At the CLS 10th Anniversary Symposium, Andrew Littlejohn was mentioning McDonaldization of education. For those, who are not familiar with this term, it’s coined from George Ritzer‘s claim of the McDonaldization of the Society. McDonaldization of education means:

[A] process that, if it were taken to its logical conclusion, would transform schools into the instructional equivalent of fast food outlets. Of particular concern is the de-skilling of educators into deliverers of canned programs, the unhealthy standardization of curriculum and pedagogy and the commercialization of public schools. (Leo Casey at Edwize.org)

It seems that this is an issue of the Anglo-American Utilitarian view of education, which is also adopted by the Germans, who had a Humanistic view. The difference is the follows. In the Utilitarian view, the main point of education is getting a degree and training for the job market, while the Humanistic view sees education as (self-)development of the human being. The job market is not focused. Both views are reasonable, however, in their extremes, both are harmful.

Education = jon training? (source)

When focusing only on degrees and training for the industry, educational institutions become lose independence in their decisions, what to teach how. The industry is interested in fast and effective education. So, long-lasting discussions and deep reasoning on difficult issues is not required by the industry. On the other hand, they want well-educated people, being able to think. But thinking is a skill that need constant practice. This view also affects students’ attitudes towards learning. First of all, they will choose their majors according to economical needs and income prospects. Of course, this is reasonable to do. However, most of the students will end up studying subjects, they are not interested in. Bored students, however, are not really keen on working hard in their subjects. They only want to do, what they have to to get their grades. Some of them might also have a genuine interest in their subject, they’ll do more and will be open. The majority, however, will only do the minimum. And that’s bad for society, as a considerable amount of professionals will be uninspired, not happy with their job and therefore not doing a good one.

A romantic view on education alone, wouldn’t help us either. Of course, people will start working after finishing their first stage of education (as we are learning all life long, or at least should). So, having the necessities of working environments in mind is not a bad thing per se and should also play a role. Otherwise, you’ll have thinkers, who are not able to put theory in action. However, if people study according to their interest (perhaps, guided a little by job market observation (but not to such an extent that a musician studies engineering, because the job market requires her to)), they’ll have an interest in their subjects, would be keen on working and thinking about issues arising in their lectures or seminars and take their learning into their own hands. If we are not only focused on grades, we can focus, on what is really necessary – learning, discussing, practice thinking.

As an educator, I want my students to be independent of me when it comes to learning. Of course, I have to guide them through the content. I have to be there, if they encounter problems and have to give feedback on their performance.

From my point of view, education is more than training for the job market, it is a further development of the learners’ personalities, enriching their experiences and helping them to become members of society being able to take part in its enhancement. Grades and degrees are necessary and valuable, but not the main point.

Wallwisher wall, click to enlarge

A notice can consist of up to 160 characters. Web pages, videos or audios can also be linked though.

Websites and video open in larger frames on the wall. For a website, it looks somewhat like this:

Wallwisher entry with website, click to enlarge

Wallwisher is a quick and simple way to share ideas in a visual appealing fashion.

Scenarios for teachers:

• Getting feedback.
• Have a somewhat different link list.
• Share information quickly.

Tom Barrett has collected 32 ideas to use Wallwisher in the classroom.

Scenarios for learners:

• Collect your most information
• Build a wall for a team project and share information quickly.
• …

Talkgroup entries can be downloaded as RSS feed, hence podcast.

Scenarios for teachers:

• Language teachers can ask their students to speak about certain topics (e.g., introduce yourself, talk about your last holiday, record a dialogue …).
• Discussion group. Ask a thought-provoking question and ask students to respond.
• Q & A. Give students the opportunity to ask questions related to your class.
• …

Scenarios for learners:

• Run a reading group using this tool.
• …

1. Simplicity

A tool has to be fool-proof. Although we might consider our students tech-savvy, not all of them are able to use difficult technologies. As a foreign language teacher, I had been looking for a possibility to record and upload audio files. The “classical” approach would be:

• Record your voice using a recording application, such as Audacity.
• Export the result as MP3.
• Go to your blog.
• Add a new post and insert your MP3 file in a new post.
• Done.

