Team Teaching in the University: Description of a Collaborative Experience between the Computer Engineering and the English Departments

— In the last twenty years, English for Specific Purposes (ESP) courses have become very popular due to the growth of science, technology, politics and economics, and also due to the condition of lingua franca of English language. From then on, the implementation of English specific courses has spread throughout the world and can be found in almost every educational institution. ESP courses at Universitat Jaume I (Castellón, Spain) are present in almost all the degrees. The objective of this paper was twofold: firstly, we describe the relevance of the English language in the Computer Engineering degree as students have to complete 6 European Credit Transfer System (ECTS) credits of the English subject in the first year and carry out activities in the English language corresponding to at least another 12 ECTS credits in the second, third and fourth year; and secondly, we explain the close cooperation between professors from the Computer Engineering department and professors from the English Studies department. This collaboration brings about the design and implementation of a rubric that is used to assess the compulsory oral presentations in English in the fourth year courses in the Computer Engineering Degree.The research conducted in this article is part of the Education and Innovation research project: Proyecto de Innovación Educativa Universitat Jaume I 2779/13 Parámetros de aproximación a la evaluación de las destrezas orales en lengua inglesa: tipología, diseño de test y criterios de validación

Effective Learner-Lecturer Interaction Working With a Virtual Learning Environment

Using the Internet to learn a language creates wide opportunities to enhance learning (Association of teachers of English in Catalonia (APAC), 2010). The Internet activities promote learners’ self-monitoring ability, encourage the use of multimedia and network technology, and develop students’ cooperation and participation. During the latest years, there have been many changes in education as these new technologies, including VLEs (Virtual Learning Environments), which have become an important part in the teaching/learning process. According to Tech Terms Computer Dictionary (2012), VLE is a virtual classroom where teachers and students communicate. VLEs have evolved as at an early stage, they were only ways of transmitting information: Teachers uploaded the multimedia resources and students read this information. At a higher stage, VLEs have become interactive. This means that students become active. We have designed a virtual environment where students, weekly, must contribute their opinions and comments in response to a required activity uploaded by the teacher. In this paper, we describe this weekly task and analyze students’ opinion about this planned activity. The students become an active subject in this field. In this paper, we show how VLEs are no longer a means of transmitting information but a means of interaction as well as a way of motivating our students to be involved in their learning process

Perceptual Parameters, Animacy and Reference Frames in the Semantics of "Opposite" and "In Front of"

In this paper we combine topological and dynamicity analysis with other parameters li ke reference frames, animacy, and function, in order to depict the polysemy of two prepositions that express spatial relationships along the horizontal axis, namely, “opposite” and “in front of”. Our method consists of manual corpus analysis of 200 example s of each one of these particles from the COCA and BNC. The sense of each preposition in context has been classified according to a network of senses which includes a proto - concept, from which other senses are cognitively derived. In addition, frames of r eference and degrees of animacy provide semantic contrasts between the prepositions under analysis. Finally, metaphorical senses can be described as cognitively derived from the previous parameterized senses, by means of mappings across domains (Lakoff, 19 93). A first approximation to different senses is based on standard dictionaries. We claim that our analysis provides both native speakers and foreign learners with a coherent explanation of the polysemy of these items

Mastering Presenters by Means of Visual Aids: Assessing Students' Oral Presentations

The introduction of the ICTs (Information and Communication Technologies) in education has set a new paradigm in knowledge acquisition. The Internet, overhead projectors and interactive boards, presentation and animation software, and online databases are only some resources that teachers use in order to present information in a more dynamic, immediate, and stunning way, transforming and revitalizing the teaching-learning process. The ICTs have been established in the university classroom and nowadays, they have become an essential part in this teaching-learning process. Lecturers make use of them in the same proportion as they make of traditional materials. At the same time, students have to be acquainted with these new technologies and they also have to be able to deal with them. The objective of this paper is twofold: On the one hand, we study and show how our students make use of the technologies when they have to face their oral presentations in the subject “Advanced English: Professional Settings” (English Studies Degree at Universitat Jaume I in Castellón, Spain). It is acknowledged that visual aids can be helpful to support a speech, but we want to analyze if the visual aids are successfully applied, how and to which extent. On the other hand, we want to make out the opinions of their classmates about the use of these graphical resources (students fill in a questionnaire about the effectiveness of the visual aids in their classmates’ presentations and how they would improve them). Results demonstrate that not only teachers make advantage of the new technological resources, we show, based on the students’ oral presentations and their peer-reviews, that also our university students are increasingly aware of the advantage and importance of the ICTs in the classroom

