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Content Type: 1
Title: First Experience with Storytelling
Body:
From https://workingtowardproficiency.blogspot.com/2019/03/my-first-experience-with-storytelling.html
This Spanish teacher shares his experience about the power of teaching proficiency through reading and storytelling. He used an authentic video to teach about self-esteem and stereotypes. This teacher also talks about scaffolding his lesson and the things that helped him to have a more successful language class this year.
To read the article, visit https://workingtowardproficiency.blogspot.com/2019/03/my-first-experience-with-storytelling.html
Source: Working Toward Proficiency
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Title: How to Create a Map-based Story with StoryMap JS
Body:
From https://www.freetech4teachers.com/2019/03/how-to-create-map-based-story-with.html
In this article, Richard Byrne demonstrates in a video how to create map-based stories using a popular multimedia timeline tool called Timeline JS. You can create the story by matching slides to locations on a map. This program can be used by teachers and students to tell their personal stories.
Watch the video, at https://www.freetech4teachers.com/2019/03/how-to-create-map-based-story-with.html
Source: Free Technology for Teachers
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Title: Assessment and Risk Taking
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This activity is designed to support teachers in crafting assessment policies and lesson design that facilitate risk taking and communication in the classroom.
Procedure:
- First, examine your grading policy. Ensure that the weight of your formative assessments is very low. This approach maximizes opportunities for learners to practice before summative measures without fear of it hurting their grades.
- Next, examine how you grade. Make sure that you are using rubrics (typically with four levels of achievement: Below expectations, Meets expectations, Exceeds expectations, Exemplary status) that are framed positively- that is, they define the work that is expected at each level instead of defining the possible deficiencies at play (e.g., Student communicates using memorized words and phrases instead of Student does not form complete sentences). Avoid attributing the loss of certain point values to certain errors related to form (e.g., minus .5 points for orthographic errors) as this type of grading can discourage motivation and cultivate an environment in which learners privilege vocabulary and grammar acquisition over meaning making.
- After that, consider the extent to which you empower learners to effectively deal with the unknown. Ensure that you teach them strategies (i.e., circumlocution, scanning, or predicting meaning) for learning and communication. Make sure that you protect time for practicing those strategies during class.
- Finally, ensure that your classroom activities adequately prepare learners for their summative assessments. If your classroom activities are focused on form and your assessments are more focused on meaning making, there is only a slim possibility that your learners have tried to achieve your expectations before assessing. Make sure that you empower learners by allowing them to try hard things before (and during) the final assessment. That way, they will have a clearer idea of how they are performing, what they can do to improve, and how to continue to push themselves in summative contexts.
Source: CASLS Activity of the Week
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Title: A Project on Overcoming Challenges in Language Learning through Learning Strategies
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Harinder Khalsa has been teaching Italian at the University of Oregon since 1993. Recently she also started teaching her native language, Turkish, as part of the UO Yamada Language Center’s Self Study Language Program and is the coordinator of the same program. Harinder is the 2015 recipient of the Thomas F. Herman Award for Excellence in Pedagogy. She is also a co-convener and a member of the steering committee of the UO Language Council, a large group of faculty, administrators and students dedicated to the advancement of language studies at the University of Oregon.
Language learning can be perceived as a challenge for many adult learners especially when they are not aware of how they learn in general and as individuals. If they discover who they are as a learner, stating clearly what they want to be able to do as a result of learning, observing how knowledge is presented, what their role is in personalizing that knowledge and deploying targeted strategies to shift old habits of learning, then learners can overcome all or many of those challenges in language learning. With this in mind, at the University of Oregon, we teamed as multi-disciplinary experts in language teaching and acquisition (Melissa Baese-Berk, Kathie Carpenter, Spike Gildea, Harinder Khalsa, Jeff Magoto) to design a course on learning how to learn languages. In this course we plan to expose our students to various cognitive and metacognitive language learning strategies and sensitize them to the interaction between these strategies and individual learning styles (e.g. Cohen 2014; Oxford 2017; Oxford & Amerstrorfer, 2018; Coursera MOOCS Learning How to Learn, Mindshift). The course will also draw on current research in second language acquisition, including work at the UO (Baese-Berk & Samuel, 2016; Wright, Baese-Berk, Marrone, & Bradlow, 2015; Sykes, 2016; Sykes & Cohen, 2018). Students at the end will have a variety of approaches they can choose from and apply to mastering all three modes of communication (interpretive listening and reading, presentational speaking and writing, interpersonal speaking and writing) with an eye on how we develop intercultural and pragmatic awareness through each and every one of these modes of communication.
