MobiMOOC - Reflections on Week One

Well, week one of the mobiMOOC course has been inspiring, interesting, baffling, frustrating, absorbing, time-consuming, and thought-provoking - probably all in equal measure!

I have learned a lot and have found some of the links really useful.   For example, I am now fully conversant with Evernote and have become one of its most vociferous advocates almost overnight.  I have also learned (finally!) how to correctly place a link in a blog post (see previous link to Evernote!).  I am also getting to grips with QR codes, although I have to say that I am not yet fully 'au fait' with these!  I think I'm beginning to understand a lot of the terminology associated with m-learning, and I have made some useful contacts in my field of EFL teaching.  I have also been mightily impressed with Inge 'Ignatia' de Waard in her role as facilitator for week one - I don't believe she can have slept at all this week judging by her almost continuous online presence!

So, it's all been good then?  Well, no, not really!  I feel like I've had to plough through a lot of irrelevant or repetitive material to get to the useful nuggets.  As an ardent supporter of the 'Plain English Campaign', I have found some of the jargon incomprehensible.  A glossary which explained the numerous acronyms and other specialist vocabulary would have been quite useful.  This is why I was drawn to and commented on, the post by Jenni Parker when she attempted to define the terms.  She blogged about it here. 

For me, speaking as a teacher, the first rule of learning is that it should be fun.  Don't get me wrong, I take my job very seriously, but see the key to my success as a teacher as being my ability to engage my students by making their lessons enjoyable for them.  Fun has been a little lacking for me in week one of mobiMOOC.  The contributions from participants have been commendable - informative and stimulating - and yet somewhat earnest.  So, I have to say that a highlight of the week for me was watching the recording of the Elluminate Live session (I was unable to participate on Monday night due to teaching committments).  One of the contributors, John, popped up centre screen and started eating his supper, seemingly oblivious to the fact that we could all see him!  Inge made reference to the fact and John, rather than switching his webcam off, simply angled it to give us all a view of the top of his head and the ceiling.  I know I could have closed the window, but I kept it open just in case John had any other tricks up his sleeve!  Thanks, John, for giving me a laugh!!

So, am I disheartened after the first week of mobiMOOC?  No!  I will continue and I am sure I will learn more as the weeks go on.  I'm no nearer to deciding on my mlearning project, but, as this is the topic for week two, I am confident that will change.

I'll let you know this time next week!

MobiMOOC 2 April - 14 May 2011

I signed up for this free MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) about mobile learning a few days ago, having seen a link during an #eltchat about the subject on Twitter on Wednesday evening. During the said chat, I felt like I was missing something - like I wasn't really part of the gang. I was ashamed of my own ignorance, so I decided to do something about it and registered for the course.

What on earth is a MOOC? This was my first question, so I turned to the oracle that is YouTube & found several videos including this one which gave me the answer:



Having established what a MOOC was, I now had to get to grips with what mlearning was. I lurked around the mobiMOOC wiki (http://mobimooc.wikispaces.com/a+MobiMOOC+hello%21) and the group discussion pages (http://groups.google.com/group/mobimooc?hl=en). I read all the information provided by the facilitators and the posts from course participants. And then came the revelation! I'm not as ignorant as I thought I was! Unfamiliar with the jargon certainly, but not totally clueless in reality.

You see, I already engage in mlearning every day. I just didn't know I was doing it! I use my mobile phone to talk, to send & receive messages, and to take photos which I sometimes use in class. I use my i-Pod Touch to access the internet via wi-fi, to manage my contacts and my diary, to keep notes, and to listen to podcasts and share them with my students. I use my laptop to do everything else, including to write my blog. All of these things, I now understand, are mlearning!

Forgive me for being a bit late to the party, but I'm here now and I won't be lurking behind the curtains any more! I'm starting to go through the course materials and following up on links provided by my fellow participants. I'm hugely encouraged by what I have seen so far and I'm really looking forward to being more actively involved over the next few weeks.

Field Trips for EFL Students

Obviously, if you are teaching EFL in an English speaking country, then the opportunities for your students to use their newly acquired language skills are endless. Every time they leave the classroom they have the chance to practise – whether that is when shopping, eating out, travelling on public transport, socialising with fellow students of different nationalities, eavesdropping on the conversations of others, or simply walking the streets. The teacher can turn such experiences into more formal learning activities by organising field trips to the supermarket, a café, or to the cinema, for example.

The situation for students studying EFL in their own countries, however, is very different. Their classes are monolingual, so the temptation is always to lapse into their native tongue with their classmates. Outside of the classroom, students have little opportunity to speak English. As an EFL teacher in this situation, you have to be a little more creative, but if, like me, you are fortunate enough to live and teach in a place which attracts large numbers of English-speaking tourists, then you have a solution.

Taking groups of students to a popular tourist attraction and getting them to speak to tourists is a great confidence booster for them, but to get the most benefit requires some preparation. It is not enough merely to accost total strangers in the street; you need to have a plan.

For lower level students, having a questionnaire is always a good idea. That way they know what they are going to say to people, and are less likely to get tongue-tied and nervous. Writing the questionnaire is a useful classroom activity in itself, and the students can practise on each other, or on students in other classes, before venturing outside. Subjects for the questionnaires should be innocuous – reasons for visit, length of stay, country of origin, etc. Controversial topics, like religion and politics, should be avoided.

For more advanced students, general conversations with tourists should be encouraged. To this end, a range of open-ended questions should be explored and practised in class beforehand. Again, subjects which may cause controversy should be discouraged. When rehearsing the use of these questions, it is important that the teacher highlights any cultural differences which may arise between the students and the people they are talking to; which questions are inappropriate and why?; what misunderstandings could cause problems?.

Whichever level students you are dealing with, you need to role-play conversation openers before you let them loose on the public. Get them to write possible introductions and try them out on each other in front of the group. Encourage feedback – what works and what doesn’t work? I live and work in Istanbul, where tourists are often approached by strangers in the street who invariably want to sell them something. Consequently, they walk around constantly on their guard, ready to rebuff the advances of anyone who comes near. So, in the preparation for a field trip, we have to discuss ways to overcome that suspicion. It is also important to tell students not to be disheartened if they suffer rejection. This makes for a fun-filled activity with some students playing themselves, earnestly trying to engage someone in conversation, and others acting the reluctant tourist!

Having prepared thoroughly, you can launch your students onto the public! If possible, choose a location with plenty of seating – somewhere where tourists are likely to take a breather to consult their maps and guidebooks. In Istanbul, we have the perfect location – an area between the Blue Mosque and Aya Sofia, where there are plenty of public benches.

In my experience, students are always nervous at first, unwilling to make that first move, but, once they have and have had their first successful encounter, particularly if it is with a native speaker, then they are delighted and want to do it again and again. Field trips such as this have, in my time in Istanbul, given the students the confidence to repeat the exercise at a later date without me being present. They have also led to friendships being made with tourists agreeing to maintain contact with students via Skype after they return home. To those people, and to all those who have had conversations with my students in Istanbul over the last two years, I offer my heartfelt thanks.

And to all tourists in foreign parts in the future, if a student approaches you and asks you to spare five minutes to help them practise their English, then please say yes. If they try to sell you a carpet, you have my permission to be as rude as you need to be to get rid of them!