Wednesday, December 11, 2013

Reflection of Week 10

 
http://www.jedakang.com/index.php?route=module/cvform

Thank God, all ran quite well from the beginning to the end. Everything went nicely from week 1 to week 10. We altogether swam across the sea of Webskills sciences. We altogether climbed the mountain of teaching technology knowledge. We altogether dug up the land of teaching practice lessons. All are very invaluable things and unforgettable experiences during our life. All are too important for our teaching future.
Nine weeks went away but they are still in my deep heart of teaching activities. 



On week 1, I started to do my first learning of Webskills by creating a blog. The blog I created was named "Building Teaching Skills through the Interactive Web that can be visited at http://e-teachingweb.blogspot.com/. This blog is for a weekly reflection that posted various information of my own activities and understanding on all tasks given by Mr. Sean and all comments from some of Webskills class friends. It is a very useful online tool for communication.

On Week 2, I studied the ABCD Learning Objectives Framework and Effective Web Searches that were very new important knowledge and science of technology of teaching. I learned more how to design a learning objective for my translation class based on the ABCD Model and browsed many valuable search engines. These facilities help me enhance the teaching and learning process in my classes.

On Week 3, I studied how to apply Skill-building Websites for Oral/Aural Skills and save Bookmarks with Delicious. The section of Skill-building Websites for Oral/Aural Skills was not too applicable in my classes because all classes I taught were translation studies classes. I rarely used oral/aural teaching tools. The second section was creating a Delicious link. This link is very important for bookmarking many online references. I created one link named https://delicious.com/erhamadina. My Delicious net now has 247 bookmarks. This is a bank of references that are very important for all. How a great tool Delicious.com is.

On Week 4, I studied more about Skill-building Websites for Reading/Writing Skills and Technology-enhanced Lesson Plans. This section was very important for me because what I taught had a close relevance to this part. Reading and writing skills were two skills that were developed in my translation classes. Students were asked to read some e-books for their theoretical bases of translation. They were also trained to understand the English texts by reading all carefully, then they had to translate all into Indonesian language accurately. That was an academic activity the students did from reading the text to writing the result of translation, because translation itself principally is rewriting process and product after reading activity. I also learned how to make a lesson planned enhanced with technology that can be seen at https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B-IlYgoe1g38MVVpbGJIUnBWSE0/edit?usp=drive_web.

On week 5, I did many things in relation to Project-based Learning, WebQuests, and rubrics. I learned more about Project-based Learning (PBL) as a method of teaching that allows students to gain a deeper understanding of the concepts and standards at the heart of a project (http://www.bie.org/about/what_is_pbl/). Talking about WebQuest, I read an explanation about it at (http://zunal.com/zunal-help/help-about-whatiswebquest.php). I tried to create Project-based learning and WebQuests though it is not good yet, but I was successful in applying this web application that can be seen at http://questgarden.com/164/08/7/131110091317/.

On week 6, I learned more about Creating Student-centered Classes and Interactive PowerPoint. On this week 6 I made tutor blog or web http://duniaterjemah.com/for managing my online teaching for my classes and asked students to create a learner blog. One of their learner blog can be seen at http://e-teachingweb.blogspot.com/p/the.html. I also made interactive PowerPoint slides for my translation classes that can be seen at https://sites.google.com/site/seanswebskillswikifall2013/powerpoints.

On week 7, I learned about Learner Autonomy, the One-computer Classroom, and Mobile Devices. This section was very invaluable for me to improve students' autonomous learning, applying one-computer classroom, and using mobile devices for enhancing teaching and learning process in or out the classroom with technology.

On Week 8, I did many things in relation to Teacher Resources Online that could be applied and practiced for online teaching and learning process and activities. On this week 8 I created Class Site of Translation Studies that can be visited on https://sites.google.com/site/translationclasssite/. This site is a sample for my translation class. This class site has some slots that are very valuable for managing and organizing my class administratively. I also made a handout of translation studies in the form of a compilation composed based on some articles from internet. I attached it on https://sites.google.com/site/translationclasssite/lesson-materials.

On week 9, I completed my activity of Webskills class and tasks by writing a final project that describes what I planned and did for and during the Webskills program. You can read my final project on https://sites.google.com/site/seanswebskillswikifall2013/final-projects. Beside that I also learned more about Learning styles and technology connections from some articles, taking the lesson of four models of learning style: 1) Myers-Briggs Type Indicator; 2) Kolb/McCarthy Learning Cycle; 3) Felder-Silverman Learning Styles Model; 4) Grasha-Riechmann Learning Styles. Those are very important and inspired me to manage my classes based students characteristics and learning capabilty.

Now on Week 10, it is time for me to wrap up. This is the week that makes me sad to do because I will leave my all extraordinary instructors of Webskills program, especially Mr. Sean McClelland who is very patient and smart to lead me to be a good learner of Webskill class and all lovely friend from many countries that accompany me week by week that make me warm in following this program. But I really believe that our friendship will be on forever, ever after this program finished. Let's be our brothers and sisters in the world of Education.

