A Mix of Technology and Reflection

-
TESL 0100
Unit 1 Reflection

 The first week of my TESL courses was extremely eye-opening! First of all, I learned about and tried out a lot of new types of educational technologies and social media tools that I had not been very familiar with previously. I created a Twitter account and an About.me page, started this Blog, and began to expand my Professional Learning Network (PLN), among other things. I have also been refreshing my memory about lesson planning for English Language Learners (ELLs), while learning about innovative and new ways to teach ESL. I taught ESL for about six years at the beginning of my teaching career, but at that time I did not have any formal TESL training. Plus, times have changed, and technology has greatly advanced in the last twenty years, so I think it is time for an update! It took a while to figure out the ins and outs of some of the technological aspects that are a part of this course, but I think I have worked out most of the kinks.

This first unit has primarily been about reflecting on “Who I Am & Who I Want to Become,” and has included a lot of reflection and goal-setting. Having to come up with a brief introduction to myself for my About.me page and Blog and selecting a few key words to include on my Twitter profile forced me to think deeply about my personal and professional identity. I am very excited about returning to the ESL field as an educator. The formation of a PLN and my participation in this course are important steps towards that goal. Having the opportunity to gain knowledge and expertise and share ideas with so many others who share my passion is fantastic!

An overview of what a language classroom can look like and the decisions that a language teacher has to make before and during a lesson were presented through the example lesson in Chapter 1 of Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy. This example lesson clearly showed that the research-based principles of second language learning and teaching need to inform teachers’ moment-to-moment decision-making in order for effective teaching to take place. As I continue through the courses in the TESL Certificate Program, I am looking forward to learning more about all of the components of the example lesson and their connections to second language research, theory and pedagogy.  

 Reference:
Brown, D. & Lee, H. (2015). Teaching by principles: An interactive approach to language pedagogy (4th ed. revised). Upper Saddle River: Pearson Education.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Continued Professional Development Report

-
Image
TESL 0170 Practicum in Teaching ESL The professional development resource that I selected to engage with and analyze is the free online CLB Bootcamp provided by the Centre for Canadian Language Benchmarks. The CLB Bootcamp is a 10-hour self-directed online training course that introduces and explains the CLB’s, as well as how to use the CLB’s for lesson planning and student assessment. The CLB Bootcamp is divided into three modules: CLB Basics , Planning and the CLB and Classroom Assessment and the CLB . Each module is then broken down into three to four sections. The material is presented in a format similar to a PowerPoint presentation, with links to resources, documents and example materials. There are also optional short quizzes throughout that can be taken more than once. It is not necessary to complete the sections or modules in order, or even to complete them all. You can pick and choose which areas you want to learn more about. If you do complete all of the modules
Read more

My Classroom Community

-
Image
TESL 0100 So I kind of overlooked this assignment, or maybe I was procrastinating it and avoiding it because I am not much of an artist and was not really looking forward to attempting to draw my classroom. :) I tried to do some of the parts in 3D, but other parts are much more basic. It's kind of a mix of both. Attempting to draw a couch was the trickiest part! Anyways, I like to think of my classroom as a community of learners, which is why I used a circular table with me, the teacher (the one with the speech bubble), as part of the circle. When needed, everyone can turn their chairs toward the whiteboard for direct instruction, or to read sentence stems or discussion prompts. I would put our agenda on the board so the students would know what was in store for the day. There would also be a word wall bulletin board with high frequency words and words we had learned in previous lessons. The classroom would have a bookshelf with a wide variety of reading materials and games/
Read more

21st Century Learners

-
Image
TESL 0100 Unit 9 Reflection As we begin to think about the language classroom that we may be teaching in, we need need to also take a step back and consider what teaching and learning looks like in the twenty-first century. We were asked to think about the skills, tasks and technologies that our students would need to have an understanding of in order to be successful in today's world, and to create an infographic to represent our ideas. Below is the infographic that I created. It includes the skills and strategies that I believe are needed by all students, including language students. In order to succeed in today's ever-changing world, students need to be taught more than just the basic knowledge and skills that were taught in traditional classroom. The four key skills that I have highlighted - communication, collaboration, creativity and critical thinking, often referred to as the four C's, should be an important component to any classroom. In university, the workp
Read more