Vania Castro
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Rodrigo Abrantes da Silva
William Cope
Alessandra Coutinho Fernandes
Petrilson Pinheiro
Elaine Reis
Jason Berg.png "Rita van Haren")
Rita van Haren
Claudia Bergamini
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New learners, old teachers and materials
It was an interesing experience to read "Life in schools". The great paradigms (didactic, authentic and transformative) closely correspond to another division I constantly work (tradicional/modern, critical, post-critical). In this sense, I think that the presentation of authentic paradigm is based mainly at a phenomenological perspective more than a critical one. Here in Brazil, critical perspective was very strog, because of Paulo Freire's work. I think that the presentation of authentic paradigm will be a little different if it includes critical view.
But the most interesting to me was the fact that all the explanation allways includes the important role of textboks and materials (my reseach subject). And it is a challenge to think about how to dispose materials to learn and teach in a transformative paradigm and how to reorganise content and sillabus in this context.
"As much as they develop disciplinary or content knowledge, they also develop knowledge about their knowledge making, and learning about how they learn." I clearly understant the flow of colaborative learning proposed on the second part of the sentence - an it reminds me MOOC a lot -, but I question myself about the first part. There are basic contents in alphabetic literacy that we can't left out, specially in Brazil. And we must combine it in flexible ranges of contents and material in mainly thematic projects of learning that develops also these basic skills. I call it "protypes of learning". This is my main interest at the moment.
Also how to prepare teacher to this kind of work is not a minor problem nowadays in Brazil. How they can face students like the baby showed at this movie?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=50BkXVSClOw
)_20Foto_20de_20F_C3_A1bio.png "Fábio Bezerra")
As I looked at that baby`s picture, one thought came to my mind: not only is that baby flipping pages, but he`s also `reading`(pictures, signs, etc) in a way that`s very different from the way we were introduced to reading. His reading ways go beyond the linear, top-down model we all know, and I`m concerned that this new model might mean an educational shock to our students nowadays.
I assigned my EFL teenage students an 80 line text the other day and I was surprised by their reaction. One student got very discouraged by the 80 lines, he said it was too long and thought he wouldn`t be able to read it. The other one started reading right away but from the end. I simply had not anticipated that way of reading as a difficulty for them.
I agree we must think about the changes and the consequences brought by them. I think we must find ways to engage all the agents other than students and teachers. In my opinion parents are crucial to this task.
I also agree with you Roxane.
By the time any material is available it`s already outdated. So maybe the key point would be how can we create something which could be changed with a quite frequency, and who would do that? Besides there`s a matter of context.
Anyway, in my opinion the thing is we should be able to prepare teachers so that they are flexible enough to work with a material which will be always changing and able to make choices for their students.
I do agree with you Roxane when you question how we can promote knowledge and prepare students to face hi tech babies in order to surpass old practices and paradigms.
Paulo, with my undergraduates, I also always refer to my experience learning the letter D, which stood for the flower DALIA, I also had never seen at that point in my life, and believe it or not, I still haven`t seen one, a real one, except in pictures, (thanks to google images!!)....
Hi Roxane! What a pleasure to be able to talk with you!! Yes, I strongly agree with you that one of our main concerns nowadays should be to prepare teachers to face such a huge challenge, not only because they lack the necessary skills to deal with and bring technology into their classrooms, but mainly because many of today`s teachers do not make the same uses of technology as their learners do. Actually, my experience with public school English teachers taking part in an in-service continuing education program at UFES has shown me that they haven`t really incorporated technology in their private lives yet, which, in my opinion, is one of the reasons why they can`t engage in authentic and tranformative e-learning/teaching. Sometimes I think that we`ll have to wait for a new generation of teachers to come and change this scenario, or start thinking of stronger policies that will ensure the effectiveness of the use of technology in meaningful practices and on more regular bases...
I always mention to my students the way I was taught to read and write. I still have my cartilha and I show it to them. In the lesson about j, we have a text that talks about cashew (caju). I had never seen a cashew in my life. The only thing I knew about it was that it came in bottle for juice. Well, I must say that I learned the j but it was meaningless to me. The big challenge in educating, in my opinion, is making things meaningful connecting necessities of alphabetic literacy to technologies and to materials.