Blog 4 (Unit 7)

       This week’s Google alerts gave me several articles that are applicable to teaching a second language or ESL and the use of technology. The first article was titled “The Art of Teaching” and offers strategies to support creativity in the language classroom to engage teachers and students and provide opportunities to develop language and thinking skills. The authors suggest focusing on four aspects to develop and support creative thinking in language classrooms: fluency, flexibility, elaboration, and originality. According to Elhess, Elturki, and Egbert (2020) “the ability to think creatively can facilitate students’ abilities to solve problems, to see alternatives, and to use language in new ways.” Creativity tasks also provide opportunities for social interaction, which exposes learners to a variety of input and opportunities to negotiate meaning in the target language. Technology can be used in a variety of ways for students to demonstrate their knowledge of the language in creative ways. I like giving students options with technology when assigning a project. This allows them to showcase their talents and use their strengths in different ways. Teachers need to be open to providing these creative options with assignments. I’ve met some language teachers through the years who are “stuck in their ways” of only using textbook driven exercises and grammar worksheets. This is one of the reasons why I am pursuing this Instructional Technology degree so that I can learn about new and creative ways to use technology in instruction and share it with my colleagues.  

       The second article was a report of a research study to compare the perceptions of students on learning the English language through conventional vs. digital storytelling. This study was conducted in Kuala Lumpur with teachers who are familiar with both storytelling methods. The conclusion of the overall study was that students preferred the approach of digital storytelling because it was engaging and helped them to better understand the story’s content. Students called this method more interactive since it uses technology and said if it were implemented again, it would encourage them to actively participate in future lessons. Digital storytelling increases student engagement in the lesson, which contributes to increased language use in the learning process. I have seen the positive engagement of students in my second language classroom when I use digital storytelling. It allows students to be creative while demonstrating their knowledge of the content we are learning.  

References:

Ahmad, W. I. W., & Yamat, H. (2020). Students’ Perception on Learning English Language through Conventional and Digital Storytelling. International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences, 10(2), 484–504.

Elhess, M., Elturki, E., & Egbert, J. (2020, February 27). The Art of Teaching. Retrieved from https://www.languagemagazine.com/2020/02/27/the-art-of-teaching-2/