TESOL-UKRAINE NEWSLETTER SUMMER 2010

TESOL-UKRAINE NEWSLETTER SUMMER 2010 TEACHERS OF ENGLISH TO SPEAKERS OF OTHER LANGUAGES IN UKRAINE

CONTENTS Editorial ………………………………………………………. . ………………………………....2 TESOL-UKRAINE IN FOCUS: XV National TESOL - Ukraine Conference. Rivne, April 15-17,2010 ”English Learning in the Context of the Long-life Education”.(reviews, comments, responses)….. ………..... ……….…………………………………..3 “The Voices of the Participants” Zoya Pukha, Methdologist Teacher of Nosivka District Gymnasium ; Olena Tarasova, Kyiv-Mohyla Collegium; Natalia Reutska, English teacher, Khmelnytskyi gymnasia #1;on behalf of Melitopol and Zaporizhya groups Lidia Storozhenko; Dmitriy Yenygen, Kerch Institute of Economics and Humanities………….. 4

English Language Specialist Program in Action. “A Brief History of CTLT at Murray State University, Murray, Kentucky”. Hal Rice, Director of the Murray State University CTLT, Professional Staff member of Murray State University; Dr. M. Sue Sroda, CTLT Faculty Scholar-in-Residence and Consultant……………………………………. 7 II All-Ukrainian Student Conference. Simferopil March 26-27, 2010 “Aiming At Discoveries That Will Make A Difference In The Community”. “Much Ado About Our Amazing Conference” Susanna Emirilyasova, English Language teacher; Fauziya Abliakimova ,Senior English Language teacher,CEPU ………………………………….10 “Fashion Show as a Part of Annual Foreign Languages Decade”. Dmitriy Yenygen, Kerch Institute of Economics and Humanities……………………………………………………………………………………………..….13 11th Annual American Studies Summer Institute:"Change in America: Perspectives on the Obama Administration" Yevpatoriya, June 7-11, 2010……………………………………………………………….14 TESOL-Ukraine Teacher Development Summer Institute. Kamyanets-Podilskyi. June 21-25, 2010.

“Exploring E-Teaching and E-Learning with TESOL” Oksana Chugai, M.A., Teacher of English Gymnasia “Euroland” of European University…………………………………………………………………………………….….15

ENGLISH UNDER GLOBALIZATION: “Celto-Slavic connections at the Institute of English Studies of KUL, Poland” Krzysztof Jaskuła, the Celtic Department of the Institute of English Studies John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin, Poland………….. 17

“Societas Celto-Slavica” Maxim Sergeevitch Fomin, Lecturer in Humanities, The Research Institute for Irish and Celtic Studies, University of Ulster…………………………………………………………………………………….…19

METHODOLOGY: “Reflection on Collection or Pitfalls of Writing” ” Oksana Chugai, M.A., Teacher of English Gymnasia “Euroland” of European University……………………………………………………………………………………………………20 “Multiple-choice Test Items: Some Tips on Writing Good Distractors.” Wojciech Malec, Catholic University of Lublin, Poland……………………………………………………………………………………………………………..23

THE WORLD OF LITERATURE: 1

“Translation Practice Challenges” Prisyazhnyuk Nadya, Kovalska Nataliia, National Technical University of Ukraine “KPI”……………………………………………………………………………………………………………26

“Using Poetry and Songs in EFL teaching” Olha Chufitskaya, The Volodymyr Dahl East - Ukrainian National University………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..28

PARTNERSHIP NEWS:

Hawai’I TESOL/TESOL Ukraine Partneship.

“My First Online Learning Experience: Findings from the “Blind Side” Keita Takashima…………………29 “MCSA’s Unique Student Council” Ray Sasaki……………………………………………………………………31

ANNOUNCEMENTS........................................................................................................ ...33.

EDITOR’S GREETING Dear Colleagues, Welcome to this summer issue of the TESOL-Ukraine Newsletter. The end of the old school year and the beginning of the new is traditionally a time to reflect on our work, on what we have gained and what we have lost. TESOL-Ukraine Newsletter has become the place for the EFL teachers from all parts of Ukraine to meet and share common ideas, values, and approaches.

