Reflection

GROUP B2

REFLECTION

 I argue that digital technologies are ideally placed to help teachers working with learners, and learners working independently, to do the necessary ‘languaging’  that makes their language development possible. In this course, as online language learner, we are talking here about doing things with language rather than just learning about language. In this unit, we came across many teaching opportunities like designing activities for transitioning classroom. Graham Stanley’s book really helps a lot in managing and developing the online activities according to my classroom setting. Through this course, I have connected with an amazing teacher community and to a vast quantity of excellent material and resources. I discovered first time how to design a website and create ePortfolio. That is why I view online language teaching a very interesting experience for teachers and learners both. Here the online teaching requires arrange of skills and knowledge, particularly in the area of pedagogical approaches which will effectively enable the design, facilitation and assessment of course , content knowledge, ability to support the social and emotional well being of students and technical skills.

Yes I am successful while I transferred some part of my F2F teaching into online teaching. The switching redefines the professional identities and teaching methodologies. Yes I was under pressure to reexamine my teaching philosophy and pedagogy. In the beginning, I was thinking to leave it but the dynamic nature of technologically enhanced teaching and learning environment where students’ co-construct knowledge through interaction made me constantly moving forward in my effort. The difficulty I experienced in my online teaching was the poor time management because in F2F class, schedule is predetermined and online course are flexible in nature and self paced that is why students feel relaxed and do not submit assignments on due dates. Students need to find a way to balance the flexibility of online learning with a disciplined schedule to be successful online learners. This area I really worked on to improve the planning in my own course. Secondly, in F2F class teacher is present whenever students get difficulty in understanding a concept, teacher support and relevant intervention help students to overcome the difficulties. While in online course, response is not immediate whenever students decide to seek attention from the instructor. So I think again this area need to be improved in planning an online course.

A well-designed rubric is an effective communication tool. It emphasizes the important skills or concepts to demonstrate. While rubrics clarify assignments for students, a rubric does so much more for the online instructor. A rubric streamlines the grading process. The rubric I designed for my online course includes criteria for Class Participation, Quality Comment, and Listening skill. F.Matos comments on my Rubric give me an idea that I have done my work to perfection in designing Rubric as her comments say: “That I have given clear description of criteria in Rubric and it is a feedback in itself”. I will use the same Rubric for my online course as it gives a descriptive assessment criteria and performance level and clearly outline the essential components of an assignment and show students how they are being assessed. Instructors can use well designed rubrics as a tool to identify weak points in their instruction, and in the online classroom, rubrics provide a means for consistent, fast grading and feedback.