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Dear CALL-ISers,
I hope all is going well for you… Happy New Year, new semester, new plans….
TESOL 2018 is a few short weeks away… preps are underway! This
year, like every year, we have a lot to share with you… You already read
the updates on what is happening with the CALL-IS from Past Chair Jack
Watson and Chair Claudio Fleury; TESOL has a new vision for the ISes,
and we are excited to be part of it as we take on the new challenges of
identify.
Similarly, what the CALL-IS brings to the Convention is always
appreciated by the CALL-IS members and TESOLers at large. As noted in
Jack’s and Claudio’s letters, I, too, want to share is the change in
location of the Electronic Village and Technology Showcase Events; they
will be conveniently placed for all TESOLers in the Exhibition Hall
(Booths 491 & 540 respectively). We expect our presence there to
be pivotal since it will welcome not only participants interested in
CALL, but those who are curious or enthusiastic to integrate CALL into
their professional worlds! Committed to the CALL-IS mission, the
volunteer leaders and their teams have been doing great work as they
plan this year’s outreach to all TESOLers interested in using CALL in
their education spaces… Through hands-on small group presentations--the
Electronic Village Technology Fair, EV Classics, and EV mini-workshops
continue to share diverse topics for customized practice, and Our Free
Advice to All and CALL for Newcomers remain two popular events to visit
where experts welcome, answer questions, and provide guidance to
facilitate the use of technology in your education learning spaces. One
of my continued service charges to the Electronic Village is as a
Co-Chair for EV Classics; two time slots have been allocated for you to
visit and hear CALLers share successes and see their outstanding
presentations repeated from past EV Technology Fairs. So please do come
and be part of the whole Electronic Village heart beat!
My main responsibility as the CALL-IS Chair-Elect for this year
was to organize the Academic session, the three IS panel collaborations
and the Hot Topic panel discussions for the Convention. The purpose of
my letter will be to focus on sharing this information.
As every year, we try to plan the panels on current issues,
relevant to TESOLers; this year the topics will include discussion on
blended learning and effective tech-supported spaces, the use of open
education resources and the real picture, the 2017 TESOL Draft Teacher
Education Standard 2e, teacher training and resources, video making and
SMALL, and culture, technology, and learning globally. The varied option
of panel choice will involve diverse experts, collaborating to share
theory, practice and recommendations as well as to discuss with the
audience the queries that may arise through question and answer time.
For the first time with the Intercultural Communication IS and
the Globetrotter Forum, CALL-IS is collaborating for a Special IS Forum
combo session. I am really excited about this; I live in Lebanon and see
how, on a daily basis, diverse cultures come together. The Lebanese use
the technologies and converse by marrying the languages of Arabic
(colloquial or classical), French, English, and/or Armenian amicably in
any communication that is common to most. The 10,452 km² country is
stereotyped to be the “Paris of the Middle East”; Lebanon’s culture has
emerged from civilizations over thousands of years: the Phoenicians,
Assyrians, Greeks, Romans, Persians, Arabs, Crusaders, Ottoman Turks and
French have all had their influence on the Lebanese people. Most
Lebanese students are trilingual and, it is normal that they use the
languages interchangeably in the community. However, in my teaching
environment where English is the language of instruction, the influence
of the students’ diverse language cultures is seen in the ways they
process and communicate information, verbally and nonverbally. During
our panel, the presenters from the CALL-IS, the IC-IS and the
Globetrotters Forum will be sharing their rich experience as they
address the role of culture, technology and language communication
across global platforms; specifically they will be discussing how CALL
and online environments can be used to facilitate intercultural exchange
and competence between teachers and students globally.
Our Hot topic panel on the use of Open Education Resources
(OER) is a topic that is gaining popularity across education spaces but
remains a controversial topic when it comes to actual adoption into the
teaching/learning set ups. The panelists will define OER, explore the
concept of OER, and look at the positive and negative uses of OER as
they share real life experiences.
Our Academic session on blended learning and its effectiveness
will take on a different approach than merely contextualizing blended
learning in the teaching environment. The panelists will not be focusing
on blended learning as a theory of connectivity or as a space to
implement models and strategies, but they will be identifying components
needed for blended learning to showcase suggestions related to blended
or hybrid lesson planning, methodologies, strategies, activities, online
content material, including open education resources (OER), tools and
resources, and assessment.
Our CALL-IS with the Teacher Education (TE)-IS panelists will
be discussing necessities to fulfill what pre-service and in-service
teachers need to know relative to the 2017 TESOL Draft Teacher Education
Standard 2e. The panelists will touch on current apps and other digital
tools for the teachers to enrich and sustain their teaching/learning
space through possible future instruction, assessment and communication
recommendations.
