Avenue - LearnIT2teach Podcasts: Recent Episodes
The LearnIT2teach Project
A podcast series for immigrant settlement language training professionals across Canada from the LearnIT2teach project
Siân Tudela is the PBLA Lead/LINC Coordinator at Vancouver Formosa Academy.
In conversation with Avenue/LearnIT2teach team member Paul Carter, Siân talks about her contributions to the eLearning module and the teachers’ experience with online learning pre-pandemic and how things have changed today. Siân shares stories that will reverberate with many teachers in terms of the move to online teaching, the challenges and frustrations, and the many resources and community of practice that were instrumental in navigating the changing landscape in the LINC program.
Duration, ten minutes, eighteen seconds.
Access the eLearning module here: AMSSA Courses: The Language Companion, Artefact Collection, and Avenue Solutions for Remote LINC Delivery
Vesna Radivojevic is an Avenue/LearnIT2teach team member and the Coordinator/Assistant Department Head for the Vancouver Community College LINC program.
In conversation with Avenue/LearnIT2teach team member Paul Carter, Vesna talks about the many contributions she made to the eLearning module and some of the challenges teachers faced with the pandemic and the rapid shift to online learning as well as some of the solutions that were developed in response to the change.
Duration, twelve minutes, twenty seconds.
Access the eLearning module here: AMSSA Courses: The Language Companion, Artefact Collection, and Avenue Solutions for Remote LINC Delivery
MingJi Wang works with AMSSA’s Language Program Manager to provide supports for language programs funded by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) in British Columbia, including online events, online training opportunities and info sheets.
In conversation with Avenue/LearnIT2teach team member Paul Carter, MingJi talks about her own immigration experience, working with AMSSA, what AMSSA is and what they do for LINC service providers, the rationale behind building the eLearning module, and feedback AMSSA has already collected for the course.
Duration, fourteen minutes, fifty-three seconds.
Access the eLearning module here: AMSSA Courses: The Language Companion, Artefact Collection, and Avenue Solutions for Remote LINC Delivery
What is TESL Basics for Language Volunteers (TBLV)? How do front line service providers put this seven unit online course to work locally or regionally? How does the partnership with the Avenue - LearnIT2teach Project work, and what does Avenue expect from partners?
In this podcast Genevieve Spicer interviews Shabana Shahzad from the Centre for Newcomers in Calgary about how her agency has made TBLV work. Shabana describes the steps in getting started, and how the course is benefiting volunteers and the Centre.
Length: 7:20
This is the third and last podcast interview with Dr. Tony Bates, a leading light for Canadian educators on questions of online and distance learning. In this episode,we are talking about how educators can make creative use of media. Tony describes the key ‘affordances for the main media types and what each does best.
This is the second of three podcast interviews recorded with Dr. Tony Bates, a leading light for Canadian educators on questions of blended, and online learning. In this episode, we are talking about the world of online learning in the aftermath of COVID-19. How will all the innovations educators made in response to the crisis shape the adult education world of the future?
How will teaching be different post-COVID? Is face to face teaching always better than online? What will learners expect online versus face to face? What are the affordances of face to face compared to online? Educators will be thinking much more carefully about how they should be using their face to face time. Teachers might prefer to deal with more sensitive topics face to face. People may be more reluctant to gather together. Learners may want to understand why they are being asked to leave their homes and travel to school. The answer may lie in what do students most enjoy doing.
This is the first of three podcast interviews recorded with Dr. Bates. In this episode, we are talking about educator responses to the COVID-19 pandemic, better practices in blended learning, and how educators can take advantage of the ‘affordances’ of the media available.
Tony is a Research Associate with Contact North, Ontario’s Distance Education & Training Network. Tony is a leading light for advocates of online and blended learning in Canada. He is the author of eleven books in the field of online learning and distance education.
He has provided consulting services in the planning and management of online learning and distance education, working with over 40 organizations in 25 countries.
