Rethinking AI’s Role in Education: Purpose and Questions

I’ve recently attended an event in which there was very brief talk followed by dinner with other educators. In addition to general conversations about the current educational scenario, the main point was to discuss the use of Generative Artificial Intelligence in education. The guest speaker was brief, and he was not there to lecture, but to raise some interesting points as he’s got access to data in both the public and the private sector of primary and secondary education in Brazil. This is not something that we, educators around the globe, haven’t discussed in the past year extensively, and some of the topics that were raised in the follow-up discussion can be easily identified: the need for better teacher education to incorporate new technology, the lack of infra-structure to allow for equitable access in the country, academic dishonesty, and some pointers on how teachers have been using AI effectively in their lessons. All valid points that should be debated more and more often. Yet, there’s one thing that I’ve been doing some thinking about so much that it could be an interesting point to put into writing. It’s been a very long time since I last wrote in this space, and I’m not even sure anyone still follows this blog, but the conversations I was able to have in the comments were always productive and helped me frame my thoughts differently, so here I am again.

The burning question is whether we’re taking the debate where we should take it. We have are witnessing the birth of technology that was able to impress us given how human-like it is. Text generated by ChatGPT back in November 2022 was so impressive because it was easy for us to forget that we were talking to a machine. What was more impressive was the results it got from exams that humans themselves failed. In the beginning the discussions revolved around the death of the English essay, or the fact that now students wouldn’t bother to learn anything – we should, some claimed, ban technology from schools or go back to oral exams and in-class assessments only. To be fair, I guess anything that is so disruptive to well-established practices is prone to causing such fears, and this is not entirely a bad thing. When COVID first appeared, many people (myself included) were overtly cautious until there was a better understanding of how the virus works. When Generative AI made it debut in education, it was still such a new thing with such potential for disruption on well-established practices that such concerns are, in my view, valid to a certain extent.

It is a fact that education takes its time to evolve and catch up to new technology. The picture on the left was taken from a report about the prospects of education in 2030 published by UNESCO (I can’t find the link for the life of me!) and it illustrates well what happens when there’s any disruption in the process. I think this happens because in education we’re working with the most precious thing in people’s lives: their children. No one wants to gamble their children’s future into a fad, and we’ve seen quite few of those in the past 20 years or so. Nevertheless, the fact that Generative AI has caused such an uproar not only in the world of education, makes me think that this is might be something more than a fad. Current uses of AI in education, from individualized learning to materials writing, should be taken more seriously as a viable tool that will soon be part of what we do in schools around the world.

My question is whether the focus is right. Yes, AI can help us do a lot of the things we currently do faster, more effectively, and even improve the current practice. However, is this what we should be doing? Any failing system tries to produce more of what it does when it’s failing. AI helps us analyze more and more data generated from standardized tests. It helps us categorize such data and create what we call an individual learning path to learners so they can perform better in those very same standardized exams. Is this what we want? Shouldn’t we go back to the purpose of school and the world that lies ahead given the technological advances, thoroughly revise them, and try our best to modify what we do? Are we simply substituting old practices with new tools, or even augmenting such practices? Is that all?

This might not be a question all over the world, but in a country as large as Brazil, with all the hurdles to reach all students and teachers, poor infra-structure and connectivity, lack of professional development opportunities, the more we try to promote the old system with new practices, I fear we’re simply adding stress to the system. What is it that will allow students to thrive in the world they will face? Do we accomplish that by shoving content down students’ throats in a such a frantic pace? How can we add rigor, or how can we ensure that we are indeed focusing on learning when there’s absolutely no time to do what needs to be done? In the past few years, a lot has been discussed about what we should add to education, conversations about how implementing this or that will benefit teachers and learners. Very few discussions have been had about what we should cross out, scratch, delete from the curriculum. Perhaps the transformation AI is causing in the world will lead us to a more concerted discussion about what to stop doing as it’s meaningless in today’s world. Do we really want to do more of what we have been doing up to now? It’s taken us thus far, but is it what we need to keep advancing? Perhaps this is the moment in which we can benefit about the advances in the science of learning and focus on what’s best for learning. Maybe AI can lead us to focus on the most important thing in the teaching and learning environment: the relationship between the teacher and the learner. If we ask the right questions, new technologies can help us make learning more human again.

