Trainee teachers e-reading group

I still don’t know how successful this project will be in the months to come but the beginning is really promising. When Sanghita and I had this idea last year and piloted it, we could not foresee that so many teachers would like to join the project in a second phase. Now we are starting the project with 19 teacher trainers working in different universities in 11 countries around the world.

I don’t think coordinating this will be easy but we are relying on the network of local coordinators to make it a success. Our first texts are ‘The Story of an Hour’ by Kate Chopin and ‘Carapace’ by Romesh Gunesekera. Participation in the group is restricted to those registered in the project, but I’ll be reporting here how things go on.

Counting on your good vibes to disseminate the idea of reading literature in initial teacher education

Frequently asked questions about CL

It’s been over three years since we started the CL in ELT project and in spite of many workshops, events and publications the idea of a critical approach to ELT education still hasn’t reached most of our colleagues and their students where it matters the most, the classroom.

Changes always take time to happen and perhaps changes in education take even longer because they cannot be imposed and have to happen at teachers and students´ own pace. What we can do is to try to bring you as much information as possible and open the space for debate on the concepts we are proposing. That is exactly why we now published a very short and simple booklet with the most frequently asked questions about the nature of CL and how it fits into ELT.

As I wrote in the Foreword, it does not propose to give you definite answers. These are the answers we have at the moment, according to our own understanding. We hope they become the stating point of an interesting discussion  in the ELT Community forum and also in your schools and workplaces with your colleagues.

The place of technology

When people read my comments at Teaching English about the need to be careful about how we see and use technology in education I’m almost certainly some think I’m a reactionary. Far from it, I’m a British Council certified online tutor, I keep 5 blogs, moderate the IATEFL LMCS SIG discussion group at Yahoo Groups, coordinate the ELT e-Reading Groups at enCompass, co-ordinate the ERF website and I’m also a member of the BC ELT Online Community. I spend most of my waking time online and if there is a way to integrate technology to ELT be sure I’m for it.

However, I maintain that we have to be careful I simply read in dismay when people write things such as ‘our students breath technology’. Sure thing if you live in a developed country or belong to the middle-upper class in a developing one. What about the rest of language learners, whcih form the vast majority, around the world? What about learners in Africa, Latin America, and some Asian countries where you have just one computer in the school? Where you only have electricity during counted hours during a day? Where kids do not have access to textbooks, let alone laptops? Where teachers have never heard of a blog, let alone twitter, flickr,pikkids and other funny names?

Unfortunately,  I have to say that one of the negative points at IATEFL was the opening plenary with Marc Prensky. Surely entertaining, but shallow, biopic and the stereotypical talk of an America salesperson. He used a variety of techniques to try to convince teachers that we are all dinosaurs who will be extinct with we don’t ally with the young generation that is born into technology. There certainly is some truth in that but the whole talk was highly misleading. Teachers know fairly well that technology came to stay and that that we have to be update. This is not the point. The point is how to make technology accessible to a wider number of learners, how to include technology in CPD and, mainly, what are the pedagogic and educational principles underpinning the use of such technologies.

I still want to see a session where webheads stop preaching us the advantages of technology to start reflecting on how, why and with what purposes we are using it.

Looking back at Cardiff

The IATEFL Annual Conference in Cardiff was a fantastic experience in many aspects, and I’m referring both to the face 2 face conference and the *virtual* one. Starting with Cardiff Online, I believe we have advanced a lot in terms of online coverage. Each year new changes are introduced, new challenges have to be met and new problems have to be solved, but on the whole we are all learning and trying to improve the quality and the quantity of material available to the more than 13,000 online delegates. When we visit the website and simply click on the various links, we usually have no idea of the number of hours spent on uploading material and solving some little technical issues. What comes so easily to us is sometimes the result of a lot of hard work. Congratulations Julian, Nik and all the Team for all your efforts and great job. Needless to say that the IATEFL Board, local committee and conference committee also deserve our praise and thanks – wonderful venue, great organisation, unforgettable moments.

There was so much going on that it was impossible to get hold of everything. We were spoilt for choice. However, for me there were some major threads I could identify in many presentations in one way or another.

• The place of technology: perhaps we are entering in a phase that we will stop advocating for technology in ELT and start making sense of it, but I still want to see presentations where we will be discussing the teaching/learning principles behind the use of various tech tools instead to just advocating for their inclusion and use.
• The place of arts: hopefully a coming back much waited for. After the functionalism of the 80’s and 90’s we are now discussing visual arts, literature and music in ELT beyond the usual workshops on songs and videos. The LMCS pre-conference event was a good example of a serious reflection on the use of fiction with Young Adults; the Art Symposium and the Writing Workshop on Art also added a new artistic dimension to the Conference – Well-inspired by the wonderful, superb collection in the National Museum of Wales next door.
• Equal Opportunities and Diversity: a recurrent theme present not only in the BC signature event but also embedded in sessions about identity, critical pedagogies and the broader socio-political, cultural implications of teaching and learning English.

If you missed the conference, there is still time to access it because Cardiff Online is still live and more material is being uploaded.

Cardiff Online

Here we go again. The third year in a row that the BC and IATEFL are sponsoring the Online Conference and once again I’m one of the moderators of the Literature. Media and Cultural Studies Forum. It’s hard work, especially if you are also attending the conference on site but it is fascinating.

I’d like to invite all my readers, friends and colleagues to join us.

Join us and fellow ELT professionals from around the world to discuss, reflect on and develop ideas. The 43rd IATEFL Conference will offer many opportunities for professional contact and development. The programme offers over 400 workshops, posters, talks, panel discussions and symposiums by international presenters from over 60 countries.