The Edulinc courseware, and the Moodle open-source learning management system on which Edulinc is built, provide a wide array of functions and tools. Wikis, blogs, the grade book, Activity Tracking, the discussion and news forums are just a few examples. But not every LINC teacher wants or needs all the tools to make blended learning work.
Rostam Pooladi-Darvish has been using Edulinc with his LINC learners at Bow Valley College in Calgary for four years now. In this podcast, Rostam describes how he makes limited use of the tools available, but he still finds the courseware is very effective for teaching and learning. He describes how he used the system initially and how his teaching has evolved. He also talks about how his learners benefit from Edulinc and enjoy it.
As today’s educator knows, Learning technology doesn’t stand still. In the past 25 years we’ve seen the Internet, and social media transform daily life and we are all experiencing the downstream effects on adult education.
As demonstrated by his work on the TESOL Technology Standards, Dr. Greg Kessler is keenly aware of technology’s impact on language education. Through his teaching at Ohio University, Greg oversees the research of many post graduate students who are challenging the boundaries of what’s possible and exploring new ways to put technology to work in language training.
In this podcast, Greg tells us why information technology matters so much to language educators. He describes some of the ways technology impacts language training today, and he gives us a glimpse of emerging technologies that are moving from campus laboratories and becoming available to TESL educators and learners.
This spotlight on a teacher episode focuses on Agnes Kucharska, who teaches Literacy and CLB 1 for a LINC program in Hamilton Ontario. Agnes was nominated as an exemplary teacher by her LearnIT2teach project mentor.
The LearnIT2teach team often gets asked what the learner courseware can do for lower level learners. Agnes describes what she’s doing with blended learning. Agnes started using the learner courseware while she was still in Stage 2 of the teacher training. She’s now finished Stage 3 and is about to start Stage 4. Agnes started using Edulinc with her learners in 2016 with a class of about 20 students, and today she uses it with ten literacy students..
After the face-to-face traditional class, Agnes brings her learners to the computer lab where they practice what they’ve covered in class to give them the opportunity for repetition and practice that are especially important for low literacy learners. The visuals included in the Edulinc courseware help learners understand what Agnes is teaching. Literacy and CLB 1 learners are sometimes afraid of using computers initially but as they move along they develop IT skills and learn to appreciate what learning technology can do. Some even access the courseware outside class on their own initiative or go to the lab on their own after class or during lunch break.
Agnes clearly sees benefits for learners but she also has a message for other LINC teachers: Edulinc benefits teachers too by helping them stay organized.
Length: 9.5 minutes.
This is the first in a new series of podcasts where we focus on one LINC teacher making exemplary use of learning technology. Bonnie Sibley teaches for Abbotsford Community Services in the Lower Mainland in BC. Bonnie has been teaching ESL for ten years and has been “…loving it and growing ever since.” Bonnie has completed all four stages of the LearnIT2teach teacher training. She’s created her own resources and shared them on Tutela, including a mini app for goal setting, and a language companion to enable learner assessment and reflection.
Bonnie teaches part time CLB 6 courses, both mornings and evenings. Students access the courseware from wherever they have an Internet connection and computer, smartphone or tablet. She uses checklists to help her and her learners organize and track their work. She also uses discussion forums to enable discussion between and among learners in her blended learning classes. She even has students in one class communicating with learners in her other class. She supplements the Edulinc learner courseware with resources on current events and Canada. She sources some of her own resources such as TED Talks and Youtube videos.
Bonnie feels the online component of blended learning has increased learner access, engagement and participation. Students even log on in the wee hours of the night: “They realize they have to be online to be successful.” And, “Students realize they need the technology and they need the skills to use it.”
The courseware supports PBLA in Bonnie’s opinion. She uses the online component to encourage skill building. "They know if I give them a skill-using or an assessment in class, that it’s linked or built on their online work. It’s so helpful for me because I don’t always have the time.” Hers is a part-time program so when learners do work on their own time to build skills, it saves her time and helps keep the student progressing. Bonnie’s last word: “I would encourage all teachers, every level, to seriously consider blended learning.”
