In my experience, there are certainly good and bad test-takers. Some people are more comfortable demonstrating their knowledge on a test, while others get overly-stressed and then forget everything they've learned. The best way that I can think of to accommodate all types of test takers would be to have a variety of questions and formats included in one test. For those who write best, have an short essay portion. For those who know the grammar best, have a couple questions that focus on that aspect. Along the same lines, it would also be fair to include a listening and oral part to every test to accommodate the students who excel in this portion. However, this would quickly become an extreme amount of work for the teacher, both during and outside of class, and would be extremely impractical. Because this ideal balance is simply not practical, I think tests can be slightly biased toward those who do better on written and reading segments.

I happen to be a very good test taker most of the time. I tend to do better on more objectively scored exams and worse on test that place more emphasis on essays. My ideas are not always well focused and concise, which can make answering an essay question quite difficult.

I'm not really sure what can be done to either make tests more student-friendly or to train students to be better test takers. Some might suggest that students should practice what they're worst at in an effort to improve, but I've learned that that may only make them resent it more and have it become ever more frustrating and tiresome for them.

FL Assessment

I believe that assessment of foreign language skills and proficiency is one of the bigger problems faceing Foreign Language Teaching. As a L2 learner, I remember taking tests and quizzes in high school and not having the slightest problem getting an A: all I had to do was memorize vocab or correctly conjugate a verb based on the subject. Most of the tests were a lot of matching, multiple choice and fill in the blank with the occasional short answer question thrown in. All I had to do was memorize the material that would be on the test, then just spit it back out on the paper. I would forget about what we were supposed to have "learned" by the time I got to my next class. One of the reasons I prefer taking tests to writing papers or doing projects is that, for me, tests are so much easier and require so much less effort and knowledge on my part.

On the other side, there are students who do not test well. Some of my friends in my high school language classes dreaded taking tests and they would study for days before taking the test, spending hours going over flash cards and notes, while I crammed 10 minutes before the class. And when the results came back, they were scored lower than I was, even though they probably knew the information better than I did and remembered it for longer than I did. Some people would freeze up and panic, while others just weren't able to work within the confines of the test. I was luckier, in the sense that my mother had taught my how to take tests well, looking for the keywords and looking at another part of the test in case it had the answer for a different section.

I feel that the stress that the current education places on tests and quizzes isn't fair or accurate. I believe that the idea of hybrid testing - using some traditional tests and quizzes, some written thoughtful responses and some skits or role plays - work much better than relying mostly on how skillful students are at test-taking, instead of their skills in the L2.

Each student will have different strengths and weaknesses in dealing with assessments and if teachers use a variety of types, then students will be on a more even playing field and can be tested more on their knowledge of the content of a lesson, than on how well they can take a test. I know some of my former classmates who could write amazing skits that were engaging and conveyed their proficiency in the language and would score much higher in those types of assessments, because they could show their skills in a way that worked best for them.

I believe that the most effective, and difficult, assessment of L2 skills and proficiency is that of discourse. It requires knowing vocabulary, grammar and the pragmatics of a language, as well as being able to make a coherent argument and understand what is said in return, then commenting on it. The problem with this type of assessment is that some students are very shy and soft-spoken and feel uncomfortable speaking that much, in public or in private.

As I said before, I feel that the best assessment is to mix up the styles and types of assessment, as each has benefits and detractors.

Testing

Personally, I do not feel like most classroom based tests give an accurate assessment of a students ability. Most tests are purely written, and therefore do not assess a students speaking ability. Also, students can easily pass an exam and stuff have no real understanding of the material. My experience as a test taker truly supports that. In high school, my Spanish teacher's tests were extremely easy. Most of our tests were fill in the blank, matching and multiple choice. There wasn't any oral portion or listening. In college, my French professor added listening, but there still was no portion of speaking. I believe the best type of test includes both speaking, listening, reading and writing. This would mean the instructor should ask the students questions, in private, and have them answer orally. For listening, have the students listen to either the instructor speaking or a recording and answer questions. For the reading section, students could read a passage and then answer questions based on the content, not something they can just copy from the text. For the writing section, students should write a paragraph to answer a prompt. The prompt should require them to use the grammar and vocabulary that is to be assessed. I also think it is important to teach some aspect of culture each month,so that should also be assessed using a combination of these methods.

Discussion 7 - Foreign Language Assessment

I feel that classroom-based tests reflect student abilities fairly reliably. If a student cannot produce the language points that they were learning in class in a written test format, then chances are they cannot produce them on the spot in conversation either. In my own experiences, this has been true. If I do not remember how to conjugate a verb on a test, it's because I do not remember how to conjugate that verb and need to study more.

In my personal opinion, I do not think there are students who simply do not test well. There are students who get very nervous under pressure and forget things they knew before, but if that is the case then they won't speak well either, meaning that rather than being a bad test taker they are simply a nervous speaker. That being said, I do not mean that this type of person is bad at language. A nervous speaker will perform the best in a relaxed setting, like a conversation with their peers. A test does not accurately reflect their ability to speak the language, but there is no real way to evaluate their ability in a one time instance, the only way to see what they can do is to observe them in a daily format where they do not feel pressured.

I think using a daily rubric is the most effective way to judge a student's language ability, whether they get nervous on tests or not. Seeing whether or not they can remember things on the fly and without studying them will reflect the most on their conversational abilities, which is arguably the most important aspect of foreign language learning in the first place.

