SESSION 4C

Ramesh Presser & Ashley Carmody
Listening to the future- BYOD and Nearpod.

Abstract
Together with my partner Ashley Carmody, we propose to present part of our on-going action research focusing on the use of mobile technology to facilitate and enhance the teaching, learning and assessment of listening skills. Utilising interactive mobile based applications such as Nearpod, which is one of a range of classroom applicable technologies, has proven extremely promising in the teaching and development of listening and note taking skills.

Interactive tools, such as Nearpod, allow teachers to enhance the student learning experience by utilising a possible learning distraction, the ubiquitous smart phone, to engage students in both an individual and group learning experience. Such technologies can allow an entire class of students to participate in a predesigned listening lesson where the teacher can play an embedded media file, for instance a podcast, video or MP3 file so that students can practice specific skill development, such as listening and note-taking. Following the listening the students then use their notes and their phones to answer a series of questions related to the listening. The entire process is quick and easy for both the teacher and student. Furthermore, as it allows ongoing monitoring, instantaneous individual feedback can be provided to students on participation and task completion. Thus, for possibly the first time teachers are able to gain a real time appreciation of what their students are able to understand and communicate regarding their listening skills. We proposed to introduce a new highly interactive blended way to teach listening skills into our ELICOS classrooms.

Bio
Ramesh holds a B. Science (Monash) and CELTA. He has more than 10 years of experience working in both private and tertiary affiliated language providers delivering a range of ESL programs. For the past 7 years Ramesh has worked at La Trobe teaching ELICOS across various programs and has experience in various roles from, teaching, mentoring, subject and E-learning co-ordination. Ramesh is a passionate advocate of integrating technology in ELICOS as well as developing learner autonomy. Ramesh is currently undertaking action research into the ways mobile based technologies can enhance the development of listening skills.