The 43rd IATEFL Conference, 31 March-4 April 2009 

 

The British Council and IATEFL have launched the Cardiff Online website which will offer coverage of this year’s IATEFL Annual Conference in Cardiff. 

The Cardiff Online website allows remote participants to take part in one of the world’s biggest ELT conferences through a variety of resources including:

• Video recordings of selected sessions
• Audio recordings of selected sessions
• Live streamed plenaries and events
• Moderated special interest discussion forums
• Chat sessions
• Blogs and photo albums

To visit the Cardiff Online website go to: http://iatefl.britishcouncil.org/2009

This initiative builds on the earlier collaboration between the British Council and IATEFL in Aberdeen and Exeter in the last two years, which brought together thousands of teachers and trainers at the actual conference and online. Over 5,000 teachers joined us for Exeter Online and this year we expect a much larger audience. This is a real opportunity to take part in the biggest online ELT training community. This year we expect a much larger audience, and this is a real opportunity to take part in the biggest online ELT training community.

The Cardiff Online website gives you an opportunity to share ideas with teachers all around the world. There will be interactive coverage with video presentations, reports and interviews ‘almost live’ from Cardiff.

Classroom culture

The language classroom has somehow ceased to be my natural environment in the last couple of mouths and that’s exactly why I have chosen *classroom culture* as the topic of one of my assignments for the Masters course. I asked a friend of mine who works in a public school in a disadvantaged innercity in Rio to give me an account of his clasroom and I have used this as the basis for my paper.

I do intend to go back to the language classroom, but I’ll almost certainly work a lot in teacher training and education but I don’t really think you can be of any help or service to your  students if you do not understand the nature of the place where they are going to work and live great part of their lives.

I’ve just finished the assignment and I’m looking forward to my tutors’ assessment of it. Interesting topic indeed, especially because I finished it with more questions than answers!!

Equal Opportunites and Diversity

It was the first time I spent my birthday in London. Actually, I wasn’t in town with the purpose to celebrate it, but it happened that I was invited by the organisers of the Equal Opportunities and Equalities Seminar to present in the event and it took place on 20-21 February. I’m really thankful for the British Council and Mike Solly, president of the IATEFL Global Issues SIG for inviting me to be one of the speakers. It was a priviledge and an honour.

The seminar was very much focussed on institutional and practical aspects we have to take into consideration when implementing an EOD policy in our institutions. My talk was more related to how to connect these practical issues to critical literacy and classroom practice. For me, just waving the flag of EOD is not enough and many times such policies are adopted because they are legally or socially imposed on us because of political correctness. If such policies do not emerge from a  real concern for promoting diversity and understanding and acceptance of differences, they will soon become the dead letter of the law. If concerns for EOD do not take into consideration the real people and their values and needs, it runs the risk of becoming another sort of paternalism or a political platform.

One person in the audience asked me why I was putting Critical Literacy in this. He could not see the reason for this. My answer was that for me Critical means to be able to see things from different perspectives and analyse them in-depth and Literacy means to be able to read the world text. If we cannot look at EOD using different lenses and cannot read the signs and situations where disadvantaged and disable people are, we cannot really promote equality and human dignity – we will be only paying lip service to the legislation and to a political trend.

What is missing?

I can really consider myself privileged because I have all the time to read, write and study now. This is just a dream come true: a library available almost 24/7, piles of books at your disposal and full support from your tutors. Besides that I have more time than I had ever had to work on my online projects. What is missing then?

Simple: teaching! I miss teaching. I miss the contact with my students and the energy and sense of purpose they give to what you read and write about teaching and learning. I miss having fun with them. Moreover, what but teaching can give you the opportunity to try new ideas and techniques? And what about the wonderful sensation of seeing your students making progress?

I do think I’m cut off for a scholar’s life but even intending to keep studying and doing research, I realise that I need to be inside a classroom to be feel that my professional life is complete.

The Oxford experience

Just coming back from the British Council/Hornby Trust Seminar in Oxford. It was a great experience indeed because I could meet all the other Hornby Scholars and besides working hard we had a whale of a time together. The highlights were the visit to Oxford University Press where we attended a short presentation by John Simpson, the chief editor of the Oxford Dictionary, and also the visit to the press museaum. That was fascnating! The museum is quite small but it has amazing pieces and I wish  had more time to read about its history and make more questions to our very knowlgeable guide.

On Thursday Penny took us for a very brief walk around Oxford and again it’s a pity we could not explore more, but perhaps it was just alright because before going to visit Oxford again I’ll read more about it – I cannot really play the tourist and walk around without knowing  and fully appreaciating the centuries of history that surround you.

Reflective writing

I have a love-hate relationship with writing. Perhaps this is a very strange thing to say if you keep 5 different blogs, belong to 14 different discussion groups and forums and is doing a Masters degree. Nonetheless, it’s true.

Writing does not come without a conscious effort, even when it flows because it is a cognitively and affectively very leaden activity. I procrastinate writing as much as I can because many times I’m afraid of what will come up; sometimes ideas are uncomfortable, they destabilise you; sometimes you have that brilliant idea that will generate at least 10 hours in front of the computer and you know that the moment you start it will take over and you will not be able to stop until the whole piece is born. And what a labour it is!

I have been reading a bit about reflective and reflexive writing. Gillie Bolton has a very interesting book about writing and professional development and to my relief it explores other genres beside the paper/essay usual diet. There are very interesting insights on how to use narrative, stories, metaphors and poetry to write reflectively on your professional practice. I’ve made a couple of attempts myself in my private learning blog and I had a quite enjoyable time doing that. I intend to explore it more when I have the opportunity to do some teacher training again and perhaps in one of my online groups.