A Review of the Traditional and Current Language Teaching Methods

Nowadays, there is a need to fit into a world increasingly globalized, in which communication and foreign languages have more importance than some years ago. The English language is, nowadays, the language of international communication. Taking this into account, foreign language lessons acquire, nowadays, more significance than in the past. For that reason, English teaching should not be limited to the study of its structure, but to the use of the language in different contexts in order to be adapted to this new reality. (Díaz Merino, 2010). These days, we can observe how English language lessons try to fulfill the students’ needs for communication using different strategies and methodologies such as team teaching in the CLIL approach. This paper provides some theoretical background about the methodologies used in Spain in the past and the way in which we can adapt them to the current English lessons in order to help students raise their English language level as well as their academic result

Internships of master students in secondary education centers: tic resources to promote classroom motivation

El Máster en Educación Secundaria, Formación Profesional y Enseñanza de Idiomas de la Universitat Jaume I de Castellón, España, está dividido en 3 fases: las clases presenciales, el Prácticum y el trabajo final de Máster. En este artículo, nos centramos en el Prácticum (clase externas en un Instituto de Enseñanza Secundaria). El período del Prácticum tiene una duración de ocho semanas académicas y se lleva a cabo en centros públicos y privados de la provincia de Castellón correspondientes a la educación secundaria obligatoria, el bachillerato y la formación profesional. En total, las prácticas tienen una duración de 200 horas donde nuestros alumnos conocen la organización de la comunidad educativa, hay una etapa de observación con el tutor asignado y un período de intervención en el aula. Los estudiantes se enfrentan a aulas reales con estudiantes reales. En esta investigación, pedimos a nuestros estudiantes del máster que analicen el papel de los docentes en las escuelas secundarias donde realizaron su Prácticum. Queremos que nuestros alumnos hagan hincapié en la motivación y en la forma en que estos profesores de secundaria se relacionan con sus alumnos y promueven la motivación. Los resultados son bastante sorprendentes ya que no todos los profesores se implican de igual grado en sus clases o se preocupan por mantener motivados a sus estudiantes.The Master in Secondary Education, Vocational Training and Language Teaching of the Universitat Jaume I of Castellón, Spain, is divided into 3 phases: the face-to-face classes, the Practicum and the final Master's project. In this article, we focus on the Practicum (external class in a Secondary School). The Practicum period lasts eight academic weeks and takes place in public and private centers in the province of Castellón corresponding to compulsory secondary education, high school and vocational training. In total, the practices have a duration of 200 hours where our students know the organization of the educational community, there is a stage of observation with the assigned tutor and a period of intervention in the classroom. Students face real classrooms with real students. In this research, we ask our master students to analyze the role of teachers in the secondary schools where they did their Practicum. We want our students to emphasize the motivation and the way these high school teachers relate to their students and promote motivation. The results are quite surprising since not all teachers are equally involved in their classes or worry about keeping their students motivated

