Your EDOK Assignment
Examines Perspectives
about Employing
the Target Language
in the Classroom.

July 15, 2009

Dear Interns:

An important aspect of becoming a highly qualified teacher involves reading about the research in our field of foreign and second language learning. Research offers us insight into many areas of language learning involving content and pedagogy. In the process of reading research, we are also learning the discourse of the profession.

Another benefit for interns and novice teachers relates to the act of reflection. We become reflective practitioners as we compare the research to our own contexts and beliefs.

The EDOK assignment introduces you to the first article of the internship, Bateman's study, "Student Teachers' Attitudes and Beliefs about Using the Target Language in the Classroom" (2008). Two documents that support this assignment are available for download:
 
1) the EDOK descriptor, and
2) the EDOK rubric.

Citation example for a peer-reviewed journal article as required for this class:
Bateman, B. E. (2008). Student teachers' attitudes and beliefs about using the target language in the classroom. Foreign Language Annals, 41(1), 11-28.

The assignment is due no later than midnight on Friday, July 17.

See you in class. 

Dr. Bowles 

Let's Keep Our Sense
of Excitement and Exhiliration.
(And Here's Your First Study Guide.)

July 12, 2009

Greetings, interns! One-fifth of our semester is done.   As we race to the finish, let's maintain our sense of excitement and exhiliration.  Just to give you a moment of inspiration, try this link:

"The Climb" by MC....

It's about the process, not the product.

To help you get to the other side, I've created a study guide for Chapter One, Teacher's Handbook [Shrum and Glisan].

S T U D Y    G U I D E    Chapter One

Let's have a great week.

Dr. Bowles 

July 16, 2009

Interns: Please note that the Chapter Two Study Guide is now available.

S T U D Y    G U I D E    Chapter Two
 

July 19, 2009

Interns: Please note that the Chapter Three Study Guide is now available.

S T U D Y    G U I D E    Chapter Three
 

July 25, 2009

Interns: Please note that the Chapter Five Study Guide is now available.

S T U D Y    G U I D E    Chapter Five
 

We Begin with the Study
of Second Language Acquisition,
Learning Theories,
and Professional Standards.

Greetings, interns, and welcome to your first semester of Special Methods of Teaching Foreign Languages. Just today I received an E-mail from a former intern who now teaches French at the Math and Science School in Hot Springs. She wrote, “Oh I remember how anxious I was to get going and get teaching then, soaking up everything the MAT professors said to us!” Frances’ motivation lead to her winning a national award for distance learning this spring.

Now you are ready to embark on a wondrous voyage of exploration and discovery as we delve into the deeps of second language acquisition, learning theories, and professional standards. Working together, we will explore the relationship between content knowledge, methods of teaching languages, and how to design instruction for student learning.

The summer semester passes quickly as we read, write, discuss, practice, and prepare for your internship. We begin by examining how professional standards and organizations guide us in becoming highly effective teachers. We also look at how standards align with curriculum design at the state and local levels. You will learn how theory informs teaching, how practice brings experience, and how reflection returns you to theory.

By the end of the summer semester, you will be able to design and teach a lesson and understand how instruction relates to language-learning standards and theories.

Remember that the journey never ends. Learning to teach is a complex process — an interaction between teachers and learners in unique contexts and settings. It is a reciprocal act of art and science, requiring ongoing planning and collaboration. Teaching and learning are forever.

Dr. Bowles 
Freddie A. Bowles
Assistant Professor of Foreign Language Education
Department of Curriculum and Instruction
College of Education and Health Professions
PEAH 314
University of Arkansas
Fayetteville, AR 72701
Office: 479-575-3035
fbowles@uark.edu

Posted on Monday, July 6, 2009

Different languages — I mean the actual vocabularies, the idioms — have worked out certain mechanisms of communication and registration. No one language is complete. A master may be continually expanding his own tongue, rendering it fit to bear some charge hitherto borne only by some other alien tongue, but the process does not stop with any one man. While Proust is learning Henry James, preparatory to breaking through certain French paste-board partitions, the whole American speech is churning and chugging, and every other tongue doing likewise.
     — Ezra Pound, "How to Read," 1929