My “dreamproject” involving New Media is in cooperation with a school in England; the students will

·        create their own blog and write posts

·        record a video and put it online

·        communicate with English students in a chat room

·        prepare and give a Powerpoint presentation

As this is not a single lesson, but a project consisting of eight double lessons, I will not describe the individual lessons in detail. I prepared the plan on the assumption that

·       I will only have double lessons with the class

·       we will be in a computer lab each lesson

·       students already know the basics about the Internet

·       there is a cooperation between me and a teacher in England who is currently teaching a sixth form German course

·        the size of my class is about the size of the class in England

In the project my year 11 students get in touch with

I interviewed a female student, who goes to a private „Gymnasium” in Baden-Württemberg. She is 17 years old and in year 13. The interview was conducted in German and later translated into English.

How often is the computer used in your classes at school?

We don’t use computers a lot at school. We work with computers maybe once a week in the lessons, but the students from year 11 onwards have free access to the computer room, so if we have a free period, we often work with the computers.

And what do you do then?

Well, normally we don’t work, but check our emails, go to schueler-vz or something like that, although the computers are actually intended for school work only. But most of the students don’t use them for that, except when we have to give a presentation or have a homework where we need to prepare something using the internet.

You said you don’t work with computers a lot at school, but when you do, in which subjects is that?

In English only, I guess.

And what do you use the computers for in English?

For example, if we have to find out

Well, unfortunately, I will not be able to visit the Lanschulheim Steinmühle next week, but maybe someone else would like to find out the following for me:
* How many computers are there at school for how many students?

* How does the use of New Media differ depending on the age of students?

Task:

This week, you are supposed to do some research, before you write your article. Find out about today’s use of computers in your old grammar school. Try to find information in the „Schulprogramm“ or on the website, remember if and how your teachers included the New Media in the classroom. Describe your findings and your opinion about it. The entry is due on the 9th of December.

Well, my entry this week would be rather short: Apparently, there is no such thing as a “Schulprogramm” for my old school (at least not online). All the information I could find on the website concerning the use of New Media is:

·        There are computers at my old school

·        There is an after school club for informatics

When I went to school, computers were rarely used. I remember a very few lessons, in which we used learning software for English. That was it, basically. It’s perfectly possible that things have changed, after all, it’s four and a half years ago that I last went to school – but there is no way one could find out on the website. If you want to check, that’s the website of my old school: http://www.lgratzeburg.de/page2008/.

My opinion about it? Well, if the school really doesn’t integrate New Media into the curriculum, I would find it quite sad, but as I said, I don’t know if that’s the case.

 

 

To not end my entry here, I would like to describe a school in England I worked at from October ’07 to May ’08 as an FLA (Foreign Language Assistant). It was a comprehensive school near Portsmouth in Hampshire: http://www.bayhouse.hants.sch.uk/. According to national rankings it was neither one of the top schools, nor a “bad” school either. Nevertheless, in terms of New Media it was better equipped than any school I’ve seen in Germany so far. Other FLAs told me about similar conditions at other schools. So, concerning New Media we might actually learn something from the English school system.

New Media Equipment

As I worked in the language department of the school, I will, first of all, focus on the New Media equipment of the language rooms and the implementation of New Media in the language lessons. At my school (and I guess generally in England), not classes but teachers have their own classroom, although sometimes two or three teachers might share one or two rooms. All the classrooms for language lessons are in one part of the school. As I already mentioned, the rooms are very well equipped with New Media devices. In each (!) language room there is a computer and a projector and in most of the rooms there is also an interactive whiteboard, also called smartboard. Before going to England I had never even heard about interactive whiteboards and I felt as if I were coming from some less developed part of the world :-( because for the teachers and students the use of this seemed to be so normal… In case I’m not the only one who was baffled to hear about “such a thing”:

The interactive whiteboard looks like a normal whiteboard, but it is actually linked to a computer and a projector and functions like a giant touch screen. The teacher can

Our task this week:

“Find (online or in a magazine) a report on a teaching project with the New Media that you really liked and you think was a success (not the one you had in-class) and explain it to your readers.”

