Snow Days!

Dear ChileTeach students,

You wouldn't believe what you are missing! I'm posting some photos here so that you can see what I see when I look out my window. We've gotten a record amount of snow here in Spokane--perhaps 2 1/2 feet since it began snowing on Wednesday. Don't you wish you were still here in Cheney???? By the way, the university is actually closed--it closed today and will be closed again tomorrow due to snow. I hope this finds you all well. I miss you already.

Best wishes,

Gina

Speech for Opening Ceremony of International Week

Dear students,
None of you will be able to attend the opening ceremony of the International Week festival on Monday because you will all be at your middle and high schools carrying out observations. I will be speaking and thought and you might like to see what it is that I will say. You have had a big impact on me this quarter, and you have helped to shape this speech. Enjoy.

Speech for Opening Ceremony of International Week
November 17, 2008
Eastern Washington University

Gina Mikel Petrie


I am going to tell you a story today. It’s a kind of love story. Are you ready? Okay.

The story begins with me. I was raised on a farm in Indiana where my father was born and his father lived before him. Being third generation farmers on this plot made us relatively new. Most families in the area had been farming the same plots of land for 4 or 5 generations. Those who were in their first generation were talked about as the ‘new people’ until their children had children. Multiple paths of immigration had brought all of our families together many many years ago. And, over the years, we had the time to settle in to this place so that it was hard to distinguish families from farms, people from place. I grew up on the same soil my father grew up on. Mine was a farming childhood in which place and identity were interwoven in ways that I struggle today to express. Mine was the knowing of earth of Ernest Hemingway’s soldiers, lying prone, hugging the earth for mere survival. Mine was the knowing of earth of Willa Cather’s children, lying so still in the warm garden sun that they truly believe that they are the pumpkins around them. It never occurred to me that life might be different elsewhere.

One day shortly before I began kindergarten a traveling salesman brought some children’s encyclopedias that he was selling. Hope against hope as I listened quietly from another room, my parents bought the set. One of the volumes was called “Far Away Lands”. This magical volume contained stories and folktales and pictures and information about places that I hadn’t known existed. A new understanding was born in me: that not every place was like my little corner of the world—that not everyone wore similar clothes or lived in houses that looked like our farmhouse. I became fascinated with the idea of far off difference. I would squint my eyes tight as I looked at our back forty acres so that the waving wheat could almost be an ocean and the little parcel of woods at the back of our property could be dreamed into a far off island To travel from the axis mundi—the center of the world—to some other place full of difference became my dream.

Difference came to our little community on the day that Amy arrived in my kindergarten classroom. Amy was one of the orphans airlifted from Vietnam, and this 5 year old suddenly found herself with a new name, surrounded by people who didn’t speak her language and who certainly didn’t look like her—all of us with our German and Irish and Scandinavian immigrant backgrounds. I warily watched Amy from afar, never attempting to interact. We merely stared across at each other when it was our turn to use the teeter-totter together. Over the next couple of years, Amy settled in, learned English, and played a part of all of my memories of activities from those school days. We were in the same Blue Bird troop, then Campfire Girls, and attended endless sleepovers together. Never once did I venture to ask Amy about her adjustment, about her life before, about her struggles. One day in third grade in the afternoon after lunch, I watched as Amy became a naturalized U.S. citizen. Amy had become a part of our WE. She was quietly folded in to our community, and I never gave it any more thought.

The high school I attended was a very popular place for foreign exchange students to spend a year. I often found Swedish or German or Finnish students, for example, in my classes. I had been taught to be polite, and I certainly didn’t want to offend anyone by saying the wrong thing or by showing that I couldn’t understand what someone was saying, so I did what I thought was the right thing. I didn’t interact with them. I kept my distance.

This changed when I met Jarkko Saastamoinen, a senior from Helsinki. Now, you are probably wondering when the love part of this story comes in. Well, it’s coming. However, it’s probably not what you are thinking. Now, it is true that Jarkko was devastatingly handsome and that we began dating and that my heart beat dangerously fast when I saw him. That is all true, but that is not the love I am talking about here. The love began one day after school when Jarkko said something that I couldn’t quite catch. I told him that I had trouble understanding his accent, and then he said the funniest thing to me. He told me that he had trouble sometimes understanding my accent. That was the most ridiculous thing I had ever heard—“But I don’t HAVE an accent!” I half-laughed half-shouted at him. How could I have an accent? Everyone in my ‘we’ spoke just like me. Only people on the outside like Jarkko spoke differently. I was at the center of the English-speaking world.

That night reflecting on what Jarkko had said, something shook loose for me. I suddenly saw that I was not at the center of the Earth, but rather that there was a center of the Earth for ME. The farm was not axis mundi but rather MY axis mundi. The room for new self-concepts was opened up, and flow they did. I breathed in a new perspective of myself, of my culture, of my place, of my language, and I was changed. This is the love that I am here to talk about. The love that gives us the courage to truly hear what others have to say about our differences. The love that gives us the courage to allow transformation of ourselves in the process.

When I went off to college and discovered the presence of a fellow student in several of my courses who I was not able to communicate with because she was deaf and did not read lips, this love led me to make a very different choice than I had made in high school. I signed up to take American Sign Language courses and attempted to use my developing language to speak with her. These interactions took me to places that were at times uncomfortable—learning about an entire culture within our culture that I hadn’t even known existed, learning about the morally-violent injustices that continued to occur in the deaf world, as well as the perceptions of the deaf of the hearing.

