UPDATE 16/10/2012: FULL ASSIGNMENT INCLUDING SAMPLE TEACHER TRAINING MATERIAL DOWNLOADABLE
- SEE BOTTOM OF EMBEDDED SCRIBD DOC.
Following my ICT in ELT module at the University of Warwick, I have just completed a Professional Practice module for ICT. For this I had to make a proposal to introduce an innovative technology into an English Language Teaching setting familiar to me - in my case, I chose the Central Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing. This was a hypothetical proposal based on a real setting and a real teaching situation. It is not a proposal which is actually going to be introduced at CAFA (unless somebody there happens to read this and nicks the idea). It is, however, an idea for using the innovative tool in any appropriate ELT setting. The tool I chose, following the number of pageviews on this blog and general feedback received, is the cloud based software presentation tool, MyBrainshark. I also used the screen capture software tool, Camtasia Studio 7 from Techsmith, to record the screencasts which accompany the PowerPoint presentations I have made for 6 one hour class-based lessons.
One book which became central to this module and to this project is 'Rethinking Pedagogy for a Digital Age: Designing and Delivering e-learning', edited by Helen Beetham and Rhona Sharpe (Routledge, 2007). But I also took some general themes on the issues of technology - for purposes other than simply enabling content to be transmitted more effectively - from Diana Laurillard's Plenary session at IATEFL, Glasgow, 2012. Laurillard also wrote the foreward to the previously mentioned book.
A short clip from Diana Laurillard's Plenary Session from IATEFL, Glasgow.
I originally just uploaded the project specification sheet, but as of 16 October 2012, I have added below the full assignment, including PPP sheets:-
A Camtasia Studio produced video, which I presented to my fellow students, is shown below. There is a 'blended' version of this, which mixes the original video with the face-to-face presentation given to my peers in the final week of term, on the video page of this blog:
Here are four (of six) downloadable PowerPoint Presentations which I created for the proposal. They are free to adapt or use but please remember that they were created for a proposal to introduce an innovative tool into an ELT setting and are not actually going to be used at CAFA.... yet!
Teacher training my brainshark - 2 uploading content and recording audio
Teacher training my brainshark - 2 uploading content and recording audio
View more PowerPoint from Phil Longwell
The full, complete set of screencasts (tutorials) for the proposed induction course can be found by following the links below. I will submit the whole thing - including the 6,000 word essay, as my final piece of assessed work for term 2, on 24 April.
Final note: This is only a proposal. I do not work at the China Central Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing, but I did so from 2009-10. This is a marked assignment on my MA course. MyBrainshark has a lot of uses but there are hardly any studies published on using it in English Language Teaching. I like to share, so have put the created content out there on scribd (the project proposal), screencast.com (7 screencasts) and on slideshare (6 PowerPoints). The ideas can be taken, modified and adapted as necessary. You would need to investigate this yourself and if you wanted to introduce the tool to teachers, create your own teacher training material as I have done.
Update (21/05/12): I received 75% for this 30 credit assignment.
