{"id":129,"date":"2009-06-21T22:15:24","date_gmt":"2009-06-22T04:15:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec565maydonik\/?p=129"},"modified":"2009-07-12T18:05:41","modified_gmt":"2009-07-13T00:05:41","slug":"exploring-communication-tools-synchronous-asynchronous","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec565maydonik\/2009\/06\/21\/exploring-communication-tools-synchronous-asynchronous\/","title":{"rendered":"Exploring Communication Tools; Synchronous & Asynchronous"},"content":{"rendered":"

The following post is also posted on the Communication Tools page.<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Activity: Exploring Communication Tools in Moodle
\n<\/strong>
\nMy LMS, in Moodle, is designed for grade one French Immersion students who will be using the LMS to support their classroom learning.\u00a0 It should be noted that I intend to use my LMS with the SMART Board <\/a>in my classroom.\u00a0 Students also have access to one classroom computer which they use on a rotational basis during literacy centers.\u00a0 I have chosen two main communication tools for my LMS, one synchronous and one asynchronous.<\/p>\n

Activity #1:\u00a0 Wiki (asynchronous)<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Description and Rationale
\n<\/strong><\/em>
\nThis activity would be completed towards the latter part of the school year.\u00a0 Generally, as grade one culminates, the students are starting to consolidate their thinking around story writing.\u00a0 My instructional goal is for students to have a sense of story, specifically the parts of a story; beginning, middle, end.\u00a0 The purpose of the wiki would be to write a collaborative story.<\/p>\n

I see myself and my students using the wiki together and individually.\u00a0 We would start the project together, using the SMART Board to instruct the students on how to edit the wiki.\u00a0 We would write the first couple of sentences together.\u00a0 At this point, I foresee my students adding to the story as part of one of my literacy centers, which is using the classroom computer.\u00a0 This will allow students time to reflect on their contribution to the collective story.\u00a0 The expectation would be that they add one sentence to the story and that the story would unfold in order (beginning, middle, end).\u00a0 Prior to starting the actual story writing, we would have, as a class, developed a story map using Kidspiration<\/a>.\u00a0 An image of our map would be posted on the wiki so that the students would be able to refer to it.\u00a0 The final story product will remain as an enduring record of a project completed by my grade one class which will develop reciprocity and cooperation among students.\u00a0 According to Chickering and Gamson (1987), \u201cLearning is enhanced when it is more like a team effort that a solo race.\u00a0 Good learning, like good work, is collaborative and social, not competitive and isolated.\u00a0 Working with others often increases involvement in learning.\u00a0 Sharing one\u2019s own ideas and responding to others\u2019 reactions sharpens thinking and deepens understanding.\u201d<\/p>\n

A limitation of asynchronous communication tools is that students may not feel as connected to a community of learners, particularly if efforts are not taken to keep people interacting with one another. I do not foresee this to be a problem, because as stated above, students will be expected to contribute to the wiki during literacy centers and are accountable for their work during this time.<\/p>\n

I have tested the wiki, and it works!\u00a0 I am confident that after being showed how to use the wiki, my students would be able to edit it at the classroom computer independently.<\/p>\n

Activity #2:\u00a0 Wimba Live Classroom (synchronous)<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Description and Rationale
\n<\/strong><\/em>
\nChickering and Gamson\u2019s (1987) third principle is \u201cGood Practice Uses Active Learning Techniques\u201d.\u00a0 Many technologies available today encourage active learning.\u00a0 Real-time conversation is one such technology.\u00a0 Real-time conversation has the ability to create a sense of real-time connection and a sense of community.<\/p>\n

The second communication tool that I have chosen for my LMS is the WIMBA Live Classroom<\/a>.\u00a0 My instructional goal with using this technology would be to improve the oral fluency in French of my students.\u00a0 At first, I thought that this tool would be far too complicated for grade one students and\u00a0 that it would be difficult to support with a class of 17-20 students.\u00a0 This bothered me for a while as I saw this problem as a major limitation.\u00a0 However, I believe that I have come up with a solution.\u00a0 My idea would be to use WIMBA as a whole class to connect with another grade one French Immersion classroom in Calgary.\u00a0 Often students do not understand why they are learning French because it is very disconnected from daily life in Calgary.\u00a0 By connecting with another peer group living the same academic path, students may start to connect their language learning with life outside of school.<\/p>\n

Research on second language acquisition supports the student-centered, task-based learning nature of real-time conversation.\u00a0 The use of WIMBA supports second language acquisition by providing a relevant, meaningful context, learning tasks appropriate to students\u2019 age level, and learner-centered instruction, which Curtain and Dalhberg recommend as crucial for language learning (2002).\u00a0 Hadley (2001) reiterates this notion by stating, \u201copportunities must be provided for active communicative interaction among students\u201d (p. 95).\u00a0 Furthermore, Hadley recommends \u201cstudents should be encouraged to express their own meaning as early as possible after productive skills have been introduced in the course of instruction\u201d (2001, p. 95).\u00a0 Real-time conversation provides opportunities for authentic \u201ccommunicative interaction among students\u201d by allowing students to communicate with other peers their own age.<\/p>\n