Something settled for me then—the joys of learning about difference outweighed any fears that I had had about messy interactions. The possibility of seeing my reflection in the eyes of others overcame the discomfort of not having a ready-made and comfortable script. And that is the moral of my story. That just having difference among us is not enough. It is EASY to dodge the opportunity of difference. We do it everyday. A former international student from Japan, Haruka Nagasaki, once told me that it tired her to show up for class early. It tired her because when she sat down next to other early arrivers, they refused to speak with her. She could feel their discomfort and most of the time acquiesced to what she knew they were silently hoping for—her own silence.

And so, I am not here to bring you good news today. I am not here to congratulate us all on our successful recruitment of students from a variety of cultures and languages or the increasing presence of diverse faculty members among our ranks. None of it means anything if the students sit silently in class waiting for class to begin or the faculty members remain in their offices feeling our disinclination to engage with them.

Expanding the We here is not enough. Just as Amy becoming a citizen, becoming absorbed into that little community was not enough. It doesn’t really change a thing.

What we must seek to do, in the words of new faculty member Darcy Dachyshyn, is to ‘create a more porous I’. We need to be willing to open ourselves to take in the difference, to hear it, to suffer it, to allow it to change us. I am here to challenge you, Eastern Washington University, to step off into uncomfortable territory, and to engage with those around you. Take in every opportunity to breathe in difference and allow it to change you.

Our last day of class...

Here is a picture of us on our last day...

Blogging your way through Teacher Shadowing

Below you will see the same handout that I gave to you in class. It describes the six blog postings that you need to make while you are placed in your internships in schools. Please contact me if you have any questions at any point.

Blogging your way through Teacher Shadowing
A requirement for the Bilingualism and Biliteracy Course
Fall 2008
Dr. Gina Mikel Petrie

What you need to do
Post one entry on your blog on one of the six following topics by each of the due dates.
Do not repeat a topic—you should cover all six by the end of your job shadowing.
When you name each entry, give it a number (e.g. the first one should be called “Reflection 1”) as well as the title of the topic (or one very similar).
Each reflection should be well-thought out and edited for use of standard English.
Gina will comment on your posting on the day AFTER the due date. Keep checking your blogs to see comments.

Due Dates
Reflection 1: Thursday, 11/13, by midnight
Reflection 2: Monday, 11/17, by midnight
Reflection 3: Wednesday, 11/19, by midnight
Reflection 4: Friday, 11/21, by midnight
Reflection 5: Monday, 11/24, by midnight
Reflection 6: Wednesday, 11/26, by midnight

Topics
A topic in language education that I want to know more about
In this topic, describe an area of language teaching or learning that you would like to know more about. It is best if this relates to your current observations. After describing what it is that you want to know, what has triggered the interest and why you want to know, then locate information online about the topic that you believe is helpful. Build the links to the URLs into your blog posting. Explain what these links have taught you. Also, go to our social bookmarking site (delicious.com) and add these links with tags to our site.

A case of effective language teaching
In this topic, describe an example of English instruction that you saw or carried out with a student in your current shadowing assignment that you believe was really effective. Describe it just as the cases that we read (remember Text tour? and Stone Fox?) were described—in clear detail so that we can see what choices were made. Change the names of students and teachers. After describing the example fully, explain why you believe that it was effective. How does it follow (or not follow) the strategies and principles that we’ve been studying?

Websites that might help
Without using a student’s real name, describe an English language learner in your current shadowing assignment that you believe could use some additional help with his/her English in addition to class time. Describe the needs that you believe the student has in learning English and describe these well. Next, go online and search websites (including those designed for English language learners as well as those which are not) to locate some that might be helpful. Put these links in your posting and then describe how you would suggest that the student use them. What effect might the use of these websites have?

Response to a question about English teaching
Go to the EverythingESL.net website maintained by Judi Haynes. Go to the link called “Ask Judi”. Read through the lists of questions that have been posted there by teachers. Locate one that you feel that you have a response to. Carefully compose your response and then Reply to their question. In this blog posting, paste the original question asked by the teacher. Then, paste the response you posted online. Next, describe to us why you responded as you did. What does this tell us about your beliefs about language teaching?

Podcasting my way to mastery of English
Search for a series of audio or video podcasts through iTunes or any other podcasting service that you are willing to commit yourself to using when you return to Chile to continue your own mastery of English. You may choose one series or several. The podcasts may be focused on English (e.g. explicit grammar instruction) or simply be broadcast in English (e.g. about a topic that you enjoy such as pets). Embed the links to several of the podcasts in your blog entry. Explain why you chose what you did. Also, explain how you believe these podcasts will assist you. Finally, explain how you are willing to commit to using them (e.g. frequency, repetition, etc.).

If only he knew…
Do not use any names or identifying details in this blog posting. I want you to reflect on someone you have encountered in your shadowing assignment that you believe is missing some information about how English is most effectively learned. None of us can know everything; all of us have room to learn more. Describe what it is that you believe this person does not yet understand about language acquisition. Explain any relevant theories and research that you are aware of. In addition, search for websites (or podcasts or videos or…) that help support your explanation. Include links to these URLs in the blog posting.


Rubric
Each posting is worth 10 points
Posted to the blog by the deadline: 3 points
Fully reflected upon and described: 3 points
Covers all requirements of topic including links: 3 points
Standard English: 1 point

Pamela, Marian, Sue, Carolina R, Sandra...

...will one of you please arrange the others' contributions for the speech and arrange them for me here? You will need to choose among different translations...

Also, the other 4 of you... please come up with a plan for me. What do I now DO with the speech specifically everyday? Any other activities that I should do?