Length: 12 minutes
In Part Two of her conversation with Jim Edgar, Marijke Geurts discusses using PBLA in her context, and its benefits and challenges.
Marijke concludes by offering some advice to other LINC teachers who may be required to use PBLA in a blended context
Marijke Geurts is an instructor at the YMCA of Greater Saint John, New Brunswick. She is implementing Portfolio-based Language Assessment (PBLA) in a LINC program through a format that blends face-to-face and online delivery using the LINC courseware (edulinc.org).
Marijke’s teaching context is not a typical LINC program. She meets her students in class for half of her contact time and she assigns work for her learners to do outside of class. Marijke has successfully integrated this blended delivery model using edulinc.org and PBLA.
There are two parts to Marijke’s podcast. In Part One, she describes her teaching context including how she integrates the face-to-face using some sample activities.
Child care, transportation, cold winters and work shifts are some of the challenges learners face in getting to LINC classes in rural Saskatchewan. To make it easier to participate in LINC, Carleton Trail College in south central Saskatchewan has piloted a delivery model where face to face study in a classroom is combined with online studies at home, or in the workplace. The result for immigrants is a more flexible delivery option.
Nicola Finnson led the piloting of the delivery model. Carleton Trail wanted to preserve the social aspects of face to face learning while making it easier for learners to participate when not in class. The college created three blended learning ‘sites’ and initiated a 16-week pilot project. Finnson reports, “The results were phenomenal”: great language training results and positive impacts on learner retention and participation numbers. For example, pilot attendance was 89% versus 77.2% in traditional classrooms. Employers report communication gains at work, including more ‘mingling’ between older employees and the newcomers. The pilot has been extended.
In this ten minute podcast, Nicola describes the challenges newcomers and the college faced, and the impact of the pilot program on learners, their course attendance and participation, and their workplaces.
Jen Artan is another in our series of LINC professionals putting blended
learning to work. Her class of 12 newcomers in London, Ontario are
studying semi-independently in a specialized class organized around
face-to-face learning, on-the-job training and independent online study.
Jen has applied the LINC courseware and the Moodle learning management
system to create an online environment accessible to learners
24/7, anywhere they have an Internet connection.
Jen has had to develop quite a lot of original curriculum for this novel
program. She talks about how the class approached flexible learning and
adapted to working independently. Jen also reflects on the LearnIT2teach
training, the challenges of migrating to blended learning and its role in
her classroom. 7 minutes.
For lots of additional informative and breezy reflection from Jen, be sure
to check out her blog at http://jennfireblendedlearning.wordpress.com/
Mirella Mosca teaches LINC at COSTI in the greater Toronto area. She has completed her Stage 4 course and is submitting the course she created on education for TESL Ontario's Margaret Pidlaski Award contest (advertised on Tutela). She prepared this short video as part of her submission. The video paints a nice picture of what a teacher can do with blended learning and how learners responded to it.
Mavis describes how her community college LINC program now implements the LINC online courseware and a blended learning approach in all classes. She describes what impact blended learning is having on the learners, teachers and the entire program. Learners now have more flexible options for learning and communicating. She tells how the key changes came about and profiles the 'leading actors'.
In conversation with Rob McBride. Length: Five minutes.
Language teachers and program administrators who want to make the move to LINC blended learning begin with an important question: how do I get there from here? Pamela Manson and her colleagues at Algonquin College have made the big move. In this podcast Pamela describes how she became involved in LearnIT2teach and how that's paying off for her teaching, her learners & her LINC program. 8 minutes.
In the build up to TESL Ontario 2013, we are focussing lots of attention on practitioners. What are the classroom benefits of blended learning? What does it take to get it going? In this podcast, you'll listen to Svetlana Lupasco describe her approach to ESL Literacy, the role technology plays in her teaching, and the courseware she has created for her classes. Svetlana also gives us a sneak preview of what attendees can expect at her technology lab session at TESL Ontario 2013. Svetlana is a LINC teacher, a 9-year TESL professional from Toronto and a recent graduate of Stage 4 in the LearnIT2teach training.
