Category Archives: ELT Resource

Learner autonomy?-Yes!!!

Teacher's Experience/anecdotes

Madhu Neupane

This story is based on my experience of introducing learner autonomy in bachelor level in teaching reading. Introducing autonomy in the class where the students are very much habituated to teacher fronted and teacher controlled classroom is a very tough job. They are usually highly reluctant to take responsibility of their learning. They lack confidence and motivation. In the beginning of my intervention, they tended to think that they can do nothing on their own regarding reading. When I asked them to read texts at home on their own, very few of them did so in the beginning. One of the students said “madam can you provide me with the techniques to read at home own my own. I understand nothing”.  Other students said, “There are a lot of new words in the texts. If I started to look them up in the dictionary it takes me a lot of time”. Still other said, “If you provide me with the answer I can memorize them and write in the exam. I am not sure of the answers I write myself”. There were similar views from other students as well.

In the beginning I was also frustrated because the students were unlikely to follow my idea. I kept on convincing them that they knew more than they thought they knew.  I said that if they learned any new word in any reading text they would encounter the same word in other texts as well which would facilitate their learning and the time consumed in one unit will save time for other units. Then I asked them to make flash cards for any new words they encountered. Their flash cards would contain words along with the pronunciation in one side and the meaning, one suitable example sentence where the word is used in meaningful sense and any other relevant information on the other side. They found the idea very interesting. It helped to bring a kind of variation in the classroom as well. Slowly and gradually students became habituated to keep cards. I kept on asking them to make cards of new words every day. At the end of intervention almost all students started to keep their flash cards which helped them increase their vocabulary as well as boost up their confidence in reading.

Slowly I shifted from explaining passage to providing them with the tasks and asking them to do the task in the class under my guidance. I divided them in groups and asked them to read and underline answers to the questions in reading texts. They would be happy to do so. I checked and confirmed their answers with the whole class. I did the same with true false items and other comprehension based exercises. To make certain whether they were doing the exercises sincerely, I would ask them to note down page number, paragraph number as well as the line number in the text. If it were true false item they would not only have to tell whether the statement was true or false but also why it was true or false. This made them somehow serious in their reading.

The interesting thing was that they did not think they understood the passage even if they were able to do all the exercises given in the text. They kept on demanding that I read and explain the text for them even after they had done all the exercises.  Not to make them frustrated I did the same for some texts but my explanation was always after they had finished doing the exercises. I made them write the answers to the questions discussed in the class at home. The problem was that even if they could find out the answer in the text most of them had problems in writing the answers. To improve their ability to write answers, I checked their answers (giving focus to the weaker ones) and provided them with answers.

When the students became a bit habituated in doing the tasks on their own in the classroom, I asked them to read texts at home before that was discussed in the classroom. Some students started to do the same and realized that their understanding was better. I kept on encouraging them and appreciating their efforts. From this they felt a sense of achievement. This encouraged other students to read text independently. Then the class started to be interactive in comparison to teacher fronted class. At the end of my one month intervention there were apparent positive changes.

Nowadays, slowly and gradually my students are becoming independent in their reading though there is still long way to go. I have a sense of achievement for this has brought some hope and confidence in my students regarding their study. Now I have realized that “small things matter”.

 

 

(Ms. Madhu Neupane, Lecturer, has been teaching at the Central Department of English Education, Tribhuvan University, for 6 years. She completed Master’s Degree in English Education in 2003 and Master’s Degree in English Literature in 2008. She has published some articles and books and presented papers in different conferences. She has experience of teaching English from Primary Level to Master’s Degree. She has conducted some research in the area of ELT. At present she is an executive member as well as life member of NELTA. Her interests include teaching and conducting research in ELT.)

For contact:

Phone Number:           01-4332867 (Res) 9841738920 (Mobile)

Email:                          madhukneupane@gmail.com

Skype:                         madhu.neupane2

Brief Experience of Teaching English in Nepal

English as a Global Language, Global thought, Teacher's Experience/anecdotes

Alban S. Holyoke

 When I started college I never envisioned myself teaching English, much less in Nepal.  In all honesty English is not my strongest subject; my friends often joke with me about my poor spelling.  When I applied for a Fulbright grant to teach English in Nepal I thought of it as a long shot.  When I received an email telling me that I won the scholarship, I realized that I would have to put my words into actions.  Fortunately, I have some very incredible mentors in the US that got me excited about the prospect of not only traveling to a vastly different culture, but also the joys of teaching.

When I came to Nepal I had little experience of teaching in a formal setting, and none in an English classroom.  During my first month in Nepal I received a crash course in teaching methodology, which bolstered my confidence somewhat.  But when I visited my first Nepali school, my spirits sunk.  I was standing in the middle of a room of screaming kids, with all the classrooms around me.  I sat at the back, observing the class from a dark corner, making notes about the classroom, the teacher’s methodology, and how the students responded.  That night I talked to my parents in the US and told them I didn’t think that I was up to the challenge of being an English teacher.  I had anticipated it being difficult, but nothing like I had seen in that first school.  Our teacher training ended, and I was sent to my school.  Set free to teach as best I could, hopefully to do more good than harm.

That first day when I arrived at my school, there was a snaking line of smiling faces, all thrusting flowers into my overflowing arms.  Their smiles said it all, “we’re happy you’re here!”  I sat in the staffroom with  other teachers while they tried to make me comfortable by making small talk in Nepali, most of which I didn’t understand.  That first day was exhausting, and when I went home after school I lay down on my bed and thought about how tired I was, and I hadn’t even taught.  My first week went by in a blur.  I went from classroom to classroom introducing myself, and having a hundred different kids introduce themselves to me with little hope that I would remember any of their names.  Then came Dashain holiday, and I  had yet to actually teach a class.  Most of my time was spent in the staffroom, or observing other teachers’ classes.  My anxiety about teaching only multiplied over the holiday, and when the school resumed I was certain that my first class would be a failure.

My classes arranged, I went to the school with very low expectations.  I would be teaching class 7, first period.  Although I had prepared for class, I was startled by what actually happened.  I went to class being anxious about how I would do, but to my surprise, staring back at me were twenty smiling faces.  I was amazed at how receptive they were and excited to learn.  When the bell rang for the second period I was surprised at how effortlessly the time had passed.  I smiled and said goodbye, and the twenty smiling faces echoed their own goodbyes in response.  I had done it, one class down.  It wasn’t so hard, and I was surer of myself in the second, third and fourth classes of the day.  The day, just like my classes, passed quickly and before I knew it I was back on my bed reflecting on my first day of teaching.  I was exhausted, but happy.

Over the course of those first few weeks I began to learn my students names, their strengths and their weaknesses.  They very quickly welcomed me into the school community.  At the same time, I was trying new teaching methods that they had never encountered before.  I tried to challenge not only in English, but also to think in progressive, critical ways.  Though all this, they stuck with me. I thought a lot about how mature, and intelligent my students were compared to me when I was their age.  But I learned quickly that I shouldn’t be suppressed by my students’ capabilities.  At the very moment that I would start to think of one of them as a poor or lazy student, they would baffle me and their peers, with an incredible dialog, or answer.    It was this uncertainty, and spontaneity that kept me on my toes, and excited to come to school.

Everyday after school I would go home exhausted.  After a few months I met another teacher and told him how tired I was after school each day.  He insisted that I must have been doing something wrong, that I shouldn’t be so tired.  In reply I said that I was fine being tired, in fact I wanted to be tired.  If I had gone home and felt anything other than exhaustion, I would feel as though I hadn’t accomplished anything that day.

That’s how time passed until a few weeks ago.  It was all of a sudden that I realized I wasn’t a new teacher anymore, and then it was time to go.  I had done it, and enjoyed every minute with my students.  My fears from the beginning were never realized.  I found that I was a pretty good teacher, perhaps not because of superior teaching or English skills, but because I cared about my students.  On my last day of school another teacher told me that the students “really love Alban sir, really really love Alban sir.”  It touched me that she would give me such a compliment.  I would have been flattered if she would have said “the teachers really love Alban sir,” but that wouldn’t have meant as much to me.  I knew that she was right, that my students really did love me.  And I, in return, loved them back.  Perhaps that’s why we had such a good rapport, they knew I cared about them, and they about me.  That also may be why they worked so hard for me, humoring my spelling mistakes, and new teaching methods.

As I sat on the stage at my farewell ceremony I could see those one hundred faces that I met eight months before with little hope of learning their names, smiling back at me.  There was Pratima, Monoj, Swastika, Sajan and so many others.  I can honestly say I have never felt such an outpouring of love as I did that day.  As they left I said goodbye and hugged as many of them as could fit between my arms.

While I may not have been a perfect teacher, certainly making mistakes along the road, I’ve very happy the way things turned out.  I’m going to miss my students when I return to the United States, but I will always remember them and teaching English in Nepal.

A Reflection on Teaching English in Large Multi-level Classroom

Native Perspective, Teacher's Experience/anecdotes, Teaching Tips

A Reflection on Large Multi-level Classroom

Janak Raj Pant

This is a short reflection on my teaching experience in a large multilevel class at university level in Sindhuli. In this piece, I discuss the opportunities and challenges in a large multi-level classroom. My focus is on how large classrooms can be made maximally beneficial for the students. I conclude by emphasizing that all language classrooms are diverse in one or another way and the larger a class the more diverse it is likely to be. It is our level of awareness, attention and devotion as a teacher that can address the challenges of the large multilevel class into opportunities for the students in their learning.

There are varied perceptions of a large classroom among the ELT professional as well as the other stake holders. For a teacher who does different activities for which the students need to move around a class in which such activities cannot be done very efficiently because of the high number of the students is a large class. For a teacher who basically delivers lectures the same class might not be a large class so far he or she is audible, can maintain non-verbal communication with the students, and can monitor the activities of the students. In the both of these contexts, the idea of large class is at substance level different but still it is not different at pragmatic level. So, it seems more beneficial not to leave it to the teacher to define a large class in their context, based on their teaching strategies, the resources available, and the strategies they can execute. As Baker and Westrup (2000) state, ‘A large class can be any number of students, if the teacher feel there are too many students for them all to make their progress’.

The class I am going to talk about is the class of B. Ed. first year students a community college in Sindhuli.  Usually more than 80 students attend the class. It is a class on general English. Different learners have different level of language proficiency varying from beginner to upper intermediate. Some of them study major English while others study other subjects such as Nepali education, population education. I found them differing in terms of their interests. Some of them have keen interest to learn English for academic purpose while others are keen interested in English for communication. However, for majority of them to pass the examinations is the ultimate aim. It is quite significant to note that for some others it is simply matter of formality to attend the class no motivation in learning at all. For some of them, being inside the class is equal to learning, they expect everything done by teachers for their learning expect copying, they remain silent in the class. The peer influence, family background, their own life orientation has deep rooted integrative influence in them. There is even terrible group of the students who have their pleasure in disturbing the class and do not have any intention to study. They just behave like visitors; for them learning is not any goal at all.

However, in spite of limitations like the above, there are a number of good things about large classes. First of all, the learners with higher level of English language proficiency have been good model in the classroom and it is good to push the weaker learners too. The learners with higher level of language proficiency have been the source of motivation for the weaker ones. Actually they are made the source of motivation.

Likewise, the learners with different cultural background have been significant in order to create communication gap in the classroom activities so as to form genuine language learning activities. It is also useful to address and illustrate several social issues in general English course.

In such large classes, I have always found willing volunteers to actively participate in classroom activities. Such classes are livelier than the smaller ones. So, it is easy to move them towards any direction. I have found the students learning from each other. One the one hand, it has been source of motivation for the one who have been supporting and on the other hand, he could support rest of the friends. This promotes mutual learning and challenges each learner appropriately. In this case brighter learners have challenges to maintain their position while the weaker ones have challenge to be as good as the brighter ones.

There is another advantage, such situation reflects real life situation as real life situations are also full of diversities. It has caused a number of challenges as well. First of all, it is quite difficult manage appropriate level of input in course of instruction. It is impossible to satisfy individual need as well. It is so because the same input becomes easy for on group and very difficult for another group. However it is possible to address such problems by some of the ways to make the lesson useful for all the learners in one or another way. Hadfield and Hadfield (2008) have shown the possibility in the following words:

It may feel like an impossible task to try to satisfy all the individual needs of your students, and you are right! But there are some practical things you can do to make sure that there is something for everyone in each of your lessons (p.152).