Discussion 7: Classroom testing

          I think that there is too much of an emphasis on testing and that classroom testing doesn’t always reflect a student’s abilities.  Some tests are not broad enough and ask very specific questions on small details instead of questions based on the overall topics.  I think most classroom-based tests that I took in my high school language class concentrated too much on reading, writing and grammar skills, and a little on listening skills.  I think having an oral component to every test is essential.  I think being able to speak and understand a foreign language is the most important aspects and ways to show that a student is learning the language.  I really like the idea of students making a portfolio of their progress through out a semester and having them write a reflection to explain why they included each artifact in their portfolio, these artifacts would include tape recordings, essays, projects, and maybe past test.  I think a portfolio like this would be a much better final exam, then a written final exam.

            The classroom-based tests that I took in high school didn’t show much and any student that just memorized a few new vocabulary words and grammar structures could have easily aced the test.  I think test need to show that the student can use the language in new and meaningful ways, not just with simple fill-in the blanks and matching type questions.  I do think that there are students who just don’t test well.  Traditional testing methods focus too much on small details such as grammar and unrealistic language use.  I really like the writing and mixed-skills formats.  The cloze adaptation is a better fill-in the blank method than just having a sentence and the verb right after because students do not even need to show that they understand the sentence to get the answer correct.  The partial conversations are also very good for testing reading and writing skills at the same time.  I think even novice students can have some open-ended questions and maybe have a word bank provided to give them cues on what vocabulary they should be using. Testing listening comprehension using a table that students have to fill-in and they have to listen for certain semantic cues.

            All language tests should be designed as hybrid tests, which purposefully blend grammar, context, structure and situation.  I think there should be open-ended (convergent) and one-right answer specific questions (divergent).  Chapter 9 points out that achievement tests which are the standard classroom-based test can be made to reflect proficiency goals as well.  It may be harder to grade an exam like this, but it will more accurately reflect the students’ abilities.  The focus needs to be on providing students with sequential, naturalistic discourse on tests and not a random sequence of single sentences or phrases.  People use language in so many different ways and this is what makes learning a second language so challenging, but also fun at the same time.  Students need to be exposed to as much authentic material as possible and do in class communicative activities that reflect meaningful language use.  The testing formats used should be ones that the student has encountered before in classroom or homework assignments and these assignments need to encourage students to use their new language skills.  Testing is a part of life, but tests in general should not focus solely on achievement because a student who doesn’t perform well on standard tests should not be considered incompetent.  Testing formats need to be adaptive and diverse enough that students aren’t just memorizing and filling-in answers without even thinking about real language use. 

Discussion 7

I think that classroom based tests will show more than a standardized test, however I do not think that tests are the best way to show a student's ability. What most tests do is show that student's know that vocabulary and are able to produce it in a format demanded by the test. Also, generally, most testing does not include a oral portion to the exam. I personally would be more interested to see what students can do in a project rather than a test. 

As a test taker, I am normally fairly good. I generally do no do well on the essay section unless it is for English, but I find that often when I take a test everything I have studied will be leached from my mind. It is of course after the test that I can remember anything. This obviously stems from nervousness, and I always hate it because I know I could have done better. As a side note, I watched a NOVA episode explaining that one way to combat that nervousness that can interfere with testing is to write own your feelings about the test in a journal entry about 10-15 minutes before the test. The studied showed that the average for the control group ( those who sat there and did nothing for 10-15 min) got an average of a B-. Those who did write down their anxieties over the test, got on average a B+. 

(If you're interested in the video, it's on this NOVA page, it should be the last 10 minutes of the episode.

I think that there are plenty of people who simply don't test well, and changing the environment of the test won't help much. However, for testing it is impotent to put a variety of test questions such as open ended, multiple choice and the ilk.  

Blog 7 - Testing

I believe that classroom tests are good and show the student's strengths and weaknesses. Classroom tests are a good way to see how the class is grasping the concept. As a test taker I like it when a teacher gives a test at the end of each chapter because I dont like to feel overwhelmed when a test is comprised of 3 or 4 chapters. I also feel that tests should be a combination of different styles. For example, multiple choice, matching, short answer and an essay are components that should be in 1 test. I know for a fact that some students do not test well because I am one of them. When it comes time for a test a psych myself out which, lowers my test score. This is very true in classes that I don't care for. When we want to measure language skills I feel that oral tests are best because it allows student and teacher interaction. It also allows the teacher to gage the student's ability using the ACTFL guidelines. In high school all of my Spanish teachers would at least have 1 or 2 speaking test or quizzes every month or so. I feel that this was a good way to not only use the vocab and the grammar but also to improve my pronunciation. The feedback from the teacher during these oral tests are very helpful because it is a 1 on 1 situation.

Discussion #7: Foreign Language Assessment

How accurately do you feel that classroom-based tests reflect student abilities? What are your experiences as a test-taker? Do you think there are students that do not test well? What method of testing do you think is most effective to measure students' language skills? Use examples to justify your point of view. 

Discussion 6: Teaching Culture

          Culture in my view is everything that makes up a group of people.  Culture really is what defines a group of people.  When people asks about where a person is from, where they grew up or where there family is from, what they are really asking is about their cultural background.  They want to know where that person came from because it helps them to better understand that person in a very important way.  This is why I believe it is so important to teach L2 culture.  Teaching C2 is just as important as teaching the language.  What is language without culture?  A foreign language should be taught within a context and that context is culture!  It is easy for language instructors to forget the most important aspect of teaching language, because they become overwhelmed in the details of the language and overemphasis how important grammar and vocabulary are.  

