Paradigm Shift: Technology for Teaching

Education Value of Blog

Do you familiar with blog? Do you have a blog account? Well… blog is one of technology mostly used nowadays. Blog is a personal website for us to share something or for reflecting ourselves. So it can be said that blog is an ‘online diary’ but the significant difference is this ‘diary’ can be read by anyone (if you are set your blog into public blog mode) or by certain people only (if you are set your blog into private blog mode).

But actually blog is not only for ‘online diary’ because blog has big potential to be used in education. Some teachers today have started to use blog as one of their medium in teaching (teaching aid) with assign student to make their own blog and post their reflection on teaching in it or with make a class blog which there will be posted materials for student to read.

It is a good choice to use blog as teaching aid, because based on discussion in our group today (29^th September 2011) in Multimedia Production course. We find at least 6 advantages for using blog as one of medium in learning. There are:

1.      Blog will make teacher and student more familiar with technology

2.      It could be good place to practice both student and teacher writing’s skill

3.      It could stimuli both student and teacher’ creativity because they should deal with designing their blog and all when they make a blog account.

4.      It could be a good medium for reflection so teacher can know about how far her/his student’s progress. In other hand student can figure out about what material they have understood and what is not.

5.      Through blog there is a medium for sharing information form teacher-student, student-student or teacher-teacher.

6.      Blogging will construct a collaborative learning because with blog teacher can review her/his student’s works and give comment at it. Teacher also can review and comment at their peer’s works. Student can review and comment and their peer’s work.

7.      With blog there is will be a community learning so people in that community can help each other.

With all of the advantages above, personally I think use blog for learning process is a good alternative to be considered by teacher.

The Truth: What Teacher Actually Do

PETA Second Reflective Journal 

Becoming a teacher isn’t as simple as it may seem form outside,  even mostly teacher looks like a person who do his/her job repeatedly so teacher could do all his/her job without thinking anymore. It can be done automatically like how robot works. Honestly although I am one of teacher candidate I ever thought about teacher profession in that way.  I thought teacher is one of most “loose” job in this world. Because all teacher has to do is enter one class to another for teaching about the same topic. I assumed that teacher also doesn’t have to think about examination like student do. Because teacher is the one who can give examination or quiz as free as he/she wants.

 But then I realized that my previous thought is wrong after I attended PETA second meeting. Through that session I learn about so many things I never knew before like fact that 80% of teacher’s time is used for class preparation meanwhile the rest is for teaching, assessing and so on. Beside than that I also learn about what is thematic learning, what is Bloom taxonomy and last but not least I get to know about how develop a lesson plan. I will just talk about thematic learning, Bloom taxonomy and how to develop lesson plan one by one before I go to the main topic about why I say become a teacher isn’t as simple as it may seem.

First about thematic learning, today I watched about demonstration of thematic learning through a video. For that video I knew that thematic learning is one of teaching method which integrated more than one subject in school at the same time. So there is no clear constraint from one lesson to another in the classroom.  I think this teaching method is effective and ineffective in the same time. It is effective because it can engage students into classroom activities and because it can make student more understand in subjects which are related to each other. But on the other hand is ineffective because with this method, explanation for each subject will be done briefly. Personally I think thematic learning is only appropriate for early stage of school and isn’t good if it is used for higher stage of school.

Second is about Bloom taxonomy, I learn that it is a framework teacher usually use as standard for making assessment. In Bloom taxonomy there are six levels of cognitive difficulties:

1.      Remembering

2.      Understanding

3.      Applying

4.      Analyzing

5.      Evaluating

6.      Creating

Teacher can look up to this taxonomy when they want to make a question, the higher the number, level of cognitive difficulty will increase as well.

Third thing I learn from PETA second session is how to develop lesson plan. I learn that to make a good lesson plan teacher should avoid twin sin, there are:

1.      Making student busy with unclear activity

2.      Teacher just teaches, gives exam and prays for the best result.

Last I will talk about why it is not easy to become a teacher. Reflect on my experience today I learn that teacher cannot teach in class without any preparation before because teacher should master about what they will teach and should know about how to transfer the material to the student. Because of that teacher need a lesson plan to become a guideline for teacher. In this session I have tried to make a simple lesson plan and I realize that it not easy because I should avoid two sin in designing lesson plan and I also need to consider Bloom taxonomy when I design the assessment. I need about 30 until 45 “tough” minutes for designing a simple lesson plan and still it is not perfect yet. What scary me the most is in the future I as a teacher should design a good lesson plan before I teach which mean it could be 3 times at one week!! But well… I guess I don’t have other choice. This is challenge I should take in other to become a new generation of teacher.

