Registration is now open!
Registration link: https://forms.gle/XanjiQjwX8BwgwWZA
Once again, please note:
*This event is for KOTESOL members only. You must have a current membership to participate.
**This event is currently capped at 50 participants.
***Registration is done on a first-come, first-serve basis
Please join us for the 4th annual University Teachers' Summer Conference. This year we'll be online, using Zoom and Discord to talk about how we can best prepare for the upcoming semester. Your co-hosts will be Michael Free (Kangwon National University) and Reece Randall (Gangneung-Wonju National University).
We're going to start the day at 9:00 a.m., with informal chat, some introductions, and - of course - coffee (or tea...or whatever gets you going)!
At 9:30, we'll get properly underway. The plan is to begin with a review of "evidence-based best practices" for teaching, and use these as a lens for the day's discussions and activities. Most of the presentations will focus on one, perhaps two, best practices in a concise way. Then, attendees will have lots of time to discuss these in small groups. We will also make an effort to have discussions on topics that attendees propose during the registration process!
Ultimately, we want to give everyone the opportunity to think about how they can operationalise best practices in their context, by listening, sharing ideas, and consider different options. It's going to be a great day!
Confirmed Presenters (Full abstracts below - Abstracts are also attached as a PDF)
Anna Loseva, Vietnam
Terri Beadle, Woosong University
Stewart Gray, Hankuk University of Foreign Studies
Maria Lisak, Chosun University
Chris Kobylinski, Hankuk University of Foreign Studies
Eric Reynolds, Woosong University
Michael Free, Kangwon National University
with a special appearance by...
Leonie Overbeek! Dept. of Philosophy, Sophia University (Bulgaria)
Full Abstracts
What ‘Lands’ with Your Students?
Leonie Overbeek
PhD candidate, Sofia University (Bulgaria)
Of course, distance teaching in one form of another has been around quite a while – for example, the radio schools in the Outback of Australia, correspondence courses offered by various colleges and Universities, and with the advent of the information highway, the rise of online courses known as MOOCs.
However, COVID-19 forced many former face-to-face institutions to, virtually overnight, gear themselves to teaching via platforms such as ZOOM. And the results have not been pretty. Complaints from students, problems with technology, and the scramble to convert lecture-hall materials into workable online presentations have all contributed to the stress of this situation.
In this presentation, I will present two cases of classes I presented online, via a platform specifically designed to be used for online teaching of English to students ranging in age from 16 to 60, as the saying goes. Many of them are either high school or University students, or even lecturers, business people and those engaged in service industries, all wishing to improve their English levels.
Despite careful planning and choice of materials, it is often almost impossible to say what will ‘land’ with your students, and what they will respond to in conversation classes, which is what I teach. What I will share is how the materials and presentations differed in a class where almost no conversation took place and one where I ran over time by about 15 minutes because the response to the topic had the students talking so much.
Participants will examine each of the cases, and be encouraged to form break-out groups to discuss the points and merits of each, then give feedback to the rest of the group.
Ten Tips for Zooming in Korean EFL.
Eric Reynolds
Woosong University
In this workshop we will review ten, or so, things that you should know and be able to do in order to give a great synchronous online lesson, particularly in Zoom. Built on our experiences in the “Teaching synchronously online using Zoom in Korea” Facebook group that sought to needs of teacher in Korea to suddenly teacher online last semester during the COVID-19 pandemic. You will get a chance to practice specific techniques as well as to share your experiences and ideas. Let’s get ‘er done!
Engaging Students with Challenging Activities
Stewart Gray
Hankuk University of Foreign Studies
Challenging activities can engage students in learning, but for teachers, creating just the right sort of challenge can be tricky. In this session, we will be looking at some of the ways to add the spice of challenge to our class activities, whether on or offline. The presenter will offer up some design tips he has used in his teaching. Participants will have the chance to share tips of their own, and to discuss how to apply these in their classes for the upcoming semester.
Building Rapport Online
Maria Lisak
Chosun University
How important is rapport for we teachers? How has the pandemic forced us to reconsider how to create rapport between our students and ourselves? After some introductory remarks on the importance of rapport, this session will have participants consider, discuss, and problem pose different ways that we achieve the goal of having good – no great! - rapport.
Worst Practices: Harmful Advice for Mischievous Students and Teachers
Anna Loseva
ELC Vietnam
Have you had your fill of all the best practices yet? Are you ready to turn the usual norms upside down? Following the playful manner of a famous Russian children's writer Grigoriy Oster, in this interactive session we will play naughty. By working together and sharing our experiences, we will collectively come up with harmful advice for both teachers and students who are about to start the new school semester in online spaces. By the end of the webinar, you can expect to have new perspectives on what makes "best" and "worst" practices, and as a bonus have some ideas for a fun alternative activity for your first class that will make your students smile.
A Few Minutes with Pixton!
Terri Beadle
Woosong University
Pixton (www.pixton.com) is a web platform that allows users to create comics and storyboards. Terri is going to take us through a brief tour on how she’s used it to get some great results from her students, and give attendees a chance to think about whether Pixton can help them in the upcoming semester, as well!
Designing a Course for Chaotic Times
Chris Kobylinski
Hankuk University of Foreign Studies
Planning a syllabus is difficult under normal circumstances but is especially challenging when the teacher has no idea how the class will be delivered during the semester. Unlike most universities in Korea, my university has decided to have all classes with under 50 students meet face-to-face on campus but has also included measures to go hybrid or completely online based on the number of Covid-19 cases. Given these circumstances, teachers must be prepared to teach their courses face-to-face, as a hybrid course, or completely online. In this presentation I will talk about how I designed the course to adapt to all of these possible situations that might occur during the semester.
From Dimes to Screwdrivers: A Review of Evidence-based Best Practices for Teachers
Michael Free
Kangwon National University
“Better to turn a screw with a screwdriver than a hammer – a dime may also do the trick, but a screwdriver is usually better.”
— Stephen W. Chickering and Stephen C. Ehrmann
Last semester found many of us university instructors in Korea doing “emergency remote teaching.” That is to say: working to learn new technologies and adapt materials to an environment that is extremely challenging for language teachers – and all of this on very short notice. As a result, using the above analogy, while we may have sometimes used a hammer, we were frequently using dimes. Why? Because we didn’t know where the screwdriver was, or even what it looked like! But now that we know most of those secret Zoom features or have cracked the mysteries of our school’s LMS, we need to think about how we can move from “emergency remote” to “effective online learning.” Even if some of us are going back to F2F teaching, it’s not going to be in a pre-COVID classroom, that’s for certain. This presentation attempts to get us to take a step (or two) back, and get ready for the new semester by starting with what we know effective teaching looks like.
In the 1st chapter of Online Teaching at its Best, authors Linda B. Nilson and Ludwika A. Goodson state that “excellent teaching rests on the same principles across all platforms.” They support this claim with a large number of sources; indeed, all of the “best practices” they examine are “evidence-based.” This presentation will not detail every principle of learning they discuss, but will briefly rehearse their amalgamated list of “best teaching practices for [undergraduate] faculty.” The presenter will guide attendees through the authors’ list, providing annotations only where necessary. The list is given as a point of departure for the day’s considerations, and attendees will be given ample time to consider it, and make additions (or deletions) they feel are necessary. Ultimately, the purpose is to provide food for thought for our day together!