Best wishes,
Gina

Trick or treating!

Here are the kids--just a few minutes ago.

Draft of my Goodbye speech in English

Here is what I think I want to say. Can you help me learn how to say this in Spanish? Please comment below to help. Read others' comments before commenting. Thanks!


----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hello.
I am an English speaker, and yet I stand before you speaking Spanish.
At least, I hope I am making sense in Spanish.

If I am successful in speaking Spanish to you today, it is because the Chilean students were able to teach me well.
If I fail, it’s their fault! : ) I’m just kidding of course!
There are many factors that impact whether or not students learn language.

And, that’s what we have spent our time talking about here:
How can we as teachers really make a difference?
How can we as teachers teach English so that our students really learn?

So, what have I learned, in addition to a little Spanish?
I have learned about the challenges that exist in the teaching of English in Chile.
I have brainstormed about ways to meet those challenges.
I have been changed by the experience and I thank you for that.

And you, the students, have been changed as well.
I can see changes in your use of technology.
I can see changes in the way that you think about the role of parents in schools.
I can see changes in the way that you think about the use of first languages.
As well as many others.

What we have done together is grow.
And, I expect that we will continue to do so as we stay in contact and help each other.

I wish all of you the best of luck.
I expect great things from you. Great things.
And so do your future students.

Thank you.

Link for ideas for activities involving parents in homework

Here is the link that we'll look at today. It will take you to a site that has ideas and information for including parents in their children's schoolwork.

http://www.csos.jhu.edu/P2000/tips/index.htm

Teaching demo: Using, building on and supporting L1s and C1s

Teaching Demo: Using, Building on and Supporting L1s and C1s
Content Focus: Artifacts
Grade level: 3rd to 6th grade

1. Put objectives on board:
Content objectives: Become introduced to the concept of artifacts; build list of questions that should be asked about artifacts; understand relationship between culture and artifacts; demonstrate understanding of the genre of ‘artifact talks’.
Language objectives: Expand vocabulary with ‘artifact’ and ‘item’ (and possibly ‘antique’ and ‘Cracker Jack’ from my model); use question-formation skills; use general listening skills.

2. Go over objectives.

3. Tell students that today they are going to learn about artifacts because we have a very special school event coming up soon. Ask if anyone has heard of ‘artifact’ before. If so, ask them to tell us what they think it means. Build on this response.

4. Tell students that you brought an artifact of your own today to help them learn about what an artifact is. Hold up the item that you brought. Tell students that you will pass it around twice. The first time, they should each only hold if for a few seconds. Be gentle with it. The second time it comes, they can take longer with it.

5. After each student has gotten to hold it once, tell the students that this item is a very special item in your family. Tell them that museums are full of special items like this but also very different. Each time a new item is found or brought into a museum, the people working there ask questions about it. These questions allow them to find out about the item.

6. Tell the students that you will be glad to tell them about the item, but that they need to come up with the questions that they will ask. Have a volunteer come to the board and lead the class in creating questions.

7. When the class feels that the task is completed, offer both content and structure feedback on these questions so that the following are included: What is it? How is it used? Who owns/uses it? What is its significance? What is its story?

8. Next, allow the students to ask the questions. Answer them by telling about the antique toy that you brought with you.

9. Tell them that the information that you just gave is what is called an ‘artifact talk’. Tell them that each of them will be giving an artifact talk at the Spring Artifact fair that will be held in your school. To do this, they will complete the following steps: a) Look around their homes for something interesting that belongs to the family; b) Ask their parents about the item using the questions that we created; c) Write an artifact talk with your family’s help; d) Memorize the talk with your family’s help. Tell students that our artifact talks will be in English but that the students can use their first languages with their families as they ask about the objects and begin to put the ideas together. Ask for any questions.

10. Give homework: Go home and look for objects. Come with two ideas tomorrow. We’ll talk about the choices then.

Building Consensus with a Group Diagram

Gina is the perfect case study on what works for teaching/learning language. We will now build on our work in class by creating a group diagram that shows the following:

--Gina's goals

--the elements of Spanish that she needs to know to be successful

--the types of activities that will get her there

Please add your email address here (by commenting) so that I can 'invite' you to join the session in creating this diagram. Watch for an email that invites you.

Good luck creating the language learning plan!
Gina

Teaching demo: High expectations

Here is the demo that I'll do today to demonstrate having high expectations for students.

Teaching Demo: Teaching with High expecations
Content Focus: Requesting that a Behavior Stops
Grade level: 2nd-4th grade

1. Put objectives on board:
Content objectives: Learn how people in English ask others to stop a behavior
Language objectives: Become familiar with the vocabulary, stress and patterns of requesting that a behavior stop; Become comfortable creating own statements

2. Go over objectives.

3. Tell students that you have thought about their request to you to talk with the other students who are carrying out behaviors that they don’t like. You have decided that rather than talking for the students, you will help them with the language that they need to do this themselves.

4. Put the following stems on the board. Explain that these are very powerful ways to tell someone to stop. Ask students to think about what might go into those blanks. Put suggestions on the board. Model saying them to the students.
I don’t like it when
It me
I want it to stop.

5. Hand out Jazz Chant “I don’t like it”. Have students turn to Side A. Explain how it works with two ‘speakers’. Read it aloud to the students to model.

6. Have everyone turn to Side B. Explain that Side B shows the stress that it put on certain words. This will help them remember how the sentences sound.

7. Have the class say the jazz chant with you.

8. Put the class in partners. Have each partner take one of the roles of speakers in the jazz chant. Have them chant it with each other.