Humanistic: Introduction to the Study of Human

Human is the most perfect creature which ever walks on this earth. Human is special because of so many reasons like having incredible brain, having unbearable intelligence and the most important reason is because there are never  two identical human in all aspect like physical appearance, personality, intelligence, race, religion and believe. All human is different compare to each other even an identical twin, they are still two different human with alike physical appearance. Along with becoming special human also becoming the most complex creature in this world. It because sometimes human cannot understand about themselves just like they don’t know about who actually they are and facing identity crisis, they also often confuse about how to  behave toward people who really different from them. Based on that fact no wonder there should be a branch of science which focuses on learning about human. That called as humanistic.

            Humanistic studied about human through many perspectives for instance through differences of individual, differences of cultures and so on. Through humanistic people can get boarder perspective rather than isolated perspective in the real social life. So it is important for people from different field to learn about humanistic and it is including teacher and teacher candidate. Because we cannot deny that teacher is one of profession which demanding the person to meet with so many people. It automatically means that teacher has to deal with so many differences in one place called classroom.

            Highly expected with learning about humanistic, future teacher could be more tolerance with differences whether it is race differences, religious differences or individual difference. Not only become more tolerance but the more important is future teacher could behave properly when he/she is facing differences. So in the future there are no more racist teachers or teacher who cannot appreciate differences in his/her classroom. Just like what happened in Clear Brook High School, Texas 2011 after news of Osama Bin Laden’s death spread out.  A high school teacher commented to an American Muslim girl that he heard about her uncle death and she must be feeling sad because of it. In the end that racist comment sent the teacher home, he cannot teach in that school anymore because more than 2000 member of change.com sent petition for that teacher.

            Reflect to my own self; personally I as one of teacher candidate and future teacher have quite high expectation from Humanistic course that I take. I hope this course will help me to know more about myself. I also expected to get better understand about diversity because I was grown up in homogenous environment and last I wish this course will help me deal with people who has different characteristic. Because usually if I meet that kind of people I will just respect them and admits their existence but I tend to not quite close to them because I afraid of making mistake which will make them feel bad or uncomfortable. I am sure that will help me in the future because I never know if I get chance to teach in a heterogeneous classroom.

Source information: http://www.change.org/petitions/demand-racist-teacher-resign-after-targeting-muslim-student   Retrieved at September 24, 2011 21: 10

Technology: The Loyal Assistant for Language Learning

            Have you ever heard about term “CALL”? CALL here isn’t one of verbs which based on Oxford learner pocket dictionary has meaning as use particular name when talking to someone on the conversation.  CALL here is an acronym. All those words stand for Computer Assisted Language Learning. Do you feel unfamiliar with that term? Do you feel confuse to heard that term?  Or feel curious about how can computer assist language learning process? Well actually many people especially people who live in less develop country are not quite familiar with this term. So do I who just got to know about term CALL after attending the second session of Technology and Language Learning course. 

                Through that course I get information that actually computer has used for so long time to assist language learning process. It started since 1960 until now. Actually CALL era has been divided into three eras, there are:

1.       1.Behavioristic Era (1960-1970)

When people believe that learn language is part of behavior. The most commonly use methods in language learning process are Grammar Translation and Audio Lingual. The most used technologies in this era are LCD, projector, tape recorder, language laboratory and some early software for drill and practice. In this era the language learning process is focus on accuracy. 

2.  2.Communicative Era (1980-1990)

The second era is communicative era, this time people believe that the most effective way to learn language is through communication with other. So the focus in language learning target change to the fluency of learner. The most commonly use technologies in this era are technologies which has “communicative sense” like telephone, text-reconstruction software and concordancing software. In this era there was even a language course via telephone.

3.       3.Integrative Era (1990- Present)

In this era language learning process is based on content. It means different people who have different purpose in learning language will learn different content of language. For instance an Indonesian student learns EAP (English for Academic Purpose) because he will continue his study in US.  At this time the most used technologies are Multimedia CALL and Web-Based CALL.

From all history above we can conclude that computer (technology) has become “a loyal assistant” for language learning process. Because with technology learning language become cheaper (The curve of cost for conduct a virtual language learning process decrease as the time goes), more interesting (With so many attractive software), more real (because today through internet various communication with various people is easily happened) and more easily (just need one button “search” to find so many authentic reading materials).

