DO YOU THINK TECHNOLOGIES (e.g., VIDEOS, COMPUTERS, ETC. ) SHOULD PLAY A CENTRAL OR A PERIPHERAL ROLE IN SECOND LANGUAGE TEACHING AND LEARNING? WHY?

 

 Yes, I do. I think technologies in general have come to our lives to facilitate our teaching as well as   to help us as teachers to lead our students and make the learning process easier and funnier for them. Furthermore, the teaching process has become a bit less monotonous and boring for our students because they are nowadays more exposed to technology, which is such a great outcome when teachers do love what they feel.

Nowadays, students are more exposed to technology, so we should take advantage of such fact and use technology as a tool in order to make our teaching methods different and more interesting

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 I think using technology is truly useful and effective whenever we teachers develop any topic with any level of students. Nevertheless, using technology (radio, television, VCR, computers) has been revolutionary in the overall context of human interaction. For instance, there are some people who complain about the internet because they consider it is a bit of a waste to use it. In addition, there are some teachers who still complain about using technology because they might not be able to aim technology towards education. Such teachers do not see that technical capabilities may be implemented for pedagogical purposes of the second language teaching. 

Technologies should play a central role in second language teaching and learning because students need to feel motivated in every single class, so a teacher needs to use variety of activities and ways to teach in order that the students enjoy their learning process instead of getting bored. Technological resources such videos and podcasts are such an amazing aid for both teachers and students´ learning. I have noticed in my classes that when I have used such aids like the ones mentioned previously, my students have shown an active and positive attitude and they have been more willing to participate and get involved in every activity.

Also, on the Internet it is easier to find different practices for different levels as well as it is easier to find warm ups, songs, and games focused towards the learning process.

If teachers want to succeed in their classes, they should begin including new technology when planning their lessons. That surely will empower their classes and also will make them feel satisfied at the end of it. They will get awesome outcomes.

Don Knezek, the CEO of the International Society for Technology in Education, compares education without technology to the medical profession without technology.
“If in 1970 you had knee surgery, you got a huge scar,” he says. “Now, if you have knee surgery you have two little dots.”
According to him, technology is helping teachers to expand beyond linear, text-based learning and to engage students who learn best in other ways. Its role in schools has evolved from a contained “computer class” into a versatile learning tool that could change how we demonstrate concepts, assign projects and assess progress.
Despite these opportunities, adoption of technology by schools is still anything but ubiquitous. Knezek says that U.S. schools are still asking if they should incorporate more technology, while other countries are asking how. But in the following eight areas, technology has shown its potential for improving education.


TECHNOLOGY IS SUCH AN ENORMOUS RESOURCE FOR IMPROVING OUR STUDENTS´ LEARNING AND OUR OWN TEACHING AND LEARNING.

MEETING THE INSTRUCTIONAL OBJECTIVES- REFLECTION ON MY LESSONS

 

One of the classes I have recently taught was more successful than what I had expected it was going to be.  Fortunately, the instructional objective was met. But, how do I know if my students learned what was intended? Actually, it surprised me because they were so willing to participate and to answer every single question I asked them. Moreover, they showed me a very positive attitude and it really pushed my bottoms to go even further as a teacher the next class, so that was such an amazing outcome that made me notice they learned what was intended.

The students were productively engaged because they were constantly asking different questions about the topic. Furthermore, they seemed to be enjoying the class as well as they were learning something new for them. I used varied activities such as performing a dialogue in pairs and filling in the blanks. Surprisingly every pair group participated eagerly and actively.

The tutor teacher had already given me a lesson plan for me to work on; however, I rearranged it and did my own lesson plan in order to organize better my class and in order to feel more confident with it. The instructional plan I did was full of activities which were focused on my students learning. I had to make several changes such as including controlled practices, semi-controlled practices, and free practices so as my students to learn the topic more easily. I decided to somewhat alter the instructional plan at the end of the class because there was an activity that did not work as I wanted, so I did such activity in a different way. Then, the activity was great and I consider it was worthy to alter my instructional plan a little bit.

It would have been greater if I had used more complex practices because I did not developed my lesson plan helping my students to develop the four skills speaking, reading, listening, and writing. Using some listening comprehension practices would have enhanced my instructional lesson.

Finally, if I had the opportunity to teach the lesson again to the same group of students I would some things differently. I would assign some homework assignments to my students and set the use of the language in different situations because in that way I could measure if they are ready to use the language in different contexts. I would also include more oral practices so that my students could improve and empower their speaking skills. In fact, I would focus on the development of my students’ speaking skills since they are not accustomed to communicate in English among each others.

I do want to do my best in order to be such a learning source for my students. I really care about their learning and even though I still make several mistakes as a teacher I try to improve them every single day. I want to be such a trace in my students’ lives.

WHAT DO YOU THINK IS THE ROLE OF RESEARCH IN IMPROVING OUR UNDERSTANDING OF TEACHING?

