Personalising English Language Teaching in Secondary Schools through Technology 3 Teaching Cases

Why Personalising? The higher the students move up the grade level spectrum, the bigger will be the gap of achievement in English. Students become more mature thinkers. Differences in learning styles.

Using Sound Editing Software and a Class Blog to Enhance Students’ Oral Presentation Skills Yeung Li Wa, Jenny, Sha Tin Government Secondary School

Personalising and Rekindling Interest in English Language Learning through Digital Storytelling Wong Sze Long, Armstrong Ho Fung College

Blogfolios for the Professional Development of English Language Teachers Paul Sze Department of Curriculum and Instruction, CUHK

Using Adacity and Weblog to enhance students’ speaking skills Jenny Yeung Sha Tin Government Secondary School

Overview Rationale Objectives The Design Benefits Reminders and Advice Further exploration Questions and Answers

Why using CALL? A class size of 35 – minimal individual attention to students’ performance Ineffective peer and self assessment in previous lessons

Objectives To enhance learning effectiveness To conduct effective self and peer assessment To help learners become active participants in the learning process To offer a platform for students to learn from each other To provide an authentic environment for students to do reflections and express their views in the target language

CALL lessons – the design (1) Sound recording  Audacity Weblog  Wordpress.com Lesson One Do a minute Individual presentations Conduct self & peer assessment Lesson Two Focused practice: accuracy in pronunciation (Dictation) 1-minute Individual response

CALL lessons – the design (2) Before the lesson Created a class blog – Wordpress.com Wrote a post   -- stated the purposes of the class blog -- laid down the regulations Prepared a lesson outline   -- learning objectives, tools needed, procedures In the lesson Explained the goals and introduced the tasks Did a demo of how to record a sound file using Audacity Introduced the class blog -- the requirements and steps of uploading a file and writing a post Went through the self and peer assessment form   Recording and uploading Conducted peer assessment

Students’ Work Individual Presentation 1 Connie (32) Individual Presentation 2 Dick (3) Individual Presentation 3 Chloe (28) Dictation 1 Tiffany (29) Dictation 2 Jaco (7) Derek (15) Individual Response Grace (31) Speech for a public speaking contest Yan (30)

Benefits Learning effectiveness -- allows feedback to all -- conducts self and peer assessment meaningfully Learner autonomy -- involves students in procedural and learning choices A stress-free environment -- minimizes anxiety Focused practice in speaking Sustaining interest in language learning

Reminders and Advice ‘Aim less’ - time constraint - task design Maintaining the class blog - appropriate use of language & the blog itself - file types, storage space

Exploring the other uses of a class blog Dictations Announcements A forum for discussing current affairs An archive for essays and speeches for public competitions Sharing and recommending teaching resources Other focused practice e.g. pronunciation, intonation, pace, grammatical accuracy

‘Computers are basically an attractive nuisance.’ (Healey, 2000) Healey. Deborah (2000) Changing Teaching with Technology. ELI, Oregon State University

Time for Professional Exchange

Digital Storytelling M otivating Remedial Students Wong Sze Long, Armstrong Ho Fung College (Sponsored by Sik Sik Yuen)

Digital Storytelling Enhances learner engagement (through a highly personalized task)

Subject and School Subjects 36 S. 2 students All of them were from classes School EMI Government-aided Secondary school

Teaching Procedures 1.Introducing DST and relevant language features (Lesson 1) 2.Developing ideas for the digital stories 3.Script/ Storyboard writing 4.Producing a digital story

Pros Meaning focus More than a language task Passive learners became active learners Personalizing language tasks

Cons Managing a DST classroom Limited language input and output Practicality

All these should have been eliminated there were not enough headsets some of the microphones available did not work the students’ pictures could not be imported the Internet connection went down the MMLC was occupied

The End ~Thank You~

Background A professional development course for 33 serving teachers of English in primary and secondary schools interested in using technology in English language teaching

My concerns How can I put together a convenient platform for the teachers’ ongoing displaying of the teaching ideas and resources that they will be creating? How can I encourage them to inspire and learn from each other?

Prof. Yang Hao’s Blogfolio e-blogfolios/

My Attempt The teachers will display the teaching ideas and resources that they will produce. I will provide feedback, reminders, etc. through the class blogfolio. The teachers will be put in groups, and encouraged to view and give feedback to each other’s work. I will demonstrate to them my own ongoing project through the course.

Experience gained A useful, convenient, platform, for everyone concerned. The teachers were highly motivated to create and display their teaching ideas and resources. There was substantial mutual support and peer learning.