Now, what I found is not exactly a report on a teaching project with the New Media, but a helpful page for teachers wanting to carry out an Internet project, but don’t know what to do. The page “E-Twinning” gives a lot of good examples of what one can do with the Internet in school. E-Twinning is part of Comenius (the European Commission for Education and Training). Comenius has the following goals:

·         “To improve and increase the mobility of pupils and educational staff in different Member States

·         To enhance and increase partnerships between schools in different Member States, with at least three million pupils taking part in joint educational activities by 2010  

·         To encourage language learning, innovative ICT-based content, services and better teaching techniques and practices 

·         To enhance the quality and European dimension of teacher training 

·         To improve pedagogical approaches and school management “

http://ec.europa.eu/education/lifelong-learning-programme/doc84_en.htm

It can be said that a special emphasis is laid on media competence and multicultural learning. On E-Twinning  one can find a diverse selection of teaching projects involving new media. The projects are described in detail and rated by teachers who tried out the different methods. In addition, it gives interesting information about pedagogical objectives, process, evaluation, and possible follow up-activities. I would like to present one of the projects on this page that I particularly liked. It is called ”E-journal bridges for foreign language learning” and in which classes from at least two schools from different countries create an e-journal together. This could be in form of an online-diary, a magazine or a newspaper. According to E-Twinning the aims are mainly to encourage language learning and intercultural discourse. In addition, pupils shall learn:

 

·       “to develop writing and reading skills in a foreign language;

·        to develop

 The VCT-unit “Internet Communication” deals with advantages and disadvantages of Internet communication, different communication tools, language used and briefly with the methodology of using Internet communication in schools. In this entry I will present my ideas concerning the practical aspects to consider regarding online communication in school contexts. I will explore when, where and how it is useful to use Internet tools for communication in class and what problems might occur.

There are several means of Internet communication that can be used with students. Those can be divided into two larger groups, namely synchronous and asynchronous tools. “Synchronous” means that the person addressed receives a message at the same time it is delivered and can in this respect be compared to the telephone as a means of conventional communication. In asynchronous communication there is a time delay between question and answer, comparable to writing a letter. In the following part synchronous and asynchronous tools of Internet communication will be listed and its relevance for schools discussed.

Asynchronous Means

E-Mails

E-Mails are virtual letters transmitted over communication networks. In class, they can be used for the teacher to…

·        be available for the students to answer questions, help and assist them

·       remind the students of test dates, homework to be submitted, etc.

·        distribute additional learning material, links, etc.

Newsgroups and Forums

Newsgroups are platforms on which each member of the group can post messages and download postings by other users. Forums pursue a similar concept, but

I think we, as future teachers, should make an effort to not be oblivious to “rules” regarding Internet research, and that’s why I will state what I would like my future students to learn:

Advantages/ Disadvantages

I would make my students aware that Internet research compared to conventional research has not only advantages, but also bears some risks

 

 

Advantages	Disadvantages
Quick, easy and inexpensive collection of information from all over the world	information can be outdated, irrelevant or unreliable
no dependence on time and space	Many results/ much information => need for evaluation
precise search possible	risk of plagiarism

Research Tools

I would like to introduce different research tools to my students:

o    Search engines

o    Meta search engines

o    Catalogues

o    Link lists

o    Wiki-websites

o    Online dictionaries

o    Web-corpora

Personally, I would guess that search engines are the most important research tool for students, but it is necessary to make them aware of the fact that there are more ways to search for documents than to “google” them. Moreover, the introduction and critical analysis of online dictionaries and online translators might help students in foreign language learning. Nevertheless, we mustn’t forget that many students are already quite familiar with a couple of research tools, which is why, in my opinion,

Our in-class task this week was to create a poster in groups about a specific topic related to the VCT-unit “Learning Theories & Principles”. I found the poster about  “drill & practise”-software not only very creative and concise, but it also reflects my own opinion concerning this issue. The questions the group was asked to consider were:

 “Why is drill & practice software still distributed? Do you think it is useful?“.

First of all, I think that the answer to the second question is already implied in the first question: If “drill and practice”-software was completely outdated and of no use at all, people wouldn’t buy it and if people didn’t buy it, software engineers wouldn’t produce it anymore…

But why is “drill and practice” software still useful?

Analyzing the poster one can conclude that

From the very beginning of history people have been concerned with the question “How does effective learning work?”. Over the years scientists and educators came up with various theories regarding this topic. Working my way through the VCT-unit “Learning Theories & Principles”, I got to know the three theories of learning, which shall be explained in the following part.

 

1. Behaviorism

This theory was established by B.F. Skinner and is mainly based on the principles of operant conditioning, which gives attention to the shaping of behavior through positive or negative reinforcement. In the context of education those principles are applied in “Drill & Practise” – learners are given input and have to repeat the input until they have memorized it.

To learn more about Skinner’s experiments on the role of reinforcement and the validity of behaviorism for human learning you might want to watch the following video:

2. Cognitivism

Cognitivism focuses on the individual, and thus demands

…I saw the video on what you said about “Young Americans and the Internet” in class a couple of days ago and feel I have to write down some thoughts on this for you. Before discussing your statements I would like to tell you some things about me:

I am under the age of 30.

I’ve got my mobile phone with me every day.

I love facebook to stay in contact with my friends.

And still:

I like to see myself as a trustworthy person.

I am not stupid.

I am not lazy.

I am not ignorant.

But, Mr. Bauerlein, I can agree with you on some aspects. You are right that