Category: Personal Learning Environment

Developing Targeted Technology Standards for Avenue language instructors, programs, and learners: an initiative of New Language Solutions

Allan, J., Healey, D., Hubbard, P., Kessler, G., McBride, R., Rajabi, S., and Sturm, M. (2024) Developing Targeted Technology Standards for Avenue language instructors, programs, and learners: an initiative of New Language Solutions. TESL Ontario Contact Magazine, 50 (1) 16-30.

Authors of this report in TESL Ontario’s Spring 2024 Contact magazine provide insight to New Language Solutions’ (NLS) approach to developing technology standards specifically targeted to instructors in Canada’s settlement language sector and that will be integrated into NLS’s online teacher training and leadership training. It describes the ongoing activities related to the standards that are intended to create a culture of continuous improvement around technology in learning environments. This includes regular reviews and updates of the standards as needed.

The report gives examples of the collaborative, online process the team used to trim the language in the standards and the performance indicators so they are as direct and clear as possible. The report links to a request form for the full set of standards but it also gives a brief overview of the seven standards along with a fuller example of “Standard 4, about digital literacy and digital citizenship for yourself and your learners.”.

The report outlines the evaluation process the standards followed, lays out the plan that will integrate the standards in instructor training and microcredentials, with the aim of sector-wide, consistent, deep understanding of the standards; and emphasizes ongoing initiatives that will generate data about the impact of the standards on programs.

A list of references is followed by a sample vignette that describes an instructor’s thoughts and experiences as she incorporates the standards into her instruction.

View of Building a Community of Connected ELT Professionals on Twitter

Nicholas, B.,  Avram, A., Chow, J., Lupasco, S. (2018). View of Building a Community of Connected ELT Professionals on Twitter. TESL Canada Journal/Revue TESL du Canada,Vol. 35 (2), pp.166-178.

This article describes the experiences of four language instructors who have created their own personal learning network using  Twitter.  Social media and particularly this platform has allowed these practitioners to bridge distances and to reduce the sense of isolation often experienced by educators. This personal learning network has become an important component of their continuing professional development.  Each describes her experiences in connecting with peers through Twitter and reflects on the benefits of such connections for their professional learning and teaching .practice.  As they put it,

“Although the chats themselves are brief (no more than an hour) and fast-
paced, the ideas generated can lead not just to change in practice but to
professional introspection and reflection.”

 

Retrievable from:

https://teslcanadajournal.ca/index.php/tesl/article/view/1319/1141

 

 

https://teslcanadajournal.ca/index.php/tesl/article/view/1319/1141

The authors of this article are four such educators. Augusta, Jennifer,
Svetlana, and Bonnie met online through a bi-monthly, pan-Canadian Twitter chat, #LINCchat (now rebranded #CdnELTchat, for Canadian ELT chat). Svetlana Lupasco and Nathan Hall were the original co-moderators of
#LINCchat (Language Instruction for Newcomers to Canada), fi rst under the auspices of LISTN (Language Instruction Support and Training Network) and then BC TEAL (British Columbia Teachers of English as an Additional Language). Augusta, Jennifer, and Bonnie were enthusiastic participants who
joined the team some time after the chats were well-established. Jennifer and
Augusta both work in the lower mainland of British Columbia, so they knew
each other professionally. Svetlana is in Ontario and Bonnie, in Alberta.
These four instructors created a supportive professional relationship
online. They knew each other for some time only online, until they all met
for the fi rst time at a BC TEAL conference in Vancouver where they were
presenting together about how they had connected and built a community
of practice on TwiĴ er, having planned and prepared the presentation using
online tools. Each of these ELT practitioners has now been active on TwiĴ er
for a few years, forging collaborative professional relationships and creating
a PLN that has become an essential part of their CPD. PLNs are character-
istically “individualized and user-centered” (Davis, 2015, p. 1553). Svetlana
discusses how she came to discover this user-centred effi cacy of TwiĴ er for

Professional development in CALL: a selection of papers

Goria, C., Konstantinidis, A., Kilvinski, B., & Dogan. B. E. (2019). Personal learning environments and personal learning networks for language teachers’ professional development. In C. N. Giannikas, E. Kakoulli Constantinou & S. Papadima-Sophocleous (Eds), Professional development in CALL: a selection of papers(pp. 87-99). Research-publishing.net. https://doi.org/10.14705/rpnet.2019.28.872

This collection of papers looks at the rise in encouragement to use technology tools in language teaching despite a lack of teacher training and support to integrate these tools in this language classroom. This annotation focuses on Chapter 6, Personal learning environments and personal learning networks for language teachers’ professional development. The specific context for the collection is foreign-language training, but is nonetheless relevant to the settlement language context.

The chapter presents background for, and two case studies that illustrate, the Personal Learning Environment (PLE) and Personal Learning Network (PLN). The chapter describes describes the impact  of the PLE and PLN on the work of participating teachers, their practice and their students’ learning and autonomy. In the first case study, the teacher seamlessly integrates good language teaching practice with mobile phones and instant messaging in the early stages of the learners’ PLEs. This case study also describes other changes that occurred during the evolution of these activities. Both case studies demonstrate how teachers continued to expand and enhance their learning beyond the teacher training program that introduced the PLE and PLN to them.

 

Retrievable from:

https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED593926.pdf