are, what access to them would involve. I'm sure it's often easier to think that it will be difficult, time consuming and fruitless to try is more attractive than give it a try. So a good informational and discussion effort on this side would at least eliminate that excuse. Of course I'm aware that this "list" or "pic" change very fast but getting a snapshot of what there is and how to access it seems basic. What other measures seem key to you to bridge the intention/actual use gap identified by Arnold and Ducate?
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