Blog Repost: #ELTChat: the loss of eltchat.com – Plan B

If you haven’t been involved in #ELTChat discussions on twitter for the past couple of years, you should know you’ve missed the chance to connect with fantastic like-minded educators who pursue PD and always strive to do best for their students. #ELTChat is a discussion held every Wednesday on Twitter, and even though I wasn’t able to participate in the last discussions, we could always refer to the website that had been created as a repository for the discussions. This was only possible due to the hard work of all those who are involved in getting things up and running. If anyone here has been involved in any kind of endeavour, be it online or offline, you’ll know how hard it is when things seem to fall apart – but they only seem. As someone who has benefitted a lot from #ELTChat, and someone who appreciates the work that’s been put up by the team of moderators in ELTChat, I’ve decided to share what Marisa Constantinides has written on her blog here. This is not meant as a manifesto, but I believe those who keep looking for opportunities to keep growing professionally should know where they’ll be able to find the new website for #ELTChat, and a couple of words by the moderators on the reasons for the change. I’m posting the post in its entirety, as it’s been written on the original blog post, without adding nor deleting any word from it. Without further ado, here goes the repost from Marisa’s blog:

 

#ELTchat: the loss of eltchat.com – Plan B

Blog post August 10, 2012

 For the last – well, almost two years now, since September 15 2010, #ELTchat has kept us on our toes and forged hundreds of professional and personal relationships amongst its followers who turn up on Twitter every Wednesday to talk about topics they have suggested and voted on – a community of peers which was created by a small group of colleagues – which grew and grew some more and became something that counts as an important part of our continuous professional development.

Like many great ideas, it didn’t hit just one person but several.

And that is how #ELTchat was created.    

The website to keep up the communication of its members, a base and repository of our ideas was one of the first things we all thought of creating – the wiki came later.

Andy Chaplin was keen to join the moderation team and help with podcasts and technical stuff; he was quick to buy eltchat.com and announced the good news to us after the fact.

A few months later, right after TESOL France 2011,  he suddenly disappeared – some say for reasons of health.

We never found out for sure.

We never received a single word of response to our emails.

eltchat.com was and still is registered in his name.

And yesterday we lost it

On August 8 the domain expired and we have no way of taking over unless it goes up for sale again; it was very sad that Andy Chaplin did not find it appropriate to renew.

The news is really upsetting.

The work we have put in on this website cannot be told in a few simple words – but it has been a labour of love and we have got so much out of it that we have never regretted one single moment

We are pretty upset at the behaviour of this individual – disappointment is one big understatement.

But we trust that our community of #ELTchatters, our PLN for short, will again gather round the new domain which we have purchased – eltchat.org

It will take us a few days to put the website back on its feet

And all will be as it was before – all the posts in place all your thoughts and comments, all the polls and great summaries which got us on the shortlist of the ELTon Awards nominations

We will be back with a vengeance

We are not just a website – we did not get on the ELTon awards shortlist as just another website!!!

We are a great community of teachers and we have a Plan B!

See you all in September!!!

Marisa Constantinides – Shaun Wilden

Henrick Oprea

P.S. We would greatly appreciate it if any of you belonging to this great community of teachers,  teacher educators, bloggers, #ELTchat followers,  reposted this on your blog

If you decide to do this, please add your name to the post under ours.

Guest post – Teacher Luiz Eduardo (Dudu)

Hello everyone! I know I’ve been quiet on the blog for a couple of months now, I do have some (good) reasons for that. First and foremost, this blogger got married in June, which meant a lot of hard work with planning everything, and a bit of partying afterwards. I’ve also attended and participated in the 13th National Braz-TESOL convention in Rio de Janeiro. I was really honoured for having been invited to be the MC for the convention (and I hope those who attended it thought it was a decent job), and I also presented a Pecha Kucha in the very first PK night in the history of Braz-TESOL. Most importantly, it was a great pleasure to have the chance to attend the convention with other staff members. One of these has actually written a guest post and has kindly accepted to be published here. Without further ado, here comes the first text of this new semester in Doing Some Thinking, a guest post written by teacher Luiz Eduardo, or, simply put, Teacher Dudu. I hope you enjoy what’s to come!

 

The teacher must have a heart

After attending a week of professional development, such as the 13th BRAZ-TESOL National Convention, teachers normally go back to their schools full of new ideas. They heard Christine Coombe talking about the 10 characteristic of a highly effective teacher; Kathi Bailey speaking about the bridges to link what students can say to what they want to say; Ben Goldstein and the metaphors in English; Jim Scrivener developing the interaction between teaching and learning; David Nunan mentioning the proto-language and real language; Luke Meddings giving ideas to teach unplugged; Herbert Puchta showing thoughtful aspects about Neurolinguistics; Nicky Hocky and the digital literacies; Jeremy Harmer elucidating the myth of multi-tasking; and Lindsay Clandfield talking about critical thinking, among other speakers. And I’m not even mentioning what teachers have certainly learned from all the workshops and talks they have attended in addition to the plenary sessions.