9. Now, give the students each 5 minutes to write silently at their desks about what it is that they want students to stop doing.

10. After students have done this, have them recreate the jazz chant with their partner so that these new requests are included.

11. At the end of class, partners read their new jazz chants to the class.

12. Homework: Think about the kinds of changes that the students would like to see in the school so that these behaviors don’t happen. Write down ideas. Bring them with you tomorrow. Tomorrow we will write a group letter to the principal with these ideas.


I don’t like it! (Side A)

I don’t like it
When you hit my arm
I don’t like it
When you hit my arm

But why?
It’s no big deal.

It hurts me
It hurts me
And I want it to stop.

I don’t like it
When you make fun of me
I don’t like it
When you make fun of me

But why?
It’s no big deal.

It hurts me
It hurts me
And I want it to stop.

I don’t like it
When you don’t give me a turn
I don’t like it
When you don’t give me a turn

But why?
It’s no big deal.

It hurts me
It hurts me
And I want it to stop.

Are you willing to stop?
It would mean so much to me.
Are you willing to stop?
It would mean so much to me.

Yes. That’s okay.
I won’t do it again.
I’ll stop. I’ll stop.
Let’s just be friends.

I don’t like it! (Side B)

I don’t like it
When you hit my arm
I don’t like it
When you hit my arm

But why?
It’s no big deal.

It hurts me
It hurts me
And I want it to stop.

I don’t like it
When you make fun of me
I don’t like it
When you make fun of me

But why?
It’s no big deal.

It hurts me
It hurts me
And I want it to stop.

I don’t like it
When you don’t give me a turn
I don’t like it
When you don’t give me a turn

But why?
It’s no big deal.

It hurts me
It hurts me
And I want it to stop.

Are you willing to stop?
It would mean so much to me.
Are you willing to stop?
It would mean so much to me.

Yes. That’s okay.
I won’t do it again.
I’ll stop. I’ll stop.
Let’s just be friends.

URLs for the blogs YOU'VE created for YOUR students

I can't believe it---I'm a blogmother! Many of you in the current Chileteach program have opted to create blogs for the 12 or so students that you have been assigned to work with in your mentoring program.

Please provide me with your URL by commenting on this post. I'll look forward to seeing what choices you make.

Also--those of you who choose NOT to create a blog for your students, please write a short comment as well about what you WILL choose to do with the students and how you will communicate with them.

Best wishes,
Gina

Teaching demo: Teaching through social interaction

Teaching Demo: Teaching through Social Interaction
Content Focus: Avalanches
Grade level: 6th or 7th grade

1. Put objectives on board:
Content objectives: Become introduced to the concept of avalanches; begin building ideas about the science of what causes them
Language objectives: Improve focused listening comprehension; Learn vocabulary associated with avalanches including caved in, roared, explosion, swirled, panic, shovels, buried, destroyed, vibrations, jarred; Use skimming skills

2. Go over objectives.

3. Tell students that today they are going to learn about avalanches. Remind them that they have learned about tsunamis and earthquakes already. Ask—how is an avalanche different than a tsunami and an earthquake? How is it the same?

4. Hand out paragraph (cloze passage) summarizing a video clip. Have students look over it and make predictions about what it is going to say.

5. Each person is assigned one of the blanks to be listening for in the paragraph.

6. Everyone watches the video about avalanches: “Forecasting Danger” http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/minutes/q_2418.html

7. After the video, recreate the paragraph with the gained knowledge.

8. Have students open their book to “A New Year’s Party Turns Deadly” about an avalanche in Canada.

9. Explain that the reading is in three parts. The first part tells us what the people experienced right before the avalanche; the second part tells us what people did immediately after the avalanche; the third part tells us what happened in the hours and days afterwards and the cause of the avalanche.

10. Assign 5 students to each part. Quickly skim to gain just enough information to be able to report back on the main ideas in the section.

11. As each group reports, point out the list of vocabulary words on the board as they come up—vocabulary in context.

12. Remind the students that the video said that people are always responsible for avalanches. What does this tell us about the avalanche in Canada?

13: Homework: Read the reading a second time for meaning. Read a third time and answer the comprehension questions on p. 91.


“Forecasting Danger”

Avalanches are becoming more/less common. In the U.S., an average of people die every year in avalanches. Avalanches are made possible because of three factors: terrain, snowpack and . However, avalanches would not occur unless you had . Avalanches happen when a layer of snow lies on top of a layer of snow. Today, scientists are able/not able to measure how weak a snow pack is. It is hoped that people will be able to make better about their activities on snow.

Teaching demo: Teaching language through content

Teaching Demo: Teaching language through content
Content focus: Irony
Grade level: 9th or 10th grade

1. Write objectives on the board.
Content objective: Identify what’s ironic and what’s not. Identify types of irony.
Language objective: Identify language people use to talk about irony; Notice use of tenses to express telling a story/commenting on it.

2. Go over objectives.

3. ‘Remind’ the students that they have been learning about irony in their Literature class. —Here, we are going to continue that discussion in English.

4. Give out the handout listing three traditional forms of irony.

5. Have a student read the first type. Restate it. Check to see if the students understand.

6. Repeat with the second two forms.

7. Hand out the lyrics to a song in which the singer is giving examples of what she thinks is irony. Ask if anyone has heard this song before. (If most students have heard it before, you will only need to listen/watch once. If many haven't heard it, repeat it twice below.)

8. Instruct the students to watch/listen to the video as they look at the lyrics. Begin to notice where the examples of irony are. Note them if you can while listening.