Svetlana shares her course materials at: (http://literacyesl.blogspot.ca/)
Jim Edgar continues his conversation with Ken Beatty, a CALL professor at Anaheim University. Jim asks Professor Beatty to summarize an inspiring conference presentation he had given at TESL Canada. The topic was 'The Unexpected Next'. In his summary, Professor Beatty lists six emerging language technologies. and their application to language teaching and learning. These are really six key techniques for making the most creative and effective use of learning technologies. This is not at all just for techies. It's practical advice for the blended learning instructor.
In this final section, Vance describes the importance of teachers modelling technological innovation to other teachers. Vance also gives some technology tips. Vance also underlines the need for teachers to be playful and exploratory with new technology.
Vance speaks to the importance of community of practice when teachers want to innovate and apply new learning technologies. As the father of Webheads and Webheads in Action, Vance has demonstrated that his approach to online community building works.
Vance Stevens,a pioneer in computer-assisted language learning since the 70's, and Rob McBride, LearnIT2teach Project, in conversation in March 2012 at TESOL Philadelphia. Vance has taught TESL extensively at the university level in the USA and the Middle East. Thousands of TESL professionals know him as the originator and the animator of Webheads, a community of practice for instructors wanting to integrate technology into their teaching.
This is the first of three podcasts with Vance. In Instalment #1, Vance speaks to the origins of Webheads and how it operates to encourage collaboration and sharing among TESL practitioners.
This podcast was recorded at the TESL Canada 2012 Conference shortly after the official launch of Tutela.ca, Citizenship and Immigration Canada's national repository for settlement language training. The podcast features Pascal St-Jean, one of the site administrators and core developers. Pascal provides a brief history of Tutela, an overview of what the site offers, strategies being used to build an online community and how being community-driven will impact the site's future.
In this episode, Dr. Ken Beatty provides insights into the benefits of using technology from both the teachers' and learners' perspectives. Dr. Beatty makes practical suggestions, and he offers advice to the many teachers who would like to do more with educational technologies, but say they don't have time to learn them. Dr. Beatty is a Professor of Computer-assisted Language Learning at Anaheim University. He is also widely published in his field. This episode was recorded by Jim Edgar at the 2012 TESL Canada Conference.
Teachers can act as 'change agents' by leading efforts to integrate CALL in their program. But this can be a dangerous path if you become known as the techie teacher, and then are relied on for technical support. Teachers in that position should be rewarded by administrators, but they should also try to teach skills to other teachers and students. Teachers need to know a little technology 'first aid' in order to fix issues themselves.
CALL has evolved a lot in the past 30 years. Mobile technology for learning and games for learning are two exciting new technologies. But people need to think carefully about what really helps and not just adopt trendy technology.
Teachers facing challenging environments and perhaps suspicious of learning technology should try to 'role play' the language learner. Dr. Hubbard suggests that teachers try using CALL materials in another language to experience technology from the learners point of view. This way, teachers can learn to understand what learners enjoy and what might frustrate them.
Technology skills for teachers are becoming more and more in demand. Building your tech skills enhances your marketability. Teachers learn best from each other. Teachers collaborating to learn new skills is a real plus. Hiring a teacher with tech skills can improve a program as she can be a model for others. A program might start the process of change and innovation with a specific project to meet a need because teachers begin to see the value of innovation when they put it work. A group of teachers collaborating to do something new lightens the individual load and makes it more interesting for everyone. Length, less than five minutes.
Dr. Phil Hubbard is the third computer assisted language learning expert we met with at TESOL Philadelphia in March 2012. He is a senior lecturer in Linguistics at Stanford University and a widely published and admired expert in the role technology plays in language teaching. As well, Phil was one of the principal authors of the TESOL Technology Standards.
