Author: Pearson

Uses of Technology:
Sharing Resources with Students

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Sharing learning resources with students is a great way to utilize technology in language teaching.[i] Like a lot of teachers, I compile resources that I find that I think will be suitable for my students to utilize as they try to challenge themselves outside of the classroom. And I’ve organized my resources into a kind of mind map[ii] that enables me to locate the kind of resource I might recommend to any particular student or any particular class. Now I wasn’t always so generous and certainly not always so organized in the ways that I recommended resources to students. In fact, I was probably very conservative about protecting resources rather than sharing them early on in my career.

I’d like to share with you a story of how my perspective on this began to shift. Continue reading →

Using our Brains:
TEACHING WITH MULTIPLE MODALITIES

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Sarah Lynn

“Our senses are designed to work together, so when they are combined . . . the brain pays more attention and encodes the memory more robustly.”

                                                                                            ~ Medina 2014
Multimodal Learning

Study after study show that memory improves when more than one sense is stimulated at the same time. The early pioneer in multimodal learning, Edgar Dale found that people learn better from pictures and words than from words alone. In more recent years, Richard Mayer has established that learners who receive input in a variety of senses have better recall than learners who receive input that is only visual or auditory. Hear a piece of information, and three days later you’ll remember 10% of it. Add a picture and you’ll remember 65%. (Medina 2014)  Furthermore, people who receive information via multiple modalities are more creative in their problem solving by 50% to 75% (Newell, Bulthoff, Ernst 2003).

The ultimate expression of simultaneous and multimodal learning is learning by doing.  When we learn by seeing and hearing, we remember 50% fourteen days later.  But we remember 90% if we actually experience it.  (Dale 1969)   This means that simulations, such as role plays, are very effective in helping students remember the new language they learned. Continue reading →

Reasons for Using Technology

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By Michael Rost    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VjX8Nff0U8QV

Video Script:

I use a lot of technology in my teaching now, but this hasn’t always been the case.[i] In fact, when I first started out teaching a number of years ago in West Africa in the Peace Corps, I had zero technology effectively. My main technology was chalk. I had white chalk, I had a blackboard, and I even had some yellow chalk to emphasize things. Continue reading →

Out of the Shadows, Into the Classroom:
Executive Action on Immigration and the Impact on Adult Education

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2014_BillBlissBill Bliss

President Obama’s recently announced executive actions on immigration have a potentially significant impact on many of the students we serve. The actions include expansion of the population of young people eligible for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, implementation of a new Deferred Action for Parental Accountability (DAPA) program for the parents of U.S. citizens and permanent residents who have been present in the United States since January 1, 2010, waivers from deportation for spouses and children of permanent residents and for children of U.S. citizens, and proposed changes to immigrant visa policies to expand opportunities for skilled workers and entrepreneurs. READ MORE

Applying the FLIP – Part 2

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SCAD Language Studio ? Professor Christina Cavage, Human Resources headshot, Fall 2013 ? Photography by Stephanie Krell, courtesy of SCADChristina Cavage

Like many of you, I am bombarded on a daily basis with ESL and education “news” from a multitude of sites. There are a few I breeze over, and others that I really pay attention to. One that has me stopping and thinking on a weekly basis is te@chthought.com. For those of you who may not be familiar with te@chthought, it is a vibrant website that is committed to providing resources for the 21st century teacher. Personally, I love the site because it really holds true to its mantra: learn better.

I recently came across a great article that reinforces what I believe about a good blended or flipped model. The article highlights the difference between using technology in the classroom and integrating technology.
UsingTech

While many of us are simply trained to use technology in the classroom, few of us are trained to effectively integrate this technology in a planned and purposeful way into our students’ learning experiences beyond the classroom walls. This integration of technology transitions us nicely into our discussion on the next two pillars of a FLIPped model: Intentional content and Professional educators. Continue reading →