Finally, the Mobile Assisted Language Learning (MALL)-IS with
CALL-IS panelists will be overviewing the role of videos for MOOCs,
online games, language learning apps, and augmented reality. The
panelists will showcase videos use and will debate the idea that videos
may be making the world SMALL.
As part of the Technology Showcase Events, the panel
discussions will be in Booth 540 according to the following dates and
times:
-
Friday, March 30th - 1:00 pm – 2:45 pm
- CALL Academic Session - Blended Learning: Creating (Or
Promoting) Effective Tech-Supported Teaching/Learning
Spaces
-
Thursday, March 29th - 9:30 am – 11:15 am -
CALL-IC-Globetrotters Special IS Forum Session - Addressing
Intercultural Awareness and CALL Importance in a Globetrotting
Endeavor…
-
Wednesday 28th - 3:00 pm – 4:45 pm - CALL-TEIS IS Session - Education Standard 2e, Teacher Training, Technology, Apps, and
Digital Resources
-
Wednesday 28th - 1:00 pm – 2:45 pm - VDMIS-CALL IS Session – Videos in the World of MALL
-
Thursday 29th - 3:45 pm - 5:00 pm – Hot Topic – The
Positive and Negative Use of Open Educational Resources (OER): The Real
Picture
All the panels will all be webcast. So if you are not able to
attend the Convention, know that you will be able to join in the live
sessions from afar. Please check the Electronic Village and
Technology Showcase Events Program book or the Convention
website for schedules and details. The webcast team has been meetings
over the past months, organizing and coordinating all the details for
our webcast sessions.
Another responsibility I have as Chair-Elect is to help arrange
our annual social/dinner dates at the Convention. This year we will
only have one social/dinner date – one gathering that will take place
post the 2018 CALL-IS Open Meeting and Steering Committee Elections and
the EV 2019 Planning Meeting on Wednesday, March
28th at 8:15 pm; it should be a vibrant social
gathering and a great occasion for networking; moreover, the new and old
committee members and the CALL-ISers will have the opportunity team-
and IS community-build. We have combined the outings into one gathering
because TESOL has planned a Taste of Chicago Celebration on Thursday at 7
pm after the Annual Business Meeting, and most of the TESOLers will be
attending the celebration.
Researching restaurants from across the world has not been an
easy task, and although I sought suggestion from friends in the Chicago
area, many thanks go to Jack Watson, Claudio Fleury, and Sandy Wagner
who helped with the arrangements. We will be socializing over a deep
dish pizza since we will be in Chicago! A set menu has been arranged as
has transportation to the venue, so if you are interested in joining us,
please send me your name and email address to add your name to the sign
up list.
I have served CALL-IS across the years as a Steering Committee
member and an Electronic Village lead and/or co-lead, but my year as
CALL-IS Chair-Elect would not have been so fruitful without the
mentoring and advice of Jack Watson, Justin Shewell, Christine
Bauer-Ramazani, and Claudio Fleury. Thank you, my brothers and sister in
CALL!!!
I also want to thank the Steering Committee and the EV Planning
Committee—the leads and their respective teams. They are all wonderful,
dedicated persons who are committed to serve and move the CALL-IS
forward. Moreover, I want to extend my appreciation to the webcast team
and all the presenters who accepted to be part of the planning of the
five panels.
I look forward to serving the CALL-IS as the 2018 Chair with
Claudio as Past Chair, Co-Chair-Elects, Maria Tomeho-Palermino, my EV
Classics 2017 Co-Chair, and Jennifer Meyer, Webcast 2017 Team Leader,
the Steering Committee and the EV Planning Committee.
I have no doubt, it will be another great Convention with all
the accepted and confirmed CALL-IS and Electronic Village sessions and
the Technology Showcase events, the social activities, and the
networking…
I look forward to welcoming you all to the Convention.
Regards,
Christine Sabieh
Dr. Christine Sabieh, Full Professor at Notre Dame University,
is an American who lives in Lebanon. She is a Rotarian (PP 2014) and a
Paul Harris Fellow. Her memberships include ASIACALL (a Past President
for 5years, Lebanese Psychological Association (Founding member
& a Past President for 3 years), TESOLArabia (Testing SIG Member
at large), AACE, WACRA, & TESOL (CALL-IS: serving SC &
EV). Currently, she is the CALL-IS Chair-elect. |