            I don’t think that it is impossible to teach L2 culture in a classroom setting, but being restricted to a classroom does make it more difficult.  I think it is too easy for a language instructor to want to teach only “Olympian culture,” or “culture MLA,” and only show his/her students the best of that culture.  However, students are better served if they are also taught “Hearthstone culture,” or “culture BBV,” (beliefs, behavior, values) because students need to get an idea of everything that makes up a culture.  The limitations to teaching both aspects of culture is that teaching the “best” of culture is a lot easier than trying to teach culture as “everything” in human life.  The limitation is that there is so much that could be taught, so trying to focus on what should be taught is hard. The Spanish culture for example encompasses the culture of Mexico, Central American countries, South American countries, Caribbean islands, and of course Spanish culture from Spain, but people try to put all these different aspects of Spanish-speaking culture into one category.  Chapter 8 mentioned how students may get the idea that all Spanish-speaking people eat tacos, go to bullfights and take abundant naps, when this is not the case.  I have even had someone ask me in the past if I was Mexican and I do not look Mexican at all.  It would be wrong for students to believe that all Spanish people are like Mexicans especially the Americanized version of Mexican people, who eat spicy food, wear sombreros, ponchos, cowboy boots, eat tortillas and want to cross the border to get to the US. 

I think that teachers can easily teach “Big C” which focuses on product, such as the food, music, art and literature from that country (aka “Olympian culture”).  In high school I learned about “product” and was the only time I remember being tested on an aspect of culture was when I had a test that I had to match the date with an important Spanish holiday.  It takes a lot more effort for a teacher to teach perspective and practice, so students learn about “small c” which is daily life, which includes the beliefs, behavior and values of a people (aka “culture BBV”).  It is the nitty-gritty, what truly defines what a culture is and sadly it is the aspect of culture that is most often stereotyped.  Testing students on aspects of culture is crucial because that shows students that culture is just as important as language.  A teacher can list facts for students like Mexicans listen to mariachi music and Dominicans like bachata, but it is the attitudes and the reason “why” they listen to this type of music that is harder to teach.  I like how the book suggested using native informants and having students make semantic maps and do word associations.  Allowing students to explore their own word connotations and realizing that these are tied to their own cultural bias, can help students understand how the way others see their world is based on their own cultural beliefs.  I also like the idea of teaching students proverbs or idioms (un “dicho”) because these can say a lot about a culture and the belief system that the culture has.  It also shows that not all the ideas of one culture can be “translated” to another culture.

 Another important aspect of culture that is usually ignored is humor.  I wish that my Spanish classes in high school had done more on humor.  I think a teacher could easily have a “joke of the day” posted on the board each class and it would be a good way to either begin or end the class.  It would be a fun way to introduce new vocabulary or a new concept.  I realized when I went to Mexico last year how much “Mexican Spanish” I did not know.  I would be watching a cartoon show like “El Chavo” which is a very popular cartoon show in Mexico and I could not understand everything that was being said, but at least this show was meant for younger audiences so the jokes were a little easier to understand and they were acted out well.  It was even worse when I watched “El Platanito show,” a comedy show meant for adults and I couldn’t understand any of the jokes made.  It was frustrating because I could understand the individual words, but not the words as a whole.  An example in English would be the kid’s joke, Q: “How do you know when it’s raining cats and dogs?”  A: “When you step in a poodle.”  A native speaker of English would have no trouble finding this joke funny, since they understand the expression, “raining cats and dogs” and also understand that a “poodle” is a type of dog and that “poodle” sounds a lot like the word “puddle,” but a person learning English might not understand the joke/pun being made. 

It got a little better as time went on and I had been in Mexico longer.  I did “joke” with my friends that I would know when I knew Spanish well when I could understand everything on “El Platanito show.”  Mexicans jokes are pretty vulgar, so learning the use of some of the vulgar words did help, but I still have a ways to go.   Another comedy show, more family-friendly, was “La familia peluche,” which was about a “furry” family and one of the episodes I watched was about the boys in the family wanting to go watch football at a friend’s house but the mother/wife wants them to go over her in-laws house for dinner.  This is an idea that is pretty easy to understand from the point of view of American culture, so it shows that Spanish culture may not be all that different.  Learning about similarities is just as important as learning about cultural differences, though family-life is very important in the Spanish culture.  The use of authentic material such as jokes, interviews, TV shows, etc is a great way to teach about culture at the same time that you are teaching language.    

Teaching Culture

I am a member of a Multicultural sorority, so my idea of culture might be slightly different. I think culture is more than a description of traditions done in a certain society. Culture includes traditions, food, as well as ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, values, and morals. I think it is extremely to teach the students who are learning a second language about culture. Learning about a language isn't simply just learning the language, it also includes learning the cultures that accompanies those cultures. If the learners ever plan on visiting a region in which the language is spoken, it is important to have a basic understanding of what to expect in that region.

There are many different ways to teach culture in a classroom setting. Teachers can have students read and answer questions about a passage in their textbooks. These passages typically include a lot about culture in a way that also pertains to the vocabulary and grammar of the current lesson. Culture can be taught through songs, readings, media, movies, etc. I think culture is best taught when the context of the lesson. For example, when teaching food vocab, you can use a song or a paragraph of text that people of that culture eat during holidays or special occasions.

