Extend activity 1 - concepts commonly misunderstood by students (EFL?)

Identify a concept that is often misunderstood in my discipline (EFL) 

  • testing as a driver for learning 
    • over testing / assessing language students as a motivator to get students to complete work, yet the excess testing means much less time for students to receive formative feedback; and little time to absorb, understand, practice before still more learning concepts are introduced  
      • a steady stream of assessment is piled onto students
        • results? 
          • students resort to coping strategies to address the constant onslaught of assessment
            • working with others 
            • copying practice exercises done by past students
          • formative assessment is compromised
            • students have little or no time to practice, get feedback, learn from feedback, reflect on feedback, apply their new understanding of concept as presented in feedback to revise their work 
            • little time to review recycling of concepts learned and applied by students
            • students do not learn (educational philosophy) and teachers are challenged to provide learning opportunities via formative assessment strategies 
  • approaches to teaching of grammar 
    • typically grammar translation; grammar function 
      • yet overlooked is transferring to students a cultural understanding of how important time is in English culture; reflected in the complexity of grammar 
        • generative grammar of action
        • word order - place and time (video)
    • simplifying the role of grammar to make it easier to learn and then apply
      • grammar equals time and place of action; complexity of time and place typically translates into complexity of grammar 

create an analogy to help make sense of it (Prior knowledge)

  • testing as a driver for learning  
  • analogy for stress on summative testing but no time for formative testing  
  • like being rushed to learn a complex interconnected series of skills required to drive a car safely and because of an impending drivers test without much time for feedback on what you're doing right or wrong .. resort to learning by copying (rote)  
  • go to drivers exam - where you're passed or failed, may provide you with some feedback on why you failed but little or no feedback on ways to improve (research based study skills, academic success, underlying theory not covered because there was no time to cover them)
        • promotes a compliance model for learning but without the underlying reasons for doing what we do  


      Identify a concept that is often misunderstood in my discipline (learning in general) 

      • learning needs to be outcomes based 
        • problem - the approach is not necessarily learner focused 
        • solution? 
          • learning experience design 
            • making the learning an experience that is 
              • personal (relevant to the learner) 
              • positive (this helps with motivation of the learner)
              • profound (seen as significant / useful) 
          • affective / supportive (Nick Shackleton / Jones) 
            • making the learning about experience & resources to help support practice and understanding 
              • minimizing the focus on memorization of information
              • maximizing the focus on experiential practice 


      I find that a misunderstood concept is that we should either choose the tools we use, or simply accept the tools that we’re handed by the institution, and build our learning strategies from there. What tends to be far more effective is to identify the pedagogical strategy that you feel would be most effective for what you are tasked with teaching, whether it’s a behaviourist, objectivist, constructivist, cognitivist or connectivist approach, and work towards choosing the tools that would fit best with those strategies only after those things are identified.

      • behaviourist - drills, stimulus reward  
      • objectivist - objective reality exists (fact); realized through self reasoning , individual must seek to find happiness without doing harm to others, achieved through independent self reasoning
      • constructivist - construct meaning by building on what we already know, practicing application, experiencing & understanding of new ideas when combined with old ..  then checking with peers (student discovers a concept perhaps through experience within a framework provided by teacher)
      • cognitivist - cognitive modeling, understand construction of something - take it apart, the parts that make up the whole and how they function helps us improve our understanding of the whole 
      • connectivist - connection with others, our network (social learning?) and learn from others through them 
      • transformative - cognitive process of effecting change in a frame of reference. - habits of mind, and points of view[44] A frame of reference defines our view of the world. The emotions are often involved.[45] Adults have a tendency to reject any ideas that do not correspond to their particular values, associations and concepts.

      Bobbi Dunham 

      Learner motivation is a misunderstood concept often viewed through a carrot-and-stick lens in higher education. The complexity of motivation is overlooked to the detriment of the learners, and faculty I should add. Accusations and assumptions fly when learners disengage in a course or program, and often the issue is the design of the learning itself.



      Location: Muscat, Oman

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