Similar is the case with other activities. Setting home work is even more complicated. In order to overcome this problem, I usually set the multilevel task and graded exercise to promote independent learning of an individual student. I found learning more useful than in a normal case as because we have variety of learners with the varying with varying expectations.

Having outlined some of the advantages of large classes, let me now turn to the drawbacks of them, because it would be unfair to not do so at the same time. But while presenting the challenges, I will also include how to address those challenges.

In large classes, it is difficult to monitor classroom activities and conduct class progress tests because if the teacher cannot reach all the students in order to monitor and we cannot have enough time for individual feedback and whole class feedback might not be very effective. Gallery walk and group feedback can be helpful for addressing this challenge.

Large classes also make it very difficult to counsel the students individually, mainly because of the number of students. In many cases we might not have detailed information in order to support students. When I teach a large class, I know little about most of my students; as a result, I don’t how to counsel students even if I can manage some time for them.

Sometimes, in large classes, students with low motivation influence the students with high motivation level. There is always possibility that students are influenced by the peer pressure. It is equally possible for the laborious and sincere learners to influence the lazy or insincere ones and vice versa. The existence of the latter case is challenge for me. I have found acknowledging former instance has been helpful and somehow preventive for the latter case.

Students in large classes are often likely to dodge classroom activities and can go off the task. Such class is also likely to go noisy. Immediate performance based task can help us to improve the situation. There are always some late arrivals and some passenger students (the students who enjoy the lessons like passengers view (not focused, not intensive, not rigorous). For me nothing is as helpful as being strict in terms of the norms of the classroom.

In large classes, the teacher always has to speak very loudly in order to be audible in the class. Occasional written instruction and the systematic and consistence use of gesture is significant for me in many cases. The existing diversities in such situation takes longer time and how carefully you design the activities in the classroom the are student for whom it does not become very much relevant. It is also difficult to remember their names which can become another complexity in setting activities and designing the activities.

Obviously, dealing with a large group of people requires a complex set of social and professional skills. Let us take a very simple example. Let us suppose that someone slaps a child. What will he or she do? There are so many possible ways in which the child will behave: the child will flee, will respond violently, will start crying, will ask you  why you slapped him/her, will rush to his or her parents and ask them to slap you in turn, and so on and so forth. The same might be the case of positive response. Let’s say you offer a candy to a child in the street: what will the child do? Takes your candy and thank you, looks at you feels shy and goes away, take the candy and goes away, does not take your candy and says “no thank you”, becomes afraid of you and leaves the place, and so on.

Learners in the class have diverse experience, cultural understanding, self esteem, level of motivation, needs, aims, interests, context, facilities, attitude, etc. So, naturally they are likely to behave differently in the language class as well. The similar is the case even in smaller classes so diversity is the norm of language class rather than the exception. You will have diverse students whatever criteria you use in grouping them. It is essential to some extent as well. So, teaching, more than dealing with people in ordinary situations, requires highly advanced skills.

Larger class exerts some pressure on the side of the teachers to be more efficient and deal with the existing challenges. So, it makes teachers strategic and more competent in their profession.

References

Dewan, S. (2003). Teaching large multilevel classes. Journal of NELTA, 8:158-162.

Hadfield, J. K. & Hadfield, C. (2008). Introduction to teaching English. Oxford: OUP.

Baker, B. & Westrup, H. (2000) The English Language Teacher’s Handbook: How to       teach large classes with few resources. London: Continuum.

Ur, P. (1996). A course in language teaching. Cambridge: CUP.

 

 


Within and beyond classroom for teaching English

English as a Global Language, Global thought, Miscellaneous, Teacher's Experience/anecdotes

Simon Taranto

 [In his narrative, Simon Taranto shares his experience of teaching English in a public school in Nepal.- Editor]

Family/Village Life Situation

Living with a Nepali family was a challenging but very rewarding experience for me.  There were many cultural, societal, and language differences that I had to get used to when living with my Nepali family.  I could not speak Nepali in the beginning. But my Nepali language skills improved slowly over the last 9 months to the point where I am now able to hold conversations and joke around in Nepali.  During the first few months of my time in the village and at the school getting over the language barrier took a significant amount of energy.

The Khadka family provided me with a very comfortable room, clean water to drink, comfortable facilities, and outrageously delicious food.  Uttam-ji, Manju-ji, Ujjwol-ji, and Hajurama-ji, were incredibly warm, welcoming, and helpful throughout my stay.  They really made me feel welcome into their family.

I met many people who live in the village and over the past many months I was able to foster relationships with many of them.  From the teashop owner to the recent college graduate and from the bicycle mechanic to the fitness center owner I really enjoyed speaking with and getting to know people.  The village is very quiet and pleasant but also located very close to Patan city so it was easy to move in and out of the city to attend meetings and other events.

School Situation

Rimal sir was an outstanding, ambitious, and energetic teammate to work with.  He showed me the ropes when I first arrived, organized an ornate welcoming ceremony, and made sure that my teaching at the school was run smoothly.  Shambhu KC, our school’s principal, was also a key asset that allowed me to work within many classes at the school of 350 students.  I regularly taught Grades 7-10 and frequently filled in for absent teachers in other lower classes.  The students and I got along well and we were able to share cultures and languages easily.  Whenever time allowed I chose to work outside of the textbooks so as to show other teachers some new teaching ideas and to give the students a broader learning experience.  The school does suffer from volatile teacher attendance and fluctuating student attendance rates.  With a new principal coming in next year and a new school building nearing completion, I expect that the future of Siddhi Mangal is brighter.

NELTA/Fulbright Cooperation

I am very grateful to the immense amount of work, time, and energy that is dedicated to NELTA by its numerous volunteer members.  NELTA’s cooperation with Fulbright is a good relationship that I hope continues far into the future.  Many of the trainings that were run by NELTA members were very impressive and helpful for teachers.  The network that NELTA provides to English teachers is an excellent resource that members should take advantage of.

It would be helpful if NELTA were able to alert ETAs with advance notice of upcoming events so that ETAs could plan accordingly.  In addition, with school selection for the next batch of ETAs I would recommend that NELTA cast its nets wider so as to include schools outside of the Valley and with schools that don’t have a traditional NELTA presence so as to spread the excellent benefits of being a part of NELTA.

Teaching Exercise/Lesson Plan

I frequently found that students were very adept at answering questions they were used to but struggled with slight variations of those same questions.  For example, ‘How are you?’ is question that can easily be answered by students.  However, how’s it going?’ or ‘How was class?’, all of which require the same kinds of answers, are very difficult for students to answer.  With that in mind, the following exercise can help students to be more linguistically flexible, feel more comfortable in unknown language territory, and be more confident.

One of my favorite exercises to run with both students and teachers is titled ‘You Can’t Say Fine.’  This exercise teaches students different ways of asking ‘how are you’ and an array of adjectives that can be used to respond to these questions.  There are many ways to run this exercise.  I am a proponent of getting children out of their seats and outside of the classroom.  With that in my mind, this exercise can used while walking around the school or while on field trips or picnics.  Below is one way to run this activity while inside of the classroom:

  1. Ask students, ‘How are you?’  They will likely robotically respond, ‘We are fine.’
  2. Write ‘fine’ on the board and then put a large X through it.
  3. Tell students they are not allowed to say ‘fine.’
  4. Ask them again, ‘How are you?’ and write all the different responses you get on the board.  This may require the teacher to ask hinting questions about other adjective that be used.  Examples of good adjectives are: excellent, outstanding, fantastic, great, very good, good, okay, alright, bad, terrible, miserable etc..  These responses will likely come from the students in an arbitrary order.
  5. Have the students work in groups and put the words in order from best to worst and write the results on the board.  Have the students copy this down into their notebooks.
  6. Next, the teacher will help the students to practice using these words by introducing other ways of asking ‘How are you?’  Some examples include: ‘How are you doing?’ ‘How are you today?’ How is your day going?’ ‘How’s everything?’ ‘How are thing?’  There are many more but this is a good start.  Write these on the board and have students copy them also.
  7. Show an example of how this works by asking a volunteer one of the above questions.  The volunteer must respond with an adjective and a reason why.  For example,
    1. Teacher: How are you?
    2. Volunteer: I am excellent because I am a volunteer.
    3. Teacher: That’s great.  Thank you.
    4. Have students work in groups to practice these different questions and responses.


Notes:

1. The title is given by the Editor.

2. The author would first like to thank NELTA, the Fulbright Commission in Nepal, Shree Siddhi Mangal Higher Secondary School, and the Khadka family for making my stay in Nepal possible.  I am very grateful for all that you did to make me comfortable.  I hope that cooperation between all these hard-working groups continues.

3. The author is a Fulbright ETA-2010 in Nepal.

Encouraging Creative Production

English as a Global Language, Global thought, Miscellaneous, Teacher's Experience/anecdotes

Luke Lindemann

 During my ten-month stint teaching English in a public secondary school in Lalitpur district, my greatest difficulty was in encouraging creative production to my students. The students found it very difficult to create spontaneous speech acts, to speak and write in an unprompted and unscripted way.

With regards to reading and writing, I found that most of my students had a good command of English vocabulary and could answer questions as long as they were not open-ended. They were very good at answering fill-in-the-gap questions, in which they must find a particular name or action in the passage and write it down as the answer to a question. But they had enormous difficulty when asked to summarize a passage or write down their own emotional response to a passage. The students were having difficulty with creative production.

As to speaking, I found that my students were used to being called upon individually to answer a specific question from the text. These questions were typically close-ended: there was only one correct answer. If they did not know the correct answer, they would look for a fellow student to answer for them, they would claim ignorance and quickly sit down, or they would stand in silent discomfort. Aside from one or two confident students in every class, the majority of students stood up to answer questions with a look of mild dread, and then answered as simply, quickly, and quietly as possible.

I believe that one solution to this problem is to give students many opportunities to practice speaking English without being put on the spot. This means creating activities in which students work in pairs or in small groups to practice dialogues, write and perform their own dramas, or play simple question-and-answer games. Students who are too shy to answer direct questions during a lecture are much more willing to speak English to their friends during group activities.

It is also necessary to foster the ability to give spontaneous answers. For this it is crucial that students learn to say the same thing in multiple ways (“How are you?”, “How is it going?”, “How are you doing?”, “What’s up?”, “What’s new?”, “Are you well?”, etc.). Speaking practice should not be about carefully translating the one correct answer from Nepali into English without any flaws in grammar or pronunciation. It should be about developing the ability to communicate.

As a student learning the German language, my teacher introduced me to the German word umschreiben. Whenever I was speaking in class and I was stumped by my inability to remember the German word for something, instead of giving me the vocabulary word I needed she would tell me that I must umschreiben. This means to paraphrase, to circle around the elusive word, to use all of the words in German that I did know to describe the word that I did not. This is a very valuable skill because it develops creative production and the ability to communicate even when knowledge of vocabulary fails.

One way to encourage spontaneous speech in a class where students have little speaking practice is to play language games that require students to quickly think of something to say. For example, with many classes I played a collaborative story game. The first student in the first row would yell out the first word of a sentence, the next student would yell out another word that adds upon the sentence, and so on down the line until the sentence is complete and a student yells out, “Full stop!” These sentences can be remarkably creative and are frequently hilarious.

Turning briefly to reading and writing skills, I found that my students needed a lot of practice to produce completely novel sentences on their own. I lead some projects in story writing, letter writing, and cartooning, in which each student was required to put his or her own thoughts on the page. We would brainstorm topics and structures as a class, and then each student would have to write their own stories or letters or cartoons.

The goal of all of these exercises is for students to learn to do more than just rearrange the words and concepts that are given to them, or that they have memorized as a sequence of simple scripts. They must learn to use English to express their own ideas and concepts, to go beyond simple reaction to creation.

If we can foster that ability, examination scores will be much higher and students will have more confidence in speaking and writing. Creative production is essential if we wish our students to learn English as an actual language, a useful tool for communication and business, and not as a mere academic exercise.

Luke Lindemann was a 2010-2011 Fulbright English Teaching Assistant in Shree Udaya Kharka Secondary School in Chapagaon VDC, Lalitpur. Before receiving this grant, he worked as an English teacher for Bhutanese refugees in the United States. He holds a Bachelor of Arts in Linguistics from Pomona College, and his primary interests are language issues and education.

 

 

Review article: Shall We Separate Boys from Girls?

