Final lesson- "Pecha Kucha"

Hello everyone!!! I would like to dedicate this last blog entry to share with you all our final presentation for our subject ECO II at the English teaching programme.

We had our last lesson yesterday and we presented our "Pecha kuchas" based on the topics dealt througout the academic year. My group and I decided to focus our attention on the role of teachers as materials designer, and we put forward the implications of adopting this role, together with the advantages and disadvantages of teacher-porduced materials.

It has been a real thrill to go over the theory in only six minutes and a half! We had to include twenty slides using either PowerPoint or Prezi and each slide should last twenty seconds! The anxiety could be cut with a knife!!! Despite all the previous nerves we could make it, and it came out wonderfully! We are really happy with the results and we had a blast during the whole process of coordinating our speech with the timing!

This is our"Pecha Kucha", hope you like it!

About Blended Learning

Blended Learning can be understood as a mixture of both face-to-face and online learning. In other words, some elements of a course are de livered online, and some are delivered in a face-to-face fashion. To what extent should we include one or the other is really a matter of balance, since both are crucially important ways of teaching and learning.

The online component still offers opportunities for interaction and communication between learners, and between learners and teacher, since a variety of web 2 tools can be used to establish rapport. For instance, learners can use Skype, Video chats, text chats, among others.

Pursuing this way of teaching  will give the teacher more time in the classroom to discuss overall difficulties and doubts that learners may have, this allow the teacher to make a more effective use of her time . Besides, if students do a test online the teacher will have the assessment reports online that will enable her to tailor and prepare the next lesson accordingly to the results.

A further advantageous aspect of blended lessons is that it gives learners more freedom, since they can access whenever they can and wherever they are. Furthermore, students will be browsing a safe online environment, which is restricted to the teacher and the students. They have everything they need there without having to visit external sources.

The following advantages and disadvantages of blended learning are taken from a book “Teaching Online Tools and techniques, options and opportunities” by Nickly Hockly

-Flexible - learners can log on when and where they like.

-Learners have access all day, every day.

-It is quick and easy for learners to submit work and assignments.

-Geographical location is not an issue.

-Many learners are familiar with the internet already.

-It can include multimedia.

-It can be cheaper for the learner.

-Flexibility means learners need to be disciplined and self-motivated.

-Learners may expect the teacher to be available 24/7.

-Learners may expect instant responses and feedback.

-It may be difficult to meet in real-time across time zones.

-Some learners may find working online alienating, or spend too much time already online at work.

-Lower-bandwidth connections can mean that not all media can be viewed easily.

-It can be more time-consuming for teachers.

Comments on Dolors Reig's conference

Today’s post is destined to comment on the salient aspects grasped in Dolors Reig's conference "Educar para las TEP (tecnologías del empoderamiento y la participación)".

An issue she tries to demystify in the conference is the preconceived idea that due to the new technologies our intellect is said to be in decay. This is far from being true since we have internalized new ways of coping with information, processing it at a higher speed and attending to more than one task at a time; I have referred to this in the blog several times, as the ability of "multi-tasking". So, when it comes to our brain's potential we are rewarded and affected positively. However, as Dolors noted, we do find it tedious and hard to memorize encyclopedic fragments or concrete data. Nevertheless, this is a peculiarity inherent to the era we are living in, memory is not as treasured as it used to be in former times.

A further reason to unveil this taboo that revolves around technology, is the fact that we have become more powerful thanks to technology and the Internet for our capacity to judge things, and being critical towards the bombardment of advertising has increased enormously. We are equipped with many digital and cognitive tools that help us to be less vulnerable to public propaganda.

Another viewpoint I found enticing was that not only do we have to teach our students to use web 2 tools appropriately, but also teach them how to disconnect and occupy the rest of their time doing something different. I personally believe this is paramount since this "Techno-frenzy" is aggravating and children seem to be numb. I think it is important for them to enjoy outdoor activities as well, and play with other kids in a face-to-face way for this has positive effects on their subjectivity.

I also found quite appealing her idea of the "sharing-fashion" that is very much present in this new generations. I reckon that we have access to a vast array of information thanks to these new webs that allow people from all over the world to make their contributions, enabling us to pick their brains whenever we have the need to.