That’s simple. But each step contains dozens of small problems, we don’t even think of. But I’m sure our students will find them.

2. Pricing

The tools should be free of charge, at least for the students. There are certain services that are very helpful. As a teacher, I’m willing to pay a reasonable premium. For the students, however, the services should be free of charge.

3. Ad-free or appropriate ads

I understand that services need money, they have to run a website and the developers need something to chew and drink. So, advertisements are okay, as long as they are appropriate.

4. Privacy and security

Every time, we use online tools, there are privacy issues to think about. There should be the possibility to password-protect the students’ work.

5. We also have to teach media competence

Our students use (digital) media on a daily basis. The emergence of Web 2.0 applications made content generation very easy. There is, however, the need to teach our students the pros and cons of using these technologies. What can be done and what should be omitted. Finally, such questions as password security, copyright issues and ethical questions should also be discussed.

… this list is going to be continued …

When I came to NUS, I thought that the use of “nicht” in german is fairly simple. However, it’s a little bit more tricky in German than in Englisch. Here is a presentation to discuss this concept with my students.

Audioboo

Audioboo is a free online application, which also offers iPhone, Android and Nokia app. You can record a sound file with up to 5 minutes length. It is stored online. You can also connect with twitter and Facebook and get you “boos” published there, too. Finally, you can also embed boos on websites and blogs.

Of course, you can also send the URL of your boo, if you don’t want to “advertise” it too much. Here is one example.

Soundcloud

Soundcloud lets you share sound of unlimited length. They can also be illustrated with photos, which makes it a perfect tool for podcasting. However, you can also record with your smartphone (iOS or Android) or your computer. And you can also link it with Facebook, twitter or tumblr.

Why not using soundcloud? by Martin G. Döpel

Sprechprojekte

Here are some ideas for speaking projects. Do you have something to add? Feel free to do so!

Here is a Spycynode map about reading strategies. There is one thing, I’ve learned though: Never link nodes, as this generates a “vicious circle”.

I also made a non-interactive version of this mind map. Here as large picture:

(Image source)
and here with all the nodes and branches as text:
Lesestrategien

It’s microblogging

Twitter is a microblogging application, its philosophy and how it works is beautifully explained in this video.

Most of my students use Facebook for this. Twitter, however, has some interesting features that make it still interesting:

• Sharing information is not based on a mutual relationship. Most of us only have a personal account on Facebook. So, I have to friend someone, if I want to exchange information with her/him. Though such a limitation can be set up in twitter, the default case is that you follow everyone, you find interesting.
• Many people use twitter to make aware of links, they came across. So, it is a kind of “link catapult”.
• Twitter helps you separate your “private” from your “public” personality. For the first one, you have Facebook. The second one, though, can express itself on twitter.

How does it work?

There are only few things, one has to know.

• You have only 140 characters. For most messages, this is enough.
• Links are shortened. This blog entry’s URL is “http://www.martin-doepel.de/blog/2011/09/30/twitter/” and has 52 characters. Therefore, links are shortened by services such as tinyURL or bit.ly. You as a user don’t have to think about this twitter clients and twitter’s website shorten links automatically.
• If you want to address someone, you have to mention her/him. This is done by putting a “@” in front of their username. So, if you want to mention me, you would have to write @mgdoepel.
• If you are writing about a certain topic and want to make it searchable, you can add a hashtag (#) in front of it. So, if you are complaining about your blog software, you can tag the topic with something like #wordpress.
• Re-tweets. Re-tweeting means that you also publish the tweet. A simple re-tweet is very seldom. However, people usually re-tweet with a short comment.

Why should you twitter?

