LESSON 9: MOTIVATION & LATERAL THINKING

MY SCHOOL DAYS

Think back to your school days & agree on five things you didn’t like about your English lessons at high school.

- Too much focused on writing.

- No games, speaking was very unnatural and under pressure.

- Grammar was the most important

- No projects, we never watched films or performed role-plays.

- Lack of real situations. Communication was very forced.

How can we improve that?

- Same focus on the four skills: speaking, listening, reading and writing.

- More games, to encourage students to talk in a real an motivated situation

- Same importance to form than content.

- Projects focus on problem solving, real life... E.g.: analysis of films, role-plays, videoclips...

- To create real communication in the classroom, by means of realia and involving students in real situations.

LATERAL THINKING

Lateral thinking means resolving problems through an indirect and creative approach, using reasoning that is not immediatelly obvious and involving ideas that may not be obtainable by using only traditional step-by-step logic.

EXAMPLE

1. You are driving down the road in your car on a wild, stormy night, when you pass by a bus stop and you see three people waiting for the bus:

1. An old lady who looks as if she is about to die.
2. An old friend who once saved your life.
3. The perfect partner you have been dreaming about.

Knowing that there can only be one passenger in your car, whom would you choose?

By means of this puzzle, students start to think different possibilities, but they do not have any rules to follow. They just have to find the best solution.

LESSON 8: WHAT MOTIVATES STUDENTS?

WHAT IS MOTIVATION?

The importance that motivation can have in every kind of learning and overall in a language learning is shown in Corder’s sentence: “If there is motivation, everyone can learn a language”.

It is well known that affective variables are very involved in the learning situation. In fact, as Stern (1983) states, “the affective component contributes at least as much and even more to language learning than cognitive skills.

So, there is no doubt that learner’s motivation is one of the most important variables influencing the learning process. But how can we define motivation? Many definitions have been produced, but most of them share that motivation is the motive power to act. Following Harmer (1991) we can say that this term refers to “some kind of internal drive that encourages somebody to pursue a course of action”.

MOTIVATION CAN BE:

• Instrumental: wanting to learn a language for the purpose of obtaining some concrete goals such as job, graduation, or the ability to read academic materials.

• Integrative: when students want to learn a language to become part of a speech community (integrate).

• Extrinsic: refers to behaviour that is driven by external rewards such as money, fame, grades and praise.

• Intrinsic: refers to behaviour that is deriven by infernal rewards. In other words, the motivation to engage in a behaviour arises from within the individual because it is intrinsically rewarding.

The next question we should make about motivation is: 

how can we motivate our students?

According to this question, it is worthwhile mentioning that Hutchinson (1991) finds that motivation is improved by three factors:

 1. If the activities are relevant for the students, and connected with their lives, they will be more motivated. For example, we can ask them to search information about their favourite sport, or to read a text about their favourite film. We can also use ICT resources in order to look for information, to play interactive games, etc., which always are more attractive for students than textbooks.

  2.   Learning through doing: For example, we can ask them to follow some instructions in order to cook a recipe or to create a video clip.

  3.   The students’ sense of achievement is very important. They must feel that they are producing worthwhile products and that these products are the result of their learning process.

     Ways of arousing interest

• Clear goals.
• Varied topics and tasks.
• Visuals.
• Tension and challenge: games.
• Entertainment (jokes, stories, songs, documentaries, video clips…)
• Play-acting.
• Information gap.
• Personalization.
• Open-ended cues.

-  

ASSIGNMENT 5: INDEX OF LEARNING STYLES QUESTIONNAIRE

INDEX OF LEARNING STYLES QUESTIONNAIRE

The term "learning styles" speaks to the understanding that every student learns differently. Technically, an individual's learning style refers to the preferencia way in which the student absorbs, processes, comprehends and retains information. For example, when learning how to build a clock, some students understand the process by following verbal instructions, while others have to physically manipulate the clock themselves. 

This notion of individualized learning styles has gained widespread recognition in education theory and classroom management strategy. Individual learning styles depend on cognitive, emotional and environmental factors, as well as one's prior experience. In other words: everyone's different. It is important for educators to understand the differences in their students' learning styles, so that they can implement best practice strategies into their daily activities, curriculum and assessments. 

In my case, according to these results, we can say that: 

I am a little more active learner than reflective. This means that I tend to retain and understand information best by doing something active with it, such as applying or explaining it to others. "Let's try it out and see how it works", more than "Let's think it through first". I prefer group work than working alone. 

I am much more sensing learner than intuitive. It means that I tend to like learning facts, more than discovering possibilities and relationships. I prefer solving problems by means of well-established methods and I don't like complications and surprises. 