As a result of this experience we hope to enhance student agency in learning in general through language learning. At the end of this experience students will gain a set of transferable skills that will help them not only in their academic life but also in their careers such as being able to:
- clearly state the purpose for their learning (a new language), set long-term goals
- break the long term goals into S.M.A.R.T. short term goals
- plan a course of action to meet them
- assess weaknesses and strengths objectively
- build community through collaborative learning strategies including peer feedback
- think critically and creatively about their strengths to address the weaknesses when faced with any new (learning) challenge
- manage time and beat the tendency to procrastinate
- make career connections and learn how to use the languages they speak to their advantage
We hope to have CASLS InterCom as a platform in future to create a repository of language learning strategies which could not only help our students but also inform the way we teach languages.
References
Baese-Berk, M. M. & Samuel, A.G. (2016). Listeners Beware: Speech Production May Be Bad for Learning Speech Sounds. Journal of Memory and Language, 89, 23-36.
Cohen, A. D. (2014). Strategies in learning and using a second language. London and New York: Routledge.
Oxford, R. L. (2017). Teaching and researching language learning strategies: Self-regulation in context. New York: Routledge.
Oxford, R. L, & Amerstorfer, C. M. (Eds.) (2018). Language learning strategies and individual learner characteristics: Situating strategy use in diverse contexts. London: Bloomsbury.
Sykes, J. (2016). Technologies for teaching and learning intercultural competence and interlanguage pragmatics. In S. Sauro & C. A. Chapelle (Eds.), Handbook of technology and second language teaching and learning (pp.118 -133). New York: Wiley.
Sykes, J. & Cohen, A. (2018). Strategies and Interlanguage Pragmatics. Explicit and Comprehensive. Studies in Second Language Learning and Teaching, 8(2), 381-402. [invited]
Wright, B. A., Baese-Berk, M. M., Marrone, N., & Bradlow, A. R. (2015). Enhancing Speech Learning by Combining Task Practice with Periods of Stimulus Exposure without Practice. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America,138 (2), 928-937.
MOOCS:
Learning How to Learn: Powerful mental tools to help you master tough subjects | University of California San Diego - https://www.coursera.org/learn/learning-how-to-learn (Can audit for free)
Mindshift: Break Through Obstacles to Learning and Discover Your Hidden Potential | Created by: McMaster University - https://www.coursera.org/learn/mindshift (Can audit for free)
Other:
Why learning a language is hard & how to make it easier https://www.ef.edu/blog/language/why-learning-a-language-is-hard/
Here's Why It's So Hard To Learn A New Language As An Adult https://www.businessinsider.com/why-its-hard-to-learn-new-language-adult-2014-7?IR=T
Learning Styles and Language Learning Strategies https://sites.educ.ualberta.ca/staff/olenka.bilash/Best%20of%20Bilash/language%20learning%20strats.html
Source: CASLS Topic of the Week
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Title: Harnessing the "Super Mario Effect": Promoting Risk Taking in the World Language Classroom
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By Stephanie Knight, CASLS Assistant Director
For those who were penalized for failed attempts, their success rate was around 52 percent. For those who were not penalized, their success rate was around 68 percent.
Mark Rober’s TEDx Talk opens with this intriguing statistic. He created a simple computer coding challenge in which he penalized only half of the participants for mistakes. He explains that those who weren’t penalized not only had a higher success rate than their peers, but were also willing to attempt the challenge more than twice as many times. These data revealed to him what he dubbed the Super Mario Effect, or the willingness for people to achieve an outcome unencumbered by the missteps along the way. Rober argues that if we frame the learning process on this outcomes-focused orientation, people will be willing to work longer and harder toward their goals.
