Last Friday 24th and Saturday 25th April saw the delivery of the second part of “Developing a Dynamic Classroom” training at the UCL IOE. On Friday we were treated to a workshop with Jamie Keddie, author of Oxford University Press’ “Images” and “Bringing Online Video into the Classroom.” Through a series of videos, Jamie introduced us to a variety of ideas and ways in which video can help us bring language alive in the classroom. This can be achieved through looking at audio, visual and textual aspects of the video, and also through using the material to tell stories, and encouraging students’ own “internal narrative” to develop language.  Participants were very enthusiastic, calling this session ” creative and fun” , “very practical and efficient” and “interesting and creative.”

In fact, the enthusiasm was so high, the workshop continued into the first part of Saturday, as groups presented their ideas for lessons, based on a task Jamie set them, which produced an impressive variety of topics, grammar points, ideas for introduction of language or revision, demonstrating just how versatile a 40 second video can be in the classroom.

Saturday then continued with a look at mobile learning with Philippa Vallely, our Teacher Training Coordinator, using five practical examples of the ways in which mobile devices can be utilised inside and outside the classroom to engage learners and develop learning, which one participant stated as her favourite aspect of the training, since “practical examples are given and teachers have a go with guidance”.

This practical aspect continued with examples of mobile learning from the classroom with I-Han Huang, who led sessions on teaching with I-pads.  Using examples from her own classroom practice, I-Han took the participants through the Book Creator and Imovie apps, demonstrating first how she works with both in her environment, then setting tasks for the teachers to then complete in small groups. This was also strongly focused on the pedagogical outcomes that such tasks can achieve, developing all skills, as well as allowing the teacher to develop a different relationship with individual students.

 Teachers then worked on their own ebooks and imovies, producing some very impressive work in a relatively short space of time. Having this opportunity to properly explore the technology was definitely felt by many participants as a key element of the training, with comments such as “Imovie practice and group work are most useful as I can use the creative ideas in class and get students to use mobiles/ ipads for learning.”

Finally, the training concluded with a brief look at blended and flipped learning, and how technology can help develop a stronger pedagogy in our classrooms, and allow for more learning styles to be accommodated in the language learning enviroment. Participants showed great enthusiasm for the training, with feedback comment such as “I hope strongly you can organise more training classes” and “All the course content is so useful. Please have more similar activities.”

For those who missed the opportunity to attend this training, Philippa Vallely and I-Han Huang will be co-presenting a workshop at our Annual Conference in June, based on some of the content from this training event. For information regarding booking this event, please click here.