What a Wiki’d World Wide Web We Weave

My private and rather pointless obsession with the internet finally found a purpose in the study of educational technology. The wonderful thing about being a language teacher is that everything is an opportunity for learning and teaching, and the web is the most abundant, self-perpetuating font there is.

What makes current technologies the next step in the evolution of our species – at least to my mind – is that it is such a participative medium. Web 2.0 is not for consumers but for participants. My colleague and visionary rock star of educational technology, Henrick Borger, introduced me to the eloquent and touching video The Machine is Us/ing Us. This was a turning point in the way I see the web, education and life @ large. His e-vangelism went further than talk, and is also demonstrated in the collaborative resources he has started for our college: a general e-learning social network, a social bookmarking site on e-learning and most recently a wiki for new teacher orientation.

These resources are priceless, and demonstrate the potential of Web 2.0: they are constantly, organically evolving, and they continue to evolve as long as collaborators participate. Resources like these are a priceless resource, especially at a small college in a rustic area this one. Most of all this is more than a parting gift to the college: it is a legacy that can have an exponential impact.

Treading Lightly: The Expat Teacher’s Imperative

There are many reasons to tread lightly in this world. Not to cause too much disturbance, not to take away too much, not to change too much. Perhaps, most importantly, to know when to gently rock the boat, and when not to. And not to hoard.

When you are an expatriate, especially in education, the balance is a fine one. To educate and introduce a window on the world, but not to disregard what is right there. To facilitate, but not to interfere. To appreciate what is unique about the here and now, rather than compare it to the heres and nows past. To lead a life where possessions are simple, few and wisely chosen.

There is a classic conversation activity where students debate the top five things they would want to have with them on a desert island. Expat living is a bit like that desert island, especially for the common garden variety English teacher abroad, who doesn’t have the luxury of cargo and shipping budgets.

Exactly nine days away from relocation, I am counting, counting, weighing and measuring every single one of the precious items on my list. Essential? Replaceable? Storable? Scan-able?

Every item I do choose to take with me reminds me to choose simply, choose wisely, choose well. And wherever I move next, I sol

The Apprenticeship of Observation

One of the paradoxes of teacher education is the fact that, no matter what array of methodologies teacher trainees are exposed to, when they reach the chalk-face they are most likely to teach the way they were taught. Teaching practice tends to be history repeating itself. In the 1975 publication ‘Schoolteacher: A sociological study’, author Dan Lortie refers to this phenomenon as the apprenticeship of observation.

In my own teaching I have often found that I do not necessarily practice what I preach, at least methodologically. And I am not alone. Tragically, the greater the pressure – whether from workload, time pressure or disaffected students – the stronger the pull of the apprenticeship of observation. Yet these are the times when education is most in need of solid theory in practice, of sound yet experimental pedagogy and innovative techniques. These are the times when teachers most need to go beyond the craft into which we were apprenticed towards the art in which we were educated.

Mastery of teaching is a mirage that will always stay out of reach. It does not mean that every class will become easy. What it does mean is that experience, schooling, common sense, a healthy sense of adventure and, yes, the apprenticeship of observation, all interact to equip us with principled ways of addressing each class uniquely. Mastery forever remains a work in progress.

Teachers as Online Language Learners goes LIVE!

The Teachers as Online Language Learners project that is the anchor of my upcoming ICT assignment is finally live. Not only that, but I have decided to join the evaluation subjects in piloting the project by learning survival Korean using, well, my own guidelines. This involves the KoreaKast blog, and perhaps a podcast or vlog, too...

Rather than write more here, I am adding the links… watch this space!

Affluenza and the Value of Resourcefulness in Education

This morning I stumbled (almost literally) across the object in the attached photograph. It is an iron pipe connecting two paint cans filled with cement. As it turns out, the workers (at least six of whom share a single room) in a nearby building crafted this inventive makeshift barbell out of what anyone else would have seen as junk. I doubt whether they would have done so on a more generous income. And I have to wonder how many affluent folk possess such initiative, inventiveness and downright gumption.

As I become more embroiled in educational technologies, there is a nagging awareness at the back of my mind that all this fancy stuff can detract from the true quality of what we do. Much as a laud the true potential of ICT for education, I am painfully aware of the fact that, misinterpreted, these frills can easily cover up a vacuum of learning – a danger that is even more acute in emerging contexts, where the nature of quality has not necessarily been defined yet.

Not only that, but there is the danger that the deluge of resources we have access to online today can make us, at best, undiscerning, creatively blunt and at worst just plain lazy.

The Hunt is On

Job-hunting. In my salad days it used to be an occult endeavour fuelled by malevolent Fates. Just finding a job opening was an ordeal. Ensuring an application reached its destination, securing an interview and getting transport to the venue – not to mention getting impeccably dressed and groomed or acing and interview – were ordeals I rarely had the privilege to take on.