Photo on Flickr by riekhavok

Although they have probably enjoyed learning and remembering so many things, they now have a big problem in their minds, which is how to apply all those things in their classroom. Is everything suitable to their reality? Should they try to do everything they have heard from these highly-respected professionals in ELT? But… how???????

This is exactly my point in this reflection. Though teachers should always try to keep up to date, they are the ones who know their students, classroom, school, city and country. They are the ones who must feel when to use certain activity. They should know how adapt activities to different contexts. They have to make students embrace the activities and the ideas they’ve been presented with. They are in charge of the responsibility to teach their students. Finally, they are the ones who have to cope with such diverse teaching situations.

Thousands of activities without feeling aren’t worth it, just as feeling without any activity is equally worthless.

It’s possible to say that the teacher should have this balance: to keep up to date, but always remembering that they need a reality filter. As Christine Coombe ranked ’the calling to the profession’ as the number one characteristic of a good teacher, I think I can say that the teacher’s heart is this reality filter I’m talking about.

I fortunately work in a school which encourages teachers to try new ideas, and to be always pursuing self and professional development. I am, most definitely, looking forward to putting to use the new ideas I had during this fantastic brainstorming week.

@teacherdudu

I am a teacher at Atlantic Idiomas in Brasília, Brazil. I was born and I’ve grown up here in Brasília, the city which has the most beautiful sky in the world. I have a BA degree and teacher’s course in History from Brasilia’s Federal University (UnB). I am finishing my undergraduation Language course, majoring in English, this year; also at Brasilia’s Federal University (UnB). I’ve been teaching English since 2004 and I really love what I do. From now on, I want to participate more actively in the online teaching world.

Teachers in training

What's deep for some may be shallow for others... | Photo on Flickr by FeatheredTar

Suppose you want to start teaching English. Now, suppose you have never taught English before and that you’re looking for a way to start your new career. This is the moment you will get acquainted with acronyms and abbreviations such as TEFL, TESOL, CELTA, DELTA, TTC and a couple of others. I mean, you may come across these if you’re lucky (?); another possibility is sitting through an initial pre-service session lasting anything from simply receiving your textbooks and a quick hello from your coordinator to a longer training session to teach how to implement the magic method that is likely to – ahem – make all learners, from all sorts of backgrounds, learn English magically and miraculously. Ask any experienced professional in the field of ELT and you’ll hear that there are, until today, many language institutes that abide by rigid methods from the days of yore.

On a different note, you may have come across this post that questions whether teacher preparation courses are dangerously irrelevant or not. This is something that strikes a chord with me as I’ve been involved with teacher training and development for quite a long time, and this is likely to become my main activity in the foreseeable future. Are teachers really being prepared effectively to what they’ll face in the classroom? Are they being prepared to deal with the fact that the role of the teacher is changing faster than many of them would like it to? The question, to me, is not whether teacher preparation is irrelevant or not, but whether we’re doing it right or not.

I guess one of the most complicated things these days is that we’re in some sort of a conundrum – many teachers believe that what matters is what you’ve learnt, and not the piece of paper you’ll get afterwards. Yet, teachers themselves tend to only favour teacher training programs that will give them a piece of paper to be described in their CV’s without actually looking for learning opportunities that may also be fruitful. But instead of questioning the validity of certificates and such, I train my words at another target. I’m yet to hear from any teacher who gave informal PD a serious chance through actively participating and engaging in the world of blogs and twitter the words that I hear from many teachers who are forced to participate in sessions given by their school – it was a waste of time. Much on the contrary, actually. You don’t even need to ask, teachers who engage in PD online are the first ones to say they have learnt more in 8 months of twitter and blogs than they’d learnt in 4 years of college. Even if this is something that we can’t measure scientifically, it does say something. The message conveyed here is the one that we experience a sense of progress we don’t usually experience when we are shoved training sessions.

Could this be easily explained through motivation? We do know that motivated students tend to learn more effectively, or at least they try much harder. When we’re told what to do, do we look at it as if someone else tried to tell us what we need and, even if it’s subconsciously, sabotage any learning experience that may come from that? Is the belief that teachers should know all so ingrained in some (most?) teachers that it prevents us from opening up and making our weaknesses seen? Do we honestly believe that we know everything someone is trying to teach us? All of these could be drives for our motivation, which would then lead to lack of commitment in any kind of teacher training programme.