In TESOL-UKRAINE IN FOCUS the readers can come back to the happy days of TESOL-Ukraine events: XV TESOL-Ukraine Annual, Summer Institutes and Students’ Conferences. To have more image memories you are invited to visit Picasaweb with the Photo Albums. We would appreciate your feedback in comments to the pictures suggested or your own Albums being added.

Authors from outside the TESOL-Ukraine have been attracted to the Newsletter, and more and more of their work has been included, taking the edition step by step toward a broader vision. We are happy to observe the shift of the Newsletter to this new perspective. ENGLISH UNDER GLOBALIZATION offers the readers a rare material on the investigations of the language connections tracing its globalization long before it was named so.

In METHODOLOGY an enthusiastic audience will meet old friends and our cherished authors who contributed invaluable professional insights and recommendations. EFL teachers will find ideas that they can apply to their own classrooms and improve their professional competence.

PARTNERSHIP NEWS opens new challenges and new possibilities to experience Hawaii TESOL friendly share. By following our new direction we are not loosing good ties, we are gaining new friends.

We thank those who have submitted articles for this edition of our TESOL Ukraine Newsletter, and we invite all of you to submit your articles, essays and information on TESOL events happened to be organized in your regions. All the material should be addressed to franchuk.ofeheln.olena@gmail.com or mykalisa@list.ru You are welcome also to use our Forum for the discussion matters.

TESOL-Ukraine Newsletter Editorial Board has got so far several clear confirmations of collaboration from our new members and welcome Kerch (Dmitriy Yenygen), Kiev (Anna Shvidchenko), Kharkiv (Svitlana Zubenko), Olena Zozulia (Chekasy). We expect to have more in the Board, at least one from each oblast’ group.

Olena Franchuk TESOL Ukraine Newsletter editor on behalf of the TESOL-Ukraine Editorial Board

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TESOL-UKRAINE IN FOCUS: XV TESOL – Ukraine National Conference: ”English Learning in the Context of the Long-life Education”.

Rivne. 15-17 April, 2010 XV TESOL-Ukraine Annual, 2010 which took place in the Rivne State University of the Humanities turned to be the most representative TESOL-Ukraine event: among about 310 participants and guests 250 were TESOL members (out of 450 TESOL members in Ukraine by April 2010) registered as the participants of the Conference representing 85 educational institutions in a whole; the Conference became an attraction for the ELT from abroad (Poland, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Armenia), and eight Peace Corps volunteers working in Ukraine. It became a powerful net-working event: during the period of preparation of the Conference (February-March, 2010) more than 300 group and individual TESOL members among which about 160 with new membership joined in the organization.

The XV TESOL-Ukraine Conference was well planned. The first time there was suggested a preconference registration to the events with an active involvement of the TESOL-Ukraine web site which made the web site more meaningful and interactive for the TESOLers, the Conference Program being exposed two weeks before the Conference start. A large, interesting and representative Book Fair (RELO, Pearson Longman Ukraine, Academia Publishing House, Shkilnyi Svit) with a wide choice of educational material and nice prices for the guests and the participants was held during the Conference. The organizers also offered ELT (Tarasova Olena, US Alumnae, Prof. Valeriy Polkovsky, Ostroh Academy, Prof. Lyudmyla Kvasova, Kiev Taras Schevchenko Univ. Zoya Pukha, Senior Teacher of Drahomanov State University, Kiev) to introduce their publications both in presentations and on the Book Fair.

The participants enjoyed 29 workshops and demonstrations, 18 of which were run by the TESOLUkraine members from 14 Universities and schools of Ukraine. On April 15-16 Short Paper Sessions organized their work in 6 sections of 25-30 participants each.

The workshop ‘Virtual Classroom as One of the Online Teaching Tool’ became a new form of work at the TESOL-Ukraine Conference and really was a success. It was an on-line bridge with several countries: Israel, Hungary, Serbia, and Brazil. Participants had an opportunity to learn about absolutely knew and not wide known yet online platform Vyew and the well known around the world WiZiQ. These were presented by Nina Lyulkun and her collaborator, Marina Petrovic from Novy Sad, Serbia, a devoted teacher online who has been sharing her own knowledge with educators all over the world. A final students’ project, works presented as well from Ukraine (Nina Lyulkun, group leader) was shown just while the session has been taken place in Tel Aviv and it was filmed out. The Conference materials were prepared in the e-version (CD) which is very handy, upto date and which has been unanimously approved by the Conference participants. The conference rooms were well equipped to satisfy the up-to date format of the presentations. While developing the project there were established good links with partner organizations both official (the dept. of Science and Culture of the Rivne Regional Administration, the dept. of Education and Science of the Rivne city administration, regional library) and NGOs. Thus, all technical service for the Conference was provided by the Regional Centre of Advanced Informational Technologies.