On the surface, the implications of Rober’s discovery in the field of world language education deal with grading. While it is logical to treat grades as the carrot we use to motivate learners, his research points to the fact that belaboring failures (e.g. lowering a student’s score from 100 for distinct orthographic or agreement errors) will demotivate learners to persevere and continue towards their ultimate goals. Contemporary calls for shifts in grading practices recognize this reality. These shifts include deemphasizing the gradebook value of formative assessments (to allow for the learning process to take place without penalty) and implementing mastery rubrics that provide an overt focus on feedback rather than a letter grade (Heitin, 2015). In concert, these practices have the potential to foment risk taking in summative and formative contexts.
However, the implications of Rober’s work points to a much more meaningful, albeit slippery, lesson for world language educators. This lesson is related to his call to help frame learning with an outcomes-oriented focus. Developing such a focus in learners is a slippery task because it requires that learners have a keen awareness of learning outcomes and that they find those outcomes to be meaningful. While the former is relatively easy to achieve by posting and communicating learning targets, the latter can seem impossible. Creating a learning environment in which 35+ learners, all distinct individuals of differing motivations, experiences, and needs, find learning to be meaningful is a yeomen’s task. Furthermore, as Sykes and Reinhardt (2012) discuss, it may even be impossible to know if the learners find personal relevance in content without asking them.
Still, there are a variety of approaches educators can take to maximize learners’ validation of learning targets. Wiggins’ (1989, 2011) call for authentic assessment provides one treatment for this reality by contextualizing academic work by the real-world context in which the work is relevant. Another treatment lies in concept-based (Erikson, Lanning, & French, 2017) and project-based (click here for more information) approaches, both of which tie learning content to greater meaning beyond acquisition and memorization. Yet another treatment is to involve learners in the creation and/or personalization of learning targets used in the classroom. For example, learners could determine the contexts that they really want to explore for a given language function, thereby providing a lens through which the teacher can deliver truly focused instruction.
However slippery, world language educators are encouraged to facilitate the building of personal relevance for learners in as many ways as possible. That effort, when combined with contemporary grading practices, has the potential to facilitate a culture of risk taking in the classroom. And, as anyone who remembers the nerves and heart palpitations that likely underscored their first target language conversations would likely note, being willing to take risks in the target language is a critical component of communication.
References
Erikson, H. L., Lanning, L., & French, R. (2017). Concept-based curriculum and instruction for the thinking classroom. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Publishing.
Heitin, L. (2015). Should Formative Assessments Be Graded? Four Experts Offer Their Takes on the Question and Suggest Some Alternatives. Education Week. Retrieved from https://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2015/11/11/should-formative-assessments-be-graded.html
Rober, M. (2018, May 31). The Super Mario Effect-Tricking your brain into learning more. TEDxTalks. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vJRopau0g0
Sykes, J. & Reinhardt, J. (2013). Language at play: Digital games in second and foreign language teaching and learning. New York: Pearson-Prentice Hall.
Wiggins, G. (1989). A True Test: Toward More Authentic and Equitable Assessment. The Phi Delta Kappan, 70 (9), 703-713.
Wiggins, G. (2011). Moving to Modern Assessments. The Phi Delta Kappan, 92 (7), 63.
Source: CASLS Topic of the Week
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Content Type: 5
Title: Language Learning Innovation for Teaching (LIFT)
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CASLS is delighted to be partnering with the College of Arts and Sciences, the UO Language Council, and the Yamada Language Center on Language-learning Innovation for Teaching (LIFT) – an initiative to support and transform language learning at the University of Oregon (UO). Participants are working together towards making the UO a leading example of proficiency-based language education in the Pacific Northwest. The LIFT initiative includes two focus area – (1) transformational classroom practice and (2) measuring proficiency and credentialing opportunities. During the 2018-2019 academic year, twenty-two faculty members from eight departments (Comparative Literature, East Asian Languages and Literatures, German and Scandinavian, International Studies, Linguistics, Religious Studies, Romance Languages, and Russian, Eastern Europe, and Eurasian) engaged in a tailored professional development experience focused on fifteen different topics to be implemented in lower-division courses. In addition, 1100 language students participated in proficiency testing at the end of their course and a working group of ten met to explore credentialing possibilities. LIFT efforts will continue into the 2019-2020 academic year. CASLS looks forward to continuing this collaboration across campus.