Last but not least, I would like to highlight a phrase that somehow summarizes the main purpose of her conference and that we should profit from in our future teaching. She mentioned that the human being is the happiest and is at his best when he/she is actually doing things, creating and actively participating, giving his/her opinion. This is food for thought, especially when our aim is to make the most out of digital tools to enhance learning. We need to get our students to generate and contrue things, since this is a direct way of stimulating their creativity and critical thinking.

Why using Web 2.0 resources for EFL learners?

 In this post I would like to comment upon Web 2.0 resources and how these can be used in the classroom to motivate learners and make ordinary activities more engaging and in keeping with this new generation of students who are immersed in a technological era.

Since this post will be devoted to Web 2.0 and its positive impact on educational affairs, it becomes essential to describe, very briefly, its predecessor Web 1.0 to appreciate the drastic differences of each.

Webs 1.0 use basic html (hypertext mark-up language) for publishing content on the internet and are static web pages. They have read-only content, the web master is solely responsible for updating users and managing the content of the website and mass-publishing is not supported. So we find "passive visitors" that search information without contributing or sharing.

Web 2.0 is the so-called "social web" that encourages creativity, communication and networking among the internet users. In this case we find a "read-write" platform in which users are able to interact and communicate. This web is all about social domains such as blogs, podcast, wikis, and the like. Here, we find "active users" who share and receive multimedia information in an ubiquous way. It allows anyone the chance to become authors and start their own blog or drop their opinion on someone else's.

This image depicts what Web 1.0 and Web 2.0 represent

The first reason for including Web 2.0 tools in the classroom is simply because of context. In one of my previous posts I referred to relevance that lies in creating an artificial context for our learners. These tools can help us in our endless search for innovative ways of introducing real and meaningful tasks and activities in our practices.

 Negotiation of meaning is a must for language learning to take place, and this is only possible when there is interaction through real communication. Not only do Web 2.0 tools facilitate interaction by allowing access to varied input but also integrate the four skills. Blogs and wikis, for instance, provide opportunities for reading and writing, whereas videos and podcasts give access to spoken language. Along with the inclusion of the four skills, students’ individual learning styles are also catered. Their integration is much easier by using these tools. For example, graphic applications and videos are a safe way of tapping into visual and auditory styles.

Another crucial benefit is when teachers decide to construct their own material. The amount of tasks, resources, and educational tips available in the web is jaw dropping. Besides, applications are user-friendly and offer step-by-step video tutorials. So, teachers can create their own material, based on the level of proficiency of their class, and if alterations are needed, it can be edited, deleted or expanded on the spot.

Finally, employing these web tools to our teaching can help students become more autonomous and responsible. If teachers ask them to keep a blog, and they also work with wikis and virtual platforms, students can access the information uploaded there anytime and anywhere, thus enabling learners to complete the activities at their own pace. As a result, they have more freedom and they learn how to distribute their time so as to accomplish the objectives proposed by the teacher.

Interesting tools to include in our lessons

Today I bring you Voki an incredible tool that not only can be used as entertainment but also for educational ends. This application allows users to create their own talking character, customize it to look like historical figures, cartoons, animals, and even yourself!

You can give this avatar a voice by recording with a microphone, typing the message you would like to share, or uploading an audio file. Voki characters can be emailed, shared on social media, and embedded on websites! Plus, it is user friendly and it only takes a few minutes to follow the steps.

If you are looking for a twist in your classroom routines, this tool will help you empower activities for your students and break the mould. They can create their own avatars and you can give instructions and assignments in a completely different way. Students will definitely enjoy creating their character and personalizing it to resemble their appearance, and perhaps can help to refresh the activity repertoire they are used to working with.

Here is my Voki, hope you like it!

Another application that we have been working with in ECO II is Wordle, in which you can generate “word clouds” from text that you provide. The clouds give greater prominence to words that appear more frequently in the source text. You can tweak your clouds with different fonts, layouts, and color schemes. The images you create with Wordle are yours to use however you like. You can print them out, or save them to the Wordle gallery to share with your friends. However, saving your wordle in the gallery is not the smartest thing to do, since the amount of "wordles" is overwhelming and yours is bound to get lost any time soon. It is always a better choice to cut it and paste it on "paint" and then you have it among your files.

