Twitterin’ about languages and new media

I cannot contain myself about the minimalist beauty of sharing with people whose work I had long followed in print, listserves and even in person, now in just 14o characters or less.  I am one of those who does not have to struggle to stay within 140.  This happy limit teaches me how tight writing can really be.  The big question I wrestle with is the same one I have year after year.  Is this something that will spill into my language teaching?

So I read this article in Le Monde online (24/6/09) with the title “

La révolution sera twitterisée… et oubliée”

There was something comforting about seeing that  Twitter adjective in French that made me think this might be the right time to talk to my French students about using Twitter for language learning. I have also begun having conversations with colleagues about how they use Twitter in language teaching. Most of these uses are extremely creative and very different than just answering  the question “What are you doing?” I’m getting so many great ideas this way.

A Pill for MS is Coming and then a cure….

I know this is a language blog, but it is also about me. So please indulge me in a moment on the laura side…..

I have to be hopeful. It is all I have. I was in Brazil last summer, nine hours on the plane away from my family, when I learned that my 21 year old daughter has MS. How could that possibly be? These days we watch many of her AAU basketball buddies with whom she played in high school battling it out in the ACC and Big East- Duke, UConn, Maryland. My little girl with the six foot wingspan and leopard print cane battles a different opponent and we are proud of her tenacious D.

This is MS Awareness month. Every hour someone else is diagnosed. They will feel sick, feel hot, feel cold, lose their balance, sleep a lot and then suffer amnesia. They will lose feeling in their feet and legs and then get sensation back and lose it again. They will feel the love of their friends and family and still feel very alone. They will inject themselves every other day with the hope that their treatment will be successful.

Yet this is MS Awareness month and look what I found out today:

http://www.thelancet.com/journals/laneur/article/PIIS1474-4422(09)70017-1/fulltext

In April, we will be walking in Walk MS. We have hope that a pill is coming. A pill and then a cure. All of you who have MS or have loved ones who do, we walk for you, too. MS does not define us. One love, one heart.

International Faculty Development Seminar: Brasil

As promised to my colleagues, here are a few more details of my study trip to what my daughters call “the land of my ancestors”. The college newsletter blurb had to be abridged, so I’ll be more expansive here . Anyone who occasionally visits here now knows that chronology (and sometimes editing) goes right out the janela……

This International Faculty Development Seminar held from June 1-10, 2008 in Sao Paulo and Paraty, Brazil was an exercise in absorbing contrasts- from the bustling city of millions of inhabitants to the last vestiges of the pristine Atlantic rainforest in  the southernmost part of Rio de Janeiro state. Although my roots are Brazilian and I am fluent in Portuguese, my family ties are much farther north, closer to the very different Amazon region. The seminar greatly increased my knowledge base on BRIC country economics, ever-controversial environmental issues and the changing role of Brazil today.

The first week was largely devoted to a vast variety of insightful pre-planned lectures and field trips. Some topics discussed included:

• Ecology and Politics in Brazil
• Education and Sustainable Development
• Challenges of Modern Brazilian Politics
• Development and Environmental Impacts in Brazil
• Social Movements in Brazil: Landless People and their Struggles
• Issues of the Brazilian Native Indians
• New Resources for Alternative Energy: The Case of Ethanol
• Urban Expansion, Population Growth and Quality of Life in Brazil
• Poverty and Development in Brazil
• Challenges in Brazilian Education

The seminar was hosted by the Assessoria de Relações Internacionais (International Relations Commission) of the Pontifícia Universidade Católica de São Paulo (PUC). PUC, founded in 1946, has 22,000 students and 2,000 professors and is considered among the best universities in Brazil. It is well-known for its Paulo Freire Chair, one of the decisive factors in my selection of this seminar. The PUC organizers went out of their way to bring us in close contact with leading experts in their respective fields. For example, the noted economist, Ladislau Dowbor, appeared so in his comfort zone as he lectured on complex issues and promptly invited us to almost all of his scholarly works online. If your field is Latin American economics, you must visit him online. (My friends  all know of my delight in sharing ideas freely online.) Our expert on the current emergent economy was a senior macroeconomist from the prestigious Bradesco bank. It was ironic that the title of his talk spoke of the “Challenges of the Economy”, but his message was optimistic with Brazil on the move with the Chinese, Russians and Indians.