In my opinion, culture is everything about a people or a country that makes them unique and similar to another people: food, clothing, religious beliefs, money, music, stories, history, art, values, ethics, laws, behavior, and more things that can't be seen or really defined well. In my FREN 790 class, we've been talking about foreign culture with the metaphor of an iceberg. Everything above the surface (10%) is the visible aspects of a culture, like how they dress or the music they listen to. Everything below the surface (90%) is the non-visible part of the culture, like values, beliefs, ethics and morals. One example that is that when visiting someone in their home in France, you will not be given a tour of their home. In fact, you may only see the entry way and the dining or living room. For Americans, that is really weird and rather stand-offish, but the unseen part of the French culture is the importance they place on private and personal space.

It is incredibly important to teach culture alongside the language. Without the knowledge of even the aspects of culture from the tip of the iceberg, let along a glimpse of the bottom parts, a student would be learning words and concepts with no meaning behind them. In addition, if a student went to a country where the L2 was spoken without knowing even a small information about the culture, they would invariably become lost and confused and in all likelihood would offend someone or multiple someones.

The difficulty is how to teach a culture in the classroom setting. In my own L2 experiences, culture topics are usually best introduced through an authentic film or reading that incorporates the aspect of culture. For example, in my high school French classes, we watched Jean de Florette and Manon des Sources, a set of films about small town provincial France and the farming communities there. In the films, we got to see what the country side looked like and how they dressed and lived there. In addition, we learned something about the French culture that can be very hard for Americans to come to terms with: they eat bunny rabbits. In fact, the raise and breed them much like we do chickens. It isn't a deep non-visible aspect of culture, but nonetheless it is an important one. Having been to France with this knowledge, I was not surprised, disgusted or taken aback when I saw "lapin" on a menu in a restaurant.

It is much easier to teach the "little culture" aspects than it is to teach the deep invisible underlying "why" culture aspects. I believe that when students are shown and taught the smaller more visible aspects, and when they have more knowledge and experience with the language and its history, they will inevitably ask "why" something is the way it is, which can lead to a good discussion about the deeper aspects of the culture. That isn't to say that the culture should be taught in a cheap, touristy way, with outlandish parties and weird food, but by exposing students to different parts of daily life in that culture, including food, holidays, school, transportation, etc.

Discussion 6

Culture is actually really hard to define. It can be the overarching themes we all know such as literature, art, film, and food, but it can also be smaller stuff such as taking the transit system or going out to buy food at the grocery store. It is important to teach the tart language culture, because without that it may as well be Linguistics. You are learning a language and the point of language is that it is a human creation in which you can communicate thoughts and ideas. You are also not fully learning a language if you take the L2 and place it over the information you know of the L1. The same works for culture. 

I think that it is definitely possible to teach culture in the classroom. With Latin, we would have units based around certain cultural practices such as how the markets worked or when a boy would exchange their toga praetexta for the toga libera (coming of age ceremony in Ancient Rome). We would also have projects such as cooking a roman traditional food and we would then have a feast of all the different foods. For Japanese, we would often go off on tangent about culture when we read of a scenario from the textbook. This was mainly because the book hadn't been updated from the 80's and our teacher would remind us that things had changed and would explain the cultural differences and what ha changed from the 80's. Also, in 401 we would also watch part of a documentary series called Japanland (which I highly recommend if any of your are remotely curious about Japanese culture) every thursday. In the higher classes, we would talk about more in-depth cultural ideas, and some problems that are caused by culture. Many times we would read an article and have a discussion about it. 

I think that it's important to have culture based in the curriculum, just as important as grammar, actually. Learning a language is extremely boring otherwise and often you will not understand the language without learning the context it comes from. 

Discussion 6 - Teaching Culture

In L2, teaching culture is as important as teaching the language itself. Culture is the history and way of life of the people who speak the language, and without learning the culture students are only experiencing half of the language. Often, there are parts of a language that do not make sense without having the cultural background of the people. For example, in Russian, a common expression is "without down, without feathers", which is essentially wishing the other person no comforts in life. This would seem harsh, but Russian people are used to living without many comforts and think of those who have them to be weak. Therefore, to wish this upon someone means to wish them to wish them strength and success.

It is certainly possible to teach culture in the classroom, but it is not entirely effective all of the time. A teacher can prepare students for some things, but there are parts of a culture that cannot be explained without experiencing them. The idea of "culture shock" is based on this, because it is the idea that a person travels to a foreign culture and is shocked by the differences in their way of life. But this should not stop teachers from trying, which can be done in several different ways. An easy way to teach culture is to inform students about special holidays and the histories behind the celebrations, but a very important part of culture is history. Students need to have historical knowledge about the native people in order to understand the general mindset of the region or country.

If someone who knew absolutely nothing about Russian history learned the Russian language and them went to Russia, not only would the famous landmarks mean nothing to them, they would never catch the nuances that make the language so special. For example, many Russian saying are spoken passively, meaning that things happen to you rather than you actively doing them. An ignorant foreigner would not understand why, but looking at Russia's history of oppression it is not hard to understand why the Russian people would feel like most things are beyond their control and simply happen to them. It is a teacher's job to not simply teach these phrases to their students, but also to stop and point out the cultural background behind them.

To me, culture is everything that a native person knows about how to fit in to their own society. This can be conscious knowledge, such as what type of food is normally eaten, or more subconscious, such as how to walk down the street and "blend in," or how to properly use a slang term in context. I think it is definitely possible to teach culture in a second-language classroom, and it is also important to do so. It is especially important for those students who plan on continuing their language education and might even plan to study abroad.

