ACTFL, Connected Learning, and 21st Century Skills

The statement from ACTFL's Position on Tech that connects the most with me is: "However, because language is one of the most complex of all human activities and interactions ACTFL also recognizes the pivotal role of a qualified language teacher to incorporate and manage the implementation of technology so that it effectively supports the language learning experience." In all honesty, there was nothing in the statement that I would alter or add. I think that ACTFL states tech's role clearly for all parties involved. It addresses the role of tech for the teacher but also gives advice to administrators in how tech should be used. I am glad that they emphasized the importance of not allowing tech to be used solely in place of an educator. For me personally, I see tech as another tool for me to use in my classroom. The internet and sites like YouTube provide a wealth of current target language material. Being able to incorporate tools like these hopefully assist me in making what I am teaching relevant and applicable to my students. As I look to the future, another goal is to make the integration of tech a very smooth process into my everyday teaching.

Connected Learning is a new concept in how we view education. Taking the traditional American approach to teaching, according to Connected Learning, is no longer an effective way of preparing students for success and jobs in the 21st century. Through the implementation of Connected Learning, we can utilize all of the technology that is available in our world and combine it with the current culture, student interests, and academics. All four combined will/should make learning more applicable to students and combat apathy.

One thing that I do with my German 3 students at the beginning of the school year is that they create a biography "Etwas über mich" in the TL. Up until now, these have just been hand written or typed and then displayed in the classroom. Using ideas from Connected Learning, I could see them using tech to research something about their future potential careers in the TC or have them interview someone currently in that career and then translate some of the conversation into the TL. Finally, they could create digital projects which could be uploaded to a neutral site where other students in the class could then see and interact with each other about their projects.

21st Century Skills call upon the four major skills that students need to master in order to be successful in our global economy. They center on the 4 Cs of Critical Thinking, Communication, Collaboration, and Creativity. Addressing these four topics together in regards to instruction will hopefully make our students not only more productive but also push them into higher order thinking skills....which as many teachers know, are difficult to reach with many of our students.

In my German 5 class we look at the various dialects spoken throughout the German speaking world. We listen to examples of native dialect speakers and read various texts in those dialects. Students then choose one of the dialects to research further and in the end try to produce a short passage in that dialect. One new idea that recently came to me after reading some of this material is a definite way to introduce more tech into this unit. Given where we live in Pennsylvania, my students have access to native PA Dutch speakers. They could reach out to them to create audio/video recordings of them speaking in the dialect and create oral histories of how the dialect was used in their families and how it and its use has changed over the years. Online tools like Skype or FaceTime could be used to hold the interviews and iMovie could be used to create videos of their interviews. It is tough to say how long a project like this might take since it would depend on who we could get to participate with our class. Their availability would partially determine the length of the project. Given that I am a native dialect speaker, I can see my ability to connect students with other speakers as a positive. One issue I could also foresee is that some older speakers might not be the most interested in participating at first.