On the other hand, when we think of online, informal PD, we soon discover that it’s all about sharing. We’re not being taught, we’re discovering things together, exchanging ideas and opinions, but not being told, “this is right, and that is wrong”. Is the fact that we don’t need to fear being graded, or is the fact that we feel we’re not being judged or assessed so liberating that we finally open up for learning? The intriguing thought to me is that we can certainly see the benefits of sharing online, learning from so many different and interesting people, and yet fail to see that we may also learn from those next to us. How many teachers, for instance, would be dying to attend a conference with only ‘local’ teachers?

Training and development are two different things, but if we believe that teachers are not to be replaced by machines and computers, if we believe that teaching is a lot more than simply transmitting information, then we should embrace each and every opportunity that comes our way. But how do we know what is worth? This semester I’ve decided to deal with teacher training and development more as tutoring than as lecturing. Is this the right way to go? Well, at least there’s one thing I’m sure of – it’ll certainly help me spot talents and identify those who are willing to walk the extra mile and separate the wheat from the chaff. In a smaller scale, tutoring makes it harder for those who simply attend lectures and sit in classes to get away with laziness and last minute cramming.

By and large, traditional teaching is not as beautiful as we wish it were. There are many “teachers” who could care less about their work and don’t really worry about their students’ learning. And it’s a shame that many schools (at least where I live) look at education as if it were simply another business and give these “teachers” a job. this is why the best place to find like-minded educators is online and elsewhere instead of in the same teachers’ room you’re in. Isn’t it time we started changing this and accepting that the guy next doors can teach us, in the broad meaning of the word, as well as, or even better than the VIP speaker who comes and talks to an audience for a couple of minutes? But most importantly, isn’t it time we accepted that, as teachers, we should be open to learning and developing? Teacher preparation is not dangerously irrelevant, but perhaps our attitude to it is.

What’s your PD story?

When I first started studying English, it was in an environment that shunned the use of L1 in the classroom and favoured native English speaking teachers (NESTs) to Non-NESTs (NNESTs). In my very first class, the teacher did not speak a word of Portuguese. To be honest, as far as I remember, the teacher couldn’t speak Portuguese – he was a NEST. There’s only one thing that I remember from that teacher in particular – when he was trying to turn on the tape-recorder but was holding the power cord in his hand. It is only this goofy moment that I can remember from that particular teacher. Later on, I remember I had only NNEST as teachers, but the same restriction held true: no L1 in class!

Some people even fool themselves by telling other they keep their eyes open for new ideas. Do you know anyone like that? / Photo by DerrickT

As this was the experience I had when I was a language learner, it was what I believed in when I started teaching. I felt that I could never be a good teacher if I were ever to use L1 in the classroom. How often do we reproduce what we’ve lived? Many people I know claim to only “learn” how to do something if someone else shows them how to do it. They them start simply repeating the processes that they’d witnessed and that’s how the cogs of the machine kept moving. Every now and them, though, someone would look at the process and come up with a different way to make things move. If it worked, they’d be regarded as very creative people who had an awesome idea to make things simpler, while a whole lot of other people would look at the proposed solution and wonder how they could have missed such a simple thing. If, however, things didn’t work, that soon to be acclaimed creative fellow would then be called a crazy man whose far-fetched ideas were to be laughed at.

I honestly think that creativity is under-rated in our schools, but I just can’t help hearing a line from Sir Ken Robinson’s TED talk whenever I see people praising every different and strange idea. Creativity is not the same thing as being wrong, and it’s not the same thing as having different ideas that might, once in a blue moon, work. What I believe in is that we need to know a lot about something if we want to be able to think about it more creatively. I’m not saying that knowledge and creativity are the same, but I certainly believe that the more you know about something, the easier it is for you to find creative solutions for the problems you have.

In the first year of my teaching career, I simply refused to hear about language classes that welcomed L1 in the classroom. It was, based on my experience and the kind of training I had, wrong in just so many ways that I couldn’t even fathom the possibility. I would attend seminars just to get practical ideas that I could implement in my very next class, and, looking back right now, I thought, after being in the classroom for a very short time, that I knew all that I needed to know. I thought that learning about the history of ELT, the myriad approaches and methods, and different things that people were doing was just a waste of time. What is funny is that this is something that I usually think about anytime I talk to a teacher who hasn’t been teaching long and who is reluctant to adopting a new approach to teaching based on his or her “vast” experience after being in the classroom for 3 years or so.

