Reflections

Why do E Portfolios link well with the sort of teaching and learning that is facilitated by blended or online approach to teaching and learning?

Because, if successful, they can become a stable linking "device" for students. A place they can turn to to revisit or redirect their learning paths and objectives.

Do you think E-Portfolios have a role in fully online teaching? Why/Why not?

Most definitely. They are an excellent way to gather evidence of performance and monitor progress.

What challenges can you see to using E Portfolios with your students?

Commitment and relevance.

What advantages do E Portfolios have over traditional forms of assessment?

They are really focused on formative assesment but work really well for summative assessment too if necessary, thus they are an asset for both teachers and students.

What did you do in the live session today? Did you learn anything from it? What points did Russell make?

During today's session, I did what I usually do to stay concentrated and make sure I take home the essential aspects: sketchnote. The key aspects, or at least the ones that caught my interest, were:

• Many aspects of the flipped classroom can be taken to online/hybrid teaching contexts.

• There needs to be a clear connection between what's done online and face to face.

• Add variety. Applying Bloom's taxonomy is key: high order thinking skills for the face-to-face session and behaviourist, low-order-thinking skills for home-based activities.

• Some practical tips to increase motivation:

  • When asking our students to create content make sure there is an objective, a practical use for it.

  • There needs to be a warmer for any synchronous session.

  • Ask them to do little tasks and make them see there is a connection between the online and the face-to-face parts.

• Be super careful about what we upload onto our Moodle courses. Don't overwhelm students.

The session started off with a question from our colleague Cristina González about the difference between blended and hybrid.

• Blended lesson: face to face + technology.

• Hybrid teaching: half of the students home (with technology) + half students face to face.

What were the key messages that Russell was putting forward about teaching online?

• Consistency.

• Build up a connection between both parts.

• In order to offer a personalized learning experience, offer options The higher the level, the more options. The lower, the more guided and closed the process will be.

What will you take from today's session? How might they impact on your use of the platform?

In terms of platform design:

• Give clear and detailed instructions

• Model processes

• Decide on a fixed number of sections and maintain them in all the units/modules of the course.

In terms of teaching:

• Structuring sessions to build up that connection.

• Instructions of steps and tasks to carry out before breakout rooms.

What did Russell miss? Are there things you have learnt about the platform that you think are key points?

Something that is not clear to me both in the course programme and in the Moodle platform: the learning pathway, which would be really good to help us with self-regulation.

I understand that we are going to go over different key elements of the blended modality and I am trying to guess how they all engrain . Or maybe that's part of the trick to sustain our attention?

A revision of our personal portfolios was the kick-off for the third session. We were sent into breakout rooms in groups of 5 to do this analysis and come up with some key points which we then shared with the big group. Some of the highlights:

• Include buttons, contents table and icons where possible, to improve accessibility and navigability.

• A reference to our schools and our KA104 projects is in order.

In turn, Russell remarked the importance of establishing some guidelines but allowing for flexibility to give room to students' creativity and customization of their own portfolios.

The second, more technical part of the session focused on screen capture technology and its uses in the language classroom, namely:

• Making reflections

• Give feedback

• Flip the classroom

Russell Stannard's website, Teacher Training Videos, makes extensive use of this option and I really encourage you to visit it.

I was already familiar with screen capture videos but it was really nice to have the heads up on mistakes to avoid and things we can do to make the most of this technology. I must confess that analysis of what worked and what didn't is my favourite part of this course, when either Russell himself does it or he invites us to do so.

The idea that anything has the potential to become a learning asset, was the high note to end the morning session. A motto language teachers live by!

In the afternoon we revisited the idea of connectedness. Kahoot about London, but Russell was giving more detailed information about the answers before moving on to the next questions. He then got us into breakout rooms (of 2-3 members this time) to try to see how many of those fine details we could remember. We then discovered that this was not only a quiz, it was an "undercover" listening task.

Conclusion: Kahoot is not only about formative assessment, but about how we can use it as a learning tool.

• Explored Socrative.

• Explored the white board feature in Zoom. It is also a tool for monitoring and assessment: When the teacher goes in the breakout rooms s/he can take a glance at the white board

• Reviewed a couple of technical aspects:

  • • Screencasting: When recording slides, don't use presentation mode to control it more easily.

    • E-portfolio on Sites: When sharing video from Drive make sure it is set to "Public".

• The challenges of hybrid teaching, shared by our colleagues from EOI Pamplona:

  • • Technical problems (poor connection)

    • Hard to pay attention to both groups of students (at home and in the class).

    • Designing materials and tasks for both groups, sometimes with no textbook available like in Jaume's case.

Loved this session. Absolutely loved it.

Some key ideas to foster autonomy or self-regulated learning processes:

• Textbook or piles of photocopies?

• Emphasis on reading as a learning tool.

• Creation of vocabulary flashcards as a way to promote language learning in context. Russell gave us an example with Polish. This implies the use of Google sheets, Google translate and Quizlet. It is used to do retrieval practice, to revise vocabulary one already knows and to learn a new word. First, he creates an Excel file with 2 columns (Polish and English) and imports it to Quizlet to create a set of flashcards with the audio attached to them. That's one set. To create a new set, he uses Polish only in both columns and then, in one of the colums, he deletes all the words except for the first and last (the trigger!).

• Creation of learning playlists in Youtube.

• Selection of favourite podcasts.

• Have students record their own monologues but accompanied by a questionnaire so that students focus on different aspects of their production and self-assess. The teacher can later correct the best productions.

• I am adding here a few texts Russell recommended reading:

  • • Boosting Speaking Fluency through Partner Taping

    • Using Pair Taping

    • Self evaluation sheet

    • Balancing the dual functions of portfolio assessment