Global thought, Miscellaneous, Teacher's Experience/anecdotes

–Uttam Gaulee

 “How can I sit on the girls’ bench?”his eyes staring at me, as if I had forced him to do something very objectionable. All the students in the classroom burst into laughter. This was a sixth grade boy at an English medium school I was teaching in West Nepal a dozen years ago. I showed the only available seat for him to sit.This boy had arrived late in the class, and afterperforming a customary “May I come in sir?” at the door, had entered the class. I expected him to take the only available seat but he wouldn’t sit down. I felt obliged to show him the only available space for him to sit and I encouraged him to sit there. The bench was shared by four other students–all girls! He would rather stand up for the entire period rather than condescend to sit on the bench with theother sex.Why would he? Wouldn’t he be insulted by all other friends afterwards? Anyway, I smiled to myself, feeling proud as his English teacher, because he spoke out his feeling so nicely in English.

We are all familiar with the typical Nepali high school classroom: girls flocked together at one side of the class in a couple of benches, and boys taking up all the rest of the available seats. Girls are often a minority and they feel secure when together with other girls. How do you arrange boys and girls in your classroom? Boys and girls alternatively, or all the girls together at one side and all the boys at the other? Or do you teach only boys and/or girls in the “boys-only” or “girls-only” schools? We do have some Kanya schools in Kathmandu such as Ishwari Kanya and Balkumari Kanya Vidhayalaya. Why did St. Xavier’s switch to co-ed at the turn of the century after serving as the “boys-only” school for half a century?Are there schools still in place where only boys are taught, perhaps in some Sanskrit or army schools? What is the rationale behind single sex education? How do these schools compete with their co-ed counterparts?Do boys learn differently than girls? Do boys and girls distract each other in learning process? Shall we rather separate boys and girls in schools or even have entirely different schools for boys and girls, so that they learn better? In this piece, I review an interesting article and present an interview that I conducted with one student as a way of testing the article’s arguments. I would be glad to hear what fellow Nepali teachers think about the issue of gender in education in general and teaching English in specific.

In “Single-Sex Classrooms Are Succeeding,”[1] Michael Gurian, Kathy Stevens, and Peggy Daniels say “yes” to the questions I asked above. The authors argue that their institute, the Gurian Institute, has trained thousands of teachers from a wide range of schools from fifteen countries, including more than two thousand schools and districts of the USA. Hence, they claim that having worked with all kinds of schools; they have seen “what is working and what is not working around the globe.”  As strong advocates of single-sex education, the authors have been able to argue very convincingly that single-sex classrooms are succeeding and that the phenomenon has been gaining popularity again. This popularity is happening despite many legal and attitudinal barriers over the past decade, particularly after the announcement of a change of regulation by the US Department of Education in October 2006.

One of the main reasons cited for promoting single-sex instruction is that boys and girls have both brain and learning differences. Putting forward their argument of single-sex instruction, the authors state that such instruction “offers specific gender friendly opportunities”  for expediting learning by the use of their resources and techniques, which many schools featured in the article have found helpful in setting up and maintaining successful single-sex programs. The article features a series of stories about single-sex education piloted by many different schools in the United States that have utilized the single-sex program model and verified its success. Also, they have experimentally verified the results in different modalitiesranging from whole single-sex academies to single-sex core programs andoptional single-sex classes.

There have been widespread successes in single-sex classrooms throughout USA. After single-sex programs were implemented, usually by teachers of the same gender as their students, but not always, achievement on state assessment tests greatly improved, causing some schools like Roosevelt Middle School in Oklahoma, to be taken off the “at risk” list. Some schools, like B.E.S.T Academy, focused on reading instruction for boys and technology instruction for girls. Moreover, a public high school in Arkansas specifically worked with struggling boys who were failing in various subjects and having problems with the transition to high school. Within two years, the high school found that very few of the boys failed. But not only this, discipline referrals also went down by one third. An independent college preparatory school in North Carolina implemented single-sex instruction and found many advantages in four years’ time, such as stronger mentoring relationships, more trust and feelings of attachment between the students and teachers, more stress reduction, anda greater production of new energy for the teaching and learning environment.

Success testimonials from principals, teachers, students, parents and even counselors all chime in to the wonderful achievement stories of the new initiative. One of the counselors writes to the authors, “There is something incredible taking place …a contagious excitement in the air that goes down to our students. It’s not just me – I am hearing it across divisions – I’m glad to be a part of it too.” While the authors cited many glowing examples of schools implementing and finding success in single-sex programs demonstrating that teachers and students found that the classroom environment and academic achievement improved, very few details were given about how boys and girls learn differently. Also missing from the article were instructional strategies teachers could use to better teach these genders.

I interviewed a person who had had some experience of both single-sex and co-ed schooling and interestingly, she is herself a part-time teacher currently teaching boys and girls in 6th grade. She went to an all-girl Catholic high school for grades 9-12, but she was in a co-ed elementary school for grades up to the 8th grade. I think she can be another testimonial for the authors.  Reflecting on her experiences, she remembers in 7th and 8th grade at a co-ed Catholic elementary school she was “a lot more interested in boys.”  However, “…at the high school, I could focus more on learning and was not afraid to participate in class.” She did take Honors Physics and A.P Physics, as well as Calculus for college credit, due to the suggestion of her Chemistry teacher, who was a male. She doesn’t remember favoring female teachers over male teachers, though. “Actually my History and Chemistry teachers (both male) were my favorite teachers because of their kindness, ability to make the class interesting, and their positive feedback.” Her physics teacher, also male, was not her favorite teacher but she did enjoy the challenging work and high standards for organized notes and classwork that he expected.

When I asked if she would have advanced in the math and sciences if Oakland Catholic would have had boys too, she answers, “Hard to say, I might have been more self-conscious and less focused, but truly hard to say.” She believes that in those years where she was forming her identity, she needed to not be distracted by the opposite sex and concentrate on growing academically, and even taking leadership roles at the Catholic religious retreat, “Kairos.”

As a current six grade teacher, she is very surprised to read of a gender achievement gap. She had worked for four years at a predominantly African American school where the racial achievement gap was discussed and shown in presentations.Asked for her thoughts on the reduction in the disciplinary referral for boys, she also wonders if teachers who only taught one gender were fairer if their student population shared their gender. Were female teachers fairer with girls and male teachers fairer with boys? Would co-ed classes show that male teachers disciplined girls differently and female teachers discipline boys differently? “Are we more open-minded with students who are more like us because we understand them?” She wants to learn more about it too.

While she thought more of brain and gender differences in terms of boys being more active and less willing to sit and study than girls are, as well as the stereotypes of boys being more interested in Math and Science while girls prefer Language Arts, she never really heard much thought about other ways they could be different. She is definitely interested in learning more about these differences now. “I briefly looked at an article about gender learning differences, and while I didn’t understand the Math concept, as it was higher Math, I could see how the teachers tapped more into the boys’ interests by just diving right into the material, while with the girls, their emotions were tapped into in regards to their curiosity about the mathematician, stories that surrounded the concept, real-life application, where they brought flowers and other objects in to use for the lesson.” The article for that suggested using “story problems” for girls because they want more of the real-life application than boys do.

She is intrigued by the section of the article that points out that due to single-sex education, the classroom environment improved, where teachers and students felt more connected to each other, and there was a greater sense of trust. Continuing this thought, my subject wondered when teachers “start from scratch” and not stick to the same routine and classroom set-up, if that helps them be creative and enthusiastic, and the students, sensing that, are more motivated to learn as a result.

The article sounds like a promotion of the authors’ institute in the beginning for a couple of reasons. First,  the authors own the institute themselves. Second, they have made a lot of claims bolstered by lots of evidences and testimonials. As much as they seems to be set out to sell their products in describing how their professional development plan for the teachers have been highly effective, they do have compelling elements in in the article.

After the discussion with my subject, another skeptical thought came to my mind. Every new idea comes with a promise and enthusiasm, such as a newly released film, and the charm wanes gradually with time.Did the teachers become more creative and/or students more motivated simply because it was just another “new idea?”  This notion of ephemeral fascination cannot be generalized to all innovations though, as there are someeducational reform movements like B.F. Skinner’s behaviorism, that have perpetual influence in the educational field, even after losing dominance for a long time.

There aretwo most compelling argumentsin the article: (1) the brains of girls and boys develop along different trajectories, and (2) thefactor of being conscious towards the opposite sex during the onset of puberty causes underachievement. However, details regarding these statements are not discussed much in the article. The interview with my subject also prompted me to reflect my own high school days. Boys and girls never sat on the same bench. Actually, all the girls flocked together in a couple of benches set to one side of the classroom while boys were on different rows. In spite of this arrangement of seating, we boys used to be very conscious about the girls’ presence in the class. It was a big distracting factor for most of us, not only in high school, but also in elementary school often times. Most of the boys were hesitant to speak out their thoughts in class because they feared the embarrassment that would entail in front of the girls if what they said was not accepted by the teacher—and the chance of rejection was always high as the teachers were too much obsessed with right or wrong and little did they care about accepting different thoughts.

While this reappearance of single-sex education has attracted the attention of educators, policymakers and parents, Dr. Leonard places a caveat on the possible global acceptance of single-sex education, though she doesn’t say anything about the success in school, per se. Her findings have ‘fuelled claims from teachers’ leaders and education psychologists that boys brought up in a single-sex environment are less able to relate to the opposite sex than those taught in a co-educational school. There is no such effect on the girls as “Girls seem to learn what the nature of the beast is if they have been to single sex schools whereas boys taught on their own seem to find girls more puzzling.” [2] This leads me to conclude that although co-education has a promise to foster natural human development, and that there are a host of other factors such as motivation contributing to the success of education, the modality of single sex classrooms does seem to have many advantages to consider and their book, I am sure, has a lot to offer for the teachers while opening an important issue for further research in different contexts.

I would like to hear what fellow Choutari readers think about this issue in the case of Nepal. Where are we in terms of single sex and co-ed discussion? Do we need to have it?

 Notes:

[1] The article that the author is reviewing in this work can be viewd at: http://www.eric.ed.gov/PDFS/EJ849022.pdf

[2] Professor Diana Leonard, from the Institute of Education, University of London at a conference at the Perse School for Girls in Cambridge.

[ 3] See http://www.singlesexschools.org/research-learning.htm for single sex issue

 

So Many Textbooks, So Little Time

Critical Outlook, Scholarly Article, Teacher's Experience/anecdotes

So Many Textbooks, So Little Time:
Selection of English Curricula in the Public Nepali School System

Kent Grosh,  Fulbright Teaching Assistant *


Though we are discussing English education, let us imagine for a moment we are with a primary school teacher teaching math at Grade 4.  The students are presented with this problem:

figure of a math problem

The basic approach to solving this problem, the one we would assume that the class 4 teacher would present, might be similar to this:

But perhaps some of the students are still having trouble understanding this problem.  They might not understand the formula, or perhaps they never learned their multiplication tables well and can’t remember what 6 times 8 is.  We would expect that the teacher goes through each step until every student understands how to get the answer.

But imagine that the school, in response to poor student performance in math, decided that teaching advanced math would help the students learn more.  The fourth grade math teacher is provided with an advanced math textbook, perhaps a calculus textbook, and asked to teach it to their students in order to help them improve faster.  In that case, the the solution to Problem 0.1 that the primary level teacher would present might end up looking like this:

Someone with a background in math would recognize that this approach is just as correct, mathematically, as the first solution, but it is not nearly as appropriate to the audience.  What good would teaching calculus to students in class four do, even if the math is right and we get the right answer?  Would the teacher expect this to improve the students performance, or would this perhaps confuse them even further, and distract them from the fundamentals that prevented them from understanding the question to begin with?  If the students have trouble with this simple problem, teaching them to solve it with calculus would likely result in hopelessly confused students who do not understand how to find the answer at all.

This scenario may sound absurd, but it is unfortunately more or less the approach that many public schools have taken to improving student’s English.  Most public schools, whether English medium or not, teach two English periods per day.  One period often uses the government text, but the other uses a supplemental text, examples of which are Headway English, New Nepali Reader, Lotus English, or Harmony.  Private schools, whose students are generally ahead of their public school peers in English, use similar texts, and the understanding among those who choose and write the textbooks seem to be that using similar curricula and materials to that of the private schools will create similar results.  Thus, the texts at use at least half the time in public schools are frequently much more advanced than the corresponding government text.  There seems to be a general consensus among public schools that the more advanced the material presented, the more students will learn.

Unfortunately, creating unrealistic expectations for students does not improve the quality of their education. There are a variety of reasons that factor into the gap between the performance of students in private schools and those in public schools, but attempting to correct poor English by increasing the difficulty of the textbook is analogous to correcting poor math performance in class four  by teaching them calculus. Frequently, these textbooks are so advanced that the majority of the material are too far above the level of the students’ understanding for anything useful to be learned.  Rather than improving their English, the students gain nothing from the material presented, wasting the time that should be spent on creating a good, foundational understanding of English basics and fundamentals.