It was only after I attended my first large conference in ELT that I started looking at things from a different perspective. It was then that I first heard of the terms NESTs and NNESTs. It was the first time that it hit me: what I was doing in class was simply what I thought to be right based on what my teachers did in their classes. I had no clue whatsoever to why I was doing such things. Little did I know that there were people trying to find out different ways to help learners. Never before had I heard that there could be a reasonable way for people to use L1 in the classroom. It was during this conference that I also found out how passionate I truly was about being a teacher, on a very special session to me.

The conference I’m talking about is the National Braz-TESOL, in 2000 in São Paulo. To be fair, I was also fortunate enough to have, by then, two bosses who helped me immensely in this eye-opening process I had to go through, and one that I personally think all teachers need to go through themselves. It was in 2000 that I had the chance to attend a 3-day workshop on the use of Drama in the classroom by Ken Wilson. It was the first time I realized that, yes, it was possible to teach English in many different ways. It was on the very same conference that I first heard about the IPA and that there was a way for me to work on my pronunciation without having to live abroad. This and many other workshops have totally reshaped the way I looked at ELT. It wasn’t something done simply by repeating what had been done to me in my language classes – there was a whole world outside and all I had to do was look for more opportunities. It was only then that I started valuing the texts that those two bosses I had made available to us and that were not merely about grammar.

It was only after learning more about language teaching and learning that I understood how little I knew – something we are always told in our philosophy classes at school but we never really grasp it until reality hits. It was then that I realized that I didn’t have to fear using L1 in class as long as I knew when and how to use it. It was then I realized that I could learn many more practical ideas to implement immediately in class by learning more about theory than by just reading about practical ideas. The more we learn, the easier it is for us to find creative ways to better cater for our learners. The more we know, the easier it is for us to innovate. It’s the turning point anyone who wants to walk the extra mile should look for – use the right R: REFLECT, don’t simply repeat. And never ever wait for others to do it for you. If you want it, you have to get it yourself. Teacher development is easier than ever these days with all the online possibilities. My concern, however, is that there’s a new generation of teachers simply repeating what they’ve read online without thinking about how it could help their learners. Not everyone will be a trendsetter, but not everyone has to be a blind follower either. How many teachers do you know who had been teaching for longer than 5, 6, 7 (or more) years but who still think like teachers who have jus started teaching but truly believe they’ve already learned it all? And how many teachers who have just started teaching but are aware of the fact that they have to go beyond what their first employer has taught them? And, finally, what was your real eye-opener in your career? What’s your professional development story?

The five stages of PD for teachers

It’s unavoidable. When you first start working as an ELT teacher, you’re given some kind of training and the truth is that it’s so well delivered that you blindly follow everything you’ve been told to do. After a while, though, you realise that the things that you’ve been told to do are not as wonderful as you were originally told, or maybe you get a new job and you have a different kind of training. All is fine if you’re an open-minded person willing to experiment with different things and taking into account that you have already studied at least a tad about teaching and learning. But what if you’re talking about professional development with someone who is not willing to change, or who counters every little thing you say simply by saying, “You’re wrong! I’ve never done that and my lessons work perfectly fine,” but these people aren’t exactly listening to your point. I’ve once heard that teachers’ egos are enormous, and to a certain extent I agree with that – and teachers who are not in the ELT world have already stated the same thing. Anyway, when being told about professional development, I can’t help but wonder the stages these people go through. It might be something like the 5 stages of death, I suppose. Let’s see if I got this right, shall we?

Stage 1 – Denial

“Listen, what you’re saying is a whole bunch of non-sense” or “if this were true, I’d have heard it by now.” These are some common utterances you’ll hear from teachers who have a vast 3-month experience in the classroom and who believe they already know what it takes to be a teacher. Another characteristic of teachers in this stage is that they refuse to listen to any new idea and call it just a fad.

Stage 2 – Anger

At this stage, these teachers start realising that they’ve been mistaken and can’t help but think they’ve been fooled by those who initially trained them. It’s quite common for them to blame their practices on their trainer and say that their trainer wasn’t good enough, and sometimes ridicule them (a big no-no guys, seriously). Another possible characteristic is being angry at the fact that what they had been doing for ages will have to be changed somehow. “Why did they have to write a new edition of Headway when the old one worked so beautifully? These #&$(@ just want to make us by a new edition because of the money… and now I’ll have to redesign all my activities” is likely to be heard from these teachers.

Stage 3 – Bargaining

This is when those teachers start, well, bargaining. They might even concede there are certain things they need to improve, but they’ll expect you to acknowledge that they aren’t wrong. They will usually say, “All right, I’ll try this new thing you have told me to, but you’ll see it won’t work” or “if I try this and it doesn’t work in class, will you then let me teach in my old ways without bothering me?”