Source: CASLS Spotlight
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Title: Book: Community-Based Language Learning
Body:
From http://press.georgetown.edu/book/languages/community-based-language-learning
Community-Based Language Learning: A Framework for Educators
By Joan Clifford and Deborah S. Reisinger
Published by Georgetown University Press
Community-based Language Learning offers a new framework for world language educators interested in integrating community-based language learning (CBLL) into their teaching and curricula. CBLL connects academic learning objectives with experiential learning, ranging from reciprocal partnerships with the community (e.g., community engagement, service learning) to one-directional learning situations such as community service and site visits.
This resource prepares teachers to implement CBLL by offering solid theoretical frameworks alongside real-world case studies and engaging exercises, all designed to help students build both language skills and authentic relationships as they engage with world language communities in the US. Making the case that language learning can be a tool for social change as well, Community-based Language Learning serves as a valuable resource for language educators at all levels, as well as students of language teaching methodology and community organizations working with immigrant populations.
Visit the publisher's website at http://press.georgetown.edu/book/languages/community-based-language-learning
Source: Georgetown University Press
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Title: Book: Nature and Enactment of Tasks for Early English as a Foreign Language Teaching
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Nature and Enactment of Tasks for Early English as a Foreign Language Teaching: A Collaborative Research Project with Teachers
By Constanze Dreßler
Published by Narr Francke Attempto Verlag
This ethnographic case study is set within a collaborative research project in which teachers and researchers investigate early English as a Foreign Language (eEFL) tasks in theory and practice in German primary schools. Results are obtained through an interpretation of multiple sources within an interdiscursive, multi-perspectived research agenda. The results suggest that eEFL tasks can emerge during an interplay of four key teaching practices: “doing school," “providing space for learners to communicate," “building a vocabulary,” and “teaching the spoken language.”
Visit the publisher's website at https://www.narr.de/nature-and-enactment-of-tasks-for-early-english-as-a-foreign-language-teaching-18224
Source: Narr Francke Attempto Verlag
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Title: Book: Further Advances in Pragmatics and Philosophy: Theories and Applications
Body:
From https://www.springer.com/gp/book/9783030009724
Further Advances in Pragmatics and Philosophy: Part 2 Theories and Applications
Edited by Alessandro Capone, Marco Carapezza, and Franco Lo Piparo, Franco
Published by Springer
The two sections of this volume present theoretical developments and practical applicative papers respectively. Theoretical papers cover topics such as intercultural pragmatics, evolutionism, argumentation theory, pragmatics and law, the semantics/pragmatics debate, slurs, and more. The applied papers focus on topics such as pragmatic disorders, mapping places of origin, stance-taking, societal pragmatics, and cultural linguistics.
Visit the publisher's website at https://www.springer.com/gp/book/9783030009724
This is the second volume of invited papers that were presented at the inaugural Pragmasofia conference in Palermo in 2016. For information about the first volume, which was published in 2018, at https://www.springer.com/gp/book/9783319721729
Source: Springer
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Title: Call for Papers: Rethinking Critical Pedagogy in L2 Learning and Teaching
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From https://escholarship.org/uc/uccllt_l2/callforpapers
Call for Papers: “Rethinking Critical Pedagogy in L2 Learning and Teaching”
Guest Editor: Panayota Gounari, University of Massachusetts Boston
Deadline for submitting abstracts: May 1, 2019
Deadline for submitting manuscripts: November 18, 2019
This Special Issue of L2 aspires to provide space for the development of intellectual work that bridges applied linguistics (specifically foreign, second and heritage language teaching and learning) with the sociology of education and knowledge. A gap in Critical Pedagogy literature is the absence of intellectual work that engages with the learning and teaching of foreign/heritage languages (HL), particularly when it comes to a clear theoretical framework FL and HL can draw from. The Special Issue seeks submissions that will attempt to re-invent a critical pedagogy as critical foreign language pedagogy. However, the aim is not to create a solid, monolithic, doctrinaire theoretical model, but rather to allow flexibility for different theoretical approaches that draw from Critical Pedagogy to co-exist and cross-fertilize.
View the full call for papers at https://escholarship.org/uc/uccllt_l2/callforpapers
Source: eScholarship
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