This is a writing sample I received from one of my class six students.  I present this not for criticism but simply for the purpose of comparison:

Ones upon a time there live in tiger and deer.  one day tiger was very hungry tigers look his lift side deer is going to drink and tiger eat that Deer.

In my experience, this sample is representative of a standard class six ability in English, and while it isn’t bad it is also clear there are still errors in basic grammar and spelling that need to be addressed; it seems that the simple past tense is not understood by the students, nor is punctuation.  By comparison, here is a sample from the textbook being taught in this class, this unit featuring a poem:

I saw a boy with eager eyes,/  Open a book upon a stall,/ And read, as he’d devour it all;
Which when the stall man did espy,/    Soon to the boy I heard him call,
“You, Sir, you never buy a book,/ Therefore in one you shall not look.”
The boy pass slowly on, and with a sigh,/ He wished he had never been taught to read,
That of the old churl’s books he should/ have no need.

            ~Mary Lamb, in Foning and Panlook, Headway English Book 6, pg. 123

Imagine the student who wrote the first writing sample reading this poem.  Look at some of the words used, such as stall, devour, espy, churl.  Not only are these words advanced and infrequently used in conversational English, but in the case of espy and churl the student might never encounter these words again until a Ph.D. program.  So what is being taught here, aside from obscure vocabulary?  There is no basic grammar construction being focused on, in fact much of the grammar is incorrect due to the flexible grammatical rules of poetry.  As a teacher, there is no lesson to teach here, little to be practiced or taught that students will find useful, and nothing to engage them.  There is little option for the teacher but to simply translate the poem into Nepali and have the students memorize the required vocabulary for the exam, all of which they are will likely to forget afterward; it is unlikely they will encounter, or they will have opportunity to use, any of these words again anytime soon.

Unfortunately, this example is representative of many, if not most, of the supplemental texts at use in public school classrooms.  Not only does this approach to learning actually result in students learning much less than they would with a simpler textbook, but there are a number of other more subtle, but equally damaging consequences.  As most Nepali teachers will be able to tell you, Nepali students frequently find speaking English extremely difficult.  It is not unusual to come across class ten students who, having studied English for six or seven years and who can read and even write proficiently, find it difficult to have a simple conversation in English.  In part, this is a result of the student never having learned fundamentals properly.  While their vocabulary is impressive, students are often never properly taught the basic grammar necessary for simple speech.  Speaking in another language is difficult, even terrifying, for a language learner, and without confidence in simple structures and grammar students will never have confidence in speaking.  When will class six students ever use espy or churl in a sentence when they need to communicate something?  And why should they, when simple past tense and correct punctuation are still a struggle for them?

But perhaps the most unfortunate result of these texts is that it removes the potential for fun from the classroom.  Students do not and cannot enjoy learning material that they cannot understand, and when the text being taught is incomprehensible to them, how will they be able to take any interest in it, even if the story or passage has good content?  Overly difficult material eliminates the possibility of games, activities, or creativity that engages the students, resulting in boring, dry lessons and a rote-learning approach in order to do well on the examinations.  A good teacher will always be able to engage students with material that they already understand, but even a good teacher will struggle to make the incredibly advanced textbooks presented in the public school classroom interesting or fun.  A good teacher can always make simple material challenging to the students by incorporating creative activities, more difficult vocabulary, or language production like writing and speaking, which are things teachers should be doing anyway.  But it is much, much harder for a good teacher to make anything useful of the difficult and irrelevant content provided as textbooks in the public school classroom.

It is true that public school students are often behind their private school peers, but there are many positive aspects to public school English education, not the least of which are fantastic government textbooks for class six, seven, and eight.  If public school are serious about increasing the quality of education that their students receive, work needs to be put into making sure that students have a solid foundation in the fundamentals, especially at the lower secondary level.  Only then will they be ready for more advanced materials.  Without that, attempting to increase student’s English with the use of textbooks above their level is like teaching calculus to class four students who have trouble finding the area of a rectangle.

————-

* From the Author: My name is Kent Grosh, and I have been teaching here in Nepal in a public school for about nine months.  It has been a wonderful experience; the students are enthusiastic and hard working, the teaching staff is dedicated and friendly, and there are many positive and encouraging things happening in the Nepali public school system that are often overlooked while lamenting the challenges at hand.  However, in this article I’ve chosen to highlight one common approach in public school English educational curricula that I believe is in need of change, with the hope this article might inspire some teachers and school administrators to assess their schools textbooks and ask whether they are appropriate to the abilities of their students.      

Speaking a Foreign Language Makes You Less Intelligent

Critical Outlook, Teacher's Experience/anecdotes

 Luke Lindemann*

Speaking a foreign language makes you less intelligent. This is a fundamental truth about speaking a foreign language, but it is often forgotten. And forgetting this truth can have profoundly negative consequences for the classroom.

I do not mean that the practice of learning a language is harmful to intelligence. What I mean is that when we express ourselves in a language that is not our mother tongue, we must simplify our thoughts. To give a personal example, I have been conversationally fluent in Nepali for almost two years, but even today when I speak Nepali I feel less intelligent. I know fewer vocabulary  and the words I do know are simpler than those of my Nepali friends. It takes me longer to parse sentences and longer to respond. I forget words and mix others up and am often laughed at for some amusing mistake (my students were quite confused when I told them that their homework assignment was due ‘pharsi’ – I had meant ‘parsi’). For me, thinking in Nepali is just harder to do. It takes longer and it is exhausting.

When our students speak or write to us in the English language, they are the same students as when they speak Nepali to us outside of class, but the outward manifestation of their personalities can be very different. They may be bolder or they may be more shy, depending upon how they face the challenge and potential humiliation of being forced to express themselves in a less intelligent (and oftentimes laughably simplistic) way. This is the discomfort and terror of learning a language, and also its exhilarating challenge.

As teachers who have long since mastered the English language, we sometimes forget this. We teach language as if it were a simple skill like long division, and not a fundamental means of expressing ourselves. We scold our students for not speaking out in class, for being timid and quiet when their names are called and they must stand up and speak out in front of their friends. But when we do this, we are forgetting the terror and frustration that we experienced when we were students. We are inhibiting their learning.

By teaching only in this way, we make speaking English a terrifying ordeal for the less confident students. And it is almost impossible to develop communicative competence, in which students are able to hold a spontaneous conversation. Without communicative competence, the students may be able to pass the SLC but they will never be able to speak English fluently.

We must also take language into account when considering the medium of instruction for other classroom subjects like science and social studies. Most of the students where I worked spoke Tamang as a first language, Nepali as a second language, and English as a third language. The decision for medium of instruction is a very important decision in a country like Nepal that has such vibrant language diversity. In choosing to include instruction in the medium of English, Nepali, or a regional language, a school must respond to the desires of the community, the pressures of competition with other schools private and public, the resources available, and the strengths and limitations of the government curricula and examinations.

Ideally, students should be given the opportunity to learn in the language with which they are most comfortable. Speaking a foreign language makes you less intelligent. When students learn history or science in a language that is not their own, their grasp of the subject matter is unavoidably simpler. The depth of their questions and their creative capacity are diminished. They do not learn as well.

Unfortunately, in many places throughout Nepal today this is something of a necessary evil. A good command of the English language is considered one of the most useful skills, and English medium instruction is held to be one of the best ways to develop that skill. Schools must compete with each other by offering quality instruction in the areas that foster high SLC scores and attract students. Schools in poorer areas can also be hampered by a lack of materials and staff.

But regardless of resources or medium of instruction, in every single classroom in Nepal there needs to be the realization that language study is less about memorizing words and more about learning to communicate. Language study is difficult, often scary, and (when mastered) extremely satisfying and valuable. Speaking a foreign language will make you feel less intelligent, especially at first, but mastering a foreign language will make you brilliant.

————– 

* Luke Lindemann was a 2010-2011 Fulbright English Teaching Assistant in Shree Udaya Kharka Secondary School in Chapagaon VDC, Lalitpur. Before receiving this grant, he worked as an English teacher for Bhutanese refugees in the United States. He holds a Bachelor of Arts in Linguistics from Pomona College, and his primary interests are language issues and education. 

Teacher Travelogue: A Journey to ELT@I Conference in Vellore, India

Nelta branch and members, Teacher's Experience/anecdotes 
 Praveen Kumar Yadav, Ram Abadhesh Ray, Ashok Kumar, Kamlesh Kumar Raut, members of NELTA Birgunj

Our trip to Vellore* was not an easy one, with no train tickets available at one point, the train we somehow got to board being late, and so on. But once we reached the venue, we had a great time. We were able to attend nine of the 147 concurrent sessions, which ran in 19 rooms where eight papers were presented during 2 hours (so each presenter only had about 15 minutes). During tea breaks, we were able to meet participants from India and other countries and shared what NELTA is doing for the professional development of English teachers in Nepal. When we informed them about the forthcoming international conference to be held in February, 2012, many teachers said they’d like to come and  participate in our conference in Nepal. We shared our email addresses and went back to more sessions. We then attended the plenary sessions which consisted of two facilitations on ‘Materials Design: From the back of an Envelope to Full-fledged Unit’ by Prof. Numa Markee and ‘Teacher Power’ by Raja Govindasamy from India.

Prof. Markee argued that as Prabhu (1987) demonstrated in the ground breaking Banglore project that was implemented in Southern India from 1979 to 1984, good materials design is fundamentally grounded in classroom experimentation by teachers. Prof. Markee illustrated this position by showing how a task based module he had presented at the 16th International conference of NELTA recently held in Kathmandu, started out life in 1990 as a demonstration lesson of task based language teaching for teachers in training at the University of Illinois originally, the hospital drawing task shown here consisted of a hastily drawn pictures and a few scribbled notes on the back of an envelope. Over time, he had the opportunity to refine these ideas into “real” materials as he repeated this demonstrated many times. In addition, he was able over time to incorporate various improvements based on evidence from video recordings of some of the early demonstration lessons. Prof. Markee concluded his talk by suggesting ways in Indian Teachers of English can adopt these ideas to their teaching situations.

The plenary session had another presentation ‘Teacher Power’ by Raja Govindasamy from India. Teacher power simply means the influence of teacher exerts on students by virtue of his/her commitment and competence. Such a quality ensures leadership status to the teacher. Then a teacher enjoys power in five ways as appropriated from J. R. B. French and B. Raven’s book, The Bases of Social Power (1959). The first power is legitimate power by virtue of designation on the basis of qualification. The second is reward power which enables the teacher to assess and appreciate student performance. The third is coercive power which empowers the teachers to nudge and pressurize the students to move away from ignorance, indifference and inhibition to interest, intelligence and improvement. The fourth is expert power, the most imp0rtant power by which the teacher establishes his/her stature as a mastermind/specialist. The fifth is referent power, a sequel to the fourth, which means that the teacher is referred to as a role model for the students to emulate his/her. The powers make a teacher a mentor.

A reflection of our trip to Vellore wouldn’t be complete if we don’t mention the typical south Indian food that was provided by the conference organizers. Almost all the food items contained coconut in them!

After lunch, we attended the special lecture given via online technology by Mrs. Claire Bradin Siskin, director of Excelsior University, USA, in the Anna Auditorium Hall which is equipped with advanced technology. The sound at the hall was so clear that it looked as if the presenter was behind the curtain. At the end, through text message and microphone/voice chat, questions were asked to her and she answered them. It was an innovative and creative presentation we have ever attended. In the same hall, three authors Mrs. Usha Jesudasan, Dr. K. Srilata from IIT Madras and Mrs. Subhasree Krishnaswamy jointly presented their paper on creative writing. They started with how creative writing begins, continued with how creativity can be promoted, and ended with encouragement to write creatively.

After a valedictory session and speeches by various dignitaries, prizes were given for the school toppers in English for Standard X and XII. Prizes were also distributed for three Best Paper Presenters of the Conference. The programme concluded with the vote of thanks by the Director of the School of Languages, VIT, Dr. C. Annadurai.

The Conference was indeed a confluence which brought together over eight hundred delegates. The ‘connection’ the meeting has given to, many hoped, would be long lasting.