Times have, of course, changed. And so have I.

Despite an ailing global economy, anyone in the English Language Teaching business knows that there is no shortage of jobs. Quite the contrary: today I have the opposite dilemma from the past, with a plethora of vacancies advertised online. The dilemma, however, has taken on a new form, both for applicants and recruiters. Because quantity simply doesn’t guarantee quality.

For teachers like myself, this means sifting through swathes of advertisements to separate the chaff from the wheat, delving into the fine print and divining the truths from lies of omission. Since there is no formal standard for advertisements on many ELT websites, this can be a time-consuming and inaccurate process. The number of employers who provide more information on their websites is increasing, and of course online forums and networks are a boon, but many questions still remain unanswered. Innumerable teachers have been burned by unscrupulous ELT employers, and a note of caution is certainly in order.

For recruiters the dilemma is perhaps even greater. In an industry where standards are still not set internationally, there is no choice but to set the requirement of copious checklist items: qualifications, references, criminal record and health checks and the like. Yet even these ostensible facts do not really fathom the true quality of an applicant as an employee, far less a language teacher. In an industry where schools depend on the presence and performance of their instructors, human resources are indispensible to both quality and profit. There is a reason behind the scepticism of language schools towards (especially foreign, “native”) English teachers: employers, too, have been burned by unreliable employees.

The problem is expansive, and I do not have a complete solution. Yet I do believe a few simple, feasible steps will be of great help.

1. A standard format for advertising, provided as an online form by ELT websites.
2. A simple spreadsheet or table for job-hunters’ personal use, showing the different categories of information on jobs applied for, such as the name, school type, location, hours, remuneration package, pros and cons and, very importantly, an update on the application process, interview dates, feedback etc.
3. A portfolio system whereby applicants can demonstrate their organizational, teaching and technical skills through a set of documents. This should include a CV, philosophy of education essay, some lesson plans, materials and other work by the teacher. With online facilities like YouTube, posting demonstration or self-introduction videos is even possible.
These simple steps would guide the applicant towards introspection, raise standards and expectations from both parties and eventually have a ripple effect on the quality of English education internationally.

What’s stopping us?

My own humble attempt at an online portfolio can be found at http://sites.google.com/site/learningcoachm/

The End Is the Beginning

From the window of my study I see a father and son in tribal costumes settle a goat and two kids into the back of a pickup truck. The sonic eruption of the morning call to prayer has long died down, but since it is Thursday, and hence the beginning of the weekend, the road running through the Al-Khalew oasis that gives my neighbourhood its name is still quiet.

My past four years in Oman have been the most challenging time of my adult life, and yet I am painfully aware what a unique world I have experienced here. Unique, not only because of the nation’s strong traditions, but also because rapid economic development is changing the physical and social landscape. Whatever the difficulties of living and working at the friction point between ancient ways and modern means, I have been blessed to share this snapshot of a society in evolution. This is one of the things that makes teaching English abroad a persistently adventurous mission.

The last day at work was simultaneously deeply emotional and profoundly anticlimactic. So much so that after an hour of trying to write about it, I eventually gave up. With so many colleagues and students to whom I am so deeply indebted, no goodbye does justice to a long-standing professional relationship. Thanks to the multitude of online networking facilities, it is possible to keep in touch with these people who have been my surrogate family for so long. But of course, it will never be never quite the same.

The emotional load of leaving my job and home of four years aside, there remain several mountains to be moved in the coming month. Most urgently, an assignment for the final taught module of my MA remains. The course is Language Learning through Information Communications Technologies (ICT), the most inspired and inspiring I have taken yet. An explosive project is brewing at the back of my mind, but with the load of previous modules, and of course wrapping up and handing over my job, I haven’t quite made it concrete yet. With the deadline on 30 June, and my flight out of Oman at 5 AM the next day, things will have to happen very quickly.

In addition, there are the small matters of securing a decent new job with Critical Study-friendly hours and reasonable pay in a reasonably free society, tying up all logistics here in Oman, packing my home into two suitcases and preparing for my month in Europe. Though technically unemployed, I am certainly not under-occupied.

It will be a demanding month, but I am extremely positive about the open possibilities it offers. It feels extremely good to be a free agent again, if only for the ninety days until my next job begins. Just ninety days, but a great deal hangs in the balance.

After all, one of the perks of being a gypsy is licence to reinvent yourself and your life around the next corner. The end of one incarnation is the beginning of another.

Though the goat scene this morning was to far to capture clearly on film, another goat scene is attached. These goats were roaming outside the local supermarket here in Rustaq.