I'm not quite sure what the video was trying to demonstrate about culture shock, but I certainly did experience shock when I went abroad this past summer. Costa Rica was such a different place with such different people that I often found myself just wishing to be around something--anything--familiar. It was hard to be eating different food, speaking a different language, and living in someone else's house so far away from home. And you can never "turn it off." I did have some idea of what the Costa Rican culture was like before I headed down there, but it is completely different from actually experiencing it first hand. I feel like that is the largest drawback from trying to teach culture in a foreign language classroom. You can't teach the students how it is to really live the culture.

Though there is no perfect solution, I think one of the best things that can be done to teach students about culture is to have native speakers come talk to them, and maybe throw a celebration for a certain holiday while they are there to get their take on how the celebration is really supposed to proceed. If there are any movies that come close to portraying the real culture of a place, those might also be a good tool to use in the classroom setting.

Discussion #6: Teaching Culture

In your view, what is culture? Is it important to teach L2 culture? Why? Is it possible to teach L2 culture in the classroom setting? What are the limitations? How should culture be learned or taught? Use examples to support your points of view. 

Teaching Style & Learning Outcomes

In my point of view, changing teachers to some extent will have effects on the formation of students' learning habits, attitude, even grade. When we talk about teaching style, it relates to a systematic teaching methods that a teacher present in class like how to interact with students to help them master the target knowledge. Whether the new teaching style that brought by the new teacher is suitable for students or not, it will cost students' time to get used to it, rather than let students fully focus on the content they are learning. Assume that students are taught by a teacher who tend to provide a comprehensive context first then leave students to predict grammatical rules, and the next teacher tend to explain grammatical rules first then leave students to solve grammar problems. Apparently, students lose the thinking process from grammatical phenomena to grammatical rules. They may feel confused and waste time on figuring out how to apply rules to grammar problems, and on the contrary, if they are accustomed to the second teacher's method, they may not be able to make hypothesis on grammar rules. It is dangerous to make students feel frustrated when confront this kind of difficulty, which may lead them to form a passive attitude towards learning, and even affect their grade.

However, changing teaching style is not always a bad thing for students. At students' early stage of a learning process, where learning habits are developed, they need a phase to find and grasp a basic way of learning that can help them master the knowledge, but after this, they should try other methods to improve and make their ways of learning more efficient, and during this phase, different kinds of teaching styles are needed. And it won't hurt students' motivation of learning.

For myself as a student, I know that my attitude towards the instructor largely affects my learning.  I become more motivated and interested in a class depending who is presenting the material and how they do it.  If a teacher of mine is dry, even a subject I'm interested in can become my least favorite class and I will become more and more reluctant to attend, pay attention, or put forth any effort towards learning.  Although, it is extremely necessary for students to see different teaching styles and methods throughout their education, this will help them in real life situations as well learning to deal with different types of people in the workplace and collaborating with them on tasks.  Students that are intrinsically motivated whether it be because of their own goals or desire to learn obviously have less of an issue with this, they put forth 100% to do well no matter what the environment is, but students that do not have such an easy time motivating themselves struggle with changes in teachers and styles of teaching.  These students are also going to have to learn to work with different types of people in order to be functioning members of society, therefore having them experience these varied educational situations will most certainly help them in achieving that.

Changing Teachers

I think that changing from teacher to teacher each year does affect students’ learning, but at the same time it is a good thing that students get used to different teaching styles.  Each year students need to adapt to different teachers’ teaching styles and the method in which they conduct their classes.  I like the idea of “looping” and having the same teacher for two or three years in a row and maybe in the ideal world students would have the same set of teachers throughout elementary school, then throughout middle school and then the same set of teachers throughout high school.  However, maybe this is not the best approach.  This method of changing teachers might actually make it harder for students to get used to the new set of teachers when they switch schools, from elementary to middle and then from middle to high school.  Students need to get used to different teaching styles and what matters even more is that students learn how they learn best. 

            A good teacher should teach to different learning styles and to accommodate all students as best as he or she can.  The emphasis needs to be on a teacher being an affective teacher, not so much on whether students should change teachers or not.  From one angle it would be great for students to get used to one teacher and the teacher wouldn’t have to worry about what the students learned last year because she would already know and having this same teacher for 2 or more years would provide continuity and stability for students.  But from another angle, say this teacher was not an effective teacher and the student is now stuck with this same teacher for 2 or more years.  I had never had the same teacher for more than a year until high school. 

I had the same Spanish teacher in high school for 3 years.  There were only two Spanish teachers at my high school and I feel that I got the least effective teacher of the two.  I didn’t learn much in those three years and I think Spanish I-III it felt like we covered the same material each year.  I got straight A’s in her class, but her class was too easy.  I am also not sure why my high school didn’t make it a point to place students in a higher level of a language class, since I had taken Spanish in middle school.  When it came to deciding if I should take Spanish IV I decided not to, because the teacher I had was that un-motivating and she did not expect the most of her students.  Even in Spanish III she did not speak the target language at all times, which would have been appropriate.  So in this case keeping the same teacher each year was not beneficial to me as a student, my grades were good but my motivation to continue learning the language was low.  