When compared to NELTA conference, the gathering was not as much as we had in our 16th international conference. The number of presenters was more in comparison of NELTA Conference, but ELT@I had fewer delegates from foreign countries. About 90 percent from India.  We also learned that ELT@I organizes more national conferences than the international ones, and that may be something that we need to start doing in Nepal. If we hold more national conferences around the country, more teachers would get the opportunity to attend them.  Among the finer details, 15 minutes only was allotted for one presentation during concurrent sessions, which seemed too short to us was that rapporteurs were highly active: they introduced the presenters at the beginning and they summed up the key messages of the presentation at the end.

Our journey to Vellore was very fruitful because we learnt a lot of things related to English language teaching in India. We got the opportunity to compare the conference with ours and learn new things from their, we saw new ways of presenting papers, and we heard about new perspectives in ELT. Our visit strengthened the relationship between NELTA and ELT@I. And we had a good interaction with the secretary of ELT@I who said that ELT@I is looking forward to collaborating with NELTA in coming days.

 

Acknowledgments 

We would like to express our sincere gratitude to the Consulate General of India (CGI) Birgunj for providing the opportunity and supporting us to attend the conference. We could not have been able to take part in the mega event of India without support of Chairperson Hemant Raj Dahal of NELTA Central and Kedar Prasad Sah and Sajan Kumar Karn of NELTA Birgunj.

—–

* This was the Sixth International and Forty-Second  ELT@I Conference, held in Vellore Institute of Technology (VIT) University, Vellore. It was organized by the English Language Teachers’ Association of India (ELT@I).

A Brief Reflection of my Humphrey Fellowship Program at Boston University

Teacher's Experience/anecdotes


Ganga Ram Gautam*

Dear Valued NELTA colleagues and Choutari readers,

In this brief reflective note, I would like to share with you how this year has been professionally rich for me and how I was able to expand the network for NELTA. I expect that this reflection will be useful information for those who are looking for similar experience.

I felt both honored and privileged to participate in the Hubert Humphrey Fellowship in the year 2010/11. This is a highly prestigious program that brings mid-career professionals to the US and offers professional opportunities to foster mutual exchange among educational leaders working in the US and other countries. This year there were 217 fellows from 93 countries based in 17 different universities in the US. The fellowship year has been a rich professional experience for me. I feel that I have been able to expand my network with scholars here in the US and the world. Expansion of professional network, meeting people and sharing information about NELTA activities were my top priorities. I attended some courses in the School of Education at BU. I also observed some of the English language classes at the Center for English Language Orientation Program (CELOP).

Let me begin with the course experience at BU. Among the courses that I attended, TESOL Seminar and TESOL Field Observation were the ones that I would like to particularly talk about. TESOL Seminar is a course in which students are guided through the steps of curriculum design and writing a book. The professor introduced us to the concept of Tri-dimensional Syllabus that combines the Topics (Themes), Language Functions, and Grammar. By combining these three elements we can really address the topical interest of the learners, expose the learners to the desired language functions and provide them with the type of grammar they need. In addition to this, we also analyzed some of the textbooks and curricula in line with the class discussion on curriculum and materials design.

Another course that I found very useful was TESOL Field Observation. In this particular course, we observed the student teachers in class and shared our experiences. The students were assigned to observe at least three classes per week. We had to take notes of how the class began, how the learning goals were communicated to the students, how the learning activities were organized in class, what the types of errors the students committed were, how those errors were detected and addressed by the teacher, whether or not the students learned from the errors they committed, how the classroom dynamics were managed and so on. At the end of the week we would come to the class at the university, share our experiences and plan for the next week’s observations.

In addition to this, I also designed a Google that I plan to use with my students back in Nepal. In this website, I have tried to include the wonderful online resources that English teachers can use in their class. Also I have hyperlinked a lot professional development resources. I will regularly update the page and please do feel free to browse the page and use the resources available there. Also, please do send me your feedback and comments so that I can make it more reader-friendly and user-friendly.

The website address is: https://sites.google.com/site/gangasprofessionaldevelopment/

Nepal is now going through a shift and English language is going to be one of the key languages in the Nepalese education system. One of the things that I wanted to learn here in the US was how English is taught in multi-lingual and multi-cultural contexts so that I can share my experience with my colleagues in Nepal in order to address the linguistic and cultural diversities in Nepal. I observed English language classes both in university and schools here and talked to the teachers. I found that the teachers use these cultural and linguistic diversities as resources in their class. They encourage the students to share their cultural practices in relevant lessons and compare the linguistic elements among different languages.

During the fellowship year, I attended a Leadership Seminar Series by Prof. Jack McCarthy from the School of Management, BU. The leadership seminar was one of the highlights of the fellowship year. Prof. McCarthy helped us carry out the Leadership Survey through which I was able to see my leadership qualities from the perspectives of the people I was working with back home. One of the things that I would like to share from this experience is ‘leadership is not what you think about you but what other people think about you’. If one wants to become a successful leader, s/he has to develop a mechanism to get regular feedback from the colleagues, co-workers, sub-ordinates and the wider audience. This is the key to a successful leadership.

I was lucky enough to participate in the mega ESL event i.e. TESOL conference in New Orleans. The conference was a great learning experience which not only connected me to the global ESL/EFL community from around the world but also updated me with trends in ESL/EFL scholarship. About 5300 teachers from around the world presented and participated in the conference.

During the same conference I attended a Leadership Course organized by TESOL for TESOL members and the leadership workshops that I attended gave me the confidence to volunteer myself to lead the professional organization at the regional and global levels.

I have established a great network in the conference and I have volunteered to one of the global forums to develop the key performance of the English language teachers of all levels of education.

I also did a series of presentations in different forums and I highlighted the role that NELTA has been playing to promote and enhance English language teaching in Nepal.

These are some of the activities that I did in the last ten months and I am now looking forward to sharing these experiences in Nepal and contributing to the professional growth of NELTA and its members.

I encourage NELTA colleagues to apply for this kind of fellowship and be a part of such great experience.

 

* Ganga Ram Gautam, Humphrey Fellow 2010/11

Immediate Past President, NELTA

The world is one big choutari–but…

Editorial, Miscellaneous, Teacher's Experience/anecdotes

Shyam Sharma

The world is one big choutari.

Yesterday I received a few emails from fellow editors and a revised article from a contributor for Choutari July issue, which I am assigned to put together, with support from my colleague Sajan Karn. My bus was leaving for Boston at 4pm, so I replied to the emails and left New York. On my way to Boston–where Ganga Sir is wrapping up his one year visit as a Humphrey scholar and where I am joining him and Hemanta Sir, who happens to be here at this time, for dinner–I was able to return the article with some minor editorial comments with a 24 hour turnaround time. On my way, I was also able to read about the  training in Majuwa, Gulmi (which is my old home town) that Gopal Sir gave and also shared the update with us via Yahoo mailing list. It’s just amazing how much communication technologies have advanced around the world. But–

But when I write about the connection that some of us happen to have among the Nepalese ELT community at home and abroad, some of us more reliably and permanently than others, I think about the colleagues across Nepal who do not have (reliable) connection for joining the professional networking that others do. As I write this, I imagine that I could have been one of those teachers in Majuwa who requested Gopal Sir to please return for another training. It could be years from now when we hear from or about Majuwa. Or–

Or, it could be not that long, if we make the best of use of what is available, if those of us who are connected help make more connections . Choutari editors have talked about this. In our attempt to promote professional networking through online forums like this, we might sound to some readers that we are oblivious of the reality on the ground. We are not. We just want to make platforms, practices, and resources available to our colleagues who are increasingly able to connect to the web AS AND WHEN they are able to do so. We don’t want to wait until everybody is connected. Therefore–

Therefore, our request to you as someone who has already some level of access is this: please do one small thing to increase access, participation, contribution for or by a colleague or two. Please print an article that you like and provide it to someone who doesn’t have the access. Please collect something from someone who doesn’t have access and type it up and email it to us. Even for those who are already connected, please “share” entries here on your Facebook, please “like” articles, please “subscribe” to the blog as a whole (link on right), and please write and send a longer, independent entry/article for the coming months. If you need some guidelines, please either see this page or email us at neltachoutari @gmail.com.

Thank you for reading this issue of Nelta Choutari!

—-
Shyam Sharma, University Doctoral Fellow
English Department, University of Louisville,
Louisville, Kentucky, USA

How to Enhance Collaborative Learning Environment in the ELT Classroom

ELT Resource

Shyam Sharma*

As language teachers, perhaps none of us underestimate the value of collaborative learning: interaction is at the heart of how we teach students speaking, listening, and even writing and reading/comprehension skills. However, conventional scholarship and practice of collaboration in the ELT classroom are usually teacher-designed, teacher-managed, and teacher-dominated group activities. In this post, I would like to highlight the value of creating a collaborative learning environment in the ELT classroom by sharing my personal experience of using student-managed, student-centered group work.

The current context in which I use student-managed group projects is that of business communication at the intermediate and advanced college level, but I will focus on ideas and strategies that are adaptable from my current context to that of ELT classrooms at the middle and high school levels. I must admit that there are significant difference between the high-tech, small class, two class periods a week context from which I want to draw some insights and the low-tech, large class, every day of week teaching situations from which I come and to which I am trying to implement some of the insights about collaborative learning. But while teaching in a hi-tech classroom where both students and teacher have access to a lot of hardware and web 2.0 collaborative technologies, I increasingly realize that collaborative learning environment is not a challenge bur rather a solution to the difficulties that I would face if I had access to fewer technologies, my class size was bigger, and my teaching load were to increase. In other words, I am trying to answer this question: “How would I achieve the goals and benefits of collaborative learning environment in low-tech, large class, high teaching load situations?” Let me start with some theoretical insights on the importance of creating/enhancing collaborative learning environment in the classroom; then I will describe the techniques and technology for doing so; finally, I will reflect on how I would try to achieve similar goals in more challenging situations.

In Learner-centered teaching, Weimer (2002) points out a fundamental problem with most teachers’ attitude towards students with regard to letting them “drive” the process of their learning: “We might squeeze over closer to the door and let students sit next to us, maybe even hold onto the [steering] wheel, but for all intents and purposes, we are still doing the driving” (p. 38). Frankly speaking, except perhaps when we are discussing the idea of teaching/learning in a more theoretical or a training situation, most of us are not ready to “let students drive” their own learning: we normally think we know what is best for them, we want to deliver the content, we need to control the class, and so on. I remember that when I was teaching at a private school in Kathmandu many years ago, the director/owner of the school happened to pass by as I was passionately implementing my ideas about “how to teach speaking skills” on which I had presented a paper at NELTA Conference the previous week! He immediately went to the Principal’s office to tell him that Sharma sir’s class looked and sounded like a circus and instruct that I change my teaching to a more acceptable way if I wanted to continue to have my job in that school! Thanks to the principal who happened to be an English teacher who had also kindly come to my session at the conference, he explained to Mr. Proprietor that I was doing students a great favor by letting them learn language by using it! Had it not for this rare principal who understood something about ELT, I would lose my job that day. Simply, most stakeholders, often including students themselves, want the class to be “under control,” a condition that is hard to achieve when we don’t know how to let collaboration happen. Besides the challenge of keeping especially large classes under control, we are culturally not wired very well to relinquish authority and let students speak, explore, present, etc.  But it is not just “eastern,” as opposed to “western,” cultures that have this issue of authority. In their book Electronic collaboration in the humanities,  Knowles and Hennequin (2004) state that “Our students arrive in our classrooms trained to devalue collaboration by their previous educational experience; they often resist collaborative work, and when required to do it, they may not know how to proceed”—and this observation is about teaching in the US.

In theory, no one argues against creating collaborative learning environment or even letting students plan, manage, and direct the course of their learning based on the ground rules, frameworks, or encouragement provided by the teacher. In Cooperative learning in the classroom, Johnson, Johnson, and Holubec (1994) state that “Cooperative learning results in significantly higher achievement and retention than do competitive and individualist learning. . . . [it] tends to result in more higher-level reasoning, more frequent generation of new ideas and solutions . . . and greater transfer from one situation to another.” It would be hard to find any language teacher who disagrees with this position in theory, or while they are attending a seminar or training; the challenge is when we return to our classrooms and are faced with the challenges like that of managing class, having the resource or energy to prepare well-structured activities, having enough time let collaborative learning happen, and completing the course before the end of the term or year—not to mention the problem of a thin wall between our classroom and the next one where Buddhi Sir wants quiet to teach his chemistry class.