As mentioned before, twitter helps you to separate public from private. Through twitter, you can interact with people, you don’t know, but you share the same interests. Very often, you can learn about news faster on twitter than on any other media, e.g. I learned about Amy Whinehouse’s death when I realized that there are plenty of R.I.P. tweets about her.

Twitter helps you to formulate shortly. You can even break up with someone using twitter, as explained by Jason Preston.

Scenarios for students

• Share links to videos, websites etc. you find interesting.
• Follow your project partners and share links using twitter.
• Give feedback. If your lecturer, teacher has twitter, you can leave her/him a short notice.
• Practice a foreign language. The limitation of 140 characters can give you peace of mind, as
• …

Scenarios for educators

• Twitter can be used as a “quick and dirty” announcement tool. Make sure that you have agreed on a hashtag with your students.
• Share links that might be interesting for your students over twitter.
• Set up a class account, so it’s easier for your students to follow your updates and students can also share information by mentioning the account (e.g., “Hey @class5a guys, this could be interesting for us biy.ly/123856″
• Twitter can be used for instant feedback (students can tweet their questions), this is great for lectures with many students. Tweets can also be included in the Powerpoint and Prezi presentation.
• Make a twitter poll.
• If you are  foreign language teacher, you can encourage students to write updates and see their progression.
• Link your blog with your twitter account to announce/advertise your posts.
• …

Writing is a skill that needs to be learned, the more you practice the better you’ll become. And that applies to your mother tongue as well as to your foreign language. Blogs also offer the opportunity to reflect about complex issues, resulting in better understanding and the emergence of new ideas. So, blogging is good for your critical thinking abilities.

In the foreign language you have to start small first

If you start to learn a foreign language, you have a problem though – your linguistic capabilities are not sufficient enough to write long texts. Often, learners also hesitate to blog, as they think long blogs require longer posts. Therefore, they might start using twitter. Having only 140 characters is sometimes frustrating, but it gives beginner peace of mind. One or two sentences is enough. But soon, they might also want to go bigger.

tumblr and posterous let you go (a little) bigger

To close this gap, there are two services, you might want to use – tumblr and posterous. Both offer pretty much the same, but posterous is more a photoblogging service. There are a number of comparisons between

• tumblr and wordpress (the later a blogging tool) – 1, 2, 3, 4, 5
• posterous and wordpress – 1, 2, 3
• and tumblr and posterous – 1, 2, 3

From my own experience, tumblr and posterous have the following advantages:

• Very good mobile phone integration.
• Espeacially for tumblr, as you can choose, whether your content is a text, quote, picture or video, you don’t feel compelled to write long posts. Only a quick thought, that’s enough. On the other hand, you are not constrained to the 140 character limitation of twitter.
• Posterous and tumblr work great with social websites. You can link your accounts to twitter and Facebook. Posterous supports the most common blogging services, too.

Tumblr and Posterous “in action”

Tumblr dashbord - choose your entry type

tumblr - Dashboard entry

Posterous - new entry

Can I make it safe?

Probably, you don’t want other people to see the efforts, you undertake to learn a foreign language. Both, tumblr and posterous offer protected blogs. Tumblr uses password-protection for whole blogs, whereas posterous offers you a “private space”, in which you have to invite people in.

Can my students get feedback?

I have a tumblr and a posterous account. However, I would like my students to use tumblr, as it makes it easier for me to follow your efforts. Please send me an email with the details of your tumblr blog (username, blog URL).

Scenarios for students

• Start a blog about your major, write about the things, you learned and try to comment on developments in your field.
• Write short paragraphs in your foreign language on a daily basis. What have you done today? What happened? Write texts about yourself: my friends, my room, my country … (add photos, when appropriate)
• Write something that is important to you. There are no ridiculous topics.
• …

Scenarios for educators

• I think, teachers should rather have a “proper” blog. However, quick thoughts can also be posted there. And sometimes, a picture is worth a thousand …
• Set up a posterous/tumblr account for your class and allow your students to contribute to a space/blog.
• Give your students blogging tasks depending on your topic.