Movimento sem terra

Touring was fantastic. We were hardly settled in our modern business hotel when we were whisked off on a bus to a settlement of the Landless Movement or Movimento sem Terra with a group of CIEE students studying at the PUC. The student mission was to talk to the farmers about their settlements and their sustainable agricultural projects. The students were asked to translate these interviews for the faculty visitors. (My student guide had it easy since I speak Portuguese. We taked about his study abroad experience which seemed to be first rate.)  To reach the MST, we climbed unpaved rocky roads to three- room homes of settlers who were proud to speak of their hard work. We learned that this type of visit was atypical, mostly because the MST do not always trust outsiders. Reasons include security issues and the sometime negative depictions of them in the press. Yet because the MST members were treated with great respect by the mostly American CIEE students, they were very generous with their time and in sharing their community life with us. This visit was an eye-opener to me because it allowed me to see the kind of authentic experiences our own NOVA students might have on a similar CIEE trip. They were well-informed in advance by their teachers, they had been in Brazil long enough to communicate appropriately with the MST and all Portuguese speakers and they had obviously absorbed the Brazilian culture in which they were immersed.

Parati, a walk in the past.

The other part of this visit was to Paraty, an historic, marvelously preserved colonial city in the south of Rio state. Here is an excerpt from an earlier post in this blog where I talk about my experience in the Saco de Mamangua, our gateway to the Atlantic rain forest:

“It seems like an eternity since my wonderful time in Paraty, Brasil in the southeast of Rio de Janeiro last month. There I visited the Saco do Mamangua, clearly one of the most beautiful places that I have been in 50+ years….. So what if I capsized my canoe in the mangrove, all my valuables were safely in another canoe with  paddlers with skills. All I had to do was not move (or breathe) and I made it safely to shore in Paraty Mirim. Will never forget the hospitality of Dona Gracinha, the little barquinhos (boats) made of caxeta wood that I brought home with me, and the utter beauty of the Atlantic rainforest where beautiful orchids with their roots extending into the air were attached to the trees. I saw pioneer vegetation growing timidly on land being reforested.

I hope to be able to find the book by Paulo Nogara, our biologist in residence from the tour,  who paddled our canoe like some practiced gondolier. His love for this country was so evident. He was an excellent teacher who raised our awareness of both the beauty and the fragility of our surroundings. In retrospect, it was a great exercise in self-control to surrender to the movement of the boat. I finally “got it”, Type A as I am. Mentally, I can still go back to the peace of the setting sun in the beautiful sunset of Paraty Mirim.

The little painted caicara boat that  I brought home from that day is sitting on my dining room table today. It helps me go back there in my mind.  When I think about the locomotion involved in it all- bus, boat, hike, canoe and  the plane ride home, the barquinho gave me a real workout then and now a lot of peace.”  The CIEE IFDS experience was wonderful, particularly the hospitality of our gracious hosts, Ana Luisa and Mauricio. I think this faculty development trip should be offered annually in Brazil. The rich diversity of this country the size of a continent informs our world-view and our practice as educators.

Let’s talk amongst ourselves- MERLOT Voices

View my page on MERLOT Voices

MERLOT now has a social networking page where we can talk and share info. I do hope all my friends will join and make it rock! I’ll see y’all in there, voices.merlot.org.

Update 9/23: We have been having great conversations in MERLOT VOICES, Adobe Connect and at the TLT group site in a three-week, worldwide version of MERLOT 101. If anyone shows up here between 9/23 and Oct/1, you can register and join our group, where else? in MERLOT VOICES.