What should I give as my advice? It is very hard for me to give advice because all things run well and completely. However, I want to say for new participants who will take the same program of Webskills next year, you should:
1. Spend your time some hours for concentrating and focusing on all assignments and tasks given weekly, though you are very busy on your school jobs and activities.
2. Be a hard learner that has an inner motivation to run fast in your learning process because it needs extra energy, time, and thought.
3. Be patient to all duties given in this program because all will lead you to be a professional teacher.
4. Be creative on making and creating a product of technology of teaching and other tools or media for our classroom facilities, for examples, creating a blog, class site, WebQuest, and other online tools of teaching and learning.
5. Be a literate learner on technology by learning how to operate computer programs, applications, internet, and other technology in education.
That's all I can say on this week. I hope that what I learned will be useful for me, my students, and institution. A great deep thanks given to all instructors, committees, and University of Oregon staffs, and Department of Education under the United States Embassy. May God bless you all for your kindness and good deeds. Thanks.

Best regards,
Rudi Hartono
Semarang State University, Indonesia

Friday, December 6, 2013

Reflection of Week 9

Woow ... Extraordinary models of Learning style we learned this week.
I read some articles about learning styles and their implications for teaching, and Multiple Intelligences. 

1) Learning Styles
http://www.ian-bradbury.com/documents/

Montgomery and Groat (http://www.crlt.umich.edu/sites/default/files/resource_files/CRLT_no10.pdf) proposed many reasons why we need to incorporate learning styles in our teaching process. There are five reasons they stated: 1) Making Teaching and Learning a Dialog; 2) Responding to a More Diverse Student Body; 3) Communicating our message; 4) Making teaching more rewarding; and 5) Ensuring the future of Our Disciplines. In relation to my own teaching, those five reasons are very logic, particularly the reason of making teaching and learning a dialog. To avoid the boredom and boring activity, we are as teachers must be able to shift teaching methods from the boring method to the interesting one. Making dialog is one of the interesting method of teaching translation I did. This method does not create teaching situation passive, students do not only listen to me explaining translation theory and just sit on the chairs sleepily, but they are active answering and discussing problems and giving comments one another.This is one example way of incorporating learning styles based on the students' mood and interest. This way can make students active and reflective. It is in accordance with Felder and Soloman (http://www4.ncsu.edu/unity/lockers/users/f/felder/public/ILSdir/styles.htm) that have ideas in incorporating learning styles for active and reflective learners.
Then, talking about learning style models discussed by Montgomery and Groat (http://www.crlt.umich.edu/sites/default/files/resource_files/CRLT_no10.pdf) that introduced four models of learning style: 1) Myers-Briggs Type Indicator; 2) Kolb/McCarthy Learning Cycle; 3) Felder-Silverman Learning Styles Model; 4) Grasha-Riechmann Learning Styles, I do agree with all learning style models that can be incorporated in teaching, but not all models can be appropriate for teaching translation.
In my mind, the learning style model that is appropriate with my class of translation is Kolb's Learning Style that has for valuable aspects that can be matched to the teaching and learning process. In this model the teacher is as the assimilator, converger, accommodator, and diverger. Those roles can be played in some students' activities based on the concept of WHAT, HOW, WHAT IF, and WHY.

http://www.crlt.umich.edu/sites/default/files/resource_files/CRLT_no10.pdf
The students' activities can be derived and implemented through some activities based on the following model of activities. 
http://www.crlt.umich.edu/sites/default/files/resource_files/CRLT_no10.pdf
Practically I incorporated this Kolb's Learning Style in my classroom translation activities as follows:

A) WHAT (Teacher as an assimilator/expert in)
1) Lectures of translation theory;
2) Students' textbook reading activity;
3) Doing translation practice;
4) Student's independent research in translation;
5) Making objective exams of translation.

B) HOW (Teacher as a coach/converger in)
1) Doing and solving homework problems;
2) Using computer simulation for doing assignments (through blogs and class site);
3) Making individuals' reports by posting on learner blogs;
4) Demonstrating translation exercises.

C) WHAT IF (Teacher as an evaluator/remediator in)
1) Ending problems;
2) Student presentation;
2) Designing projects of translating;
3) Holding subjective exam;
4) Doing simulation.

D) WHY (Teacher as a diverger/motivator in)
1) Motivational stories;
2) Group discussion;
3) Group projects;
4) Subjective tests;
5) Doing field research.

2) Multiple Intelligences

http://greeneyezwinkin2.wordpress.com/2012/01/22/dr-howard-gardner-on-multiple-intelligences/

In relation to the Multiple Intelligences cited on http://www.thirteen.org/edonline/concept2class/mi/index.html, I have an opinion that translating activities in translation classes tend to:
1) Verbal-Linguistic Intelligence that leads students to be smart in understanding linguistic problems in translation;
2) Interpersonal Intelligence that makes students being responsive on all problems of translation;
3) Naturalist intelligence that forms students to be smart in classifying, analyzing, and categorizing translation problems based on the real facts in daily life.
That's all what I can summarize from what I read through some suggested articles.

Best regards,
Rudi Hartono