Despite being a rather simple tool, I think it does wonders when it comes to working with grammar, it also reinforces vocabulary, syntax and lexis. It adds a new dimention to the well-known "word order" found in many books that may result a bit dull. Students have the opportunity to create their own wordles without being limited to what they see on the books and this is advantageous for their autonomy and self-steem.

Let's see if you can tackle my wordle, it is about a popular saying... that is the only hint you will get! 

My experience working with Google Docs

I guess you might be wondering what Google Docs is and why is it used for; I will only explain my personal experience using this service but I do not want to go on about the programme as such, since Gisel Cracco (a classmate) wrote a very appealing article about it and I highly recommend you to read it if you would like to learn about it thoroughly. Here's the link to her post, where you will find valuable information about it along with her own experience that may help you decide whether to try it out or not.  So, this post will be limited to my experience as a user.

This year was the very first time I came into contact with this marvelous service when we had to do a practical work for this subject (ECOII). My group and I could not see eye to eye to arrange a date to team up and start working, plus, the only moment we could all be “present” at the same time was late at night so we were in the middle of a pickle! How on earth could we be all together late at night!? Unless we did a pyjama party… but that was not the point at all. We figured it was high time to change the group dynamics and look for a quick and effective solution: Google Docs was the answer to our prayers.

It is a fact that whenever we are trying something completely new we get this oppressive feeling in the chest and doubts assault you in no time. Luckily, our work developed smoothly without any inconvenience and with the tranquility that we were working separately but strongly connected. Since this programme allows you to create documents which can be edited, shared, and opened by different members of the group at the same time, you can see what the other person is actually doing to the file and all the changes done are saved every time you modify something, that is while you are typing. You can also program it to delimit the access to it and none of the adjustments made to the documents are lost, you can browse through it and you will find past editions.

The only pitfall would be that you need internet connection to use it, but it is a minor defect compared to the immense benefits it comprises. I have no further complaints about this programme, it helps you save a lot of time and the whole getting-together issue is resolved. Besides, you feel freer to write without having to discuss every single sentence and in case you want to have a say in what your partner did, it has a chat where you can talk things over and put things into discussion. In case you need to download the document you have different formats available, making it even easier for you to take it with you. In addition to this, it is “dummy-proof” very easy to use, create and addictive too.

For me it’s an ideal way to work in groups, especially when you have tight schedules and you cannot agree on a day to meet. It saves time, you do not lose information, and you can set the boundaries as regards privacy. 

Teacher-designed materials, give it a try!

Having read the article about designing effective English language teaching materials by Jocelyn Howard and Jae Major, I would like to express my point of view regarding the overall article. Personally, I found it to be practical and applicable to our daily practices and could help us expand our teaching horizons.

English language teachers may choose to construct their own teaching materials to meet their instructional purposes and objectives. They do so by tailoring texts, worksheets and activities to suit a particular level, class-size, learning styles and strategies to ensure students are learning to their maximum potential.

Appealing as it may look, it is quite a demanding task that only a few teachers dare to embark on. It is cognitively challenging since a wide array of factors need to be taken into account, and educational goals should be crystal-clear for their successful employment. It becomes crucial for teachers to recognize and spot the instructional objectives and to establish a well-defined idea of what students should be able to do at the end of the lesson. In other words, the establishment of prior objectives will give you a clear perspective on what you want to accomplish with the group.

Additionally, analyzing the group we are working with in depth to gather information regarding their social status, ethnic origin, and interests will give you well-grounded tips to successful material development. Likewise, bearing in mind the variety of intelligences present in the classroom will provide us with important hints to adapt and tailor the material to enhance the learning process.

One of the first positive aspects of teacher-designed material is that the context in which the learning and teaching is taking place is comprised, whereas commercial material is devoid of meaning and ends up being artificial. What’s more, it is produced in a serial and systematic fashion without contemplating the special features of each context, resulting in a lack of interest and identification with the topics dealt. Something even more concerning is that we learn our mother tongue in a natural context, that is why when it comes to teaching another language it is paramount important to create an artificial context within which we can attribute meaning to the language itself. Language is meaning, and meaning is conveyed through language, so if we do not set the conditions for that, the learning will be hindered.

Another issue that goes hand in hand with the context is the resources available. We may have the possibility of taking full advantage of the vast resources of the institution but at some other times, lessons will be impoverished because of the lack of aids. It is here when the teacher gains importance and his or her creativity is at the heart of it to profit from the material he/she manages to construe. Along with this, teacher-designed material is beneficial for those students who do not have access to commercial goods because of their high prices; it is not directed to a unique sector of society, fostering inclusion.