A RESEARCH IN INNOVATION IN THE SECONDARY EDUCATION: MAKING USE OF VIRTUAL RESOURCES TO LEARN A LANGUAGE

The present paper describes the research carried out in the subject of the The University Master's Degree for Secondary Education, Vocational Training and Language Teaching at the University Jaume I (Castellón, Spain): Teaching Innovation and Introduction to Educational Research’ in the specialty of Language and Literature and Language Teaching. 125 students were involved in this subject. As part of the subject´s assessment, our students were asked to work in groups in order to write a research proposal divided into two main parts: (i) theoretical background (definition of innovative teaching, main trends and authors and some examples of innovative projects), (ii) students define the innovative tool/resource they have chosen (e.g. blog, Kahoot, podcasts, digital books, Mahara, Fakebook, etc.) and design a didactic unit using this virtual tool. In this paper, we analyse the virtual resources chosen by our students and reflect their feelings and opinions about the implementation of these new innovative materials in a real secondary school classroom. Result show that these innovative tools can help secondary school teachers to enrich and improve the teaching/learning method by supporting the traditional method but, by no means, substituting it; however not all our students think about the possibility of implementing them.  Article visualizations

Prácticas de estudiantes de máster en centros de educación secundaria: recursos tic para promover la motivación en el aula / Internships of master students in secondary education centers: tic resources to promote classroom motivation

El Máster en Educación Secundaria, Formación Profesional y Enseñanza de Idiomas de la Universitat Jaume I de Castellón, España, está dividido en 3 fases: las clases presenciales, el Prácticum y el trabajo final de Máster. En este artículo, nos centramos en el Prácticum (clase externas en un Instituto de Enseñanza Secundaria). El período del Prácticum tiene una duración de ocho semanas académicas y se lleva a cabo en centros públicos y privados de la provincia de Castellón correspondientes a la educación secundaria obligatoria, el bachillerato y la formación profesional. En total, las prácticas tienen una duración de 200 horas donde nuestros alumnos conocen la organización de la comunidad educativa, hay una etapa de observación con el tutor asignado y un período de intervención en el aula. Los estudiantes se enfrentan a aulas reales con estudiantes reales. En esta investigación, pedimos a nuestros estudiantes del máster que analicen el papel de los docentes en las escuelas secundarias donde realizaron su Prácticum. Queremos que nuestros alumnos hagan hincapié en la motivación y en la forma en que estos profesores de secundaria se relacionan con sus alumnos y promueven la motivación. Los resultados son bastante sorprendentes ya que no todos los profesores se implican de igual grado en sus clases o se preocupan por mantener motivados a sus estudiantes

Integrating ICT in a didactic unit: lights, camera, action!

In Spain, the educational system is focused on traditional teacher-centred methods. Nevertheless, this traditional approach does not engage students anymore. Prensky (2001) claims that students have changed and our educational system was not designed to teach today's students. Today's students are digital natives, they were born into the digital world and they have spent their entire lives using technology. Therefore, taking this into account is paramount to capture the students’ interest in class. This work has been designed to integrate the use of ICT in a Spanish high school where traditional approach is the predominant methodology amongst teachers. The didactic unit designed and described in this paper has been implemented in a third year of Compulsory Secondary Education with the objective of combining a traditional approach with a task-based approach. This didactic unit includes the use of ICT in a wide variety of activities in order to deal with diversity awareness and to cope with the different learning styles students may have. Results indicate that the use of ICT is highly motivating for the students, that students perform better on the tasks which imply the use of computers opposed to the use of traditional materials and that they are willing to work in collaborative groups

Analysis of the implementation of a Webquest for learning English in a secondary school in Spain

In this technological era we live in, the educative scenario is changing rapidly and significantly due to the incorporation of the Internet. Therefore, education should pay special attention to society needs considering the information and communication technologies (TICs) essentially in the teaching process in order to make students ready for this changing society. This paper is focused on the implementation, assessment and analysis of a computer-based approach, a WebQuest, in a third year of compulsory secondary education. The didactic unit implemented deals with the different English-speaking countries and their particularities. The new approach has been carried out using in-class sessions together with autonomous work and group work. The purpose of this study is to analyse and discuss students' opinions and reactions towards the use of this new teaching and learning strategy in an English as a Second Language class. In this sense, the study aims at showing whether students 1) gain a higher motivation in learning English, 2) have improved their digital competence and 3) have acquired cultural competence. The results show that the use of new technologies have motivated students towards the teaching and learning of the English subject, improving their digital competence as well as their cultural competence