The constructivist model of education further supports the use of real-time conversation\u00a0 in the classroom.\u00a0 According to Jonassen (1999), knowledge is \u201cindividually constructed and socially constructed by learners based on their interpretations of experiences in the world\u201d (p. 217).\u00a0 Feedback provided by the teacher encourages the learners to \u201creflect on what they have done\u201d and the \u201cstrategies they used\u201d (Jonassen 1998) to communicate in a second language.<\/p>\n

Hatch (1978) argues that “[…] language grows out of experience, and it is out of participating in conversations that one learns how to interact verbally; out of this interaction, syntactic forms develop” (as cited in Ram\u00edrez, 241).\u00a0 Therefore, the use of WIMBA will facilitate interactional competence and will provide a medium where students can interact in the second language and conduct a conversation without the worries of grammar mistakes.\u00a0 Ram\u00edrez (1995) writes, “Students need to be made aware that it is not necessary to converse perfectly in the [second language] in order to communicate and that conversational strategies can be used to overcome communication difficulties in the real world” (Ram\u00edrez, 253).<\/p>\n

I see my students using WIMBA to share projects they have been working on with the partner class.\u00a0 My students could, for example, share the collaborative story that they wrote with the other grade one classroom.\u00a0 Their presentation could also be archived allowing for parents or other members of the classroom community the opportunity to watch the students present.<\/p>\n

I intend to try to connect with another grade one classroom next school year.\u00a0 Although we do not have access to WIMBA within the Calgary Board of Education, we do have access to Elluminate<\/a> which could be used for this purpose as well.\u00a0 Last week, I was able to test Elluminate with my Assistant Principal and four other teachers.\u00a0 It was very successful and after having participated with the WIMBA demonstration in ETEC 565, I am confident that real-time conversation will be an asset to my LMS and my instructional goals.<\/p>\n

Assessment of students<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Because my LMS will be used in the classroom, I will be able to monitor my students very closely.\u00a0 I will be able to know who has contributed to the wiki (collaborative story) as the students are on a rotating schedule to use the computer during literacy centers.\u00a0 Furthermore, Moodle itself keeps track of who has edited what.\u00a0 In terms of using WIMBA, the interaction would be facilitated by myself and another teacher in another school.\u00a0 Besides formally evaluating the work the students will present, I will be able to make observations of their conversations in French and the improvement of their oral fluency.<\/p>\n

References:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Anderson, T. (2008). Teaching in an Online Learning Context.\u00a0 I In: T. Anderson & F. Elloumi (Eds.), Theory and Practice of Online Learning. Edmonton AB: \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Athabasca University. Accessed online 21 June 2009
\nhttp:\/\/www.aupress.ca\/books\/120146\/ebook\/14_Anderson_2008_Anderson-DeliveryQualitySupport.pdf <\/a><\/p>\n

Chickering, A.W. & Gamson, Z.F. (1987). Seven Principles for Good Practice in Undergraduate Education. American Association for Higher Education Bulletin, 39 (7), 3-7. Accessed online 21 June 2009 http:\/\/www.aahea.org\/bulletins\/articles\/sevenprinciples1987.htm <\/a><\/p>\n

Chickering, A.W. & Ehrmann, S.C. (1996). Implementing the Seven Principles: Technology as Lever. American Association for Higher Education Bulletin, 49(2), 3-6. Accessed online 21 June 2009\u2028 http:\/\/www.aahea.org\/bulletins\/articles\/sevenprinciples.htm <\/a><\/p>\n

Curtain, H. & Dahlberg, C. (2004). Languages and children, making the match: New languages for young learners, grades K-8 (3rd ed.). Boston: Pearson<\/p>\n

Hadley, A. O.\u00a0 (2001). Teaching language in context (3rd ed.). Boston, MA: Heinle & Heinle.<\/p>\n

Jonassen, D. (1998). Designing constructivist learning environments. In C. Reigeleth (Ed.), Instructional Design Theories and Models: Volume II. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.<\/p>\n

Ram\u00edrez, A. G. (1995). Creating Contexts for Second Language Acquisition: Theory and Methods.\u00a0 Baton Rouge: Longman Publishers USA.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The following post is also posted on the Communication Tools page. Activity: Exploring Communication Tools in Moodle My LMS, in Moodle, is designed for grade one French Immersion students who will be using the LMS to support their classroom learning.\u00a0 It should be noted that I intend to use my LMS with the SMART Board […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":515,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3865,164],"tags":[3865,4250,3716,318,3317,3636],"class_list":["post-129","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-e-learning-toolkit","category-module-3","tag-e-learning-toolkit","tag-elluminate","tag-lms","tag-moodle","tag-submitted","tag-wimba"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec565maydonik\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec565maydonik\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec565maydonik\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec565maydonik\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/515"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec565maydonik\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=129"}],"version-history":[{"count":17,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec565maydonik\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":196,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec565maydonik\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129\/revisions\/196"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec565maydonik\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=129"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec565maydonik\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=129"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/etec565maydonik\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=129"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}