We all—even perhaps the director of our schools—know that today’s kids are used to interactive learning from the other modes and means at home and outside class. The rising trend of interactivity due to increased access to the web and social networking have been pointed out as making children of younger generations increasingly attuned to networked social relationship and interactive learning environment, and our society is no exception to that trend. In Millennial rising, Howe and Strauss (2000) pointed out that wherever the new information technologies have reached, young people have adapted to doing “teamwork” through the use of technology outside school, for instance quickly communicating how a group of them want to divvy up and do a task. What Howe and Strauss call the “millennials”—or people born around the turn of the new millennium, spend time communicating with friends and family, and are savvy with ICTs. As they grow up many of them are even involved in “grassroots reconstruction of community, teamwork, and civic spirit.” So, it is natural and necessary for the younger generations of school children to learn in collaborative environments, whether or not the technology is available/accessible in the classroom itself. Let me now briefly describe the use of technology that I have, before moving on to reflect on how I would try to achieve those teaching/learning goals without it.

Continue reading How to Enhance Collaborative Learning Environment in the ELT Classroom →

Teacher’s Travelogue: A Journey to Bangladesh

Teacher's Experience/anecdotes

Kashiraj Pandey

[What follows is a section of a travelogue by Mr. Kashiraj Pandey, NELTA executive member. Please click HERE  for the full text.]

….

Seeing Myself in Dhaka

I did not have fixed plans and no one was worried about my arrival. For me, to experience everyday in which almost nothing seemed so familiar was the pride of travelling that way. I reached Dhaka around 10 am, the 19th May, 2011. As I was told to meet BELTA colleagues at 4 pm, that 10 to 4 worked so well that I explored many parts of Dhaka on the first day that delegates other parts of than Bangladesh and a colleague Ganesh from Nepal, another representative from NELTA, who took a flight to Dhaka the same day with grants from the British Council, was surprised to see me steering him towards many corners of Dhaka during our stay there.

Meeting Sudebjee from English in Action and Sonia from BELTA at the BIAM at 5 pm, the conference venue made me realize that a journey is best measured in friends, rather than miles. As soon As I met them one let me use his computer and the next offered to join for the snacks.

At the Conference

As announced, the conference started on time. At 8.30 am, the volunteers were ready, waiting for the participants and delegates to register. Most of the presenters had registered the previous day. During 9.00 to  9.45 , I could see all participants, presenters and delegates inside the dining hall each holding a cup, exchanging greetings and talking, every one busy, what a fine opportunity for networking!

And I was busy too, talking to everybody, if not as many people as I could find who loved listening others, not many actually. But, I did my best to make me heard, and they were amazed to see me and the way I reached there (you know in 40 degree Dhaka city, a man arrives by bus, all wet from every corner of his body and sweating, with fairly grubby clothes, never taken shower for three whole days and nights) and how I travelled all the way to Bangladesh by bus, and my unplanned journey by road– no seats in a scheduled bus with all hopes to eat and stay in  readily available local hotels… and more, all fun when things went well, and that’s how I was there, very excited.

Then I saw all going towards the hall by 10.00 for inauguration, so quiet, so curious we all were.

Then at 11.00 the plenary started with David Graddol for an hour, where he highlighted how the global trends are affecting in reshaping the world of ELT.

Before the concurrent sessions started at 12, I could see all the presenters working on their slides to shorten them so as to fit within the 25 minute time bound which was not very normal for anyone, and I was no exception either, for presentation in such huge gathering meant for an hour in general. The volunteers in different  rooms were so alert, and time sensitive. After 20 minutes, they would show a placard saying 5 MINUTES, which was a good signal for the smart presenters to conclude and switch into Q/A session. And in next 5 minutes, STOP!.

Some big names like Fife MacDuff , Jeremy Harmer enjoyed the opportunity to present at the auditorium for an hour each where other presenters like me had to compromise with a normal hall for 25 minutes time limit, and mine to be more specific was in the fourth floor. Yes, I also had my session on the first day with a topic, Journaling for Teacher Development: An Autoethnographic Approach. I could see all participants very enthusiastic, excited for the topic; for the technique of journaling, for an autoethnographic approach they wanted to know what it was and of course some were little skeptic on how would I deal the topic, very curious, very inquisitive, and involving.

After I gave my session, a bunch of BELTA members, the young faculties from universities in Dhaka encircled me, nice to see them falling in love with autoethnographic approach, I know who does not love to talk about their own feelings and emotions, and more than that, about what Creswell (2002) claims as “a reflective self examination by an individual set within his or her cultural context” (p. 438). When people have their own creation and feeling, they look for their own space within creativity, while autoethnography gives a space to display our multiple layers of consciousness, connecting the personal to the cultures around and that was reason they loved to hold me back. Revealing my days for the past three years that once I started to work in this domain, I have found people around me valuing and celebrating my efforts, kept me update and fresh all the times. I have never found anyone coming out to harm my creation, when I believe in “heart to heart communication” in writing. My teachers, colleagues, students, family members, readers, and participants in any workshops have given energy to save me ahead.

A professor from Eastern University did not delay to invite me to her university to talk about my attempt in using reflective journals to garner students’ and teachers’ creativity as well.

I readily accepted where pleasure was all mine to meet the young budding writers, the faculties of English Department at the Eastern.

At the Eastern

It was already four and the CNG auto took us at the University’s building in Dhanmundi. The professors, especially those who were writers too, were waiting for us. I had Mr. Ganesh Gnawali, my colleague from Nepal, with me. Yes, I shared my experience as a writer, the contents we readily get in this part of the world. I talked about some best pieces of Literature that I have read from around the world. I was more lenient towards the one that best represented life, society, and cultures of course, starting with what we already know. People have their own style  of creation and feeling, very unique but universal. Those dynamic participants promised they would keep in touch, let see how we could keep the promises further, may be by exchanging the ideas, writing and publishing more books of creativity, documenting the moments of pain and pleasure, ups and downs as what was done by other writers, their influencing texts. To name a few texts like King Lear, Malini, Kabuliwala, The Great Railway Bazaar, The Kite Runner, Swan Song, The Necklace, The Lunatic, Munamadan, and Gauri are some works that the world cannot forget even someone is indifferent to, and all of them somehow were able to capture the moment that reflected the social-cultural, or personal-political experiences based on their own spacio-temporal context/s, and reading, such creation of other writers, works as burning fuel to all writers on the rise when we all are the butterfly of a same garden with multiple sets of flowers blooming within.  That’s what I shared in the workshop at the Eastern based on my ongoing research area, reflective practices (Journaling) for overall transformation in teaching- learning. Thank you Professor Iffat Majid, for you gave this wonderful opportunity to meet all these creative galaxy.

At the TA Meeting

Mr. Ganesh Gnawali and I attended a meeting with the leaders of teacher associations from the region; from Bangladesh, from Pakistan, from Afghanistan, and from India. I was glad to observe that the regional Teacher associations are taking NELTA as a model association. We are also the one with branches all around the country who have active life members, more than 2000 by 2011.  While other TAs were advocating to encourage young and new members, we had already had Mr. Ganesh Gnawali, an aspiring and promising young man, the proof, whom the committee recommended to avail the BC grant while myself, though representing the central committee, so happily attended the conference on my own.

I shared how we are smoothly working with the government and the partners while it is still a challenge for other TAs from neighboring countries. Our members’ active participation, specially the new ones who wholeheartedly volunteer during the conference or throughout the years was another asset we shared with them. Agreeing on the need of frequent exchange programs, support in training and material development, and regional cooperation etc. the meeting concluded hoping to meet again soon.

Finally,

As Aldous Huxley  remarks, to travel is to discover that everyone is wrong about other countries, I was really worried whether I would be sold on the way even before reaching Bangladesh (Dhaka), but no one tried to hurt me in any cultural (sensitive) matters. However, as a tourist I could sense how easily things were sorted out when we spent money. Had the money changer not arranged the easy escape, I would have returned Kakarvitta instead of heading towards Dhaka from Burimari. And I had a good cause for this. At Burimari, but I should confess, I was so happy to see the humans in uniform accepting any amount of money from anyone with great confidence, confidence counts, doesn’t it?

….

An Interview with Mr Hemanta Raj Dahal, President of NELTA

Teacher's Experience/anecdotes

NELTA Choutari had an interview with Mr Hemanta Raj Dahal, newly elected president of NELTA for the tenure 2011-2013. In the interview, he has addressed a number of questions that are directly related to institutional and professional development of NELTA, English Language teaching in Nepal, Choutari’s role in promoting ELT activities and its support to NELTA, present challenges and opportunities and many other issues. Please go through the interview, and leave your comments which can be instrumental in giving right directions to NELTA in the future. Your voice matters to shape the ways of NELTA. Please, come up with innovative ideas after reading the interview with Mr Dahal.

1. Choutari: You have been serving NELTA for long. How the organization has been instrumental in enhancing the professional skills of the teachers in Nepal? What challenges have you foreseen as it is a volunteer orgaisation and there is always a substantial expectation from the people. Also, what are the opportunities? To address this situation, what are your plans and visions so that NELTA will be able to achieve the goals?

Mr. Dahal: NELTA has been providing a platform to the ELT professionals which could be instrumental to learn and let learn. The core of our modality is the exchanges of knowledge and skills on English language pedagogy not only limiting ourselves within the domestic periphery but beyond. As regards to the challenges, NELTA has grown so big and it is still growing in terms of its size and the scope. All the members are expected to contribute voluntarily. Naturally, every member has aspirations. One of the opportunities is to be able to contribute NELTA voluntarily because there are set examples that the NETLA volunteers have been better recognized by national and international institutions professionally and socially. However, what has been getting tougher is to convince the roles of the members without expecting any special individual gains. I have a strong feeling of a need to decentralize NELTA programs and activities so that every member will own the institution. Consequently, the members will explore opportunities to better qualify and meet their expectations while the institution will support their mission.

2. Choutari: What are your plans for the institutional growth of NELTA in order that it meets its goal? Institutionally, how are you planning to work with NELTA partners? To what extent the partnership has been successful for NELTA?

Mr. Dahal: NELTA has envisioned to contribute for quality education in Nepal through English language as a powerful tool. Though the institution has been distinctly standing amidst the crowd of professionals and the other key stakeholders – national and international both, we have yet to build up a rapport so that NELTA will enhance not only social and moral recognition but also institutional one. It reminds me when I presented the General Secretary’s report in the Annual General Meeting (AGM) at the 16th international conference venue on 19th February 2011 when one of my key concerns for future direction of NELTA was to institutionalize it. Our partnership with other key stakeholders in ELT has been successful in the institutional level to some extent where we have been chiefly collaborating with Ministry of Education, the US Embassy, British Council and private and boarding school associations. However, we have yet to convince these communities regarding our professional expertise and the contribution NELTA can make to this country. Our institution is being expanded from Sankhuwasabha, the far eastern part to Baitadi, the far western part of Nepal where NELTA has been working through its branches. Now is the time to enhance quality within ourselves first. Our members by now have already become very receptive. Therefore, we do not have to wait for long to achieve this goal.

3. Choutari: What are your plans to develop NELTA as a consultant for the government so that education in general and English teaching in particular will be more effective and meaningful?

Mr. Dahal: The 21st century has become extremely competitive in every discipline. NELTA has been working for last 17 years without any full time human resources but taking time of those professional members who have been generous, stealing some of their times either from their academic pursuit or from their jobs for subsistence, not leaving any moment for their family. Of course, this modality has one significant advantage that every member would like to look for some opportunities how he or she could support NELTA. However, we have yet to prove with our concerted effort that we are the appropriate entity so that the government will be ready to buy our expertise. NELTA has discovered that only a few of its members have been involved in research, developing manuals and materials and doing project reviews and monitoring. Moreover, we have yet to create atmosphere to bring them in a boat so that instead of working on individual basis they can join hands with the institution. We should be proud that the editorial team of NELTA journal  has undergone a considerable transformation in its working modality. As a result, the journal has been peer reviewed which is worthier than ever before. However, our publications are very limited and they are mostly circulated among our members only. Therefore, the government should have very little knowledge about the strength and quality of NELTA. I would therefore encourage the NELTA family to adopt special strategies that help develop our strengths, recognition and network. As a president, I look into the opportunities how I could contribute towards this direction.

4. Choutari: How does our effort for promoting professional communication relate to NELTA’s goals and how might we be able to enhance them?

Mr. Dahal: We should first establish the norms of professional communication. Communication is the most powerful tool to help break the digitally divided world. Consequently, quality of education will not be superseded by the notion of its access. To me, the professional communication has two-prongs. One is for the network and another is for sharing of the culture of developing capacity and the best practices. The more efficient is the communication, the faster is the global recognition of the institution. Again, our performance and commitments should be reflected in each and every communication. One of the ways of promoting our professional communication is learning from other organisations of similar nature, for instance, IATEFL, TESOL and Asia-TEFL. I am sure my colleagues in the central committee have better ideas in this area.