9. Play video.
Alanis Morissette – Ironic http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8v9yUVgrmPY

10. Assign partners. Circle all the individual examples that the singer is using to talk about irony. Then analyze each one. Can you identify any of the types of irony with any of them?

11. Check in with students. Did they find true examples of irony? Discuss. (Most of the examples are NOT irony--just bad luck.)

12. State that the song switches back and forth in tenses. Why? What does this tell us?

13. Now, identify three sentences that English speakers use in everyday speech in the song to talk about irony.

Homework: You can choose one of the following for your homework. Either compose a letter to Alanis explaining what she doesn’t seem to know about irony OR rewrite the song so that it DOES contain instances of irony.

Handout for lyrics:
Alanis Morissette - Ironic lyrics
An old man turned ninety-eight
He won the lottery and died the next day
It's a black fly in your Chardonnay
It's a death row pardon two minutes too late
Isn't it ironic... don't you think?
It's like rain on your wedding day
It's a free ride when you've already paid
It's the good advice that you just didn't take
Who would've thought? It figures!
Mr. Play-It-Safe was afraid to fly
He packed his suitcase and kissed his kids good-bye
He waited his whole damn life to take that flight
And as the plane crashed down he thought
'Well isn't this nice...'
And isn't it ironic ... don't you think?
Well life has a funny way of sneaking up on you
When you think everything's okay and everything's going right
And life has a funny way of helping you out when
You think everything's gone wrong and everything blows up
In your face
It's a traffic jam when you're already late
It's a ‘No Smoking’ sign on your cigarette break
It's like ten thousand spoons when all you need is a knife
It's meeting the man of my dreams
And then meeting his beautiful wife
And isn't it ironic... don't you think?
A little too ironic... and yeah I really do think...
Life has a funny way of sneaking up on you
Life has a funny, funny way of helping you out
Helping you out

Social Interaction

Here is a copy of the handout that I'll be going over today for our work with Chapter 6.

Chapter 6: Learning Take Place in Social Interaction

The key questions/activities that will help us understand this concept:

1. “Learning English is all about deciding to join the English-speaking club.” Explain what this mean and defend the statement.

p. 148-149


2. What theories from second language acquisition can you use to persuade teachers that group work really DOES lead to better language learning and is not just a messy waste of time? Put together a very persuasive speech.

p. 151-154


3. Technology has often led to LESS interation in language classrooms. Why? How can we ‘fix’ this? Create some activities that demonstrate how technology can be used to lead to more interaction.

p. 149-151


4. How could you know if a classroom you were observing REALLY contained social interaction? Create a list of factors that we can look for when we visit classes.

p. 154-156


5. Choose two of the many activities that will lead to social interaction that you can most see yourself using as a teacher in Chile. Describe how these activities work and why they appeal to you.

p. 156-168


6. What is the relationship between problem solving and social interaction? Create an original activity that you could carry out with students in your own future classroom. Describe the activity.

p. 168-173

If you are checking my blog this weekend...

...then please note that Monday's class will be a bit differently than I had said it would be. Here is how we'll spend our Monday:

9:00-9:50 5-7 of us will present our activity demonstrations

10:00-10:30 We will assist ESL students in the English Language Institute to locate sources for their research topics. They know how to find TEXTS (articles, books). What we will do is to help them see if there are any interesting PODCASTS or VIDEOS that might be helpful to them. Get ready to put on your teaching hats! : )

10:45-12:00 The remaining 8-10 of us will present our activity presentations back in Senior Hall.

Everything that I had hoped to have happen on Monday (Flash, etc.) will happen---just at a later date. We will have the Bilingualism Seminar together all through October, November and into December, so we'll get it in. There's so much yet that we haven't done... like Google Docs. We'll get to it...

If you are reading this before Monday, please let the others in our ChileTeach program know...

Best wishes,
Gina

Time to contact our teachers in Chile

Okay... we are at the end of our time in our technology workshop. Now, we need to synthesize what we've learned, apply it and get ready to move on to our Bilingualism and Biliteracy Seminar. What we learned from the Windschutl article that we read is that WHAT TEACHERS BELIEVE determines how much and the ways that they use technology. Simply having laptop computers does not bring about changes necessarily. (Sorry--Technophiles!)

So.... what we need to discover about the teachers who we have arranged to communicate with in Chile is what their beliefs are. Here is what I want you to do: Ask your teacher(s) the following questions. Then, create a new posting on your blog in which you summarize their responses (without their last names). This will give us some information about how open they might REALLY be to technological innovations.

1. What role do you think technology does take/can take in learning? (You are looking to know if they are a technophile, technophobe, instrumentalist, take a critical approach...)
2. What role should the learner take in the classroom?
3. What role should the teacher take in the classroom? (Both of these questions will help you determine if your teachers are teacher-centered or open to learned-centered learning...)
4. What does good teaching look like?

Okay... go out there and connect with your teachers!

The end of our first synchronous CMC chat...

