Professional Development in CALL

If you sit at home one afternoon watching daytime television, no less than five schools will advertise their excellent online educational opportunities. While in the past distance learning was restricted to trade schools and nationally accredited schools, today top schools offer online courses and full online degrees. In fact, I am currently enrolled in a fully online masters degree program through Indiana University-Bloomington, a very well respected school. Students in grades K-12 can also take part or all of their coursework online through state-funded virtual schools. Online education is no longer an anomaly, it is becoming the norm. And if a student chooses not to take an online course, often that student will find that one or more of his/her classes meet in a comptuer lab and use technology to support the course objectives.

ESL education often follows the trends in mainstream education. Sometimes this change occurs slowly and sometimes very quickly. Currently, English Language Learners (ELLs) are not given the opportunity to complete an entire ESL program online, although I don't think we are far from this happening. However, most ESL programs today intergrate technology into the coursework somehow. For example, last spring I visited the ESL prorgram at a middle school in order to observe a few classes. During their two hours in their pull-out ESL class, the students I observed spent 45 minutes in a computer lab working on an individualized program that rates the student's ability, chooses activities based on the student's current level, and tracks the student's progress. The program allowed students to work on all skill areas, except speaking. Another example comes from my current work situation. I direct a language program for university-bound adults. As part of the curriculum, the students spend an hour a day in a computer lab where they use a variety of programs to support their Individualized Learning Plan.

In both of the scenarios above, the instructor's job is to teach the students how to use the technology and then support the students as they move through their individualized lessons. Computer Assisted Language Learning (CALL) does not only work with individualized learning plans, but also with regular coursework in an ESL program. Often times, as Hubbard (2007) points out, ESL instructors are trained to use technology efficiently to support language learning. Just think, many ESL teachers (of adults) take a 4 week intensive course on how to teach ESL and then they begin teaching right away. I don't know of any of these programs that provides instruction on CALL. Hubbard (2007) also points out that most graduate programs in language learning do not provide coursework in CALL and the ones that do offer the course as an elective.

Due to the lack of professional development in CALL, Hubbard (2007) calls upon organizations like TESOL to place more emphasis on the importance of incorporating technology into the language learning classroom. He presents a list of tips on how to begin an individualized plan of professional development in the field of CALL. A few of these tips are:
- Start small
- Identify one area of technology to use in the classroom and try it out and perfect the use of it
- When learning a new technology, learn by show and tell, don't let others do it for you (Hubbard, 2007).

In my workplace, I need to provide more support to my teachers on the technology available in the computer lab. We are a new school and no one is really familiar with the technology yet. I am somewhat familiar, but I definitely need to spend more time in the lab familiarizing myself with the software.

I think there is often a fear of technology when it comes to teaching. Just as when manufacturing became automized, many fear that they might lose their jobs to teachnology. In education, technology does not replace the teacher - technology simply changes the teacher's role. For seasoned teachers who have found a method of teaching that they are comfortable with and that they believe works, encouraging them to change their role can be very difficult. However, computer assisted learning is not a fad, it is here to stay and we all need to adjust. I know I am adjusting and I'm very exciting about the possibilities CALL brings!!