We are not quite as big as the 1900+ Connectivism Course that I am taking with George Siemens and Stephen Downes as facilitators. I am  learning amazing things there, which in my experience happens when you put the world together. I have found a worldwide community of bloggers called Global Voices and a related Lingua Project that has volunteer translators translating the GV pages. I love it!!!

Brief Hybrid Workshops: Live from MERLOT

Steve Gilbert, Ray Purdom and the TLT group presented on the 5 minute workshop. Faculty developers make 5 minute e-clips to introduce a new instructional strategy or concept.  These e-clips can be used alone, online and f2f. E-clips are easy to make and they are the central element of brief hybrid workshops which can be online or face to face. Here’s a blueprint for the workshops from the TLT’s site:

http://www.tltgroup.org/BHW/HowTo/Templates/WebPageBHW-BHTLM.htm

We looked at a video and did a very brief Think Pair Share which is part of the brief hybrid workshop, reacting to the content in the video. The final activity was an individual reflection on a 3×5 card to help the presenters refine their workshop and to help participants conceptualize the workshop.

MERLOT 2008- e-portfolios

First day of the MERLOT conference in Minneapolis and I’m in a session on e-portfolios done by  folks from the CSU system. I can definitely see the application of this type of project to show employers the competencies and skill sets our students have. For language students these portfolios can include work in the target language, showcasing their language skills and evidence of their cultural awareness through the posting of photographs, digital video and their own voice samples.  Many products are available for this work. Students can easily use a  blog format which encourages reflection on the part of students that reveal aspects of their personality to potential employer. The presenters showed various institutional e-portfolio solutions a few of which I ink beow.  In a video that they showed, one employer said that he felt like he knew a candidate before he arrived, based on his portfolio. The presenters spoke to the growing acceptance of e-portfolios by employers. Promising for getting known worldwide.

No more paper resumes!

eportfolio.sfsu.edu
eportfolio.merlot.org

O Museu da lingua portuguesa

First, it goes right to my heartstrings to find a museum dedicated to a language (as the name of my

Photo by Bee Dieu

blog might suggest). That it’s my heritage language, ainda melhor. I almost did not even make it to this gem in the Estacao da Luz in Sao Paulo, except for Bee’s tenacity on the last day of our visit. We had no idea it was the Day of the Portuguese Language, June 10, chosen because that was the day Luiz Vaz de Camoes died 428 years ago. Wikipedia has a very good page  to whet your apetite but you really just have to go, queridos.  How do I describe what we saw? A small auditorium where a ten minute multimedia presentation on the Portuguese language opened up into a planetarium-like space. Only in this room, the stars were words, verses and snippets of unbelievable literature pronounced by actors and poets and little children. Portuguese, indigenous and African words shot across the dark ceiling like shooting stars. Nothing is more delicious to me than a language in it’s natural beauty. This was one of those priceless moments for someone who love languages, like me.

Banku is news to me

Goes great with Ghanaian stews.

We got to Accra very late. Our hotel is charming. I feel very at home here. Folks are so nice and the landscape is like Belem.

 I have tried a new food called banku. It is a starch. You’d love it, Vegan.  Check it out.|It goes very well with okra and fish stew which I also had. Funny and a little, just a tad awkward was when the waiter brought me a pot of water to go along and I asked him what it was for!! Apparently banku, and the stew that accompanies it, is eaten with the fingers. I didn’t know, but proceeded to apply my first lesson learned, day one in Accra.

