Category Archives: The educational technologist

This section of the blog is for anything connected with the educational technology element of our work at Manchester. These postings are managed by Gary but anyone else can also add relevant postings. We particularly welcome postings from current and former students.

5th International Symposium on Digital Technologies in Foreign Language Learning

The 5th International Symposium on Digital Technologies in Foreign Language Learning will be held on 31st March 2012.
Venue: Kyoto University Clock Tower Centennial Hall, Japan
Keynote Speaker: Professor James Paul Gee (Arizona State University, USA)
Call for Papers: 10th November 2011 – 31st January 2012
Contact: Dr Mark Peterson (digitalkyoto@gmail.com) Dr Michael Thomas (mthomas4@uclan.ac.uk)
Webpage: http://digitallanguagelearning.wikispaces.com

Call for Papers
Abstracts of no more than 250 words are now being accepted on the following or related themes:

  • digital game-based language learning
  • web 2.0 technologies in the language classroom
  • e-learning and collaborative learning
  • social networking applications and tools
  • teacher professional development and digital technologies
  • mobile-assisted language learning
  • digital literacies
  • telecollaboration
  • social media and language learning

Proposals will be accepted in the following categories: papers (20 minutes); poster sessions (ongoing); workshops (40 minutes). Abstracts should be sent to: digitalkyoto@gmail.com by no later than 31st January 2012. Successful participants will be notified of acceptance by 7th February 2012.

Teaching English with Technology

Just discovered this online journal to do with language teching and technology. It appears to have been going since 2001 and has lots of interesting people on its editorial board.

Gary Motteram

LTSIG event in Morocco

The Learning Technologies Special Interest Group (SIG), the Moroccan Association of Teachers of English (MATE) and The British Council, Morocco are pleased to announce the 1st International Conference of ICT in Education in Marrakech, Morocco from 8th-11th February 2012.

The CALL for papers is available on the LTSIG website. The cut off date for proposals is 16th December.

This will be an exciting and interesting event, taking place in North Africa at a time of momentous change, make sure that you can say that you were there!

Gary Motteram
Event Organiser for the LTSIG.

NATESOL invite you to a Teacher’s Evening on…

‘Online context-related and critical thinking materials for the ESOL classroom’
by The British Council ESOL Nexus Team

‘Evaluating classroom materials is something we do everyday as ESOL tutors. However, with a shift from paper-based to internet resources there are new questions to ask of what we use and what will work with our learners. Presented by ESOL resource specialists from the British Council’s ESOL Nexus team, this workshop will take a critical look at the issues raised by the use of the internet in the ESOL classroom. In the workshop you will have the opportunity to apply what you learn to evaluating some selected web materials and relate this to the contexts within which you teach.  An online CPD Module will soon be available, which will allow you to explore some of the issues covered in the workshop in greater depth.’

Additional information with be posted on the NATESOL website at www.natesol.org

Thursday, 8th December, 2011
5.30pm – Registration.    6 -6.15pm – Start..

Venue:
The British Council
Bridgewater House
58 Whitworth Street
Manchester M1 6BB

Pre-registration is required with Jonathan Nicolson at jtnicolson@hotmail.co.uk or 0161 789 4970.
NATESOL’s programme consists of 6 sessions during the academic year.
* Individual membership per year: £10 – Free attendance at each session
* Institutional membership per year: £50.
* Non-members pay £4 per session, concession £3
To renew your membership, become a new member, or just receive information about future sessions, then please contact:
Jonathan Nicolson at 6 Stafford Rd. Eccles.  jtnicolson@hotmail.co.uk or 0161 789 4970.

New free online webinars

LT SIG Webinars

Online seminars for teachers interested in technology

The Learning Technologies SIG will be holding regular online workshops (or ‘webinars’) which are open to the general public. These webinars will take place in the online video conferencing platform (Adobe Connect) and last approximately one hour. The webinars feature well-known and experienced practitioners talking about technology  in English language teaching, and are of interest to all teachers.

More detail here: http://www.ltsig.org.uk/online-events.html

Gary Motteram

Recent panel I took part in

Here is a link to a discussion that I took part in about the use of social media in teacher education. This was part of a conference that was happening at the time in Moscow: http://connectpro10829081.adobeconnect.com/p84tr9d2eyd/. This talk uses Adobe Connect Professional.
Gary Motteram

Looking for case studies of blended learning

Blended learning course design in ELT – Case Studies requested. The
British Council is preparing a publication on blended learning course
design in ELT. The publication will include a set of case studies:
concise (1000-2000 words) descriptions of blended learning models
across a range of ELT courses and contexts.  We seek expressions of
interest in submitting a case study from practitioners with experience
of designing, managing, or teaching blended learning (face-to-face and
technology in the same course) courses. Each case study would
include:

  • Context, course overview, learners/teachers, levels,
    length, rational for blended approach.
  • Description of how the F2F and technology modes are blended.
  • Conclusions, reflections, learning points on the course design.

We want a range of contributions from different contexts, both low-resource initiatives and larger investments. We will provide support in writing the full
case-study. If you are interested please send a brief description (max.
200 words), of your blended learning course with an overview of the
teaching and learning context to john.knagg@britishcouncil.org and
clairewhittaker04@yahoo.co.uk by 20 July or as soon as possible
thereafter.

Gary Motteram

Another updated European website on e-learning

Just like buses, none come along for ages and then two re-vamped European websites on e-learning come along together. Must be the European year for DL! This one is the European organisation for Distance Learning, EDEN.

An updated European website on e-learning

A useful website and lots of resources, mostly focused on Europe.

Gary Motteram

Latest version of IJCALLT — 1(2) — now available

The edition of IJCALLT that contains articles from recent graduates of our MA (Simon Bibby and Rachel Lindner) as well as an editorial from myself (Gary) and Graham Stanley as editors is now available. You can download and read the editorial, which is a small article, for free.

Gary Motteram