Stage 4 – Depression

This usually happens when they realise their new teaching practices are actually helping their learners and they come to terms with the fact they’ll have to start studying a bit more, and reflecting a lot more on their practices. Some of these teachers feel guilty about so many things they could have done to help their students for so many years but they didn’t. This stage might also show itself after a teacher has been made redundant by someone who actually embraces continuing PD and is keen on sharing and experimenting new ideas in the classroom. It’s now that those teachers finally see they had stopped in time and need to do something about it.

Stage 5 – Acceptance

Now your trainees are ready to receive your input. It’s now the trainer’s responsibility to make sure those who have reached this stage actually see it pays off to learn new things and that these things will help them in their professional career. If the trainer does nothing, then we might end up with a teacher simply becoming more resistant to the idea of PD.

In case you still haven’t seen the video “The 5 stages of a giraffe’s death”, it was an inspiration to this post. What I’ve been thinking is that we sometimes have got to accept that what we so deeply believe in may as well be wrong, and simply trying to adapt it might just postpone the fact that we will have to deal with the problem sooner or later. I don’t think there’s a right way for us to teach, but there may be certain things which we need to radically change in our teaching. If you don’t accept a revolution is necessary, your old practices will always get in the way.

A class, two chats, and an interview

Honestly, I hadn’t really planned to write a follow up to my previous post. However, things just seem to happen in a certain way and you have to do your best to adapt and make use of them to your advantage. I’m a strong proponent of meaningful and interesting conversation used to promote professional development. If you keep yourself open to learning possibilities, you’ll certainly see that people everywhere are dropping hints on how you can improve your game if you listen carefully. I had mentioned Jason’s participation in my class on my previous post, and students told me they enjoyed it so much that I could actually get a second guest teacher in that class. this time, it was Cecília Coelho, and we had a marvellous talk about assessment. Time was, again, an issue. Unlike Jason, who is in Australia, Cecília and I share the same timezone. Yet, our teaching schedules make it somehow hard for us to connect. I thoroughly appreciate Cecília’s effort dashing home to join the class – and I also thank the students for staying a bit longer than usual. It was definitely worth the while! 🙂

In addition to all of these wonderful co-teaching moments in my class, I’m also really happy with our #breltchat. In case you’re an English teacher in Brazil and you still haven’t heard of it, then you should pay a visit to our blog and join the conversation. #breltchat is the younger brother of #eltchat, a chat for English language teachers eager to discuss some issues we have to face on a daily basis in our profession. #eltchat takes place every Wednesday – twice! Currently, the first chat starts at 8:00 a.m. and the second one at 5:00 p.m. Brazilian time. This is a very successful chat on twitter, and 5 Brazilian English Language Teachers decided it would be a great chance for us to help Brazilian teachers develop and think about the particularities of our educational system. Bruno, Raquel, Valéria, Cecília and the one who writes you gave it a go and, fortunately, a wealth of Brazilian English teachers bought the idea and have made it a success. We hope it keeps growing from now on, and I’m sure the teachers who started participating in it won’t drop the ball now! 🙂

Anyway, our last chat was about Dogme and we decided we were going to try and interview some of the Dogmeists out there so that they could explain the concept better to teachers who still don’t know much about it. We also asked them about a couple of possibilities and suggestions that could possibly work in Brazil. Apart from Willy (interview coming up soon, hopefully) I don’t think they actually knew much about our educational system in Brazil, but they still agreed to help us think about some matters. You’ll soon be able to watch all 5 interviews: Fiona Mauchline, Luke Meddings, Scott Thornbury, Shelly Terrell, and Willy Cardoso.

Learning from a conversation? Well, I guess then these interviews are going to give you a lot to think about. On behalf of the #breltchat team of moderators, I hope you enjoy this interview with Scott Thornbury. Oh, and I hope you can get past my initial nervousness… trust me, it gets a lot better after the first answer! 🙂

I’d like to, once more, thank Scott for his participation (and apologise for my poor introduction). I’m sure this interview will be helpful to many teachers out there. 🙂

I hope you’ve enjoyed this one. All 5 interviews will soon be available at #breltchat. In the meantime…

• Watch Bruno’s brilliant interview with Shelly here.

A thank you note

This blog is about to turn one year old and I must say I’m rather surprised by that. I guess once we find out our true passion, it’s easy for us to keep doing things, huh?! But what exactly does that mean to me? Is it a landmark to be celebrated on its own? Not really. Is there a lot more behind this? I truly believe so.

