“What is Teaching and Learning with ICT and why do I care about it”

Posted on September 24, 2014 by pgde5172htyiyeung

As I walk through the subway at 7:00 a.m. every day in the morning, I could see tons of people passing by with their heads down on their high-tech devices, I could hardly hear people chatting with each other, or see them looking at each other. However, I am sure that many of them are

chatting or getting other people’s updates through the social network. Obviously, the world has been changing by the technology which guides people towards a high-tech era, an era where we communicate, acquire knowledge or get information on our hands.

Thus, this should also be happening in the education field where both teaching and learning could be facilitated by the technology. With the technology of augmented reality, students could use their imagination and creativeness in their everyday learning. On the other hand, teachers could get to know more about students’ learning progress through e-learning websites, where students could give feedback, have a vote or discussion through online forum…etc. Teachers could also assess and enhance students’ learning through online assessments, Learning and teaching are no longer a progress in the classroom with the help of ICT.

As a teacher of Chinese Language, ICT is already an essential need on my teaching. In recent years, I have to teach quite a number of non-Chinese speaking students, however, my teaching resources are limited since NCS students are new to our school, (and most of the schools in HK). Therefore, most NCS teachers have taken part in updating an online question bank, where teachers could get a wide range of questions, and communicate through the system on our teaching difficulties…etc. This system has largely increased my efficiency on creating exercises, tests or exams for my students.

Here are some useful links for NCS teachers and students:

Teaching resources provided by the EDB

Learning materials for NCS students and parents provided by the EDB

Question bank system created by HKU (for registered NCS teachers only)

Learning and Teaching with ICT in Chinese Language in Secondary Education

Posted on November 23, 2014 by pgde5172htyiyeung

This is my first year as a Chinese teacher teaching both junior and senior forms in a local secondary school. As a “freshman” in the field, I have had lots of ideas and expectations in my mind on both pedagogy and students’ learning outcomes. However, in the beginning of the school year, I found that students’ performance during lessons and their learning outcomes are far from my expectations. Since my school is a “low-banding” school, students are mostly low-motivated in learning, and some even refuse to learn, they are less confident and thus a vicious cycle is always affecting these students, especially in languages subjects. Since they seldom read and thus can never improve their writing, reading comprehension skills…etc.

Nevertheless, my school never gives up on our kids. We teachers would like to increase their initiative on language learning. Thus, “Autonomous learning [1] with the help of ICT” is introduced and being practiced in junior forms. Autonomous learning is a student-centered learning mode,

Student-centered learning based on the trust on human……there is a belief on human’s positive talent, these talents could be achieved once acquired condition is provided. 方展画 (1990) [2]

which aims at stimulating students’ learning motives and foster collaborations among students in order to create an interdependent learning atmosphere in our school.

As my previous blog posts mentioned, there would be “pre-lesson” tasks on each passage to be taught, students have to finish several tasks online/ in the worksheets before lessons. According to 趙霞及孫雲曉 (2008), the process of preparation for lessons before class is the beginning of learning[3]. In order to increase their learning motives, we designed several tasks related to specific learning targets for students to finish at home.

For instance, when teaching《賣炭翁》(an old man selling charcoals) , the learning target is students learn to describe different people with their outlooks, languages, thoughts and actions. Thus, we first asked students to go through the passage once and try to draw the appearance of the old man with descriptions in the passage (see below).

Then, during lessons, teacher divides students into several groups and asks them to show their drawings with other group members and explain with their own words. I found that students love to express their ideas with pictures and their own words, they are eager to compare their work and could remember several difficult literary words when those are used in their drawings. Moreover, with the help of ICT, good work are being posted and discussed online, students tend to comment on the relativeness of their classmates drawing and the text.

Student’s beautiful drawing with captions

After 3 months of teaching, I could see gradual improvement in my class. Students are more willing to learn, and to comment on what they are learning (Learning by Design), an autonomous learning habit is created within the class, which I think is more important than the marks on the exam paper. I could see students who like to talk or lie on the desk are willing to participate in class. It is because they could gain their confidence back through drawings, commenting…etc. And through Inquiry-Based Learning, they could help each other and solve problems by themselves which largely reduced teacher’s burden.

As a language teacher, I am glad to see the change brought by autonomous learning with the help of ICT, which largely increased the learning initiative of students when comparing to the traditional way of learning, a rather passive way to learn which depends on the teacher’s output most of the time. The previous way cannot help much on students who have lower incentive on language learning, who hate copying teachers’ notes, and the ones who can never sit well in their places for 45 minutes. I believe students have their own virtues, e.g. leadership, drawing talents…etc. Therefore, autonomous learning with the help of ICT could give more chances for students to express themselves, to help each other, and learn in an active way, and most importantly, to help our students to remember knowledge through an easier path.

Teaching Non-Chinese speaking students (NCS)

Another advantage brought by ICT is that it helped a great hand on teachers who teach non-Chinese speaking students (NCS students). As a teacher of a group of 15 NCS students, I found that they have a rather low incentive in learning Chinese language, since they think that Chinese characters are like pictures, which is hard to write and to remember. Thus, my team members and I tried to take the advantage of ICT to change the way of teaching for these students.

Literally, we start with different components of Chinese characters, strokes and the order of strokes. With the help of “Chinese characters components learning games”, components are being sorted and explained figuratively.