Switching teachers

Yes I do believe that switching teachers year to year affects the students' learning because it offers students to be taught in more then one method. From personal experience and switching Spanish teachers in all 4 years of high school I was shown many different methods of learning. Not one of my teachers had the same method of teaching. It ranged from just lecture and notes on the whiteboard to actually going to a museum to learn about art vs. just sitting in the classroom. I found it very beneficial to have a variety of teachers.

Students do adapt to a certain teaching stye from having it every day but I feel that students can adapt to different teaching styles. From m high school experience I was able to grasp a range of different teaching styles that ranged just reading the textbook and doing exercises or watching a powerpoint to learn. I think that if students struggle with the new teaching style they will be able to grasp it by the end of the year and semester. It is important that teachers realize that some students may struggle and of the students continue to struggle then the teacher should change his or her teaching style.

I do believe that the method that the teacher used to teach has a direct connection with the students motivation and grades because if the teacher shows that they are interested in the subject then the students are more likely to benefit. I know this to be true because by the time that I was in Spanish 4 in high school the teacher was able to express her opinions on the class. This showed me that the teacher had a unique style that motivated her students. The teacher needs to have a good teaching style because it shows their motivation and when the teacher is more motivated that class grades and overall atmosphere is positive.

I feel that students do become accustomed to certain teachers, how they teach, how they grade, and the teachers become used to the students as well. I'm a very visual learner, and I take terrible notes and always have. Teachers who are more animated and who teach in a way other than just dictating facts and dates are the ones I learn best from.

I had a history teacher in high school who was really really great for me because she would draw pictures of the battles she would talk about and tell us the story of it as though it was a movie. This kept it from getting dry and dull as most history classes are. I had this teacher for 2 straight years. I got used to the way she taught, what she looked for on the tests and her personality in general. When I got to college, my history teacher wrote a list of important vocab words on the board at the beginning of class, then proceeded to drone on and on for the next hour and a half. Never drawing or writing anything on the board, and listing off dates and names with no animation. These never stuck in my head and the class brought my GPA down dramatically. Her test consisted of 5 long essays, and when I went to her office hours to study all I got was her criticizing my note-taking abilities.

This second teacher really did affect my motivation to do well in the class. She clearly didn't think I was good, so why should I even try? My other teacher made history, a subject I never was attracted to, something interesting and almost-fun.

I think this is especially true for languages. If one teacher does a very good job at encouraging the students to use the language in new, fun, and creative ways, hey are more likely to spend time outside the classroom with it. On the other hand, if a teacher makes language learning a chore, they may scare the students away from something they may have loved, if only they were paired with the right teacher.

I'm not really sure how I feel about changing teachers. I've experienced "looping" and non-looping classes and teachers before and I feel they both have their merits. In my elementary school, you kept the same teacher for 3rd and 4th grade, but you changed teachers from 1st to 2nd to 3rd. I loved my teacher in those last two years. Her classes were always fun and she taught us everything from reading to history to science in a way that was engaging and exciting. I'm so glad I had her as a teacher for two years. The second year was great because I already knew what kind of behavior and learning she expected and what kind of teaching style (not that I knew what to call it in 4th grade) to expect. We also kept mostly the same classmates, so it was great that I already knew the kids in my class. 

In my high school students had the option to "loop" teachers for freshman and sophomore year, or not. If you took the Honors track, you had different teachers both years, which is what I did. What was nice about the looping is that, again, you keep the same 3 teachers and the same 60 or so classmates for two years and 3 classes each year: Science, History and English. The teachers were able to really work together to cross the normal boundaries of learning and incorporate what students are studying in one subject into the other two. In addition, for students who sometimes struggle, there are 3 teachers that know you very well and are looking out for you. In this style of looping, there is a lot more communication between the teachers so that it is harder for a student to "fall through the cracks". Though I was never personally in the high school looping pod, I did have friends who were a part of it, and they loved it. There is a much closer bond between students and teachers and students and peers with that sort of system, as well as more freedom on the part of teachers to break out of the box and do projects that combine multiple subject areas.

On the other hand, I really enjoyed switching from one teacher to another in the Honors courses. I learned how to adapt my writing styles to multiple different teachers' requirements. I learned how to adapt my participation to what certain teachers wanted. And I learned a lot of different things from these teachers because they each brought their own experiences and interests to the class. My junior year English teacher encouraged laughter in the classroom and we were even allowed to poke fun at his mistakes sometimes. But my sophomore English teacher encouraged very sober discussions about ethical dilemmas and challenges we face in this modern day world. Both classes are some of my classes to this day, but because they were different teachers, there were different learning and teaching styles. 

I feel that changing teachers can be a good thing for the growth of some students. On the other hand, I know that some students may flourish in a class where they keep the same teacher for multiple years or classes. It is really nice to already have that rapport with the teacher, even if you're taking a completely different class with them. Even after all of this writing, I'm still not very sure how I feel about this topic. I guess what I like best is how my high school had the option to do either looping or changing teachers. I'm really proud of my high school.

Discussion 5

I think that changing teachers is good for students. I think that it allows students to become comfortable to change and teaches them to adapt to situation that they may not find desirable. There are plenty of times when we move from a teacher we love to a teacher that we find less than desirable. In the end though, we are forced to learn to get along with people we don’t like: a daily lesson that we use in the real world.

            From an educational standpoint, I don’t think it’s the teaching style that is the problem. If a teacher is eager and effective, they will be able to get students to learn and have an enjoyable time learning. The problem comes when teachers are complacent and ineffective in the classroom. There are many teachers who can be using the same style as the teacher in the room over, but if they cannot effectively communicate with their students, that is where the largest problems arise.

