Project

In the School of Modern Languages of the Universidad Central de Venezuela, students choose two languages their first day. These two languages –among other subjects- will be studied for five years in order to obtain a Bachelor’s Degree in Translation, Interpretation or Research in Languages. Many of them choose English for different reasons. However, many of them do not have previous knowledge about the language, even though it is a mandatory subject in high school.

In the first years, English was separated into four components: reading and writing, listening and speaking, grammar and laboratory; each one with its own learning material and teacher. Hence, as the approach and workload were very different from high school, the experience was usually shocking. In the first year, students struggled to understand the language, and the course with its components, different materials, several teachers… Some of them ended up with a very strong feeling of dislike towards the language. In order to avoid this situation, the English curriculum has been modified. In the last two academic years students do not have the subject separated into four components, and they only have a single book and a workbook, which includes all skills –reading, writing, listening and speaking and also sub-skills such as grammar. Additionally, they work with a novel adapted to their English level, to encourage extensive reading.

This academic year, students focused their attention on a single set of two books (from the Upstream series) and a short novel (called Brave New World). The book and workbook have numerous colors, pictures and images, font types and sizes for the presentation of information. On the contrary, the novel has a plain presentation of information, no pictures, images or colors, and it has only one type and size of font. English seems to be understood better this academic year, according to the impression of some of the teachers I frequently talk. However, the novel has been difficult to read and comprehend for some of them: only a small amount of input is becoming intake. This might be due to the lack of pictures, images, colors and the rather dull presentation of input.

Therefore, based on this information, the research to be carried out focuses on the differences of presentation of input, and my research question would be: Should input be presented in a different way (i.e. with colors, pictures, audio, video, hands-on-works, etc.) in order to increase intake? Can the Web help teachers to present information in a way that translates into a greater amount of intake? These and other questions will be addressed in this study.


Research questions

• How does presentation of input influence intake?

• Does quality of input affect amount of intake?

• Should input be presented in a different way in order to increase intake?

• Can the Web help teachers to present information in a way that results in greater amount of intake?

Here you have my Project's PPT

Presentation on ICT in ELT Project

View more presentations from Fernanda Liendo.

12. E-Assessment

The A-Assessment Association defines the term as: “the use of electronic processes for registration of candidates to certification and also the end-to-end assessment processes from the perspective of learners, practitioners, school administrators, learning establishments, awarding bodies and members of the general public”. According to Evelyn Izquierdo, our ICT in ELT professor, e-assessment is gathering data about a student’s performance over a period of time through the use of information technology, and it is different from evaluation since marks are not assigned to the undertaken tasks. E-assessment includes students’ activities ranging from the use of a computer application to on-screen tests.

There are three types of assessment, although the terms are usually interchanged:

1. Computer Assisted/Mediated Assessment: this refers the use of computers within the assessment process. The computer only facilitates the transfer of responses between humans.

2. Computer-Based Assessment: it refers to assessment through the intrinsic use of a computer. It is related to IT practical skills or knowledge tests. The difference here is that the computer assesses the candidates’ responses.

3. Online assessment: this one requires the use of the Internet. The transfer of data is conducted via the Internet; nevertheless, few sessions or activities are actually online in real time.

Nowadays, e-assessment is frequently used since it has more advantages than traditional paper-based assessments:

- Flexibility in terms of time and location

- Improved reliability with respect to marking

- Instant feedback to students

- Greater storage

- Interactivity

- Multimedia

- Lower long-term costs

However, it also has disadvantages. For instance, e-assessment is not suitable for long response questions and it is expensive to establish. Here is an example of e-assessment in Mathematics and Numeracy. If you have examples in Language Teaching, I will be thrilled to include them in this blog. Feel free to contact me.

For more information on this topic, visit the following links

E-Assessment in Wikipedia

E-Assessment Association

E-Assessment: Guide to Effective Practice