Collaboration to Teach English Language Learners

Published by Melissa

Collaborative learning is a teaching approach which enhances maturity, experience and social communication in an academic environment while discouraging passivity, repetition and individuality. In collaborative learning, students can develop their own learning strategies and select their own objectives. At the same time they are responsible for what they learn and how they  gain  knowledge of  a  topic.  Collaborative  learning  has  long  been  of  interest  to practitioners  of  communicative  language  teaching  since  it  offers  widely  tested  classroom procedures such as those described, for example, by Mc Cafferty, Jacobs and Dasilva Iddings (2006).The inter dependency and mutual respect between the components of the collaborative activity is essential to obtain a coherent proposal. Students and teachers should become a coherent group that dialogues and negotiates in a dynamic class (González Fernández, 2006:3). Nunan (1991: 1) suggests a number of reasons for collaborating: In language education, teachers, learners, researchers and curriculum specialists can collaborate for  a  number of  reasons.  They  may  wish  to  experiment  with  alternative  ways  of  organizing teaching and learning; they maybe concerned with promoting a philosophy of cooperation rather than  competition;  they  may  wish  to  create  an  environment in which  learners,  teachers  and researchers are teaching and learning from each other in an equitable way [...]; or they may wish to experiment with ways of incorporating principles of learner-centredness into their programs. Thus, there are different motivations for incorporating collaborative approaches and different ways in which such approaches can be implemented in language learning. In all of them, however,  collaboration  can  be  broadly  understood  as;  “...the  mutual  engagement  of participants in a coordinated effort to solve the problem together” (Roschelle & Teasley, 1995:70).

Thus, the teacher is present to assist language learning while the students collaborate in elaborating tasks. Under teacher guidance, the students make connections between previous knowledge and new information. They use language and technology as tools for learning and develop language and thinking competences. Collaborative work should be well planned and teachers  should  design  strategies that  provide  all  the  participants  with  clear  roles  in  the different parts of the action research. There are two modalities to consider in the collaborative approach. On the one hand, teachers  from different  areas  of  knowledge  collaborate  in  order  to  offer  learning  tools  to students. On the other hand, students work collaboratively in the classroom to carry out the tasks proposed by the teacher. In both modalities, the roles of the teachers and students  are different.  In the  first  one,  the  teacher  is  central  to  the  learning  activity, facilitating the interdisciplinary tasks to the passive students.

The teacher’s role is more facilitative; to guide and channel the students in their learning. In the second, the teacher’s role is less active, helping the students but not interfering in the learning process. We propose a third modality which combines these two, in which teachers and students collaborate in the design and evaluation of the teaching-learning activities, thereby taking into account individual and group needs of the students (Carrió Pastor, 2006). Collaboration implies interaction among the different members of the group and the different proposals should act as webs of knowledge that combine to offer unique results (Strijbos, Martens and Jochems, 2004: 403). Furthermore, would like to introduce here a further aspect. The Collaborative Approach(CA) combined with the Content and Language integrated Learning (CLIL) approach, which integrates the learning process of a second language and specific topics of content subjects (Carrió &Gimeno,2007 and Carrió Pastor,2009b: 39). As the target language is the means of  learning  content,  students  tend  to  be  highly  motivated  and  language  acquisition  is integrated in  the  learning  process.  Content  teachers  and language  teachers  integrate  their learning approaches in order to obtain a higher learning outcome from students.

We believe  that  CLIL  should  be  taught  as  a  single  subject  being  based  on  close cooperation  between  content  teachers  and  language  teachers.  Some  researchers  into  this approach (Wolf, 2007; Marsh, 2009; Coyle, 2007;2009;Hodgson and Jones,2009; Morton,2009 and Ezeiza Ramos, 2009) consider that the role of the language teacher is merely that of‘ assistant’  to  the  content  teacher.  In  our  view,  both  content  and  language  are  of  equal importance  and  both the  content  and  language  teachers  collaborate  to  produce  specific materials which allow different aspects to be focused on. In addition, we start from the belief that collaborative learning implies interactive learning and we accept that technology can facilitate communication and make the learning process more effective. Online learning can generate a positive interdependency, can promote verbal exchange,  can  stimulate personal  and  group  skills  while  giving  due  value  to  individual contributions.

As such, it is ideally suited to collaborative and content-based activities: “The computer-as-a-tool agrees with the fact that today a number of educators are seeking ways to teach in more content-based approaches” (Soetaert & Bonamie, 2006: 5). Our main aim in this research was to determine whether blending different approaches and incorporating the regular use of technology would result inappropriate materials for teaching second language learners in Higher Education. We present examples of specific materials which were designed by teachers and students working together. Finally, we aim to show that content teachers and language teachers should collaborate together in order to create materials for second language and content learning, and that this collaboration can result in new and innovative learning methodologies.