Teacher-designed material is advantageous for individual needs, as I have explained later on, it allows a more flexible approach and it can be modified and articulated to fit a particular group and attend class diversity. This material is designed in the light of the student’s background, experiences, level, and socioeconomic situation, resulting in a personalized instruction that becomes extremely motivating for the learners and rewarding for the teacher.

Working this way will also assure you up-to-date material that is pertinent and relevant to bring about critical discussions in class, let alone the fact that you will tap into the learners’ interest.

Lack of coherence or organization may be the first disadvantage that teacher-made material has. By adopting this crafty way, we run the risk of losing our focus and moving towards unwanted directions. If we decide to construe something by ourselves, we need to have clear in our mind what we are aiming at, to avoid losing perspective. In this case coursebooks do offer a reliable guidance to the teacher, and it is highly likely that they feel more confident and secure following this framework.

Let us imagine we are teaching the animals to a group of kids. For that reason we have decided to design colorful flashcards that resemble the animals because the ones that the book has are not of your liking. In this case, we need to be mindful since kids tend to touch things a lot (they need to make use of all their senses), you will use those flashcards to play memory games, you can hide them in the classroom and they should find them and this may be counterproductive for the material, it may be damaged. Hence, it becomes indispensable for us to plaster the flashcards and make sure the material we used is a good quality one.

Suppose you have your material ready, you are pleased with it and confident it will work out perfectly, and are planning to use it for next class. There is a remarkably important detail we should not let it pass us by: the instructions. These are the cherry on top, without clear, concise and straightforward instructions we won’t make it too far.

Time is an impediment factor for those teachers who are loaded with work and are running against the clock. It is important to strike a balance between life and work; you also need time for yourself and others. Hard work always pays, but when it comes to the final decision you are the one to weigh up the pros and cons of designing your own material. Nevertheless, whenever possible, we should not hesitate to try and offer our students alternative ways of working.

If you found the topic interesting, here's the link to the complete article

Best regards!

Using Prezi... (For the first time)

If you are fed up with the monotonous aspect of power point, I suggest you to take the plunge and try Prezi instead. I am not trying to underestimate power point as such, it is greatly useful (As I have stated in the previous entry) but if you would like to spice things up a bit, Prezi is certaintly the way to go!

This was the very first time I used it and to tell the truth, I was a bit apprehensive about it since I thought it would be extremely difficult to handle. It just takes a few minutes until you get used to the experience and then is like riding a bike, really. The results are alluring and more glamorous, it is a pleasure to look at, especially the way in which you can arrange the slides to move backwards and forwards; it is completely novel. You are also allowed to zoom in and out, depending on the emphasis you might give to certain things and the display is not linear like in power point but is messy in a lovely kind of way; you can play with it to create the effect you desire and it also has enticing effects to highlight some words and the outcome is surprisingly modern.

We used Prezi for ECO's PW nº 2 and had the possibility of choosing either power point or Prezi. We worked in groups, which made the whole process more "doable" and when we got together we decided on a whim to give Prezi a try. Choosing Power point would have been a much safer choice but it is interesting to move towards unknown directions and be positively surprised. We were supposed to work with a unit called "Girls night out" and to come up with a lesson plan that includes one of these presentations. We thought it would be really interesting to create a Prezi presentation with our own "nights out", including real pictures and customs that we have here in Santa Fe as a contrast with the ones they have in The United States. Our Prezi would be used a model for learners to create their own Prezi with their own stories. I must say it came out wonderfully, and the foremost important aspect of this work was the authenticity implied.

All in all it is worth running the risk of trying new things out, I would definitely use it again for further presentations. We were not able to try it out in a real classroom, but I'm posistive that students would be thrilled to work this way. It is a personalized work, extremely menaingful and enjoyable.

Here I share our Prezi for you to see how gratifying the result is!

Using Power Point Presentations adequately

Using slides are a great way to guide your audience through the main points of your presentation. Slides that are clear and concise will complement, and even enhance, your verbal presentation. However, slides can also become a source of distraction. There is a fine balance between providing enough information so that slides make sense and overwhelming the audience with excessive information.