Fabiola Lucay: and now... we are using a different english... a more technological one... haha! Sep 5, 2008 9:44:04 AM PDTfrancisco hauyon: lol Sep 5, 2008 9:44:04 AM PDTCarolina Romero: that is why that tachnology is only a tool, because teachind depond on us, i mean the teachers and the students too Sep 5, 2008 9:44:06 AM PDTSandra Vidal: this a good point, we have to know also how to do classes interesting without technology Sep 5, 2008 9:44:14 AM PDTCarolina collao: al fin entraste ombre jajajajaj Sep 5, 2008 9:44:21 AM PDTfrancisco hauyon: sorry im a little late Sep 5, 2008 9:44:22 AM PDTSandra Vidal: buuuu Sep 5, 2008 9:44:33 AM PDTPaulina Rojas Gonzalez: HOMBRE IS WITH H Sep 5, 2008 9:44:37 AM PDTFelipe Rodriguez: I agree with gina, too... that was the point that i tried to explained... Sep 5, 2008 9:44:37 AM PDTGina Petrie: ...you are on Chile time, no? : ) Sep 5, 2008 9:44:38 AM PDTClaudio Araya: huuuuyyyy Sep 5, 2008 9:44:41 AM PDTCarolina Romero: uh Sep 5, 2008 9:44:42 AM PDTfrancisco hauyon: yeah Sep 5, 2008 9:44:46 AM PDTJuan Reyes: ce ache i Sep 5, 2008 9:44:58 AM PDTfrancisco hauyon: chi Sep 5, 2008 9:45:11 AM PDTGina Petrie: So.... if grades are what motivate students, what motivates TEACHERS???? Sep 5, 2008 9:45:13 AM PDTJuan Reyes: a better education Sep 5, 2008 9:45:33 AM PDTPaulina Rojas Gonzalez: TO HELP THEM AND TO SEE THIR PROGRESS Sep 5, 2008 9:45:38 AM PDTfrancisco hauyon: mmm Sep 5, 2008 9:45:39 AM PDTCarolina collao: the good grades that students get Sep 5, 2008 9:45:42 AM PDTCarolina Romero: salary Sep 5, 2008 9:45:48 AM PDTClaudio Araya: the success of the students Sep 5, 2008 9:45:51 AM PDTfrancisco hauyon: money is not the answer really Sep 5, 2008 9:45:52 AM PDTJuan Reyes: not only Sep 5, 2008 9:46:00 AM PDTGina Petrie: Are teachers rewarded or punished if students do not succeed? Sep 5, 2008 9:46:04 AM PDTPilar Escalona: no Sep 5, 2008 9:46:10 AM PDTSusana Valladares: to watch how your students improve their language Sep 5, 2008 9:46:12 AM PDTFabiola Lucay: Something that motivates teachers is to see the improvement of their students!!!!!!!!!!! Sep 5, 2008 9:46:16 AM PDTfrancisco rojas: I agree with you hauyon Sep 5, 2008 9:46:20 AM PDTPaulina Rojas Gonzalez: I THINK SALARY IS TOO LOW FOR TEACHERS IN CHILE Sep 5, 2008 9:46:21 AM PDTCarolina collao: their progress, their good marks because these mean that students are learning in some way Sep 5, 2008 9:46:34 AM PDTJuan Reyes: sure,add to the facebook group Sep 5, 2008 9:46:41 AM PDTJuan Reyes: a better salary Sep 5, 2008 9:46:51 AM PDTPaulina Rojas Gonzalez: SO I DON'T THINK THAT SALARY IS THEIR MAIN MOTIVATION Sep 5, 2008 9:46:52 AM PDTPilar Escalona: but some of them are still motivated, even if they do not have enough money Sep 5, 2008 9:46:55 AM PDTGina Petrie: Why do you want to teach? Sep 5, 2008 9:47:06 AM PDTCarolina collao: i agrre with pilar Sep 5, 2008 9:47:12 AM PDTfrancisco hauyon: !!!! Sep 5, 2008 9:47:14 AM PDTPaulina Rojas Gonzalez: I AGRR WITH PILAR Sep 5, 2008 9:47:15 AM PDTClaudio Araya: but it is not a matter of money... Sep 5, 2008 9:47:17 AM PDTPaulina Rojas Gonzalez: AGRY Sep 5, 2008 9:47:20 AM PDTFabiola Lucay: Money is not the main problem... Sep 5, 2008 9:47:21 AM PDTfrancisco hauyon: what a question! Sep 5, 2008 9:47:26 AM PDTfrancisco rojas: to make a change in students' lives Sep 5, 2008 9:47:51 AM PDTPaulina Rojas Gonzalez: AGREE!!!! Sep 5, 2008 9:47:52 AM PDTSusana Valladares: because many students need our help Sep 5, 2008 9:47:59 AM PDTJuan Reyes: because