I am practically as visual as verbal learner. But a bit more visual. It means that I remember things either through visual (pictures, diagrams, films or demonstrations) or verbal (words, written texts or explanaitions). 

I am practically as sequential as global learner. But a bit more global. It means that I tend to gain understanding either in linear steps or in large jumps. I like absorbing material randomly without seeing connections and suddenly "getting it", but I also work following logically steps from the previous one. 

And you, what are your learning styles? 
Click here and make this questionnaire in order to know your results. 

https://www.engr.ncsu.edu/learningstyles/ilsweb.html

ASSIGNMENT 4.1. FIND YOUR STRENGTHS

WHAT'S YOUR LEARNING STYLE?

This form can help you determine which intelligences are strongest for you. If you're a teacher or tutor, you can also use it to find out which intelligences your learner uses most often. Many thanks to Dr. Terry Armstrong for graciously allowing us to use his questionnaire.

• One of my learning styles is body movement, because I like learning through movements. For example, I like playing sports such as tennis or volley ball. I also like other activities such as running, riding a bicycle, etc. In a classroom, I like methods such as Total Physical Response, because we learn English relating movements with actions. I also like role-plays and games which include dancing. 

• I also like learning in groups, sharing ideas and opiniones with other people, so another learning style is the social. My favourite tasks are in groups of three or four. I think I am very good establishing objectives in a group work and organising the information. 

• Nevertheless, sometimes I am overloaded and I prefer working alone, being independent and taking decisions by myself. So the conclusión is that I am very good dealing with both situations, working in groups and working individually. 

And you, what are your learning styles? 
Click here to see your results!

http://www.literacynet.org/mi/assessment/findyourstrengths.html

ASSIGNMENT 4: MULTIPLE INTELLIGENCE SELF-ASSESSMENT

Multiple intelligences

Almost 80 years after the first intelligence tests were developed, a Harvard psychologist named Howard Gardner challenged this commonly held belief. Saying that our culture has defined intelligence too narrowly, he proposed in the book Frames of Mind (1993) the existence of seven basic intelligences Then he added an eighth and discussed the possibility of a ninth. He suggested that intelligence has more to do with the capacity of solving problems and fashioning products in a context-rich and naturalistic context.

THIS IS MY RESULT:

Seeing this, I can say that I am very intelligent establishing relationships, with others (interpersonal), but also with myself (intrapersonal).

This means that I am a person who likes being in contact with other people, sharing feelings and experiences. But also, I am good understanding my feelings and emotions. Therefore, some qualities I could have are empathy, sensitivity, self-confidence, etc. 

Other qualities I can highligh about myself are the linguistic and the naturalistic. According to the first one, I feel comfortable when I present my ideas, (orally or written). Moreover, I like languages, how they are organised and other elements such as syntax, lexicon... 

According to naturalistic, I consider myself a person who enjoys with the nature, visiting beautiful landscapes. I also like animals. 

However, I am not good at logical-mathematics. Certainly, I always avoid problems which need a lot of reasoning, because I lose in specific details. Moreover, I do not like calculations and numbers.

And you, what is your best intelligence?

Click here and find your most developed intelligences 

https://www.edutopia.org/multiple-intelligences-assessment

LESSON 7: MULTIPLE INTELLIGENCES & LEARNING STYLES II

LESSON 6: MULTIPLE INTELLIGENCES & LEARNING STYLES I

Speaker’c corner 1: Lawrence Stenhouse

Lawrence Stenhouse (29 March 1926-1982) was a British educational thinker who sought to promote an active role for teachers in educational research and curriculum development. 

Stenhouse was particularly influential during the 1960s and 1970s. He helped to develop innovative classwork for secondary school pupils through the Schools Council Humanities Project.

SHOULD WE TEACH KNOWLEDGE OR SKILLS?

• My reflection of this: 

In my opinion, we should teach both of them, evenly and combined. 

The contents that students learn in school are not only conceptual (facts and concepts) but also procedural, that is to say, content that teaches "how to do something".

Therefore, we must teach what an equation is, but also, how to solve it. Or another example: it is useless for a student to learn the whole biography (knowledge) of a literary author, if after, he does not know reading and interpreting his work (skills).

Here we can observe 7 essential skills students must develop nowadays in order to success. 

THE SOLO TAXONOMY: 

When we talk about taxonomy, we refer to a hierarchy of skills about learning. We start from the most simple skill, and the learning of higher skills depends on the acquisition of the previous skills. 

As in this picture, we can observe that each skills requires the previous one to be acquired. That is to say, I would not be able to describe (3rd step) if I did not acquire the ability to identify.