NECTFL 2008: languagelabunleashed

Big props to Felix Kronenburg to come to the Marriott Marquis in NYC  all the way from Pomona California to introduce East Coast language educators at NECTFL to languagelabunleashed, a professional development gem on the web that is so much more than a blog. One of the topics that came up during a very insightful and comfortable conversation about technology-enhanced language learning was how to engage the many FL faculty who never make it to a professional conference for whatever reason.   LLU regularly hosts informative sessions and live webcasts where listeners can join in easily  both to listen and  chat . Tech o’ Tuesdays feature tech tips on topics like recording skype, file conversions and new 2.0 applications. Other webcasts cover topics like using skype for language exchanges, Wikipedia in the classroom and a very interesting show that I heard myself on foreign language learner anxiety. The beauty of these programs is that they are archived and serve the PD needs of all the FL teachers who have the LLU URL.

In addition to the live broadcasts, the LLU team are seasoned backchannelers. They go to conferences and blog about sessions while they are sitting in them. This is a very inclusive approach to sharing ideas at conferences linking those who were there to those who were not. In effect, it extends the conversation and the networking well beyond the original talk so that a multitude of participants can potentially benefit. However, live  backchanneling, that makes conference proceedings available in real time, presupposes an Internet connection in the session room which is not routinely available in many conference venues. When broadband connections become truly ubiquitous, more teachers will be able to join in the discussions -some in the session room and some in blogs. It is up to all of us to imagine the kinds of discussions that technology will enable to make professional development available to all.

NECTFL 2008: I don’t have ADD, I’m just not listening

Marc Prensky,  was the keynote speaker for the opening session of the 55th conference for the 2008 Northeast Conference on the Teaching of Foreign Languages and what can I say but that ”he rocked it”. My kids are playing a lot of Rock Band lately so that’s the first thing that comes to my mind. To get the flavor of Prensky’s ideas, check out a few minutes of his comments when his latest book was recently published in Italy. (Focus on the ideas, because the format in the video is VERY different from the event we experienced in the conference venue. At NECTFL, Prensky was  much freer to move about interacting with his audience and the digital presentation he brings with him.) 

In this video, we can see him on one of his favorite learning tools, YouTube.:

Now back to New York and the Northeast Conference—-

 His remarks  centered  as  they usually do on student engagement and allowing the learner to play a BIG role in how they learn. He encouraged teachers to allow students to use YouTube, their cell phones, blogs, wikis and podcasts to construct new learning activities. For example, imagine a classrom where instead of announcing “Shut off your cellphones”, teachers asked students to pick them up to find information that would be used right there in the lesson. It might be that they’d “phone a friend” a la Millionnaire, or look something up on a Sidekick or Blackberry or even take pictures or a video that could later go up on YouTube- in the target language. No doubt the students could imagine all kinds of ways to use phones for learning that we digital immigrants cannot begin to imagine. And that’s cool- the first step to a level playing field in the classroom where student-centered becomes learning-centered and technology is just the tool that enables communication. (Although in the participation phase, one student reported that if she did not have her cell phone, she could not live.)

A highlight was when high school and middle school students came on the stage to interact with Prensky about what they liked about studying a language and what they really did not like. The dream situation for them was to be able to go to a place where the TL was being spoken and to be able to communicate and get what they want. Technology enables real-world communication and so does speaking the language. Students realize that both skills are part of the equation. The less interesting part from the learner perspective was the classroom drilling with one student using the analogy of a nail/lesson  being hammered into his head. The students reported that they enjoyed being asked how they’d like to have their school work designed. They liked the opportunity to be creative and they liked it when language learning led to real-world communication They said that they wanted to learn the language that would help them negotiate practical needs when traveling.

The onstage interview was followed by an exchange between the students and the teachers in the audience.Teachers came up to microphones in the crowded ballroom to bridge the gap between digital immigrants, those of us who predate computers and the digital natives on stage.  It was an  invigorating experience to hear the conversation about re-imagining  how we all work in a digital world.  In Prensky’s world, we are all learners with the power to transform the educational experience for all.  It is a place where everyone is learning, creating , sharing and collaborating.

His slides are posted on the Northeast Conference home page:

http://alpha.dickinson.edu/prorg/nectfl/