A new episode of TEFLology is up on the website here.
I'm once again several days late with my review, but here are my thoughts nonetheless.
I've mentioned several times before now that I find the regular episodes of TEFLology to be hit and miss, but the interviews to be really great. At the risk of repeating myself, I'll say it again. This interview was great--interesting, informative, thought provoking--well worth the listen.
I don't have a full review formed in my mind, but I do have a lot of random thoughts, so I'll drop some of those random thoughts here.
* Some of what Denise Murray said about the development of Artificial Intelligence--specifically the gap between the optimistic predictions of when it will arrive, and the reality of how little progress has actually been made, reminded me of this interview with Daniel Dennett on The Ling Space. (A review of The Ling Space Youtube series coming soon.)
* Denise Murray's comments about how computers will never replace teachers in the classroom because teachers are needed to motivate students reminded me of Fredrik deBoer's comments on the same subject.
* The comments about Japanese students using their smart phones for everything, but not being comfortable with other types of technology, rang true for me as well.
My own anecdotes are now very dated, but I remember when I arrived in Japan in 2001 being very surprised that some Japanese people my own age didn't know how to operate a computer. The reason was that they used their phones to do e-mail, texting, and accessing the Internet.
(This relates back to something I've said earlier on this blog--contrary to popular belief, Japan is not some sort of high-tech utopia. It's a strange mixture of being really high tech and at the same time being really low tech).
My subsequent experiences in Cambodia and Vietnam have confirmed to me that young people in many Asian countries are very comfortable using smart phones, but less comfortable with personal computers--which is what Denise Murray is saying in her talk.
* When I taught English for Academic Purposes in Cambodia, I experienced many of the things Denise Murray and the TEFLologist talk about in this interview.
For example, students not being able to distinguish between reliable sources of information on the Internet, and unreliable. (Which is why I ended up having to create this worksheet on using Wikipedia).
I also particularly enjoyed this exchange on copying and pasting from the Internet:
--It's not just how authentic it is, it's the language at a level that they can read in. You know, they can't, so what do they do? They copy and paste. And the copy and paste syndrome has just absolutely proliferated and escalated as a result of mainly the second reason that the students can't understand it, and somebody said it, so, it's got to be the best thing so I'll just cut and paste it
--Yeah, students often say, "how did you know that I didn't write that sentence?" Well, cause I don't think you know the word "eschatological" for example.
--Yeah, you're right. They're absolutely surprised when teachers say to them that "this isn't your own work"
Oh man, this is SO TRUE.
When I first started teaching English for Academic Purposes, I rather enjoyed the thrill of catching plagiarists in action. "Aha! Thought you could trick me, huh? Well here's your essay back, and here's the Wikipedia page you copied it from. I win again. Ahahaha."
But as time wore on, and I kept getting essay after essay that was just blatantly copied and pasted from the Internet, I began to tire of the game.
I tried so hard to make my students understand how obvious it was to me that they were copying from the Internet. I put up their essays on the projector, and showed them how obvious the difference in style was between the sentences they wrote, and the sentences they had copied from the Internet.
It's a strange thing, because the difference in style seems so obvious to us native speakers that we wonder why the students would even try to get away with passing something off as their own work. But as Denise Murray and the TEFLologist says, the students are always surprised when they get caught.
* I agree with Denise Murray and the TEFLologist when they talk about the problems of technology in the classroom, and how easy it is for the students to get distracted by other things on the smart phone or the tablet device. Oh, the stories I could tell about students getting distracted on their smart phones, and not paying attention to the lesson. Someday I'll write a book about it.
* I also agree with Denise Murray when she says that if a school is going to make technology a priority in the classroom, then they need to provide support and tech training to the teachers. On this issue also, I have more stories than I have time to write. I'll have to save this rant for another time as well.
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