All posts by Lisa Hidalgo

Social Media in a Foreign Language Classroom

Media and Technology Critiques, Urban Adolescents

            Building media literacy in a classroom starts with the teacher. Before considering the pros and cons, the teacher needs to get to know the outlets available in technology and media to select which one they’d use for students to be able to relate and connect to. I want to focus on social media, like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram because they share similar features. It’s a popular outlet that students and adults are familiar with. As adults, we use social media to network, create an image for ourselves, to update our friends on our current events, and to get our point across using nothing other than memes. With that said, I think students can also use these social apps in the same way but with the objective of learning a second language, we just need to make that clear to them and monitor their use of it. Some of the pros I foresee with using social media in a foreign language classroom is that students will be exposed to real comments, tweets, and posts in the target language, they can find new ways to express themselves, and it could motivate them to participate or keep them interested in the lesson since they can connect to a device or app that they may already use. A con I think educators may encounter, if they use this approach, is if the social apps will be used negatively, as in, will this be an open opportunity for a student to get bullied? This thought came up because one of the biggest topics concerning social media is cyberbullying. As educators we need to remind students that they are given the privilege to use social  media apps in class, but if used inappropriately that privilege will get taken away. We want to model media literacy as something fun and useful, so we must model a kind ethical use of social media: what is and is not allowed.

            I would use all three social apps because they all share similar tools. First, they all have a language setting, so you can ask the students to change the language of the app to the target language. It’s a way for students to get used to the language, it may become second nature to them knowing how to navigate the app. The apps also share the translation tool, you can encourage students to read comments on a post, and if they’re not sure of a few words they can click the translate button. A downside to this is that it may become tiresome monitoring each student to make sure they’re not using that tool every second. Another way to implement social media in the classroom is using the target language for a specific purpose, we can do this through hashtags. For example, let’s say your objective for students is to be able to express their feelings or opinions on brands that aren’t animal cruelty free. They can look up the hashtag “#AnimalCruelty #AnimalCreultyFree” and see what posts come up and analyze how people write about that topic. A con to this is that we need to monitor what hashtags students look up, they should stay on task and not consider this activity as free time.

            Lastly, students can use the apps to communicate with each other using memes! I love this part because I truly believe we practice this every day. For example, instead of having a conversation through tweets, texts, comments, or posts, what we do is communicate through memes (images with a funny/clever caption). When I say that I mean send a different meme back and forth with someone. This definitely needs to be monitored because a meme conversation has to make sense like an oral conversation, we need to make sure students don’t send random memes to each other just because it’s funny, it should relate to the same topic. Although I find using social media apps in the classroom as an effective learning process and convenient, since most of us have it downloaded in our devices, educators must get to know the privacy settings, always keep the objective clear, and monitor the students.

Ss Self-Concept

Differentiation as an Approach to Teaching Diverse Learners, Urban Adolescents

“Tracks can create a self-fulfilling prophesy of behavior in students and play an important role in defining the type of person that they believe themselves to be.” (Ansalone, 2010, p. 12

Tracking or differentiating is assumed to have either a positive or negative affect on a student’s self-concept. Basically, if Ss with a low track are put together in the same classroom it impacts their self-esteem and increases motivation. But, if Ss are in a heterogeneous classroom, low and high track, it has a negative impact on their ability to participate and their attitude in general. It also invites the opportunity for Ss to make comparisons within their classroom, like who’s bright or slow. I’ve seen this first hand at my student placement.

First, at my placement there’s no differentiation for ESL Ss (consider viewing them as Ss with a “low track”) because my CT says that by the end of the year “they’ll get it”, in other words, they’re given the same instruction as everyone else in the hopes of them understanding. I’m the only one that is practicing how to differentiate for the ESL Ss that need it because they really do need it! In my ESL seminars all we talk about is differentiating because not all ESL Ss are the same, it is essential to practice differentiating in our field, so that’s why I try to implement it at my placement. When the students that don’t need help with instructions witness what I do for the ESL Ss they always, and I mean ALWAYS, make side comments about it, like: “That’s easy”, “How do you not know this?”, “Don’t help them, they’re not going to understand”, and “WOW! You’re always asking for help!” I always tell them to mind their business, but I also don’t see it affecting the ESL Ss. I do see the comparisons taking place by the “high track” students, but I don’t see it affecting negatively the ESL Ss self-concept. I wonder if they’re just ignoring it or don’t know how to express that is hurts their feelings when their classmates make those comments? I don’t know if it’s my place to pull the ESL Ss aside and ask how they feel about it?

