2017-2018 Academic Year Fall Semester Teaching and Learning Development Unit Update
Dear all,
Please find the Teaching and Learning Development Unit updates for 2017-2018 Academic Year Fall Semester below:
Common Time Sessions
As you know this year we followed a different procedure for the common time sessions considering the instructor feedback from the previous year. Since all of us do great things in our classes, it was suggested that different teachers could also give sessions and share their valuable ideas and expertise. There have been six sessions so far and all of them were repeated so that instructors with different timetables could join (Please see the table below). In total, 65 participants attended these sessions. We would like to thank our colleagues who gave the sessions voluntarily and the ones who attended and contributed to these sessions. We hope we will continue sharing our ideas and expertise with each other in the future 🙂
If you are interested in giving a session next semester, please contact TLDU by 14.01.2018.
ScOLa ELT Conference
This semester we started working on the organisation of ScOLa’s first ELT conference. We held regular meetings as much as possible with the instructors who volunteered to be a part of the organisation committee. During these meetings, we discussed and finalized various issues such as the theme of the conference, Call for Papers, webpage design, plenary speakers, conference program and promotional posters. We will continue working on this in the upcoming semester with the collaboration of all of us. You can check our website for further information and follow our Facebook and Instagram accounts if you haven’t done so yet 🙂
Webpage: http://scolaconference.ozyegin.edu.tr/
Instagram: @scolaconference
Facebook: @Scolaconference2018
Induction
In the fall module sessions on effective teaching criteria, lesson planning and weekly planning were conducted so that our new colleagues could get familiar with the expectations of our institution. Diagnostic observations were completed in week 9 and actions including another in-class observation, video observation, reading and reflecting were taken for the rest of the module. In addition to the sessions and the observation cycle, individual meetings were held to focus on lesson planning and indiviual needs.
Research Sessions
The group started with 9 people. However, now the number of participants is 5.
Participants have attended 4 sessions which were held on Thursdays in the morning so far:
1. Our interpretation of research & the function of the research community
2. Introduction to the basic steps of conducting a research
• The research problem and questions
3. The introduction and the purpose statement
4. Literature Review
For each session there were suggested articles to read prior to the session. During the sessions, there were group discussions and hands-on-practice in order to internalize the input. And after each session the group came up with guidelines to follow in order to utilize while conducting their research.
After the sessions, participants were expected to work on their research. The tasks that they have completed so far are as follows:
-Thinking about the research problem (choosing & narrowing down the topic)
-Developing the research questions using the guidelines they prepare together
-Writing the introduction and the purpose statement using the guidelines we prepare
-Preparing the literature review map (ongoing)
Participants have received feedback on their introduction and research questions either during the sessions or during the individual conferences.
B1 Project
Although the B1 project class started with more than 120 students, 46 students completed it successfully in this module. Students were expected to attend the 90% of the sessions and complete all the oral or written tasks during and after each session as well as the final project which was shooting a short movie. The first phase of the project started with the input sessions/tasks which provided students with the opportunity to read and listen to different views of different parties on the generational differences and challenges of teaching the new generation. All the tasks were in line with B1 level objectives and some of the tasks completed were conducting interviews with their teachers, reporting their interviews in the sessions, participating in group discussions, conducting research on the issue and presenting their findings orally in the classroom. For each task they were assessed based on the criteria that had been shared with them. The second phase of the project started with narrowing their topics down and learning about the features of shooting an effective short movie. They were supposed to choose a problem related to teaching the new generation, to raise awareness of others on the issue and propose a solution directly/indirectly. Each week they also completed a different step (submitting project proposal, describing the characters and main scenes, writing the first draft of their scenario, etc.) and received feedback to make necessary revisions. Since they worked hard, took responsibility and managed their time effectively, they could produce great projects. You can watch the movies for which we got the permission from students to publish. We hope you will enjoy them.
The links for the videos:
ScOLa Clubs
This semester 6 ScOLa clubs (see below for details) were run by our voluntary teachers. We aimed at providing co-curricular and extra-curricular support to our students who would like to participate outside-class-activities to further develop their English language skills. By the end of the semester, we reached more than 100 students through different club activities. In some clubs, the regular attendees received a certificate of attendance showing that they attended the majority of the sessions.
A2 Speaking Club by Esra Çelik Soydan
B1 Speaking Club by Saadet Şahin
B2 Speaking Club by Sean Monaghan
Everyday English Club by Wasfiyah Talib
TV Show Club by Cem Kaya
Using Technology Club by Selma Tamdoğan Çalışkan
We would like to thank the club teachers for their effort in promoting and running these clubs, and we hope to continue these activities in the upcoming semester with the collaboration of all of us. If you would like to run a club in the Spring semester, you can contact TLDU by the end of this week.
Study Center
Study center continued providing individual outside-class support for ScOLa students. This semester the center was visited around 300 times which was a record compared to last year Fall semester visits (124 times) and the previous year Fall semester visits (92 times). We also provided “How-to” Sessions on Vocabulary study and Writing study for the students at different levels. We are happy to be of help for our students who seek this kind of help. Thank you all for your effort to guide your students who need extra support.
We aimed at updating ScOLa about news in our school and in the ELT world through our blog posts. We tried to use this blog for the updates as much as possible so that all the posts, news, reflections and comments are available whenever we need them. If you would like to contribute to the blog by posting reflections and news, please contact TLDU.
Thank you all for the smooth Fall semester & See you in Spring Semester 🙂
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