Dr. J's Blog of ELT Praxis

I am in the data analysis phase of my dissertation, and one of the best benefits of doing this research is learning about the impact of social media on English language teachers abroad.  To clarify, my research is about the adjustment process of sojourning English language teachers, and I intend to complete my research and to publish my findings in peer-reviewed journals.  However, I wanted to share my enthusiasm of the learning process through social media.  This is part of my attempt to bridge the gap between researchers and practitioners. Through my research and my job as instructional designer at Kirkwood Community College, I have discovered many practitioners learning more about teaching and learning through social media than through peer-reviewed research journals.  This is completely anecdotal evidence as I am witnessing teachers sharing what they learn through their practice more than teachers sharing what they learn through reading research articles. ...

These past six months have been quite chaotic in terms of social media.  This blog went on a long hiatus as I was preparing to start my new professional blog geared towards my new job at Kirkwood Community College.  That blog was then overtaken by the blog I started for my job.  So I am here to announce my new blog organization now that the dust has settled.  I will try to start posting on this blog again for two main reasons: 1) I want to write to ESL & foreign language teachers more directly than in the Kirkwood (related) blogs, and 2) Both my job at Kirkwood and my dissertation research project have helped learn the relationship between social media and professional development.  I haven't done much in terms of exploring ideas and concepts of teaching English for glocalized communication beyond my dissertation since March, and I plan to direct part of my learning back this way as my dissertation data analysis eases up.  I have gained a stronger i...

As I mentioned in my previous post, here is the link to my new blog:  http://jdslagoski.blogspot.com/ I will maintain this blog as well, but since the new blog centers around my new job, I will be posting on that one more frequently.  I hope to post on this blog at least once every month or two.

A few weeks ago, I started my new job at Kirkwood Community College in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.  My job title is instructional designer, and thus I will be working with the community college faculty across all subjects and disciplines.  Kirkwood has a large ESL program, but I have not yet had the chance to visit the department yet. Because of my new job and my current dissertation research project, I will not be writing too much on this blog for the next year.  For all things English language teaching, my time will be spent on my dissertation and Twitter @slagoski23.  I expect to blog here a few times, especially when I encounter an engaging question or a brilliant idea.  In the meantime, I will be creating a new blog related to professional development in community colleges with an emphasis on education technology--like we need another edtech blogger.  When the blog is up and running, I will post the link here.

I came across the term "glocalized communication" a few years ago when I was researching perspectives, on teaching English language learners, similar to mine.  I found the term in a chapter of a book about language policies edited by Suresh Canagarajah.  The chapter is an extension of an article written by the same authors a few years earlier.  Below is the reference to that article. Lin, A., Wang, W., Akamatsu, N., & Riazi, A. M. (2002). Appropriating English, expanding identities, and re-visioning the field: From TESOL to teaching English for glocalized communication (TEGCOM). Journal of Language, Identity, and Education, 1 (4), 295-316. What appealed to me the most came not from the original article but from the last section of the chapter, titled "International TESOL Professionals and Teaching English for Glocalized Communication (TEGCOM),"   in which the authors proposed a research program for TEGCOM.  I believe that providing their preliminary out...

One of the biggest reasons multiliteracies is not implemented in the classroom is that it is difficult to assess.  And if you cannot assess your students' learning, then how do you know they are learning?  I'd like to propose a formative assessment, which is more like an activity.  It also happens to be one of my favorite multiliteracies activities that I would like to implement fully.  I have done bits and pieces of it, and that experience has helped me create this example. Purpose and Context  For the past few years multiliteracies has been a secondary research interest of mine. I will define it in the construct section of this posting.  One of the key articles I discovered made a point of concluding the implications of its investigations at the very end of the article, “And finally, there should be alignment between curriculum, pedagogy and assessment. Assessment criteria should include future-oriented new literacies if the latter are to become part ...

As promised in the previous post, I am going to share an idea, although it has not been tried or tested by me.  Perhaps some other English language teacher has done something similar to this: developing English language learners' information and communication technology (ICT) skills while developing their English language skills.  This is kind of like a hybrid of content-based instruction and task-based instruction.  The content includes academic and workplace language regarding ICT, whereas the tasks can vary. For the sake of continuity from the previous post, the example task for this blog is more linguistic:  teach another group of English language learners (in their own classroom, in another classroom, or to future students in their current class) a grammar rule and demonstrate its usage as authentic to your life as possible.  Although some novice level students may be able to do this, I would aim this task at intermediate speakers.  For advanced spea...