Let us consider the following tips to capitalize on its use:

1)-Use readable font: make your slides easy to read from anywhere in a room.

-Use bold font for all text on a slide.

-Do not rely on the default settings; they may not be as legible when projected onto a large screen as they are on your computer screen.

-Use contrasting colors for text and background.

-Be consistent, use the same size and color font throughout the whole presentation.

2)-Use key words and phrases: be concise on slides.

-Use bullet points (phrases instead of complete sentences)

-Your slides should guide the reader to your main points: make only three or four points per slide.

-However, include enough information so that the slide makes sense.

3)-Use Charts and Figures: when it is difficult to describe something briefly, display the information in another format.

4)-Keep it simple: too much animation, color, or text will be distracting.

-Use simple design templates or backgrounds.

-Use animation sparingly.

-Keep text out of the slide design.

5)-Talking with your Slides: remember that no matter how great your slides look, content is the most important part of your presentation.

-Use your slides as your outline for the presentation.

-Use the same words in your speech as appear on the slide; this will help the audience follow along.

-Be sure to discuss the text on the slide; try not to make the audience choose between reading the slide or listening to you.

-Reference your information by including citations on slides

-As a general rule, have one slide per minute of presentation (e.g., for a 12 minute talk, have 12 slides)

-Practice your talk so you stay within your allotted time.

We should definitely employ the use of power point presentations or prezi for our teaching practices because it offers the possibility of making your work more attractive and neat (following the above criteria). Instead of making a plain oral speech we could implement this to enthrall our audience and aid comprehension, as long as slides are tidy and clear. Besides, note-taking is improved since the slides state the main points of the topic and people can have a better understanding of the subject matter.

I personally believe that one of the best pieces of advice on the use of power point presentations is to keep it simple, do not overload the slide with words, if so, your audience will switch off at once and the main idea of your theme will be lost. It is always advisable to include images that represent what you are stating and make it more eye-catching.

If the above criteria is too serious and formal for you, take a look at this video that will make you break in two with laughter!

Food for thought: Is it a good website?

Websites can become our ally when teaching and looking for novelty or adding variety to our daily practices, but being assertive on our choices is not something that comes out naturally and  out of the blue. One should be mindful, and foremost important, to be as critical as possible and to browse deeply through it to find any information that may come handy and give us a hint of its credibility and reliability.

This may seem a piece-of-cake-kind-of-task, but it is definitely not. It is time-consuming and also requires our undivided attention, if we want to do it properly. On the other hand, it is highly rewarding and it may be an interesting complement to introduce variety, to shake up routines and it serves as further practice on a particular topic that the teacher wishes to enlarge on, or to extend its practice.

As a complementary part of our subjet ECO, I have been analyzing websites based on a specific criteria, and believe me when I say it is worth every bit of our time. I must confess that I wouldn't have payed attention to the analysis of websites before, in fact, choosing a website for me was something instinctive and directionless; I only cared for the attractiveness of the activities proposed there. After having the chance of revising key features within sites, I have come to the conclusion that we should be consciencious before choosing to work with one.

Some criteria that may be useful to apply:

Accuracy: make sure the athor provides e-mail or contact address/phone number and the institution that published the page.

Authority: If your page lists the author credentials and check URL domain. The ones preferred are: .edu, .gov, .org, or .net.

Objectivity: If your page provides accurate information with limited advertising and it is objective in presenting the information.

Currency:  If your page is current and updated regularly and also if the links (if any) are also up-to-date. Pay attention if the page is outdated or to the amount of dead links present.

Coverage: If you can view the information properly and it is not limited to fees, browser technology, or software requirement, otherwise you will be loosing the opportunity of making the most out of it if you do not have the required sofware to view the information.

 If you use this guideline as a framework for your decision, then you won't run the risk of choosing an invaluable website.

The above criteria also applies to our learners. The internet can become a trap for some children if they do not have a steady direction to follow. It is our duty as teachers to create awareness on this issue and to deliver trustworthy information about it. It is pretty common to see very young children in front of the computer, clicking thousands of webpages every day; then, it is worth asking ourselves: how many of these kids are able to distinguish a safe webpage from a crappy one? the answer is alarming. Consequently, helping them to utilice this magnificent tool is our number one priority and should not be procrastinated. This is the only way of showing them that not all information out there is valuable and that a careful selection of the material existent in the web is needed.