                But it doesn’t mean that there are no disadvantages with using technology to assist language learning process. Because at least there are five disadvantages of it, there are high cost to provide all needed facilities, need a expert, less interactive compare to direct communication, there is chance for unexpected situation occur like technical error and usually there are only writing, reading and listening software for learning language meanwhile there is no software for assist speaking skills.

                That all material I know for now. Last, personally I think that  Indonesia education haven’t ready yet for use Web-based CALL for language learning regarding to some reason. First is because the different topography from one region to another. Second is because the high cost needed to provide all facilities in school. Next is because limited expert to teach language assist by technology in school and last is because the quite poor internet connection in Indonesia which could make occurrence of unexpected situation increase. Because of all reason above I think for now the usage of Web based CALL in Indonesia is not the right answer or effective method for language learning process especially in remote area.

TLL 1ST Reflective Journal

22^th September 2011, finally the day came. Since first time I heard about course “Technology and Language Learning” I felt so worry about it whether I could follow this course good enough or not. That because I am not so into the technology.  I even consider myself as an “obsolete” in technology. But then my point of view has changed as the course was running. That because two simple questions from my lecturer, there are:

1.  How does technology help you to learn?

2.  How does technology help you to learn language?

I thought I never used technology for learning especially for learning language. But when I think more about it, I realize that I have used technology for learning since long time ago and I even use technology almost in every single day! I just realize it when my lecturer gives me definition about what is technology. That technology is anything which has function to make people life easier. That is so far different from what I was believe about what is technology. I thought that term “technology” relate very closest with some of difficult and unfamiliar software.

 Now that I finally understand about what technology is.  I can say that I also use technology in learning process because technology is including computer, Microsoft word, search engine, excel, power point, email, internet and ect which all I familiar with. I also feel more confidence about my future  performance in this course especially after I watched video about “New Digital Generation” which talks about how nowadays young generation even children have really strong interest in technology like IPad, Cellphone, Internet ect. For them technology even have became part of their life style.

Based on that fact on the video I cannot deny that one day I’ll become a teacher of high-tech students and when the time come I just cannot simply use an old style teaching methods like lecturing because I am sure they will get bored so easily and do not pay attention to me nor to the materials I try to transfer to them. So I think the only way to get them engage to my class is with use technology in my classroom.  I will try to utilize usage of technology in my classroom as part of learning tool. But of course before use certain technology I consider whether the material I want to impart to my student could be incorporated with technology or not.

Because of that need, I have high expectation for this course, I hope this course will help me to become more and more familiar with up to date technology like web 2.0 and support me to become high-tech teacher.

PETA 1st Reflective Journal

Tuesday 19 September 2011 was my first time attending PETA course. Once I heard about “Principle of Effective Teaching and Assessment” I think that I will learn about the basic principle to become an effective teacher and how to assess student fairly and it seems like my assumption is right until now. I hope this course will help me for my future preparation as teacher. Because I always think that become an effective teacher and assess student fairly aren’t easy thing to do. I reflect it from my own experience since I was in my first grade in my elementary school. I have met so many teachers with different teaching styles and also different assessment styles.

I ever like some of my teacher so much and on the other hand I also ever dislike some of my teachers. Mostly I like certain teachers because they good in mastery the materials they teach, they can lead the class for running smoothly, they show their concern toward students and they also really good in dealing with all students including students which labeled as ‘troubled students’. On the other side I dislike certain teachers because I think they do have focus in teaching and do not have interest in their students. Some of them have bad habits like coming late to the class, absent without informing the class coordinator and talk too much about other things but the materials they should give to students. So I feel like I do not get anything from their class.

All of those experiences help me to figure out about characteristic of effective teacher and effective teaching.

I assume that an effective teacher is:

1. Teacher who prepares herself/ himself before teaching (make lesson plan, mastery the material, prepare all things needed like post-it or something like that)
2. Teacher who good at time management (stick on the schedule, she/he doesn’t come late nor ended the class late)
3. Teacher who good at classroom management ( he/she already make an agreement with the class, he/she gives attention fairly to all students, he/she knows how to maintain students attention to be engage into learning process)
4. Teacher who knows using ICT tools wisely.

Meanwhile I think that effective teaching is:

1. Teaching which makes almost all students understands about the materials.
2. Teaching which meet teaching’s objectives like what have been planned in lesson plan.

But aside from that, I still confuse about whether a teacher who could lit up classroom’s atmosphere is automatically categorized as an effective teacher or not? And whether a teaching method which could make students enjoy learning and teaching process will automatically categorized as effective teaching?

That my entire reflective journal for now hopefully I could be an effective teacher in the future and I could get better understanding about PETA course.