we know that we can improve our educational system,guiding our students Sep 5, 2008 9:48:29 AM PDTSusana Valladares: knowledge, frendliness.... Sep 5, 2008 9:48:30 AM PDTCarolina collao: i want to teach because i like english and i trhink tghat english language is really important, it is predent even in other cultures and in daily activities in everywhere Sep 5, 2008 9:48:40 AM PDTClaudio Araya: emphaty Sep 5, 2008 9:48:41 AM PDTCarolina Romero: i would like to teach in order my students can be good people Sep 5, 2008 9:48:44 AM PDTPaulina Rojas Gonzalez: THE FOOTBALL MATCH IS ON SUNDAY!!! Sep 5, 2008 9:48:46 AM PDTSusana Valladares: YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS Sep 5, 2008 9:49:01 AM PDTCarolina Romero: yes Sep 5, 2008 9:49:03 AM PDTPaulina Rojas Gonzalez: BY THE WAY... Sep 5, 2008 9:49:06 AM PDTFabiola Lucay: want to teach to improve the future of my country and consequently the world's future Sep 5, 2008 9:49:07 AM PDTSusana Valladares: 6 O CLOCK Sep 5, 2008 9:49:07 AM PDTPaulina Rojas Gonzalez: YEP Sep 5, 2008 9:49:12 AM PDTJuan Reyes: se van a coserse los brasilenos Sep 5, 2008 9:49:17 AM PDTSusana Valladares: at Streeter Hall Sep 5, 2008 9:49:17 AM PDTPaulina Rojas Gonzalez: COSERSE? Sep 5, 2008 9:49:29 AM PDTJuan Reyes: ? Sep 5, 2008 9:49:33 AM PDTJuan Reyes: jaja Sep 5, 2008 9:49:35 AM PDTfrancisco hauyon: choripan bailable pre match! Sep 5, 2008 9:49:36 AM PDTClaudio Araya: carolina romero .. are you going to teach your stds moral values too? Sep 5, 2008 9:49:36 AM PDTPaulina Rojas Gonzalez: WHAT'S THAT? Sep 5, 2008 9:49:37 AM PDTPilar Escalona: choripannnnnnnnn Sep 5, 2008 9:49:43 AM PDTCarolina Romero: yes , why not Sep 5, 2008 9:49:48 AM PDTfrancisco rojas: oe jc tirate un c ahche i Sep 5, 2008 9:49:50 AM PDTSusana Valladares: SHiii po de mas Sep 5, 2008 9:49:51 AM PDTSandra Vidal: pan con ensalada para mi Sep 5, 2008 9:49:52 AM PDTPaulina Rojas Gonzalez: CHORIPAN? AUSPICIADO POR PANCHO AND PILAR??? Sep 5, 2008 9:49:56 AM PDTPaulina Rojas Gonzalez: >) Sep 5, 2008 9:50:01 AM PDTJuan Reyes: dale Sep 5, 2008 9:50:01 AM PDTSusana Valladares: jaja Sep 5, 2008 9:50:02 AM PDTPilar Escalona: shia Sep 5, 2008 9:50:02 AM PDTFelipe Rodriguez: pa mi una aguita de menta :( Sep 5, 2008 9:50:05 AM PDTJuan Reyes: atencion barra Sep 5, 2008 9:50:05 AM PDTPaulina Rojas Gonzalez: A VERSHHH Sep 5, 2008 9:50:14 AM PDTSusana Valladares: YA PO Sep 5, 2008 9:50:24 AM PDTfrancisco hauyon: so Sep 5, 2008 9:50:31 AM PDTJuan Reyes: c h e Sep 5, 2008 9:50:33 AM PDTfrancisco rojas: dale Sep 5, 2008 9:50:34 AM PDTJuan Reyes: ney Sep 5, 2008 9:50:38 AM PDTJuan Reyes: cheny Sep 5, 2008 9:50:41 AM PDTPaulina Rojas Gonzalez: HAHAHA Sep 5, 2008 9:50:50 AM PDTFelipe Rodriguez: cheney? Sep 5, 2008 9:50:52 AM PDTJuan Reyes: osea cheney Sep 5, 2008 9:50:54 AM PDTGina Petrie: Okay... are we ready to talk f2f? Sep 5, 2008 9:51:13 AM PDTPilar Escalona: yep Sep 5, 2008 9:51:22 AM PDTFabiola Lucay: mmmmmmm Sep 5, 2008 9:51:22 AM PDTSandra Vidal: ;) Sep 5, 2008 9:51:25 AM PDTFabiola Lucay: may be Sep 5, 2008 9:51:26 AM PDTJuan Reyes: sure Sep 5, 2008 9:51:27 AM PDTPaulina Rojas Gonzalez: FACE TO FACE.. Sep 5, 2008 9:51:29 AM PDTPaulina Rojas Gonzalez: :( Sep 5, 2008 9:51:33 AM PDTJuan Reyes: or not? Sep 5, 2008 9:51:33 AM PDTClaudio Araya: gina... are you ready to beging learning spanish? Sep 5, 2008 9:51:43 AM PDTPaulina Rojas Gonzalez: JUST JOKING Sep 5, 2008 9:51:44 AM PDTfrancisco rojas: yeah Sep 5, 2008 9:51:44 AM PDTFabiola Lucay: this is funny! Sep 5, 2008 9:52:05 AM PDT

