Practical uses of Technology in the English Classroom

Course attended: Practical Uses of Technology in the English Classroom

Before the Mobility started, I received the following:

1. Detailed travel and accommodation information

2. A request from the trainer to fill in a course-specific questionnaire

3. Course program

During the mobility

At the beginning of the course, which was organised at the University of Kent, Canterbury, the course provider organised the orientation tour around the campus. Like the other participants, who also stayed in students’ houses which enabled a lot of multicultural interaction, I was given the folder including all the necessary brochures regarding the practical information such as facilities offered at the campus, the map of the campus and the city, and the bus timetable.

I attended the course entitled Practical Uses of Technology in the English Classroom. There were 4 more participants in the group which meant that the trainer could dedicate a lot of his time individually to each participant. The course covered the following topics:

• Developments in ICT
• Digital Literacy: searching, bookmarking and sharing content
• Using cloud services: Google Drive
• The SAMR model for using ICT in education
• Introduction to Blended Learning
• Virtual Learning Environments
• Google+ Communities
• Managing the Digital Classroom
• Website Evaluation
• Working with digital text tools
• Google Docs
• Building ePortfolios
• Digital Task design
• Working with digital images: copyright Issues
• Digital storytelling tools
• Social bookmarking - Diigo
• Online security
• Online digital boards - Padlet
• Working with audio
• Using video: viewing and creating content
• Using word-cloud generators
• Working with QR codes
• Backchanneling tools
• Online brainstorming tools
• Polling and questionnaire tools
• Introduction to The Flipped Classroom
• Video tutorial creation tools
• Making the most of online resources for Continuous Professional Development
• Introduction to blogging

During the mobility period I improved my existing and acquired new digital skills and competences which include the following:

· Discussing e-identity: security, passwords, avatars

· Working with authoring tools: respecting copyright and preventing plagiarism, blogs, wikis, slide share sites

· Working with images: effective screen capture tools, copyright issues for images, editing images, creating cartoons and video

· Working with audio: podcasting (finding, subscribing, creating and sharing), VoiceThreads

· Enhancing researching skills: effective search techniques, evaluating websites, alternative search engines,

· Using the social networking/bookmarking tools; Google Apps for teachers

· Putting it together: designing tasks for ICT-based lessons, integrating ICT into the curriculum, lesson planning, classroom management for lab lessons

Erasmus+ provided me with the opportunity to expand my knowledge regarding the use of Technology for the educational purposes, to share the ideas, experiences and the examples of good practice with the colleagues from Europe and to broaden my own network.