5. Choutari: Do you have any suggestions for conducting networked discussions in better ways so that branches and members can contribute better? Where do you see the present strength (academic and institutional) of NELTA to help teachers enhance their professionalism?

Mr. Dahal: Despite unbearable power cut hours in Nepal, many English language professionals including the learners have started using the medium of IT. If you ask which one is odd man out in  rice, vegetable, computer, lentil, yogurt, I am sure the answer will not be ‘computer’. Therefore, Wiki can be the easiest and effective means for such network. Mr Prem Phyak, the Secretary of NELTA has already initiated the design of Wiki. In my experience, many ELT professionals mainly outside the Kathmandu valley would like something specific that how to teach particular content from their courses. Our Wiki modality then should address the expectations of the ELT community looking for resources so that the benefit of our effort will go to the real learners of English.

6. Choutari: Choutari is a volunteer mission that works as per the core missions of NELTA, for which it is cost and labor free; but Choutari’s organizers would greatly benefit if NELTA could help us promote the forum through its existing communication mechanisms. What could be, for example, one significant way in which NELTA can help us in increasing our reach, readership, and involvement where there is more limited access or recognition of professional conversation?

Mr. Dahal: I am sure the Choutari involves a lot of cost if we convert our colleagues’ valuable time and use of their brain. It is free only because they have sponsored it. This is one of the most striking issues at the moment. I would recommend to motivate more and more contributors to the NELTA Choutari mission and also to disseminate it more widely. Some of the modalities I could suggest are to link Choutari to the NELTA website and also request the  British Council, the US Embassy, TESOL and IATEFL to link to their websites as well. Moreover, it would be very exciting to publish it as a booklet  or bulletin form either on regular basis or occasionally as an special issue. We can then receive feedback from the readers. Consequently, we will have better opportunity to learn what our readers want.

7. Choutari: We have got good support from NELTA in the past. How do you plan and intend to support Choutari as NELTA’s new President? Do you have any new ideas as per your presidential vision as our new leader?

Mr. Dahal: I have a feeling whether we did a proper justice to NELTA Choutari in the past. I am always aware that Bal Krishna Sharma and Shyam Sharma in the US and Prem Phyak, Kamal Poudel, Hem Raj Kafle and Sajan Karn in Nepal have been rigorously contributing to bring it out. They deserve special recognition from NELTA. Now is the time NELTA has to disseminate the core value of the Choutari mode of professional development. I would like to support the Choutari team to make this noble work more visible among the ELT communities and heighten the level of ownership of NELTA members. I would expect the Choutari materials to be combination of some theoretical notions  with more practical tips, professional reflections of the members and the guest contributors and the best practices in ELT. I can see the opportunity to forge partnership and collaboration with other similar sort of network and agencies so that quality of this e-platform can be enhanced.

Mentoring in Nepalese Context

ELT Resource

-by Shyam  Pandey

Language teachers are anticipated to keep themselves up to date with developments in the field related to language. They need to regularly review and evaluate their teaching skills and to take on new teaching assignments according to the changing needs of the institution. Some teachers may also be expected to serve as mentors to novice teachers, to plan workshops, to present papers at seminars and conferences and to write for journals and magazines and other professional activities. Professional development is one of the key issues for those teachers because it is inadequate to talk about teachers’ performance and learning outcomes without training, evaluation, mentoring the teachers etc. Teachers’ success in professional development enhances the results of students’ learning. At the core of the training process, teachers play a key role in determining students’ outcomes.

Every year, Teachers’ Professional Development (TPD) programs are applied in universities in almost all the countries in the world. These programs are held to serve the determination of providing teachers with apparatuses and best milieu to develop their profession. They deal with TPD from different outlooks, which pressures on teachers’ engagement in inquiry as a fundamental part of their teaching practice. Similarly, they must sustain their learning continuity both with their colleagues in professional communities and with their own students inside classroom. However, it does not seem that regular workshops, trainings and conferences regarding TPD programs take place successfully and effectively.

In the current climate of systemic alteration, the professional development of teachers has taken on new status. There are many reasons for this new urgency, ultimately centering on the importance of the classroom teacher in promoting successful student learning. Without the continuous improvement of teaching (and of professional teachers), the reforms will fail. Professional development must serve the purpose of promoting teachers’ continuous learning of integrating new knowledge about teaching and learning within the social contexts in which teaching takes place.

When English as Foreign Language (EFL) teachers are aware of the different strategies and techniques of TPD, it helps to achieve the anticipated goal of the educational institutions. The teachers can adopt many strategies and modes for their professional development. In the context of Nepal, some of the models like classroom observation, case study, assessment, etc. are familiar and being used by many language teachers. Many colleges and universities like Tribhuban University (TU) (mainly), Kathmandu University (KU) launch the pre-service program to prepare teachers. They give good theoretical knowledge. After the completion of certain level like I. Ed., B. Ed., and M. Ed., the student teachers go to teach in the real classroom. However, when they try to teach the theoretical knowledge (inputs) which they have taken from colleges and universities, they face certain problems. They expect some help, guidance and coaching. Nevertheless, at that time they do not find anyone to support them. When I was in teaching practice (B. Ed.), I did not get proper mentorship from my teacher. After that, I joined M. Ed. in Kathmandu University where I got to know a lot about mentoring which gives good platform to the new teachers develop them professionally.

Mentoring can be defined as helping, guiding, assisting and coaching to novice teacher by the experienced one. Darish (2003) says, “Mentoring is a means of assisting and guiding the work of others” (p. 47). The very help, guide or support could be of about the problem of the novice teachers inside school or outside school as well or even sharing their success. In course of time, I joined a school as a teacher of English language. When I was a novice teacher, I faced lots of problems; sometimes finding resources which were available in the school periphery, sometimes I even did not know how to use such materials, sometimes classroom management, etc. and sometimes to apply the strategies which I had learnt from my university. I did not get any help from anyone until I requested them. Sometimes I consulted to my senior teacher but I was in dilemma whether I should consult him or not because my senior teacher may not have such willingness to help me. Therefore, I did not ask all my problems and concerns because I had a fear if they would rate me as an unqualified teacher. Neither had I seen my school having formal mentoring program nor any teacher groups or organizations helping the novice teachers. This is because “there is no any formal mentoring educational institution in Nepal which has separate course or program and mentoring to the new language teachers” (Pandey, S.B. 2009; p. 88). In the context of Nepal, mentoring can be one of the best tools that the language teachers can use to develop them professionally and personally but it is still not being practiced in Nepal formally which is an urgent need now. Portner, (1998) says “Mentoring is a powerful and effective way to provide support and assistance to neophyte teachers during their first year on the job” (p. xi). As Pandey, S.B. (2009) has discussed the English teachers of Nepal are well familiar with the concept of mentoring which helps them to adjust in the new situation and cope with the problems, get new ideas of solving the problems. Therefore, it is a platform for new and experienced teachers to share the things, to understand the new situation (p. 84). But Nepalese teachers have not formally practiced mentoring in their institutions yet which is a burning necessity now.

References:
Daresh, J. C. (2003). Teachers mentoring teachers: A practical approach to helping new and experienced staff. New Delhi: Sage Publications India Pvt. Ltd.
Pandey, S.B. (2009). Mentoring for Teachers’ Professional Development in Nepal: A Status Study of Kathmandu District. Unpublished M.Ed. dissertation, Kathmandu University, Dhulikhel, Kathmandu, Nepal.
Portner, H. (1998). Mentoring new teachers. New Delhi: Sage Publications India Pvt. Ltd.

Use of Authentic Materials in Language Classrooms: A Fashion or Compulsion?

ELT Resource, Miscellaneous

-by Suman Laudari

What is authentic material? What is the authenticity of a material? How do you determine whether a material is authentic or not? We had had a lot of prolonged discussion on the authenticity of the materials that we use in our classes to teach a language, in particular English Language.
For the last one decade or so, in Nepal, the communicative approach has been widely discussed and now, more or less, it has clearly substituted more traditional methods of teaching English like Grammar-Translation Method. Communicative approach advocates the use of real English in situation that is close to reality. This emphasis on the real English influences the choice of language matter that we use in our classroom and also the materials that we use in our textbooks.
With the booming of communicative approach, authentic text has gained much attention. Authentic texts, which were defined as those which were designed for native speakers, make it feel that the text being used in the classroom is real. Harmer, in his book “The Practice of English Language Teaching,” rightly says that authentic texts are real texts designed not for language students, but for the speakers of the language in questions (Harmer, 1991)
However, the perception towards authentic materials has changed now. Nowadays, people just do not see whether it was designed for the native speakers but whether the language used sounds authentic in part or in its entirety and also whether students are likely to hear or read it in real situations. Thus, anything a native speaker of English would hear or read or use can be described as authentic such as the news cast of BBC, 103 F.M., or online version of New York Times or local newspapers that are published in English. These materials can rightly be called authentic materials of English because these materials are not designed for the EFL learners. They are also not graded to fit the need of the learners. However, teachers have to be very much careful while selecting such materials because the uses of such materials demoralize students if they are higher than the level of the students. However, according to Harmer (1994), the use of authentic materials helps learners in the following three ways.
1. It helps them become better readers and better learners which ultimately helps them produce good language
2. The acquisition will be better and faster
3. Students feel triumphant over their accomplishment because the skills that they acquire make them feel that they can handle the situations in the real life too.
Non-authentic materials, in my opinion, are the materials which are especially for language students. Such texts sometimes concentrate on the language we wish to teach but not on what students’ need are. These types of materials, what I feel is, are highly artificial because the language items being used are perfectly formed sentences all the time (as I am doing in this piece of writing). Yet, in real life the language is not used just like that. If one studies the structure of the language he/she is likely to find the language extremely unvaried. Hence, such kind of language, if taught, does not encourage students become better learners. The language is manipulated in such a way that the students will, at certain points of time, feel that they are not going to encounter such language in real life.
It is easy saying things that you should not use graded materials because it does not contribute in language learning but how do teachers use authentic materials. So, now, in this section I would like to share some of my personal experience which I think will make teachers realize that they can do it too.
The first idea is about using ‘English Songs’ in an ELT classroom. Here, English songs do not mean the songs that have been sung in the class for a long like ‘Twinkle, Twinkle’, ‘Humpty Dumpty’ etc but popular music, country rock or Blues. For example Michael Jackson’s ‘The Earth Song’ or Shakira’s ‘World Cup Song’ or Justin Bieber’s ‘Baby’.
Many teachers might just wonder how could it be done in the classroom and what will their headmaster do or it is not my cup of tea or they might have many more excuses. But, if the teachers really want it they can do it making it the part of their lesson. When you talk about environmental issues like depletion of Ozone Layer, in ‘How Sane Are We’ in BBS first year’s course book you could play Michael Jackson’s ‘Earth Song’ in which he expresses how human beings have changed the Earth and so many environmental issues. You could provide your students with incomplete lyrics with some gaps in it; play the song; have them listen to it and complete the lyrics. After that you could give them task (which is designed on the basis of your student’s level of English) based on the song; put them in group and get them to complete the tasks. And, as the production activity, you could ask them to write how they felt about the song.
Similarly, you can exploit local newspapers that are published in English to teach English. Newspapers are great source of learning in many ways. To mention few you can use newspaper to teach reading, writing, vocabulary and cultural issues. One can also use newspapers cutouts for other fun activities which can be used as starters. For examples, newspaper cutouts can be used to make picture jig-saw; you can have an activity to match pictures with captions or headline.
So, using authentic material should be a compulsion; an inner compulsion from the inner self of the teachers. When you use authentic materials you expose your students to real discourse (real discourse in the sense that they become aware that that is the kind of language used in a language classroom. Use of authentic materials reflects the language change in the classroom which helps teachers and students keep aware of such changes. On top of all, use of authentic materials, as said earlier, acquire English better than those who do not. Thus, use of authentic materials must be a compulsion not only fashion.
References
Harmer, J. 1991. The Practice of English Language Teaching. London: Longman
Harmer, J. 1994. The Practice of English Language Teaching. London: Longman