[4] source: http://cd1.edb.hkedcity.net/cd/bcalt/chi/BW1-1/BW1-1-f1/BW1-1-f1-1/%E7%AD%86%E5%8A%83_ver96a.swf

Moreover, different strokes and order of strokes are being shown online, students could revise the order at anytime and anyplace, which largely increased the efficiency of the lesson on practices strokes and their orders.

Phonologically, we also introduced different software to students which help them to learn Cantonese at home, with few clicks in their electronic devices. One of the software could turn text into speech. This software is very convenient for students’ in which they could less rely on the help of the teacher, and could foster their self-study (see below).

[5] source: http://tdc.putonghuaonline.com/tool/index.php

For senior forms, we also introduced other useful websites for our students to increase their exposure on Cantonese out of the class. With the help of ipad, students could practice their conversations with the words provided on the web.

[6] source: http://cantonese.ca/

As a result, ICT has largely helped teachers with the usage of these online materials, teaching non-chinese speaking students is still a new subject to Chinese language teachers, through online test bank (as mentioned in my previous blog), there is an inter-school cooperation which largely reduced the burden of teachers, so do our students.

Read more on online teaching materials for NCS students:

[7] http://www.dragonwise.hku.hk/dragonwise_main/index.html

[8] http://www.dragonwise.hku.hk/sa/index_c.htm

Teaching students with Special Education Needs

Dyslexia

There are three dyslexia students in my class, they are low-motivated in language learning, as they have difficulty on processing phonological elements with characters.

The use of ICT could help to ease their problem through visual and auditory stimulation (Multi-sensory teaching)[9]. With colorful images and interactive mode of learning, students are more willing to learn Chinese Language. These websites could improve their foundations on language structure and characters recognition…etc.

[10] source: http://horoscope.little-prince.com.hk/

Moreover, there are several teaching plans online which provide lots of teaching materials for teachers to teach SEN students. These websites largely reduce the time consumed on lesson preparation. For example, there are graphs with images for students to organize their ideas before writing.

[11] source: http://www.hkedcity.net/cms_files/cms-sen/1-1000/d4454df959270a4a7f514768b1627a93543/3.1.pdf

“Of course, in order to encourage students to write more, we have to reduce their fear on writing and reading. First we have to encourage them more. Second, we have to use vivid and interesting way to let students write on things they are interested in. For example, picture composition is a better way to encourage students to write.[12]”

Therefore, picture composition is always used in order to help my students to organize their thoughts and express their ideas chronologically. Students are more willing to write when things are under their control.

All in all, I believe the best way to encourage different students to learn is to eliminate their fear on language learning. Once they gained confidence in learning, their motivation on it will thus increase. As different students have different learning levels, teachers should set suitable targets for them to reach in order to see gradual improvement. We must treat students as unique individuals and let them fly within their own territories.

A reflection on Student-Centered Learning – Autonomous learning

Posted on November 13, 2014 by pgde5172htyiyeung

Learning is a natural process, we learn since the day we were born, however, as a teacher, I could observe that students’ motive to learn seems to decrease as they stay in schools longer.

What is the reason behind? Why do our students hate learning?

Is learning boring?

In recent years, my school started “Autonomous learning” in nearly every subject in junior forms, it’s the third year until now. At first it was a totally new concept to us, teachers, who received “Teacher-oriented learning” in our old days, which is a passive way to learn.

However, Autonomous learning aimed at increasing students’ learning motive, we want to learn more than what teachers teach, they prepare their lessons before entering the classrooms. In order to achieve this goal, teachers design worksheets which include “Pre-lesson exercises”, as a Chinese teacher, our exercises are mostly designed for students to go through reading passages before the lessons. This is vital to language teaching as students have a better understanding and impression on a specific passage and could ask questions already during classes. Teachers could foster their process of learning through discussions in classes. The discussion process is also an essential element in Autonomous learning, students have to collaborate with others in order to find out the answer, thus, they could help and correct each other, and to improve together.

To collaborate, solving problems together.

Moreover, with the help of ICT, there would be online forum and online reading materials provided for each topic, where students could continue to discuss and finish after-class exercises online. This has largely increased students’ learning motive, which created a self-learning habit among them. We, teachers, are the happiest ones to see this change, which I think, is influencing students’ life, but not just these 19-20 school years.

Read more on Pros and Cons about “Autonomous learning”:
趙志成：推行自主學習的迷思

An English teacher’s blog on autonomous learning

About scaffolding and teaching and learning in Chinese Language with ICT

Posted on October 16, 2014 by pgde5172htyiyeung

I used to learn in a passive way throughout my whole study path, which teachers write on the blackboard, students copy in their notebooks. This situation occur mostly in language and humanities lessons, where every student is like a robot, receiving same materials and producing same products.

Passive way of studying – receiving same materials and producing same products. (Origin: tech.hexun.com.tw)

Nevertheless, as a language teacher now, I realize that a self-directed learning attitude is always the best way to acquire knowledge. According to the Scaffolding theory, “Scaffolding refers to a process in which teachers model or demonstrate the problem-solving process, then step back and offer support as needed.” (Scaffolding in Education: Definition, Theory & Examples) For instance, teachers could be a stimulus in students’ learning process. Thus, there should be a change of roles in both students and teachers in classes.