I recently paid a visit to my very first posts, and I thought back about what motivated me to write the blog. What I had in mind is that this could serve as a nice place for reflection, and I believe this is still what I’ve been doing. I have shared lots of my personal beliefs towards language teaching and learning, and general education as well. I said once and I’ll repeat again: I believe I’ve “learned” more in almost a year of blogging than I did in 4 years of college. However, this doesn’t mean my education in college was useless. Much on the contrary. I don’t think I’d be able to profit as much if I hadn’t read and studied the basics. Would it be too much? I still remember Jason’s post referring to the sharing of information that takes place in blogs and social media in general as trying to drink from a firehose. And I can’t say he was exactly wrong. If one does not lean how to handle all this wealth of information, one is bound to be gobbled up by it.

However, how can one turn off so many interesting posts that lead us to reflections and to sometimes question our own beliefs? How can you simply decide you’re not going to participate in twitter discussions such as #edchat (I still remember the first adjective I hear to describe it was eye-ball spinning), and, more recently, #eltchat? The more we connect, the more we learn. I don’t think we have ideas because we have to be the very best at what we do at all costs. An idea, alone, can hardly ever be a great idea. It’s only through sharing, listening, discussing, changing our minds, and discussing again that big changes can occur. I recently heard an interview on the radio in which the interviewee was talking about a book whose author investigated the origins of good ideas. Do you believe in those ‘Eureka!’ moments? Apparently, none of the 250 inventions mentioned in the book happened that way. This is a short version of the author’s ideas:

I guess that’s pretty much in synchrony with what I believe in. My hunch is that in the near future people will start valuing informal learning a lot more than today. People have been forced to learn new skills, to collaborate, to think outside the box, to understand and tolerate differences. It doesn’t really matter if you know more in the class – information is easier and easier to find. The big question is: do you know how to look for the right answer? Is there anyone you can turn to?

How about your PLN? You still haven’t heard about this concept yet? There are just so many new ideas percolating on the Web these days that you can’t help but be a part of it. Learning is dynamic, and teachers have got to keep the pace. We’re trying to teach people to learn how to stand on their feet in a world we still don’t know what it will be like. But one thing is a fact, these students will need to be able to respond to change a lot faster, they’ll need to learn the power of collaboration, they’ll have to learn how to listen to one another.

This is what blogging for almost one yea has done for me. I started out following some of the tips I got mainly from Karenne, Shelly, and Burcu. I’m really happy to see that one year after I have started, these people are more and more responsible for my learning. I’ve made friends and connections I could only dream of in the past. All right, I have to say I’d love to have the chance to go to the US soon and talk to some of the friends I’ve made online, such as Brian. And what about going to Europe and getting to know many of the people in my PLN, some of which were people I really look up to and I never thought I’d ever have a chance to engage in conversation with! And I can’t forget the land down under, as Jason himself has been mentioned in this post. Luke, Herbert, Nick, Jason T., Kelly, Susi, Barbara, Cecília, Willy, Denilso, Sue… you know what, it’s just too hard to name them all, and it’d probably add at least another 1000 words to this post. Perhaps you should pay a visit to my twitter page and check the people I’m following. They’ve all been very important to me these days. 🙂

What have I got from blogging? A lot more than I could ever expect. Fortunately, I’ve never thought of it as a place to build me a name or anything like that. Truth be told, I didn’t really think I was going to get past the third post. But learning is fun, sharing is fun, blogging s a lot of fun as well. And the best part of blogging so far are the comments – which is why I’d like to thank each and everyone of you for helping me out on my journey of learning. I really appreciate each and everyone of the visits and comments I’ve had. And if there was ever anything that you disagreed with in one of my posts and you felt you’ve wasted your time reading it, think twice. You’ve helped this chump learn a bit more. 🙂

In case you’re interested in the full lecture given at TED by Steven Johnson, here it goes:

The power of two

There are two different kinds of PLNs, as I see it. First, there’s the virtual PLN, the one you create through your visits to other educators’ blogs and engaging conversations on Twitter, blogs, or Skype to name but a few. This is a PLN which is filled with teachers who are willing to share, grow, learn, and keep an open mind to all that’s new and everything that might enhance your students’ learning. It’s an active space, and it’s open 24/7. The second kind of PLN is your real one, made of teachers who work with you in your school. The good side of this PLN is that it shows you you that, sometimes, the world you live in is still not ready for all those changes that so many educators worldwide have been talking about. They understand your context, and they face exactly the same difficulties you have to face. That could even be called the ‘keeping-it-real PLN’.