 I leave you this quote which I think should be reminded constantly when in panic!

 "There is no reason to fear the Internet. When used properly with the right precautions educates, positively influences, and provides a creative outlet for today's kids." 

Don Tapscott: "Net Generation"

In the first entry of this blog I have put forward my viewpoint regarding Mark Prensky's article about "Digital natives and Digital immigrants". I have read another author called Don Tapscott who also wrote and did research on the same topic presented, but with the minor difference that he uses another terminology: "The Net Generation" (Shortened to N-geners). I reckoned that it would be quite interesting to reflect upon some ideas that I've gathered from one of his most well-known articles called: "The rise of the Net generation".

I took an excerpt from the article that I considered worthwhile: “The Net generation are children at the heart of the new digital media culture, and whose learning styles and strategies have changed profoundly and dramatically from that of their parents”. I believe it is highly important for us to see that learning strategies and styles are no longer similar to that of former times; hence, we need to move away from the traditional teaching model to a more eclectic and inclusive one. Our learners are more demanding because the world we live in is fast-moving and insists on trends that are hard to crack.

 Furthermore, we should not fight back or resist the network fashion but we should adopt it and apply it to improve our lessons and to appeal students. That is why I think it is advantageous to obserb and be mindful about our children’s strategies to develop lessons that are more fruitful, content-rich, and that contemplate the new learning styles.

Another characteristic the author mentions, is that this new generations are exceptionally curious, self-reliant, smart, focused, able to adapt, high in self-esteem, and has a global orientation. Let alone the fact that the way they get hold of input data is utterly different, and their ability to multi-task has shaken everything known so far.

 This last fragment holds truth only partly, since it generalizes and one cannot take for granted that all kids will have these traits with no exception whatsoever. In the educational field, we encounter individuals of all kinds, some of them may embody the characteristics mentioned above, but some others won’t. This is the moment in which our role becomes important to help learners develop their learning skills, stimulate their intelligences and adjust our lessons to make the most out of their potential.

The “culture of interaction” is another topic tackled within this article, and I do agree with the author in that this generation has the strong necessity of exposing themselves, their passions and interests; it is the Internet the path that makes this urgency viable with only just "one click". This culture, if harnessed, can be a tremendous force in promoting learning.

"When these peoples surf the net, they typically participate in several activities at the same time.” This fragment reffers back to multi-tasking and I must say I have an ambiguous posture towards this topic. It is widely affirmed that this ability is aqcuired by new generations because of the way they access and digest information masively and overwhelmingly. However, it is also fair to say that this ability is somehow connected to maturational factors. Young learners have a more flexible schemata and they subsume information in a larger scale and with hardly any effort than older people, who do not have much "room" left in their shemas and their speed for processing data is fairly weaker. Two plausible theories for one topic, I guess it depends on how we want to see it.

“Another reality is that kids are not fond of pre-digested information, they want (and need) to learn by doing, where they check their own understanding trying things out! and this is how learning becomes experiential, and hence, meaningful and long-lasting.” When I read this passage form the article Brunner came to my mind immediately. We studied Brunner's ideas and theories in Psycholinguistics (a subject of our English teaching programme) and he coined the term "Scaffolding", by which adults or teachers (in our case) should guide the learner or child to discover things by himself. It is precisely this discovery that will have a meaningful outcome for the child and that experience is automatically engraved in his mind, resulting in a long-lasting learning. Having said that, we should consider devicing classroom activities based on problem-solving or simply tasks that pose a challenge to them and that they can resolve by trial and error.

These are some ideas that kept bouncing in my mind...

Hope you find them worthwhile.

Here's the link to the complete article if you feel like reading it! 

Embracing it!

While I was searching the web I bumped into this video and couldn't help but share it with you all.

What drag my attention instantly was that despite being a rather simple presentation, it definitely leaves a message concerning the use of technology inside the classroom. The reality is that the way in which human beings connect each other and exchange information is global, fast, and above all, enjoyable. So, when it comes to teaching and learning one should, at least, wonder if the lessons we prepare are not falling short of ideas or components.

