Using technology to enhance teaching
Network-supported teaching is a hybrid approach which consists of face to face classroom teaching supported by use of the technology (for example, computers at home or in the classroom or in a computer room) to extend the teaching outside the four walls of the classroom and to create communicative activity between the teacher and the learner(s) and between learners and learners. In other words the use of the technology is not an end in itself, but rather a useful addition to the tools already used by the teacher.
This website looks at different ways of using technology to enhance teaching in this way. It concentrates on the use of electronic tools and in particular on the use of tools we have found most useful in Virtual Learning Environments.
Because of the Internet more and more people, particularly young people, communicate in writing in a variety of styles which are often close to the spoken language. The activities discussed here are largely written activities, but this does not of course mean that reading or oral activities are neglected. Reading is an integrated part of the production of written text and discussion. Oral activities will be an essential and integrated part of the process in the classroom where, for example, learners will be sitting in front of a screen and discussing in groups how to solve a problem or how to create a text. But most of the activities discussed here are in a virtual reality, i.e. outside classroom time rather than in face to face situations.
Having said that we do also feel that so much emphasis has been given in recent years to oral communication, especially in schools, that the use of the written language has often been neglected. Using the written language has for us several separate but interconnected purposes:
1. Traditionally writing has taken the form of a piece of written work, handed in to a teacher who corrects it, evaluates it and then returns it to the student, who then puts it away somewhere and never looks at it again. In the environment we are discussing, the learners produce text for “real” readers including not only a teacher but also fellow students, and are given feedback on their writing which can be used to improve their final version. In addition, they are also able to read and comment on other students’ texts in a meaningful situation.
2. Writing develops language skills in mother tongue, foreign or second language.
3. Learners use writing as a thinking tool, enabling themselves to develop ideas as part of a process
A wide range of genres
In New Teacher Skills we discuss how teachers can meet and cope with the challenges and opportunities of Network Supported Teaching.
Both teachers and learners need to be aware that electronic communication covers a wide range of genres from text messaging to a formal piece of written work. In Language and genre we look at examples of a number of these genres and also discuss questions of acceptability and correctness.