            I do think that teacher’s and their effectiveness plays a large part. The teacher should be inspiring students to learn, and we have all had that teacher who has made us want to give up. I, in fact, decided I would not go into the sciences because of one teacher who made math such a dreadful subject and in effect made me believe I was not good at it. I know many people who have dropped courses because they recognized that they would not be compatible with their instructor. I find this very sad. 

Teaching Styles and Learning Outcomes

I absolutely think changing teachers every year has an impact on students' learning, especially in terms of foreign language. Every teacher covers information based on their own unique teaching style. Some teachers are better at covering certain aspects of a language than others, but no teacher is perfect. This makes it difficult for students who are continuing their studies of foreign language. In the beginning of every year in each foreign language class (except for the first, obviously) the teacher does a review unit to make sure everyone is on the same level. During the review unit, some student might be bored because the teacher they had the previous year did an excellent job in making sure they learned that material. Other students, however, could potentially be completely lost, because their teacher didn't cover that at all. For students who feel like they are lost and don't understand what is going on, they could lose all motivation and as a result earn poor grades. 

Personally, my first Spanish teacher was extremely easy, so at the time I really enjoyed her class. It wasn't until my second and third year of Spanish did I learn what a disservice she did to us. Although we all got decent grades in her class, she didn't go over all the necessary material or prepare us for the following years. I struggled through my second year of Spanish because my teacher had much higher expectations and expected us to know the material presented in the first year - with very little review. It wasn't until the third year that I finally understood some of the important material that was so basic. After my third year of Spanish I decided not to continue because of how hard it was for me. This was rather unfortunate, because I do enjoy learning about other languages and cultures, but I didn't have a helpful teacher until the final year and by then it seemed too late. 

Discussion Five - Teaching Styles and Learning Outcomes

I think that switching teachers from year to year definitely has an effect on students' learning, whether it is a good or bad change depends on the student and the teacher. Students do get used a specific teaching style, but I think the biggest factor in whether they do better or worse is in their own personal learning style. The teaching and learning styles need to be harmonious for the best acquisition of knowledge, and sometimes a teacher's style just does not match with a student's style. It does not mean that the teacher is a bad teacher necessarily, but that the student requires a different kind of classroom setup to have the best potential benefit.

I have found this to be true in my own studies, especially with language. I did not do well in second year Russian because the teacher's style did not suit my learning style. Now, in third year, I am doing much better with a new teacher. This does not mean that my second year teacher was a bad teacher, or that I was a bad student. My new teacher and I are simply a better match. Even though the material is more complicated, my grades and motivation level have both drastically increased. Last year I could not find the energy to do my homework, because the class itself stressed me out so badly I did not even want to think about it when I got home. Now, not only is my homework getting done on time, it's also much better quality.

While it can be difficult to meet all students' learning needs, I think there needs to be some sort of effort made. My teacher knew I was struggling, and there was no effort made to explain things in a different way. It is easy to put the emphasis on a student's need to study and learn the material, but a teacher should facilitate this learning past just putting the information out there for them to figure out. This is a quality of an above average professor, and something that should be sought.

Teaching Style and Learning Outcomes

Do you think that the process of changing from teacher to teacher, year to year affects students' learning? Do students get used to one teaching style and have trouble moving onto a different teaching style? Can it affect their motivation and grades? Use example to illustrate your points. 

Digital Technology

    The article I read is about  how microblogging (take twitter as an example) contributes to the second language acquisition comparing to the traditional computer-mediated communication such as instant messages and e-mails. Though we have not yet know the measurable results about how much students can benefit from microblogging, we can find that it has four features: participatory, authentic, immediate, community engaging to be able to create a promising language learning environment outside of classroom. Because of the form of twitter, the content members update can reflect individual's point of view, and open to everyone in the community, which is similar to real conversation in group setting. And from the questionare data, 94% of students agreed that the tweets were relevant to real-life language use because they can get authentic contact with native Italian speakers. Like hybrid platform of instant messages and e-mails, twitter can adapt itself to both synchronous and asynchronous modes. Students can immediately engage their followers by reply tweet but also can have more time than texting instant messages to plan their writing, edit their spelling, grammar, and punctuation before posting a tweet. In my opinion, this form's topics are limited to self daily status expression and culture discussion of target language, which is suitable for intermediate level language learners.
    I would like to use a variety of technology in language learning if they can arouse students' initiative of interacting and practicing. And I prefer to use social networking tools like facebook that students can have diverse tasks to work with, and twitter that has many topics students can talk about, and most importantly, students only need to use concise language to express their opinions by these tools, which will not be a burden to them.
    And the virtual city showed in this video is cool, teachers can let students involve in any language environment such as restaurant, airplane, which achieve the environment that in classroom we cannot simulate. However, limited by the design of the characters, students cannot perceive the real face expression or body language of teacher or classmates they are talking with.