Definition, benefits and barriers of interdisciplinary collaboration

‘Inter’ is a prefix that literally means something moves, exists or happens between two or more places, things or groups of people (Collins Cobuild English Dictionary, 1995). Interdisciplinary collaboration usually refers to some form of work between or among people from two or more subjects within the same or across institutions. Bronstein (2003) defines interdisciplinary collaboration in a more positive way by referring to it as an effective interpersonal process in which communication, coordination and partnership are involved. Whatever form it takes, interdisciplinary collaboration can benefit teachers in the following ways: continued learning in content knowledge, modern technology and recent methodology; sustained enthusiasm for teaching and professional development (Shibley, 2006; Forman & Markus, 2005), generation of a new outcome such as course design and teaching (Mavor & Trayner, 2001), curriculum development (Parks & Goldblatt, 2000), multipled input from experts of other subjects, increasing awareness of incompatible personalities, working style, beliefs about learning (Perry & Stewart, 2005) and perceptions of learners’ needs (Jackson, 2005). All this in return maximizes productivity, improve student learning and facilitate personal professional development. Nevertheless, such barriers as fundamental differences in philosophy, pedagogies, personalities and rejection of publications of collaborative work may jeopardize collaboration between people (Lynch, 2006). To overcome the constraints, it is believed that on-campus administrative and structural support, official recognition of collaborative work as scholarly research, time release and rewards, setting common goals among parties and institutionalizing collaboration are the most felicitous conditions (Fauske, 1993; Kezar, 2005).

Interdisciplinary collaboration: Collaboration between English language and subject teachers

English language teaching at tertiary level is also closely hooked with subject contents and it is unrealistic to detach language from content or to teach the language in isolation. Although each subject teacher has his or her area of expertise, language (in this case, it is English) is a common element and topic across subjects. Understanding or being aware of what students are studying, their needs and the subject discourse definitely helps an English language teacher to develop the syllabus and materials. This is best achieved if the English language teacher takes the initiative to gather information from subject teachers, and both sides are involved in more direct working at a later stage. Dudley-Evans & St. John (1998) term the two stages ‘cooperation’ and ‘collaboration’. However, it is argued by Lee (2000, p. 24) that cooperation or collaboration between English language teachers and other subject teachers do not guarantee any success if there is a lack of the willingness to cooperate, patience and open attitude from both sides. Therefore, it is important for English language teachers to know more about subject teachers’ thoughts and feelings of interdisciplinary collaboration.

Interdisciplinary collaboration, however, is little researched in the English language teaching profession particularly from subject teachers’ perspective. Although collaborating with subject teachers has been recommended in the profession and we know that pooling inputs from both sides to the same task is useful in respect of course design, material development, teaching, assessment and even understanding of the learning and teaching culture at students’ parent departments (Lee, 2000), we know very little about the thoughts and feelings of subject teachers on interdisciplinary collaboration.

Benefits

The greatest benefit mentioned by one collaborator, W, was that he knew more about language and language teaching. W said he did not know what constituted a good essay. It was from the project that he knew some key writing concepts and the concepts helped them fine tune the system. Another collaborator, K, felt that the cooperation was successful because there was no confrontation among the team members. Cooperation continued with tangible outputs such as the series of workshops conducted at a local secondary school.
The subject teachers also stated that interdisciplinary collaboration was encouraged in their field. W said that Information Systems which was related to high-impact technology could not avoid cooperation with end-users. Their job was to find out what was useful to end-users and ascertained the acceptability level. In other words, it was a field that cried out for contact with people of the outside world. However, analysts who are more theory-oriented may not need to take the initiative to work with English language teachers.

Problems and challenges

F and W, expressed their concern over publishing interdisciplinary collaborative outputs in journals of their respective discipline and job appraisal. They said that discipline journals did not favor publications about interdisciplinary collaboration because they failed to address the state of the art or central focus of the discipline. Furthermore, unfavorable evaluation of articles about interdisciplinary collaborative products in refereed journals, sequence of collaborators’ names in publication, the institutional funding situation, time availability and long working process for a single publication were their worries. As expressed by another collaborator, K, looking for collaborators could be a hard task as collaboration requires investment of time, effort and energy from both parties. He was hesitant to bother other subject teachers as he feared that collaboration might add additional burden to other colleagues who were busy with their teaching, research and administrative work. However, he would not decline any collaborative initiative if he had time and interest in it.

Key successful factors

All collaborators felt that open-minded and conflict-avoiding personality traits are the secrets of a successful collaboration. They were willing to play their role in a flexible manner, sometimes as a team player or sometimes as a leader by complying with the team’s goal and direction, providing feedback on system design or leading the team to explore the problems respectively. They believed that when there was collaboration, collaborators should be willing to listen to comments, study problems arising from various domains and go for a winwin situation. Regular team meetings and email communication also helped collaborators understand the progress and problems, make the right decisions and maintain a good relationship. Moreover, there must be mutual understanding and mutual respect.

References

Bronstein, L.R. (2003). A model for interdisciplinary collaboration. Social Work, 48(3), 297-304.

Fauske, J.R. (1993). Five conditions for sustaining cross campus collaboration on teaching and learning. Researcher, Ogden, Utah: Weber State University.

Forman, J., & Markus, M.L. (2005). Research on collaboration, business communication and technology: Reflections on an interdisciplinary academic collaboration. Journal of Business Communication, 42(1), 78-102.

Shilbey, Jr., I.A. (2006). Interdisciplinary team teaching: Negotiating pedagogical differences. College Teaching, 54(3), 271-274.