Ms. Chen’s Mandarin Learning Centre

Yeah, Manu has very well summarized the article, as I have read this article as well. I have been thinking that how well teachers could embrace the new technologies in teaching. Yes, it’s true that young people can not survive without music, internet and mobile, but have they really used these new things in their studies or they just use them for pastime. From what I’ve observed from prac I think kids use these things merely for entertainment.

Miao’s posting is interesting, especially the questions asked by her at the end of this posting which makes me to think. I think teachers could still get the feedback from computer based games. It is not a big difference from other material based game such as paper or pen based game. Computer based games would certainly bring some fun to students, but as every game it will have the result which could be seen as the feedback for teachers. And the other question asked by Miao is does a game need to have winner and loser. I guess it is better to have winning result, because it is one of the factors that could stimulate students to participate in learning by using games. However we might emphasis the winning side which would make the winning side even more eager to learn and would provocate the losing side to put more effort to the next game or other activities to gain a winning situation. So I think it is better to have the result when playing a game but emphasis on the winning side rather than saying “this group is loser” which might hurt students feeling.

I have just read this article, which is very interesting and a good reflection of our nowadays’ education. The main point of this article is that education is not just as simple as teachers pour information to students and use new technologies for retrieving information only such as surf the internet, but education is rather to nourish and develop children’s creativity and transmit information into knowledge.

I guess it is more common in our education system that to pour information to students than educate them how to process the information to become their knowledge and computers are more easily to be seen as information resource. Anyway how many educators are confident enough to teach students to use computers or technologies creatively? That’s why computers are used as a machine that we can get lot of information out of it.  Except this, students are seen as information recipients. For instance, despite of Australian government advocate language learning in schools, but how many students become bilingual when they left school? On the problem is teachers see learning as a process of receiving information but neglect the process of transmit information into knowledge, in terms of language learning students only receive information of a new language but they didn’t process the information and become their knowledge and creatively use it in the real world.

Resnick, M. (2002). Rethinking Learning in the Digital Age. In G. Kirk-
man (Ed.), The Global Information Technology Report: Readiness for
the Networked Word. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

I have just read this article, the main point of this article is that when everyone advocates computers in education, we should also see its negative sides and many examples are being given. I agree with the point that using computers in our education may bring some more fun to students, but when they have jobs in the real world, would that be interesting again as once they’ve enjoyed in their school days? What is the purpose of our education, I guess one of the purposes is to teach students the skills they will need one day they leave schools. And again things in computers are artificial, so we should balance the computer using in terms of teaching and learning styles. For example, if teachers using computers in language teaching all the time, that might end up student develop their writing skills but delay in their oral skills as they hardly the open their mouth and practice the speaking but face the computer all the time and practicing written or listening skills.

I’ve just read Yuri’s posting about game-based learning; I feel like her comment about the article is quite good and detailised which makes me to rethink about game use in LOTE class. Yuri’s comment started by summurising the main ideas of the article she had read that gives me an overal idea about the article without reading it.

Then she goes to talk about her personal view about game using in LOTE class. Yes, I agree with her, however in my opinion that game is not just used for learning vocabulary and grammar, but it could be use in other aspect when teaching language and it doesn’t have to be digital based, I mean in could be done without computer as well. For example, a game called “language wishpering” could be used in any class either with or without computer and could be use for practicing student speaking skill for the language learning.

This speech was published at the end of twenty century that predicts the education system in the twenty-first century would be child-centre and technology would bring mega change to the education. Now we are already in the twenty-first century, how much of the prediction has happened? Are our education really focused on children that give children power to control their own learning process? Computer is a major tool that used in education no matter in school or out of school. Almost all schools now have computer but are they well used or they are more likely used for administration? Most households have computer with internet nowadays, and children are much better informed as they can search it in the internet. So this prediction is quite right.   

Yes I agree with this article, this is a very interesting article to read and an excellent reflex ion for teachers when they come to use technology in their lessons. The article reminds me that as a teacher am I using technology to improve my lesson quality or just for the sake of using technology.  I would not just stuff technology into my lessons if it doesn’t improve my lessons.

