The Centre’s year long IT Project concludes this autumn with a final series of regional events dedicated to New Media and English. The project, designed to determine the extent to which Communication and Information Technology (or C&IT) has been incorporated into the teaching of English, has been guided by three objectives: mapping the use of C&IT at the subject level; identifying examples of best practice, innovation, and experimentation; and making these examples available by means of a series of free events and an online database.
The IT Project began in December 2001 with an information gathering campaign during which we wrote to all English departments, describing our project and inviting feedback from lecturers who were using C&IT in their teaching. After gathering the information volunteered by lecturers across the country, we sought to make contact with individuals who were especially active in using C&IT. We subsequently organized over a dozen departmental visits, in which we arranged to cover as wide a geographical distribution and institutional range as possible; for example, we visited and met with colleagues at Exeter, Newport, London Guildhall, Huddersfield, Durham, and Lancaster.
We took for granted three technologies as entrenched in the life of most academics, regardless of subject: word processing, web browsing and email programs. We were interested, however, in the way in which lecturers used these essential tools beyond their most basic functions — for example, were they composing web documents with MS Word? Were they requiring their students to use browsers to access course materials and resources outside of class? And were they using email to establish group discussion among students as well as for one-to-one correspondence? We essentially wanted to identify pedagogical practices that seemed to flourish across institutions. We also, of course, simultaneously strove to locate those resources that lecturers regardless of their pre-dispositions would readily recognize as useful and valuable applications of technology to teaching English. All the tools, resources, and instructional materials that we have catalogued have been compiled in our Learning Link Database, which was accessible from the former website: http://www.english.ltsn.ac.uk/learninglink (now incorporated into the new website resource database)
Among the surprises encountered was the discovery that departments are increasingly relying on course management systems (commonly known as Virtual Learning Environments or VLEs) to develop learning and teaching resources. The sheer number of departments currently using or planning to use VLEs provided the impetus to dedicate a thread in our event series to VLEs and English. In doing so, we sought to engage the pedagogical challenges as well as the professional consequences that attend developing instructional materials within such systems.
To date we have held three regional events, highlighting issues and showcasing resources: ‘VLEs and English’ at the University of Durham (May 15) and University of Wolverhampton (September 4); ‘Computers, English Language, and Linguistics’ at Queen’s University, Belfast (May 24); and ‘New Media and English’, at the University of Exeter (June 12). We have scheduled an additional event for the autumn: ‘New Media and English’ at the University of London (October 9).
All are welcome to attend this event and contribute to the Learning Link Database.
