Teacher in Development

Via EFL Geek and Scott Sommers comes a rather odd news story that I have never heard of before: English Villages (Accessed Friday, April 21, 2006)

Both EFL Geek and Sommers point to a very interesting letter by Steven Krashen located here: Taipei Times - English Villages and Hype

Krashen makes some interesting points about the English Village:

1. The village is not real. It’s a glorified role-play.

2.  How can you tell progress in learning English is being made?

3. It’s an expensive spot to go to.

Intrigued by the whole idea, I delved a little deeper and found this scary video over at Reuters  (Accessed today: Friday, April 21 2006)  The title alone got my attention, because as I was reading the articles EFL Geek pointed to, I began thinking of Disney World.

While the idea is interesting, I think the English Village concept is totally off. The place is fake. It looks (watch the video) like a movie set from Universal Studios, and if you listen to the "immigration officer" she sounds totally…unreal - just like the listening activities you can get with most ESL material these days. 

The real thing, in general, is a whole other animal. The officers are usually far more….direct and to the point. While they MAY be friendly, most immigration officers I’ve come into contact with are harried, suspicious of everything (and they should be), and just not an easy experience…especially if your a nervous EFL student.

I applaud the attempt at making language learning more authentic, but I think the English Village, as is, has missed the boat big time.  

"I think the answer to student portfolios is Web 2.0 — that is, students should be doing (authentic) work somewhere, and turn in a URL to that work." (Maybe Universities should not host ePortfolios)

Interesting thought. What if you adopted a decentralized stance towards ePortfolios? You would solve plenty of problems like: Who owns the ePortfolio? Who keeps it when the student graduates? My server is hosting the ePortfolio of a few hundred students, and boy that’s getting mighty expensive!

A decentralized approach would also enable greater autonomy and creativity.I have been exploring a few university ePortfolio programs, and I’ve not enjoyed a lot of what I’ve met. The majority feel boxy, like  eCookie cutters that don’t seem to openly embrace messy learning.

I think that feeling of "I don’t like this space" is an important one to pay attention to. If you don’t feel drawn in, you won’t stick around. If you don’t want to hang out in your ePortfolio, chances are you’ll just use it to get the grade, and that soundly defeats the point of a personal learning environment doesn’t it? 

Web 2 is fun. It’s a cool place to be. It’s a cool space to work in. I would even say it’s addictive. Shouldn’t that be a foundation to ePortfolios? A place where students could become easily addicted to ongoing learning? A place where development is fun?  

I’m fascinated.

Today I was reading and responding to comments left on my post about ePortfolios, and I found Graham’s comments around the need to model portfolio use for students to be very thought provoking. 

He asked:

"… have you given thought to being the role model and setting up your own e-portfolio and learning alongside your students. That way, you aren’t imposing your idea on them but rolling up your sleeves (metaphorically) and pitching in with them."

That made me think.

In my last post, one of the "big questions" I had been wrestling with was around encouraging students to "buy" the whole portfolio process in the first place. Could this be part of the solution?

I think Graham is on the right track here. A few hours after I read his reply I came across this link in my bloglines account. I’ve set a feed up to monitor delicious postings which have to do with portfolios - here’s the link if you want to do the same thing: del.icio.us/tag/eportfolio

Delicious led me here:PORTFOLIO LIBRARY: Planning and Design Guide : see Exercise  2: WHAT GENERAL PORTFOLIO SKILLS DO WE NEED TO TEACH?

He opens with two very interesting approaches to deploying portfolios: the folder approach vs. the model approach.  It was a good smack in the head for me, as I found myself showing up a bit in the "folder" story. Now I know where I need to migrate to…and quickly.

 I do have a very weak blogfolio on the go, but with these new ideas before me I now see that I need to pump my own portfolio up if I want to successfully use it with my students.

It makes beautifully simple sense: If you’re not a "folio thinker" yourself, how can you expect your student to become one?

Take a few minutes and read Kimeldorf’s  story of how he has been using portfolios: he’s passionate about them. Passion is catchy.

Related resources for future exploration:

Why Engage with Electronic Portfolios? 

Engagement with Electronic Portfolios: Challenges from the Student Perspective. 

I identify with Konrad Glogowski and his quest to move theory into practice. His latest post, Readerly Comments - Part II, really struck this whole idea home for me.

"Working on my thesis and keeping this blog has had a strong impact on who I am as an educator. But I do not want to operate in the realm of theory all the time. I needed to test myself." (Readerly Comments - Part II, Glogowski.)

Blogging has had a deep impact on my teaching as well. It’s introduced me to how other people do things in their classrooms, it’s dropped me into powerful conversations that I would never have had access to, it’s caused me to think about things that I would have never thought about on my own, and most valuable of all, blogging has placed me inside a vibrant community of teachers and thinkers.

I’ve been blogging for almost a year now.  I can honestly say that I’ve learned more about the art of teaching and myself during this year than all my six years of ESL teaching without blogging combined.

One of the things that I am learning a lot about are portfolios. (Again, before blogging I didn’t have a clue about them…) I think portfolios are fascinating, and offer a viable alternative to testing and examinations. 

I’ve read about portfolios. I’ve explored them. I’ve written about them. I’ve advocated for their use, but I’ve never actually been able to USE one. I’ve been stuck in theory.

But stuck no longer. I’ve been given an advanced level group, my old legal English group again, and I’ve decided to try and put my theoretical knowledge of portfolios to practice.

Blogging and thinking about things is one thing, actually DOING those things is quite another animal!

Since my group started up a few days ago, I’ve found myself in a state of block. I’ve been really excited about the idea of employing portfolios with my class, but when it actually came to deployment …well it’s been a lot more challanging than I had expected.  

Here are a few of the things I’ve been working through:

1. Selling it to the students: Teaching portfolios.

2. Selling the idea that language learners can  help themselves, and most of the work of language learning should happen OUTSIDE the class.  

3. How do you decide what goes in a portfolio?

4. Where should the portfolio live? Should it be digital or paper based? If it’s digital, what do you do with those who fear tech?

5. How do you evaluate a portfolio?

And those are just a few of the things that have been giving me a bumpy ride. But you know what? I was reflecting on the whole thing during thismorning’s commute from class to our offices, and I found myself feeling a rush. A fresh motivation, and sense of aliveness around what I was doing.

The concepts around portfolios that I’ve only been thinking about, have taken on brand new meaning as I try to deploy into reality.

I can see why portfolios can so easily become a boxy thing, a place controlled by the institution vs. a messy learning environment controlled by the student.

This post feels like it should go on to deliver a polished conclusion, where I share how I’ve figured the whole thing out, and share how my successfully deployed portfolio system has dramatically enhanced my student’s language learning.

But I can’t do that. More than anything, this is a request for help. What have you done? How have you used portfolios? How have you "sold" the idea to your students?

I’m still figuring it all out, and loving the process of stepping out of theory. What do you think?