Discussion #4: Technology

The article I read focused on intercultural learning through the use of blogging and ethnographic interviews.  Blogs are a form of computer-mediated communication and are used to promote reflective learning.  The idea of having L2 learners read the blogs of NS’s (native speakers) is an excellent idea and I like that it can help those students that are study abroad improve their experience abroad, as well as helping students who are at home become more inter-culturally aware.  Blogs are a good way to learn about important cross-cultural issues, see other cultural perspectives and become culturally sensitive.   I loved this quote that commented on ethnographic interviews, “According to Spradley (1980), “Ethnography offers us the chance to step outside of our narrow cultural back grounds, to set aside our socially inherited ethnocentrism, if only for a brief period, and to apprehend the world from the viewpoint of other human beings who live by different meaning systems” (pp. vii–viii).,” (p.3).  Ethnocentrism is a huge problem and it hinders the experience that a student who goes abroad.  To fully enjoy a study abroad experience a person needs to be open to different cultural experiences and therefore become culturally aware.  The article discussed a study of 16 American students who were studying abroad in Spain and were able to use blogs (personal, class, project blogs) as well as ethnographic interviews to improve their study abroad experience and cultural awareness.  I think one important point made is that students need to be taught idioms (or phrases) that are used in the foreign country that they were be visiting, so that cultural misunderstanding does not happen because of literal/direct translation.  I would not give back my experience abroad for anything and I’m happy I have been able to experience speaking and interacting with a diverse population of NS’s. 

            I think that technology is most definitely an asset when it comes to foreign language learning.  I think foreign language teachers should use social networking tools like twitter, Facebook, blogs and wiki to supplement/enhance foreign language learning.  I have to say that I have become better at writing in Spanish because of the time I spent communicating via text message and chat on Facebook.  I was able to see things written out in front of me and would get instant feedback from the person (a native speaker of Spanish) who I was talking to.  The feedback would either be they did not understand, so I would have to rephrase/rethink what I wanted to say or they would send me an appropriate reply which let me know that the language I used was clear enough to get my message across.  This type of interaction is so different from just writing a dialogue or turning in a paper, since the teacher would give feedback after the fact and it did not show how language is used on a daily basis.             

 

Just this past week after I had posted a comment on Facebook in Spanish to respond to something a Mexican friend of mine had said, I actually had a friend from the Dominican Republic, who is learning English, message me and ask what “chinos” meant.  He wrote me, “hey what does mean chinos I haven't seen this word before at least mexican use it?”  I responded, “Yes, Mexicans use it. Chinos to them it means curly hair...which is really funny because Chinos (meaning Chinese people) do not have curly hair at all!” He messaged back, “alright now I know a new word.”  This shows that my friend is curious and culturally aware as well.  He knows that I have friends from Mexico, so he was correct in assuming that it must be Mexican “slang” or jerga.  It is nice to learn different dialects of Spanish and because of social networking like Facebook, I can see what my friends are up to and how they live their day to day lives. Through my friendships and continued communication with my Spanish friends via Facebook, it is like my time abroad has never really ended. 

            The Second Life for Language Learning was a cool YouTube video and I can see why this approach could be very beneficial for students who want to improve their English speaking skills.  Having a virtual classroom like this English school is an up and coming concept that is taking hold all over the world and a lot of people seem to agree that online learning is more than just a possibility, it is reality.  More people are opting to take online classes and the use of technology in the classroom has increased exponentially in the passing years.  We are more dependent on technology and it is great that we can take advantage of technology when it comes to language learning.  Face-to-face interaction with NS’s is not always a possibility, but not with computer-mediated communication we can chat, Skype, blog, twitter and get to know a NS without ever actually meeting him/her in real life.  Second Life puts a whole new spin on this because it takes role-playing to a whole new level.  I loved how the video had the English students practice being at the airport and the restaurant through this virtual world.  There were many opportunities to practice English, while also becoming more culturally competent.  During the airport practice the English teacher asked the students what they thought the most important thing was about the airport and during the restaurant practice students were able to learn about the food from other cultures. 

Technology and L2 Learning and Teaching

I believe that technology can be helpful for learning, however I do not feel it has a large enough impact on second language learning. Personally, I found social networking sites distracting and they typically prevent me from doing homework. If one of my classes was utilizing these sites for assignments I would struggle on concentrating on the task at hand. However, my sociology statistics class had a class Facebook  and we used it to form study groups and ask each other questions about our homework if we were struggling. I found this very effective because we weren't using it to complete assignments - we were mostly using it to seek out help from our classmates. Also, our professor used to post on the Facebook group as well, so if we were really struggling with something, and no one seemed to know the answer, she would point us in the correct direction.

My article was about the use of a podcast and to see if it really is beneficial tool for students learning better pronunciation. The article defines a podcast as, "an audio file that anyone can create using a computer, microphone, and a software program." Once these are posted on the web, they can be downloaded and played using a computer and/or MP3 player. Since many students have difficulty detecting errors in their pronunciation, assignments on a podcast allows students to record themselves and then play it back and listen to their errors. They can record, listen, edit and revise as many times as they would like. On a podcast, students can also receive feedback from their peers as well as their teacher. A teacher can also post a lecture on a podcast for students to review before coming to class or if they missed class to catch up on the material.  One unique and effective tool of a podcast is that teachers can make assignments contextualized in comparison to just drills. This will help students make connections and eventually learn the information better. As a teacher, I would find it useful to use a podcast to post lectures for students who missed class or as reinforcement for students who are struggling. In regards to assignments, I would have students use a blog similar to the one Lina showed us in class.

Although I do think the video is interesting, I personally wouldn't use second life in my classroom. For those students who are interested in computer simulations, such as the sims, this could be interesting for them. I think for students who are more serious  about learning a second language this would be a good tool for them. However, for students who are only taking the class to get credit, it wouldn't be effective at all.