Out With the Old in With the New?

eLiteracy and Social Media(tion), Urban Adolescents

Teachers of English need not sacrifice the mature literacy practices of adults to the informal literacies of youth. Conversely, they need not sacrifice the literacies of youth to the formal literacies of adulthood. (Mills, 2010, pg. 38)

I thought deeply about this passage: how true it is, how I can relate to it, and how it inspires me. First thing that came to mind is how teachers set routines in their classrooms, which is great. It helps our youth create good habits that they carry on into adulthood, hopefully. But, looking deeper, there are other routines that teachers put in place that adolescents don’t see connection with or relation to and that’s when we lose their interest in school. In other words, the traditional pedagogy theories that teachers don’t let go of completely, and therefore make it hard for students to find that link between that and their lives, is basically: “Here’s the rule, this is the strategy, learn it, study it, and good luck applying it outside of class.” So, how do we change this? Well, this article is trying to tell us that we shouldn’t sacrifice mature lectures and then only teach what the students are into nowadays, instead we must bridge the two spectrums in order for students to naturally make connections from their “informal experiences” to what is being taught in class. This inspires me to always keep in mind that I shouldn’t have to sacrifice anyone’s interests, the school’s and student’s, to be able to teach effectively.

Classroom Climate

Socioemotional and Psychological Development in Adolescence

“…adolescents’ perceptions of how caring their teachers are predict gains and losses in their feelings of self-esteem, school belong, and positive affect in school.” (Eccles & Roeser, 2011, p. 229)

In my opinion, teachers fail to acknowledge the fact that they have a lot to do with how a student does in their academic tasks and overall school career. It’s obvious that, or at least you would think that teachers should get to know their student’s different backgrounds, cultures, and family situations to help form a relationship with them. But, I’ve seen and known of many teachers that don’t even try to get to know their students, so aside from getting to know them, what I want to get across is, teachers should at least try to create a classroom environment where everyone feels like they belong. How? Well, it’s fair to say that students can perceive if a teacher cares about them, if a teacher shows a “lack of enthusiasm or enjoyment” it could negatively affect a student’s emotional status (“anxiety, shame, and hopelessness”) as described in the article, but also, maybe they should pick another profession. It’s important to do our part as teachers and the rest is a domino effect. I’m interested in learning more on how to make student’s feel like they belong while in class and being responsible of my “classroom climate.”

Teachers as guidance counselors, not so much health ed. experts

Biological & Cognitive Development in Adolescence, Urban Adolescents

“Middle school students are certain that no one has ever thought the thoughts they are thinking or felt the feelings they are feeling.” (Brown & Knowles, 2007, p. 35)

The many reasons for why not to be a middle school teacher is supported by scientific research which also confirmed what I already know about the “special stage” of adolescence. What I took away from this information was to stay conscious of what this period of time means to students and what it meant to me. I believe it’s true that students don’t talk about the mental or physical changes we go through because we don’t understand it or we don’t even know it’s happening. These changes can affect how a young teenager is as a student and how they process information.

I know I’ve viewed students being able to open up to me as a success, because it is, as an educator, but now I wonder if students would even bring up health questions. I never thought it would be a possibility, I thought maybe friend, relationship, or family drama would be something I’d be confided in, and I wouldn’t oppose to give advice on those issues but guiding through or answering health topics is a whole different story. I understand that the article suggests that teachers are like guidance counselors, I can say that’s pretty accurate, but expecting or adding on to our workload being prepared to answer health questions is something that if I had to do I’d want to be heavily versed on what to say and trained on how to approach those sensitive questions. Again, it sounds like another workload to me, but for now, if I were ever approached with such questions I’d say: “I’ll get back to you on that.”