Social Bookmarking

Hurrah! We've created our own social bookmarking site. Go to del.icio.us or delicious.com and look for chileteach. All of you in the Chileteach program have the password to get in and make changes. What we have so far is tremendous!

I envision the use of social bookmarking as useful to you in several ways. First, it is a way for us to keep track of the places that we have been to as a group or have found as individuals as we have been learning about language technology together. Second, it is a way for us to stay connected once you return to Chile and can be yet another tool for you to continue to develop your English skills. Finally, social bookmarking itself could be a classroom tool that you use with your students. If the students in your class are learning about... say... mammals... and you all go online (together or separately) and locate good useful websites about mammals, then you can put your list together easily as a class. Also, when students are reading on a website (especially in English!), they will have to understand the key elements of what they are reading--the significance and the details--to be able to create good 'tags' for the bookmark. It's a good reading and writing activity for language learners!

See the article below for more information about tagging and social bookmarking with language learners. It's an 'Emerging Technology' article on the Language Learning and Technology journal website.
http://llt.msu.edu/vol10num2/pdf/emerging.pdf

Model Posting: Podcasts worth using...

Here is a model of the type of posting I would like you to create in class today. Please create four categories like those I have created below. Then, add at least one podcast or podcast idea (#4) to each one.

1. Podcasts that I as an EFL teacher could use to continue mastering English

2. Podcasts that I believe would be helpful to assign to my students

3. Podcasts that I would like to assign to Gina to assist her as she learns Spanish

4. Podcasting ideas that I have.... Podcasts that I could create for my students

Favorite Podcasts for ESL/EFL

In class on Tuesday, we'll talk about podcasting for ESL/EFL. Here are some of the places that we'll go in our discussion:

6-Minute English (BBC)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/podcasts/how2/

ESL Podcast Blog
http://www.eslpod.com/website/

Simple English News
http://www.simpleenglishnews.com/

ESL Podcast (Center for Educational Development)
http://www.eslpod.com

Fun English Lessons (Video)
http://www.china232.com

Let's see what you can find that you might find helpful to either continue your development of your own English or to assign to your students in Chile.

How can we support EFL students with writing?

As I mentioned in class, writing in a second or foreign language is a difficult task. It's challenging to find the words and grammar to express what you want to say. We have looked at two very different technologies today to help motivate and assist students with this process: Wordle and Inspiration. How do you as a teacher plan to motivate and assist your students--both WITH technology and WITHOUT it? Please put your comments here.

On a personal note: A few pictures...

Here are a few pictures. The youngest three kids just had their school pictures taken. And, here's a photo I took of our house this summer and a photo of my husband with his car.

Where our Blogs are

Below is a list of all of our blogs in the ChileTeach program at EWU. Check in with each person's blog below on a regular basis so that you can watch the development. Enjoy!

Sue: http://susanachileteach.blogspot.com/
Pamela: http://pamelachileteach.blogspot.com/
Carolina R: http://cromeroabarca.blogspot.com/
Francisco H: http://fhauyon.blogspot.com/
Carolina: http://carolinateachings.blogspot.com/
Abbie: http://abbielucay.blogspot.com/
Claudio: http://floricuervo.blogspot.com/
Pilar: http://ewusemester.blogspot.com/
Francisco: http://learninginthestates.blogspot.com/
Paulina: http://pauinewu.blogspot.com/
Nina: http://learningfaraway.blogspot.com/
JC: http://juankspace.blogspot.com/
Marian: http://marianelace.blogspot.com/
Felipe: http://studyinginewu.blogspot.com/
Sandra: http://sandrainus.blogspot.com/

Reflection #1 on a language tech article

Leverett, T. (2006). This is your class on weblogs. Teaching English with Technology, 6 (3). Available online: http://www.iatefl.org.pl/call/j_tech25.htm

Since I am kicking off our creation of blogs at the same time that I am modeling for you the type of reflection that I would like you to write about the articles that you find, I thought it would be interesting to begin with an article that discusses the use of blogging with our students. The citation for the article by Thomas Leverett is above in APA. (Try your best to follow this model.)

The author of this article is reporting on the use of blogging with ESL/EFL students at the university at which he is located--Southern Illinois University.

The author reports that blogging with language learners brings about three positive effects. First, he says that by blogging, students gain access to the 'real' authentic English-speaking communities that they wish to be a part of. This is far more authentic than simply having their essays read by the teacher of a course. Second, he reports that students gain an understanding and comfort with the connectedness of the new media. Students learn to easily access new information to link to on their blogs and to skim large amounts of information and then synthesize it for inclusion in their blogs. Finally, blogging improves the relationships between students and teachers. How? When students write for teachers, they are really writing for the grade they can 'win' from the teacher. This sets up an adversarial relationship, according to the author. However, when students are writing for a larger audience, the teacher becomes a support person whose comments and suggestions might be more likely to be seen as helpful rather than critical.

The author states that weblogs are used in many ways in the program. For the lower levels, students gather information from a variety of sources about a topic and then publish what they have found on a weblog. In addition, the program newsletter is now a weblog. The newsletter was always meant to be accessed by friends and family of the students in the program; it is now accessible by everyone. At the higher levels, students publish their final writing products for their portfolios on their blogs.

As I mentioned in class, I subscribe to the 'critical approach' to language technology (Warschauer's term). For this reason, the most interesting elements in this article are about the changes in relationships and the changes in processes that come about through blogging. The author states, "...the most profound change in their learning is simply that they are opening themselves up to public scrutiny at the same time they are learning English..." (n.p.) I am extremely interested in how the language learning process is made visible or invisible through the use of technologies. What follows below is an excerpt from an article that I wrote in which I talk about this phenomenon.

"The 1990s movement to publish student work on the Internet and use the Internet for group collaboration brought new levels of publicness to language learning. Even now educators are reconsidering the effects of language teaming in a public environment. What do learners experience when they produce language in a venue open to the entire class or to the public? Sengupta (2001) found that Taiwanese EFL students discussing course content on an electronic bulletin board were uncomfortable with the knowledge that anyone in the course could read their writing and would be able to for some time. The public and stable nature of their writings affected what and how they wrote online. Aware that the public nature of the online arena may affect students, language teachers need to take closer note of the cultures they create in their online classrooms. CALL professionals must become sensitive to issues of publicness, rethinking which traces of language learning they leave for the public and which they erase. Effective teachers keep in mind that learners need time for reflective language development and are wary of online discussion technologies that allow learners very little privacy such as those that show everything learners type as they are typing it (see Pellettieri, 2000). Inequalities, such as the teacher's being able to delete threaded messages whereas students cannot, should also come under scrutiny. Another consideration about the public nature of online language development is the limelight it puts on our students. Some aspects of their identities may be highlighted; others may recede into the shadows, leaving our online communities poorer for the loss."

Now that those of you in the ChileTeach program have read my response to Leverett's article, I would like you to think about how you might use blogging in your classrooms in Chile and what the impacts (intended or unintentional) might be.