Reflective Learning

ELT Resource

-Ganesh Gnawali

Introduction

Reflection is great tool which leads us towards better learning. It is important aspect for teacher as well students. Being both I’m observing this issue from the near and practising this in my current days which is certainly enhancing my teaching and learning activities. As a teacher or lecturer throughout the year we can share our ideas about teaching and learning in staff meetings, conversations in the staff room, and outside the classroom. It is truth that most of us know the theory of reflective practice. In order to take this theory into practice, teachers should become aware that within their own teaching routine they have the main tools for personal professional progress: their own teaching experience and their reflections on it, and the interaction with other teachers in the institution. I believe that “teacher development takes place when teachers, as individuals or in a group, consciously take advantage of such resources to forward their own professional learning” Ur (1999: 318). Development does not just happen with time, it happens with awareness. An awareness of a need to change. Why we are back to take advantage from our own resources i.e. colleagues?
Bashyal (2007) expresses Reflective practice is a mode that integrates or links thought and action with reflection. It involves thinking about and critically analyzing one’s actions with the goal of improving professional practice. Engaging in reflective practice requires individuals to assume the perspective of an external observer in order to identify the assumptions and feelings underlying their practice and then to speculate about how these assumptions and feelings affects practice. It is interesting to note that Ur (1999) also considers that the Reflective Model can tend to over-emphasize teacher experience, with a relative neglect of external input – lectures, reading, and so on – which can make a real contribution to understanding. She comes to the conclusion that a fully effective Reflective Model should make room for external as well as personal input. She calls this model “enriched reflection”.
Professionalization has become a very important issue in the field of e education. Reflection on one’s own work is a key component of being a professional and is essential to teacher education. Teachers must examine their beliefs, assumptions and biases regarding teaching and learning, and determine how those beliefs influence classroom practice. Reflection improves a teacher’s ability to make appropriate and sound judgments and, therefore, become an empowered decision-maker.
Reflection refers to the ongoing process of critically examining and refining practice, taking into careful consideration the personal, pedagogical, societal and ethical contexts associated with schools, college, classrooms and the multiple roles of teachers.So reflection can be summarized as a natural process that facilitates the development of future action from the contemplation of past and/or current behavior.
The Collaboration in Reflection
The opportunity to share with colleagues and friends is important in becoming a more reflective practitioner. Feedback, comments, and discussion about your reflections might come from your mentor or supervising teachers, your university supervisor/coordinator and/or your peers in the program. Reflection, as a method of inquiry into teaching, can be collaborative. For example, questions from a friend can help clarify an issue for you, just as a probe or comment from a university supervisor can help you look deeper into the situation. Collaboration when developing a portfolio includes requesting feedback from you mentor, university supervisor, or colleagues and peers. It can also take the form of discussion with colleagues who will assist you in identifying appropriate artifacts to or to help you clarify your beliefs and dispositions. The feedback option provides opportunities for peer evaluation and editing as part of this collaborative process.

It has been noticed that teachers talk about their students in particular, whenever they meet their colleagues. In addition, it is quite revealing that the topics teachers touch on are frequently related to some problematic classroom situation, some negative attitudes or some difficulties students have in their learning process. Rarely do teachers speak about their student´s achievements in a spontaneous way. We often hear teachers say: “They don´t feel like studying and therefore they are getting low marks.” “They never get the initiative in oral interaction; I have to push them on all the time!” “They make too many spelling mistakes.” “Nothing seems to interest them.” “They don´t care about their homework”, “they are not serious about their study.”etc. On the other hand the principal, head teacher and managements committees blame teachers that they don’t prepare well. This motorbike teachers have not enough time so they hardly manage the time and they do not attend the meeting regularly and so on. It’s better to assign to self reflect on their own teaching of the teachers for their and institutions’ professional development.
Although we may agree that teachers´ complaints have become commonplace, we are inclined to think that when teachers talk to colleagues about their students´ problems, difficulties or attitudes they are expressing what they are really worried about or dissatisfied at. Such conversations drawback to struggles and disappointments which must be attended to in a reflective and professional way.
I found the clear idea that Neupane(2006) expresses the purpose of reflection is to allow the possibility of learning through learning. The experience may be the experience of meeting, project, a disaster, a success, a relationship or any other internal and external event. Certain kinds of experience create particularly powerful opportunities for learning through reflection. To make new sense of our experience through the process of inquiring into it is another aim of reflection. So that we can move forward in practical ways that make a difference. The basic idea of reflection in teacher development is that a teacher learns about her/his teaching by observing and understanding what is happening in her/his own classroom and reflecting in it. Reflection involves a structured approach to learning experiences.
Approaches to develop Reflective Practice
Underhill, 2006 presents the following most frequently adopted approaches for developing the skill of reflecting practice:
a. Self monitoring
b. Writing a teaching journal
c. Peer observation
d. Teacher support group
e. Reflective conversation
f. Action inquiry
g. Teaching portfolio

So reflection is a developmental learning process which can be acquire through practice teaching, attending seminars and conferences, subscribing to professional journals and publications. There are other important issues to be taken into account are individual or group reflection and interaction with colleagues, learning through experience etc.
A reflective approach to teaching involves changes in the way we usually perceive teaching and our role in the process of teaching. As the examples above illustrate, teachers who explore their own teaching through critical reflection develop changes in attitudes and awareness which they believe can benefit their professional growth as teachers, as well as improve the kind of support they provide their students. Like other forms of self-inquiry, reflective teaching is not without its risks, since journal writing, self-reporting or making recordings of lessons can be time-consuming. However teachers engaged in reflective analysis of their own teaching report that it is a valuable tool for self-evaluation and professional growth. Reflective teaching suggests that experience alone is insufficient for professional growth, but that experience coupled with reflection can be a powerful impetus for teacher development. I’m realizing this as a fact, though I’m in the beginng stage.

References:
Bashyal, G.P.(2007) Reflection and critical pedagogy, Journal of NELA: NELTA
UR, P. (1999) A Course in Language Teaching: Practice and theory. Cambridge. CUP
Neupane, M. (2006) Reflective learning and teaching .Young Voice in ELT: Faculty of Education. T.U.

Outrunning the Unknown

Teacher's Experience/anecdotes

— Hem Raj Kafle

During the early days of teaching in a private boarding school one gets to come across diversity of odd but exciting moments. The time is full of tests and cross-examinations. People around you — founders, administrators, colleagues, staffs, students, and students’ parents — try to know your knack in their own ways. Or, at least, you appear after a time to consider the need of ensuring such multifaceted satisfaction as the only secret of becoming a teacher. This is my understanding, which, I admit, need not resemble anyone’s. Experiences vary.

My actual, substantial teaching career began in a private Boarding School at Urlabari, Morang. The entry was interesting. I went to ask if there was a vacancy (In fact, I had had a hint that there was or would be one). The principal, J.B. Rai as I recall now, told me to drop an application. When I did, they asked me to prepare for a short demonstration class. I did it, and taught in grade three for about ten minutes. This was the first time I had spoken English to students to my satisfaction.  Then they took a sort of interview –  if I could join instantly as a an assistant hostel warden cum teacher. I said yes. I got the appointment letter after a brief meeting with the founder the following day.

I was only an I. A. with English major, and had nine months teaching experience in a primary school. Everything was so fast and more than expected for me. I knew later that people had taken it to be really fast and more than I deserved.

When people keep watch on you in a workplace, you must also watch how they try to crisscross the lines of responsibilities.  You must first be clear about your line(s), and see where they go closer to and farther from others’. One morning I was teaching English in the same grade three, which was next to the staff room in the old tin-roofed block. I was only half-way with the new teacher’s vigour when a man (a colleague, of course) who had happened (or pretended/wanted) to hear the fun we were making, came to the door, excused himself (in English) and began to scold the students for making noise. Then he again excused himself, called me out and began to counsel me on how to handle small kids. I was a bit puzzled because I had never seen him. “Maybe he is someone with such responsibilities — to watch on a newcomer.” “Who knows what boarding schools do to keep things straight!”

Some colleagues had seen this from the adjacent staff room. I knew from them that he was junior to me in qualification and equal in designation. They said he used to do so with almost all newcomers. One of them even remarked, in his absence, of course,  “I would thrash that snob. But you are new and humble. Check from next time.”

I thought if I had known him well, I would have spoken more fluent and better English to the hearing of everyone around. But I had just listened to and thanked him ‘for his valuable words’.

This little thing spread like a wild-fire and reached the Vice Principal, my one-time English teacher. He called me to say, “He knows you were my student. Some other teachers know it, too. You can expect a few more such tests. And next time, with him or anyone else, argue strongly and with the best English you have. Make sure you know more and speak better than your juniors and equals here.”

Working in this school gave me the best opportunity to test my self-confidence.  It was a big place for my age and qualification but had swift chance of promotion. And promotion was ensured in working hard and emulating others. It was a time when a locally educated lad like me was brought face to face with Darjiling-born ‘experts’ highly sought-after in English boarding schools. I was an alternative to one of them to start with, and made swift progresses in the probation year. People tested me time and again. The Hostel warden, whose assistant I was, tested me half a dozen times with queerest of orders and admonitions, the hostellers tested me for my anger and patience, the cooks and peons did that to check my capability to exercise authority. Colleagues who spoke and taught English kept on evaluating my English. I remember one English teacher coming to the hostel tutorial time in the evening just to check how well I wrote and spoke. He gave a question to answer as if I were a student. I wrote and explained. He confessed he wanted to see how  the Vice Principal’s disciple would actually fare in his proficiency parameters.

I had started as an assistant hostel warden, which demanded a lot of going around and quarreling with kids, which some people satirically called an ‘opportunity’ for twenty four hour English speaking. I hated this after a time because it overtook my study, and snatched me off the friends’ circle.  At the end of the session I requested the founder to set me free from the hostel. He agreed to let me stay out, but said I had to continue as a primary level teacher with the earlier salary. This meant I was not going to get a promotion to the lower secondary though there was a vacancy and I was eligible. For me leaving the quarrelsome kids was a better reward than a promotion for that time.

A year passed. I ‘topped’ my batch in the Bachelor first year exams. My young colleagues advised me to reveal this fact in the upcoming start-of-the-session staff meeting. We bought some kilos of oranges and distributed at the end of the meeting. The friends disclosed the reason for this humble treat.  I did not really bother how it worked. But friends said my success was a lesson to my competitors. The Vice Principal later reminded me the optimism of the myth of  “a needle-like entry for a ploughshare’s exit.” This success added to my image. But I had to prove that I could top the second year also, which I did. There was no celebration for this since I left the school along with the results.

During a short farewell gathering on my last day in the school, the Principal and Mr. Regmi, both respectable old teachers, enumerated the phases of my growth in those two years and four months. For the first time I realized the accuracy and weight of the judgment of experienced people. They said they were happy for my beginning ahead though the school would welcome my longer stay. They only expected me to acknowledge how the school had prepared me to explore new opportunities in Kathmandu. It is during this farewell moment that I first heard the principle of “forgiving and forgetting” unpleasant encounters of the past at the start of a new journey ahead.

Thus, with B.A. and confidence, I left Urlabari the winter of 1997.  I have always made it a rule to visit the school whenever I go home. When I reach there, I get a feeling of being around all these fourteen years though a lot of things have changed. I will cherish those 28 months for the rest of my life.

And, I continue to value the early tests and cross-examinations. If similar cases occur today also, I just take them as the new editions/reprints of those valuable old books.  Working there, I learned this simple maxim for life: Professional life is a race. Whether you like or not, there always is a pressure to run faster. You may not know others’ speed, but must constantly try to outrun them without tresspassing their trails. When you win, the person who deserves both thanks and congratulations is you yourself.

Do you know why “they” are “there”?: Professional value of personal blogs

ELT Resource

Bal Krishna Sharma

They are here because of several reasons.

Blogs have become an effective platform to share personal as well as professional ideas. I had my personal blog two years ago and I have found it as a space to communicate to a larger audience. Traditionally, people used to introduce themselves with their name, ethnicity, parents’ names and their occupations, etc. In this increasingly globalized world, the trend has changed and these traditional ways of constructing identities have become less important.

As a language teacher, what can you learn from personal blogs of people who are involved in the ELT profession? Ideally, you can learn these people’s’ biographies, interests, works and publications as well as their reflections on their teaching and research. Most of them give good resources for teaching and learning of English that you can either download or copy for your purpose. Here, I list some “good” blogs by ELT professionals, researchers and linguists, and I leave it up to you regarding what you can learn from them. Among them are people like David Crystal, Jeremmy Harmer, and Ken Wilson. Don’t forget to leave your feedback.

Click on https://eltchoutari.com/elt-resource-bank/, and navigate what they offer to you.