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Although this article is about British language education and it's two years old, my interest was piqued when I read it: ""Languages cannot be taught, they can only be learnt. The best way is to tell students right away that they are responsible for their own learning process, and the teacher is just a guide who has to motivate them."" Made me think about relevancy and how Tech is only one part of that.

Really interesting. I wonder if we changed the setting to the U.S. if the same difficulties would apply. I never really thought about grammar being discarded simply because students don't know it well enough. While I've found that most students we teach don't understand their mother tongue, I still think that the shift to task-based work had as much to do with the lack of real communication skills. Just teaching them grammar and relying on them to go abroad to learn to speak wasn't doing it. That being said, I think the mixture of methods is best, and by mixture I mean the integration of many methods into accomplishing a task. And I agree that the meta-learning is key.

I remember getting a comment from a student once, many years ago, that she had learned more about English grammar in my Spanish class than anywhere else... (sigh)

"The Foreign Language Teaching Forum is an integrated service for FL teachers, dedicated to encouraging communication, sharing, and collaboration at all levels. Our broad discussion topic is foreign language teaching methods for any level of instruction in all languages."

Some good advice for online and hybrid course engagement. One of the comments below says - even for F2F classes! One of the comments also questions the point about responding to all student posts - saying that it's better to let them discuss without you, only adding in occasionally or with a summary or notes in a weekly wrap-up. This "hands-off" discussion method is the route Alyssa and I have taken, what has worked for you?

The goal of OCEP is to provide the academic community with a criteria-based evaluation tool to assess and compare the quality of online courses. The focus of the evaluation is on the presentation of the content and the pedagogical aspects of online courses, yet OCEP also considers the instructional and communication methods so vital in a successful online learning experience. Existing online courses are identified and measured against a set of objective evaluation categories. These criteria were developed through extensive research and review of instructional design guidelines from nationally recognized course developers, best practices from leading online consultants, and from numerous academic course evaluations.

"Abstract Currently, language educators experience difficulties in facilitating oral practice effectively in the foreign language classroom. Regularly, they face introverted and passive learners who fail to embrace speaking opportunities (Poza, 2011), or simply do not find the time to promote speaking practice in the classroom (Meddings & Thornbury, 2009). In this light, many asynchronous computer mediated communication (ACMC) technologies have emerged to confront this situation. However, central research studies do not seem to acknowledge ACMC as viable in accommodating oral development but, rather, frequently attribute this merit to synchronous CMC (Levy & Stockwell, 2006; Kervin & Derewianka, 2011). By employing a mixed-methods approach, this small-scale case study examines, firstly, the extent to which ACMC speaking practices are suitable for language learners' speaking development. Secondly, and by extension, it investigates the salient characteristics of the ACMC tool myBrainshark, that makes it appropriate for fostering linguistic growth. The data is obtained from post-beginner Spanish language learners by means of an online questionnaire and an online structured stimulated recall. The findings show, on the one hand, that ACMC oral practices can be beneficial in developing speaking aspects in lower-proficiency language learners and, on the other hand, that myBrainshark has characteristics that can potentially promote linguistic development. Finally, this paper calls for experimental research on the improvement of oral competency in post-beginner and higher-proficiency learners."

This is a really good suggestion Vivian! It is always nice to have plan B especially when using technology!

The author says that CMC helps in all of these areas, but doesn't provide any information about his sources. I think this shows the value of including links to other websites in blog posts about education!

Good discussion of "authenticity" -- what makes a text authentic or not?

"Authentic" appears to mean: naturally produced by authentic source for communication in a native setting. What concerns me is that the call for "authentic" dates back to perhaps 20 years ago? We are still claiming it is important, yet we scaffold authentic text often to the point that they loose their intrinsic challenge.

"...open access eBook contains 133 chapters with over 850 pages documenting best practices, strategies, and efforts by teacher educators, professional developers, researchers, and practitioners. It is divided into seven sections that address pedagogy, collaboration, field experiences, preservice education methods, professional development, digital tools, and equity issues. Chapters are presented as innovations with supporting materials that could be easily replicated or studied. (v1.02)"

"When it's student-paced, no one gets left in the dust and no one gets bored waiting for the class to move on. HyperDocs are purposefully designed digital lessons and can transform your class. The creators of HyperDocs - Lisa Highfill, Kelly Hilton, and Sarah Landis - describe them as a transformative, interactive Google Doc replacing the worksheet method of delivering instruction, the ultimate change agent in the blended learning classroom. https://hyperdocs.co/about"

"Abstract The U.S. National Educational Technology Plan recommends the need to have a common set of technology competencies specifically for teacher educators who prepare teacher candidates to teach with technology (U.S. Department of Education, Office of Educational Technology, 2017). This study facilitated the co-creation of the Teacher Educator Technology Competencies (TETCs). The TETCs define the competencies (knowledge, skills, and attitudes) all teacher educators need in order to support teacher candidates as they prepare to become technology-using teachers. The TETCs shed light on the roles and responsibilities of teacher educators who address technology within their courses. A highly collaborative research approach was used to develop the TETCs which involved the crowdsourcing of technology-related literature, a Delphi method for expert feedback, and an open call for public comment. As a result, 12 competencies with related criteria were identified. The TETCs should be viewed as a first step in a larger reform effort to better address technology integration in teacher preparation programs. The release of the TETCs provides future research opportunities including, but not limited to, implications for course design, relevant faculty development for teacher educators, and policy implications."

I am fascinated by this notion of "lurking" to describe students/ people on-line who do not respond immediately but take time to read and reflect. Interesting research questions whether this impacts their learning positively and how to assess their learning. Maybe someone can find a better name, too?

google or apple?

The article describes how technology (I took it as one of the terms for media) is important in the foreign language classroom.

I am opening the article and is not showing the highlights. Hopefully it will when I share the article.

A helpful article by Hilda Thomas, published on FluentU. Thomas provides a comprehensive list of online tools that can be used in the language classroom, some of which will be familiar to you from Koning's article. She also suggests resources for teachers interested in flipping their classrooms.