However, one thing that usually strikes me as odd is how often I hear people from my virtual PLN complain about the lack of interest and willingness to change from those present in their real PLN. I’ve already heard a couple of times that it would be wonderful to have all of those people from your virtual PLN working together in the same school, aiming at providing their learners nothing but the very best. This would be a place where people wouldn’t fear making mistakes, and mistakes might as well happen. However, no mistake would be made owing to lack of action. Things would always be going forward.

If this ideal school existed, perhaps change in education would come at a much faster rate. If there are people who are also as committed as you are working with you, it’s always easier to make things happen. If, on the other hand, there is no one interested in joining you and helping you in your physical surroundings, things get much tougher. Fortunately, the distance between the virtual and the real PLN is getting smaller by the day. Thanks to technology, it’s now possible to get your students to interact with students whose teachers aren’t that afraid of attempting to get things done. Sometimes it’s easier to get two classes from two different continents to collaborate than to get two neighbouring classes to do so.

That’s one of the things that most people realise once they join the world of blogs and twitter, to begin with. They learn that there are other people who are also interested in bringing about change. There are other educators who are 100% sure they’ve still got a lot to learn, and they find other educators who think just the same way. Working alone is pretty hard, but the power of two has something magical about it. If you’re working together with people who also share your principles and, despite being snowed under with work, still manage to make time for sharing and learning, you know that’s the right place to be in.

Nevertheless, sometimes our co-workers and members of the keeping-it-real PLN need a little push. They’ve all got it inside themselves – this ideal towards learning and helping students thrive. It may have been forgotten somewhere because of the treatment that’s been dispensed to educators for many, many years, but it’s there. If we all work together and give this little push, we’ll find out we’re not alone anymore. The power of two will make it a lot easier for you to do what you want to do. Mind you, this doesn’t mean you all have got to agree on everything; it only means there are at least two people willing to shift gears and get things evolving at a faster pace.

Following or reflecting?

Are you happy with just reading the headlines, or do you feel the need to read the news?

What do you usually expect to take away from interactions with other teachers? How often do such interactions and exchanges fall short of your expectations? Just like everything we do, we usually engage in conversations with other people because we expect to have some sort of insight or at least to have something to think about that might change us, slightly as it may be, but still, something that will definitely contribute to our growth. Needless to say, we do have some meaningless conversations in our daily lives, but we deride a great deal of pleasure from such chit-chat that this is also something we benefit from. However, my focus here is how often do we tend to reflect about the things we talk about to other people or how often we simply repeat what we’ve heard.

One of the things I’ve been thinking about lately is what I look for when I go to a convention or a lecture. I remember that in the past, I’d always look for practical, hands-on activities that I could instantly use in classes. After all, variety is the spice of lessons as well, right? I didn’t expect anything else but ideas that I could simply go home and use straight away in my morning lessons. As time went by, I believe my focus has changed and I am now a lot more interested in learning a bit more of the theory that leads to such activities. What is the rationale behind them? Why is it that this or that results in more effective learning or recalling?

I wouldn’t say that there’s anything wrong with either of the approaches. However, I must say that I don’t think teachers will fully develop unless they start investigating their own beliefs towards learning and teaching. Why do I do the things that I do? Why do I believe that activity A is likely to work with that specific group whereas activity B can simply be dismissed out of hand? No matter how little you do it, reflecting about what others tell you is always a sound thing to do. And so is challenging your beliefs.

I wish more teachers understood the importance of actually trying to come up with their own personal language teaching methodology, as Jason Renshaw did on this post, and Marisa continued doing on this post. If you’re just following in your teachers’ footsteps, you’re always going to be a follower, and chances are you’ll progress very little. On the other hand, if you start thinking about what you believe in as a language teacher, you’re bound to always look for more effective ways to help your students learn. If I were still doing the same things my teachers did when they taught me, no matter how good they were, I’d probably have done very little. Fortunately, at least some of my teachers taught me that there’s no way one can know everything. If there’s one thing I still follow, it is this – always strive to improve.

I don’t know if it’s just me, but I sometimes feel that more and more frequently conferences are becoming a place for teachers to share practical ideas of what they’ve done in class and expect others to follow them blindly. I don’t think I was the only one who came across someone who simply refused to listen someone else’s opinion because it was entirely against what they were saying. Pity. I see in that a great opportunity for growth. Having your ideas challenged, or even putting forward something that others might not entirely agree with should be a healthy habit. When is it that people stopped trying to answer WHY and only focus on HOW? I guess when you expect a lot of answers to WHY, some of your professional interactions may actually fall short of your expectations…