I consider that since we are teachers, we must be researching, reading, and enriching our knowledge so that we are able to lead our students every time we teach them. Many teachers mistakenly believe that being a teacher is just a matter of going to the classroom and limiting their teaching to prepare their classes based on a book or a lesson already established by the Minister of education instead of going further and empower their lesson with information from other sources such as the Internet, other books, magazines, journals, and blogs from different teachers. Also, it is important that teachers interchange experiences with other colleagues.

                

The role of research is definitely to guide and lead us as lecturers or teachers to be such great inspiration in our students lives; however, the most important rol of research is to help us improve our understanding of teaching. It is really obvious that the more we teachers read and research, the better conception we will have about teaching. For instance, when we taught for the first time, we had to read about the topic we were going to teach about, and we tried to prepare ourselves to such moment so that we could give the best impression to our students. Now that we have already certain experience as teachers, we need to be constantly studying and reading a lot in order to make our performance even better.

                                             

 Teachers must be refreshing and improving their teaching methods every single day. There are some cases in which the students know more than their teachers because those teachers are always procrastinating all the things they should already be doing so as to understand what teaching really means.

The role of research in improving our understanding of teaching is also to be aware of how well and effective our teaching is. We as teachers should be always critizising our own teaching, evaluating ourselves,and measuring if we are fulfilling our students needs. In fact, nowadays students are free to express their ideas and they may be so demanding that we will need to be ready in case they try to dare us to know every thing they want to learn.

                                        

There are sometimes that one student from your class asks a difficult question and tries to dare you or challenge you to know and give the answer instantly. So, we as teachers should be ready to surprise our students and let them trust in what we are teaching.

Research is so important in our understanding of teaching because it helps us understand what resources are required for teaching a particular topic or discipline. Moreover, research helps us to achieve the desired outcomes in pedagogy, helps us to understand strategies and methods to use in teaching a particular subject, helps us to understand the learners’ attittudes towards the disciplines so as to identify the appropriate strategies, and helps us to understand the knowledge and skills our students need.

In addition, research helps teachers to create an appropriate learning environment and helps them to be able to utilize it fully. The role of research facilitates teachers to establish existing problems and offer solutions for the wellbeing of the communities attached to the institution for which they work. Thus, students will want to have an extent knowledge as their teacher, so they will consider their teacher as their role model.

WHAT EXPERIENCE DO YOU HAVE OF LEARNING A SECOND OR FOREIGN LANGUAGE? HOW WOULD YOU CHARACTERIZE THE TEACHER'S TEACHING METHOD? HOW EFFECTIVE DID YOU FIND IT?

The first time I began to study English was completely dissapointing  for me. It was when I began to  study middle high school. I was 12 years old, and at that time I was so interested in learning English because I had always wanted to learn it. Unfortunately, my first teachers were not so good and creative; as matter of fact, they did not leave a trace in my life as it should have been. I just rememeber few words, but I did not enjoy the classes  as I would have liked. Then, the next year was even worse. The English teacher I had that year was good and very creative; nevertheless, he almost all the time had other things to do, and that year all the teachers were attending to some  courses related to computers, so the teacher missed clases with us very often and as a result,we did not learn more than few vocabulary.

Some years later, since I loved English, I decided to study my major, Licenciatura en Idioma Ingles opción enseñanza, so from the very begining I promised to be the great teacher I could not have when I was younger. Once we began the first semester, I tried to do my best at the university; however, I did not succeed. Why did not I succeed? I did not succeed not because of the teachers I had at that time but because I had not been taught the way I needed. When I began studying at the university, I realized that my preevious teachers had not done a good job, so it affected my learning process. I could not understand almost anything. Whenever the teachers asked me something in English I was so afraid and ashamed for I was not able to answer their questions in English. I did feel so frustrated because my other classmates did understand the language; meanwhile, I was totally lost and felt as if I was the only girl who did not know anything in my class. Later, when I entered to to university, everything changed in my life. My English teachers have been awesome. I have enjoyed every single class and I have learned and improved my English a lot. I can say teachers at the university have been such a great help for me to acquire the second language

At the begining Learning a second or foreign language was too difficult for me and I really would have liked to have better teachers at school so that It had not been like that. Now, as a teacher, I want to be the best and to be such a role model for my students so that they can face any situation at the university and they can have great job opportunities in the future.

Probably, my first teachers’ teaching method did not work with me. They may have lucked more creativity, a better and more organized lesson plan, and the desire to change their students’ lives. I chararterize their teaching method as poor and boring. I do not find it so effective for some reasons. For example, they made us to just repeat the vocabulary and write it down on our notebooks. However, they did not warn us top ut the language into practice. We almost never did dialoges nor did we have any listening activities. So, in order to be effective, their teaching method should have had a well organized lesson plan and more creative didactics material. In fact, They almost never used any didactics material.

Teachers surely should care about their students outcomes from the very begining of the teaching period so that they can stablish good objectives in order that their students learn. All teachers should have a purpose mainly led towards their students; especially, when they teach a foreign language to students who are studying the foreign language for the first time.