This video also made me recall an instance when I was doing my observations last year, in which the teacher told students to work with an article that contained vocabulary they did not yet know and they were supposed to use the dictionaries from the library. Instead, they used their cell phones as dictionaries; this came as a shock to me since I was quite reluctanct to believe that they could be used as an actual tool to fulfill the activity proposed. My experience at secondary school was a bit different, I remeber being told off if I used my phone in class. Amazingly, I was proved wrong when I saw learners working energetically and enthusiastically looking up the words on the on-line dictionary. That got me into thinking it would have taken ages for them to look for each word in a book-like dictionary, and to tell the truth, the overall task would have been quite boring and time-cosuming as well. The teacher also gave them permission to do the activities proposed while listening to music in a low volume, so as not to disrupt the classroom environment. I considered this behavior to be disrespectful towards the teacher and not appropriate for an institutional context. We are institutionalized human beings because we need to learn certain rules and norms that enable us to live in a dignified and harmonic way; there are places in which we cannot and shouldn't do what we please.

This video illustrates the need for us teachers to articulate our practices by using technological devices together with the fact that we cannot expect to entertain learners and have their undivided attention with a piece of chalk and a blackboard on a daily basis. 

Hope this will get our brains in gear or at least plant the seed of curiosity ;)

Digital Natives Vs Digital Immigrants

To begin with, I would like to briefly describe two terms that have become widely spread: the so-called "Digital natives" and "Digital immigrants".

A Digital native is a person who was born during the introduction of digital technologies and interacts with them from an early age; as a result, they have a greater understanding of its concepts. Computers, e-mails, the Internet, cell-phones and instant messaging are integral parts of their lives. Consequently, the way they manipulate and process information has changed drastically to that of their predecessors.

At the other extreme, we find Digital immigrants who were born before the existence of digital technologies and adopted it to some extent later in life.

I reckon that this dichotomy poses a challenge to teachers who are trying to develop a more comprehensive understanding of the matter to make the most out of these new technologies for teaching purposes. The intended direction towards we are heading is an integrative approach, in which we incorporate these new developments as potencial tools that will foster and enrich learners' educational experiencies. Adopting an apprehensive position is not a viable choice; we cannot rely on traditional teaching as the only way out either. We are seeking to nurture our professional field and to provide high quality education, but above all, we are trying to reach our students, to engage them, and to help them grow up healthily without rejecting their worlds.

 I found Marc Prensky's article about Digital natives and Digital immigrants to be enthralling and quite straightforward on the matter and I would like to have a say and share my humble opinion:

It goes without saying that this concept of "digital natives" cannot , by any means, be overlooked. Personally, I believe it is essential for us, as future professionals, to become aware of the fact that the introduction of digital technologies has provoked drastic changes in the way our students process and deal with information. We shouldn't think of this situation as an impediment for our teaching practices, on the contrary, we should embrace it and make the most out of it, since it can simplify and make the teaching-learning process an incredibly exciting experience for both, teachers and students. Nevertheless, we should be conscientious with regards to its use.

I have selected a fragment from the article that I very much agree with:

"(...) today's teachers have to learn to communicate in the language and style of their students. This doesn't mean changing the meaning of what is important, but it does mean going faster, less step-by-step (...)" I found this part of the article to be connected to what I mentioned above. This idea of trying to be updated to meet the increasing demands of our hectic world, together with the acknowledgement that things HAVE changed and the need to keep pace with these new developments.

And another one which I consider erroneous:

"(...) Digital immigrants don't believe their students can learn successfully while watching TV or listening to music, because they (the immigrants) can't (...)" I do not agree with this passage. I think people need to be less narrow-minded about certain issues; our students skills shouldn't be underestimated, and we should be aware that we are constantly bombarded with information; hence, the way of coping with things will be different. A clear example would be the ability to "multi-task", doing one or more things at the same time. The way in which students approach general data is significantly different from previous generations and the brain structure has changed as well, allowing learners to focus on more than one thing at a time.




If by any chance you want to have a look-see to the whole article here is the link to it:

http://www.twitchspeed.com/site/Prensky%20-%20Digital%20Natives,%20Digital%20Immigrants%20-%20Part1.htm

 These images you see below epitomize the two concepts described in the article above: "Digital natives" and "Digital immigrants".

A pitiful depiction of a Digital Immigrant loosing his head over technology and the Digital native looking at him thinking: "poor  guy... he's utterly technologically impaired"

A clear example of how traditional teaching seems backward-looking compared to nowaday's reality. Reading, as a fine art, is also in decay.