Strategies and practices for integrating EnglishCentral activities, 2015.02.15

Editor's Notes

• #3: You may be wondering what a Creative Commons license is. On the next couple of slides, for example, are the kinds of licenses I usually use on course materials, presentations, and websites.
• #4: While it is a pleasure to be here today, I may get a little carried away in the excitement to get to the parts where you pitch in. So if at any time you'd like me slow down, back up, repeat something, or pause briefly for questions, please raise a hand.
• #5: Acknowledgment & disclosure: Though I am grateful for initial and on-going support from the folks at EnglishCentral, Ryo Yamamoto in particular (who … [was] in attendance), and have collaborated with them from time to time on micro-research, pilot projects, and minor corrections; I have no vested interests in EnglishCentral other than in the continuity and convenience of uses with students and peers.
• #6: This slide lists a few outcomes in which I hope we will share today, or collectively envision not far down the line. With regard to near-future publication, forum organizers were drawing up plans for conference proceedings about a week ago (personal notes, 2015.01.23). I expect that there will be an announcement during the closing ceremony on Feb. 2nd, 2015, if not before.
• #7: To set off on the right foot, I'd like to ask everyone to share _briefly_ (in triads or groups of four): a) where they're from, b) what their roles and status are with regard to EnglishCentral or other local server or cloud-based (online) language learning venues, and c) what their current projects and plans are. Then, as the workshop continues, there will be additional opportunities to share both strategies and projections for integrating such learning venues and the activities they support with existing or planned curricula.
• #9: Please note that there may be considerable overlap in affordances from one column to the next, from one role or situation to another. The question marks in the lower right corner of the chart indicated areas of great interest and concern for me, as all departments and faculties across the campus where I work spring–or perhaps tip-toe into action now that the university has acquired premium access for all students (and staff?). I was especially keen to find out whether participants (and service providers) saw eye to eye the potentially key affordances of EnglishCentral as a learning and content management venue.
• #10: A central focus of learning activities at EnglishCentral, indicated in this flowchart by the magenta frame around integrated modes of audio-visual input (中心), can vary from institution to institution, department to department, class to class, group to group, learner to learner, and time to time. Granted, some learners, teachers, and administrators may see vocabulary study, or pronunciation and speaking practice as central, and thus locate the central frame of reference to the right. However, for purposes of discussion at the JALT NanKyu Chapter and Sojo University Teaching and Learning Forum, we may wish to concentrate on prospects for tipping the central focus towards listening, before exploring additional strategies and practices..
• #11: If we think of the time that learners have to devote to activities as limited, sometimes far more limited than we may hope or they may need in order to ensure steady language development, shifts towards listening may come at the expense of time devoted to other activities, for instance: vocabulary study or pronunciation and speaking practice.
• #12: This chart represents findings from a pilot project with two classes of 2nd-year students to which the presenter was introducing EnglishCentral. Their assignments either to an experimental class group for which he set standard weekly goals (view five videos, study 50 words, earn 500 speaking points) or to the control group with no explicit goals was not random. Though inaccurate, individual self-reported vocabulary size test scores may have distorted both maximum gains in one group and maximum losses in the other, there was a noticeable if not significant difference in group averages over the period of one semester (approximately 15 weeks). [Per a suggestion from a workshop participant, it will be interesting to revisit the data to try to identify and possibly eliminate outliers.]
• #14: If, on one hand, you're interested mainly in assignments bridging between class meetings (a type of blending), I would advise against allocating much time in class for independent online activities at EnglishCentral, other than when students are just getting started using the site. However, especially for students who may not yet have acquired habits of self-regulation and distributed practice, setting aside a few minutes at the beginning of class once a week or so can be advantageous.
• #15: However, as the bar charts on this slide suggest, students may not cooperate in bridging or flipping strategies; they may visit the site only in class. At a rate of approx. 15 min. of contact per week (max.), they should expect to make little if any progress.
• #16: If, on the other hand, you are planning for an intensive course such as a summer camp, you may wish to set aside 60 to 90 minutes a day for concentrated learning activities and personal reflections.
• #17: Here's an example of do-it-yourself integration based on target vocabulary: In a classroom or lab, you can demonstrate use of the search function with a word or two from a textbook vocabulary index (e.g.: Anderson, 2013, p. 165), then instruct learners to do their own searches and selections for each of the key words from each unit or chapter to focus their previewing or reviewing activities: Listening/Reading/Viewing, Vocabulary study, or Pronunciation and Speaking practice. If necessary–to remind learners, you also can instruct them to start with the most appealing courses, videos, or word forms, at the most appropriate levels for themselves: Beginner, Advanced, or Intermediate. Similarly, you can make readymade EC course or video selections beforehand, and add those selections as options or requirements to curricula for courses that you teach or administer.
• #18: For details on how to build and brand courses, please check out the EnglishCentral blog post: Custom courses–You be the author! (Deubelbeiss, 2014), or talk to the EnglishCentral rep. here today!