Research has found that 39% of public school teachers who have computers in their classroom indicate they use computer ‘a lot’ for creating instruction material, and 34% indicate they use computer a lot for administration purpose. (http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2000/2000090.pdf). Is this result good enough? I, personally think it is not good enough; we can maximize computer usage for better teaching. To do so we might also need to provide some professional training for teacher who might not very confident with new technologies, as it is obviously that young teachers use technology more often.

So far in my reading of the literature provided online and other people’s posting, especially in the area of “digital culture” and “e-learning in 7-12 Education”, I have realized there are many interesting and useful issues for teachers to be aware of.  For example, how does digital culture impact on our life and how does this affect our education?

Firstly, technology has changed people’s life style, especially the younger generations. Young people’s life is dependant on technology; they will not survive without technology such as mobile phones and the internet. As the article “Truly, madly, deeply engage” (Yahoo, OMD, n.d.) has pointed out that “youth around the globe are engaging with media in new, deeper and more passionate ways”. Yes, it is true that technology has greatly influence young people’s life that some of classmates have agreed with. Their views such as “One of the things that I thought beneficial is that the Internet makes youth to feel connected to friends living in other cities and countries or even people in the world they never met” and “On the other hand, the Internet can cause some problems…”, the whole posting can be read from here.

Consequently, as new technology has such a great influence then how should our education adapt to it. In other words, how should we teach our students as their life style has changed that as well has influenced their study habit? Under the influence of new technology, students think and study in a different way to the last generation did. The article “Digital natives, digital immigrants” (Prensky, M., 2001) has asserted that “today’s students think and process information fundamentally differently from their predecessor” and they are defined as “‘native speakers’ of digital language of computers, digital games and internet.” And I personally believe that to cater these students better the educators need to update their knowledge to learn “digital language”. However, it may not be that easy, as some of the educators need support for learning this new “language”, for example, some educators need help in learning this new language but they are willing to learn, a posting of this situation can be viewed here.

Secondly, as we are with such great technology, schools and teachers should use embrace this opportunity, by, for example, installing curricula related programs in school computers and maximizing the benefits provided by new technology, while at the same time attempting to prevent technology addiction and misusage.

On the whole, I am an advocator of using new technology in our education system and am optimistic about the future education with these great technologies.

References:

Prensky,M., (2001). Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants. Retrieved October 09 2008, from http://www.marcprensky.com/writing/Prensky%20-%20Digital%20Natives,%20Digital%20Immigrants%20-%20Part1.pdf

Yahoo, OMD.   Truly, madly, deeply engage: global youth, media and technology. Retrieved October 09 2008, from http://www.iabaustralia.com.au/Truly_Madly_Final_booklet.pdf

I read a posting on Masaco’s blog; it is based on her reading of “the multitasking generation”. I agree with her opinion that parents should intervene their children’s online habit to stop the addictive by controlling the time they spend online. When I read through articles that boasting how great our modern technologies could benefit our education especially the internet, have they concern about how many kids are using them for the purpose of studies.  

I read the article “log on education”, yes I agree that internet can always bring benefits to education, but how many of us can trust students when a lesson is hold in a computer lab? Will students concentrate on the lesson content or will they have their own social activities in front of the internet? As a language teacher I agree that the internet provides a great deal of information that could be used in the lesson, for example, I could download a video clip of Chinese culture to teach the culture part that prescribed in the syllabus. However, I’d rather do it as a part of lesson plan and burnt it in a CD disk and show the whole class rather than to let the whole class to go to the computer lab and watch it online. In this way I have archived the purpose of using multimedia and make the lesson interesting to students, while has avoided the misusing of the internet by students. Secondly, I have the same feeling that the article has pointed out that school computer are much better designed for administration, financially or other using purpose rather than designed to cater curriculums. So I think it’d be great for teachers if school could install relative programs for subjects, such as program of games for language learning.