This is the first of a three part interview with Dr. Hubbard. In this part, he describes how students have evolved from consumers of content to producers. CALL has become part of TESL because technology pervades our lives in general. The TESOL Technology Standards were developed partly for this reason. The standards have parts for both teachers and learners and performance indicators to show where both should be. Teachers need to understand what their learners need to know about technology. And they need to reflect on what technology applications are appropriate for their learners.
Dr. Greg Kessler is Associate Professor of Computer Assisted Language Learning (CALL) in the Department of Linguistics and Director of the Language Resource Center at Ohio University. He teaches CALL teacher preparation and research methods courses. His research addresses CALL teacher preparation, teacher and student language use in collaborative constructivist language learning, the role of students and teachers in innovative pedagogical contexts, student and teacher autonomy, and the relationship between technology and change in the English language. He has published widely in the area of CALL.
This seven minute conversation with LearnIT2teach Project Manager Rob McBride took place at TESOL Philadelphia 2012. Greg describes how CALL resources are constantly expanding. Also the CALL world has evolved and today there is no necessity for teachers to know computer code. New media and social networking are powerful new tools for language learning and teaching. New technology offers all TESL practitioners new opportunities. TESL professionals who don't take advantage are doing their constituents a disservice. One of the best ways to integrate CALL into an ESL program is when one teacher gets things going and models success with CALL for her colleagues. Successful integration of technology requires 'institutionalizing' CALL.
In the second part of a conversation with Rob McBride, Deborah Healey explains how teachers can easily integrate technology into their practice. Tools as accessible as word processing or simple photo editing programs can be new and powerful avenues for language experience. The new ways we can do things are very empowering for teachers and learners. The Internet is a powerful medium for finding useful and stimulating classroom content. Creating a Google site or a blog on blogger take no more than a few minutes and link learners to the world in empowering ways.
Duration, six minutes.
Deborah Healey is a senior instructor at the University of Oregon and a CALL educator with an international reputation for thoughtful and incisive work. This seven minute podcast is part one of a two part conversation with Deborah.
In conversation with LearnIT2teach team member Rob McBride at TESOL Philadelphia 2012, she explains why teachers have a responsibility to engage their learners with technology. Deborah also explains why getting started with technology doesn't demand a lot of technical know-how.
Duration, seven and a half minutes.
In conversation with LearnIT2Teach team member John Allan, Professor John Sivell of Brock University gives general guidance and useful tips on teaching reading using online and other resources. Professor Sivell answers questions regarding selecting and adapting materials and improvising extensions using material sourced online. Wikis and other collaborative tools can play a very useful role in developing reading materials for ESL classes. Specific sources for Canadian materials are reviewed by Professor Sivell. He also answers related questions on respecting copyright law when using sourced materials, and sharing materials that teachers develop themselves. Sivell also reviews the language acquisition theory on making technology the servant of teaching and learning. Length, 14:00.
In this eight minute conversation with LearnIT2teach Communications Manager Rob McBride, Carolyn Cohen describes the origins of the framework project and the need for more specialized TESL skills that has emerged. Carolyn also describes the challenges of consulting the Ontario field and reviewing training to shortlist programs that qualify as TESL training rather than service professional development. Carolyn also describes why LearnIT2teach Stage Four training qualifies as post certificate training, while the first three stages fall into the category of PD.
A three minute introduction to putting LINC courseware and your creativity to work to familiarize your learners with Canada's fall festivals.
Mary Ellen Gillespie developed the e-learning materials in question for LearnIT2teach and discusses them in conversation with Rob. Mary Ellen also discusses how the e-learning materials can support classroom learning.
A two minute expose of life on the frontiers of e-learning. Featuring Pamela, Karen, Ellen and Kathleen discussing how they put the courseware to work with their learners.
Sharon discusses how the role of technology and the newcomers' interest and abilities to use these technologies have changed in settlement language programs in Ontario and at her workplace, the Toronto Catholic District School Board. Sharon is supportive of the learning objects and online resources that are available to settlement language programs through the LearnIT2teach project, yet she also identifies the challenges of getting these resources onto the computer screens of the clients.