There was organized an adequate Mass Media coverage of the event which made it known among the Rivne region ELT and the community, and supported the recruiting of new TESOL members from the region. Several Universities followed the example of the Rivne State University of the Humanities to give the information about the event on their University official web sites. The 3

Conference events were filmed by the TESOL students group and the e-version of the film will be suggested for the TESOLers on the YouTube after up-dating of the TESOL-Ukraine web site.

What was unexpected- 1/3of the participants were young researchers aged up to 30-35 years old. This is a good sign for the TESOL-Ukraine, for the future development of the organization. TESOL-Ukraine now has to do much to involve both new and former members in the adequate activities and to support the net-working. According to the Questionnaire TESOLers are eager to form Interest Groups and conduct a wide range of the regional events to unite the ELT in reforming the process of education.

As we got to know from the Questionnaire filled out by 201 participants, the results of the project has met the expectations of the participants and the time-table of the project. A very active e-mail communication (February-March,2010) helped both sides (the Organising Committee and the perspective participants ) be definite about the Conference events, the character and the format of presentations, the procedure of registration, logistics, etc what made the three-days conference be held successfully. Also, we hope this project helps the TESOL-Ukraine not only enlarge its membership and raise the standard level of the events organized but also find new partners not just in Ukraine but in other countries as well The Conference schedule was fulfilled without any essential changes. The Organizing Committee have done everything possible in coordinating the project work the way that we could achieve the goals in logistics and it did work. The participants were not only happy to come to the Conference, but the results of their work are quite good and highly appreciated by them according to their responses. But even a very well planned Annual can’t satisfy the interest and meet the needs of all the participants because the workshops and demonstrations, short papers sessions have to be planned for one and the same time.

The Organizing Committee suggest the following Recommendations to make the preparations of the upcoming Annuals easier : 1. to up-date the TESOL-Ukraine web site and to consider better site administrating; 2. to create an up-dated list- serve of the TESOL members; 3. to restore the TESOL-Ukraine Interest Groups through active involvement of the TESOL members in the open discussions and event planning, informational and instructional support in organizing and conducting at least once a year a Regional Conference for one/some Interest Groups.

The Voices of the Participants.

Zoya Pukha, Methdologist Teacher of Nosivka District Gymnasium Senior Teacher of Drahomanov State University in Kyiv The days spent at XV TESOL - Ukraine Conference at Rivne State Humanitarian University were the days of sharing fantastic ideas of hardworking colleagues, the days of meeting like minded teachers for collaboration on mutual projects, the days of concern about the problems of teaching English & the problems of education and finding the ways out, the days of welcoming atmosphere created by organizers of the Conference. Thanks to everybody who hosted TESOLers!:) I'm so grateful to you for the huge job done to make the Conference successful. From the very beginning to the last day we felt your hard work of a conductor of a wonderful orchestra, every second of which was tuned in a well - organized events held in time according to the program: workshops, presentations, sessions, book exhibitions, discussions and, of course, coffee - breaks, huge lunches:), unforgettable welcoming Reception with a lot of dancing. :) I'll keep in my memory the opening speech of Thomas Santos & the session he monitored together with Svitlana Bobyr. His gentle , intelligent humour & a great gift to support colleagues helping them to get ready for 4

presentations is worth admiring. My special thanks to Alisa, our President. Being welcoming and wise she opened her heart to every participant of the Conference where everyone felt so alike having much in common but still unique sharing their vision of a lot of educational issues. It was my great pleasure to meet Dr. Mary Sue Sroda and to absorb every word of her wonderful presentation. And the crown of the great event was a fascinating travelling to the oldest educational institution - Ostroh Academy. At a final meeting in Rivne I told that I was already TESOLsick paraphrasing the word homesick. The thing I can say about Ostroh Academy. When I met it last Saturday I told to myself that I would be back again one day together with my students and colleagues. Thank you ever so much for the opportunity to touch the past that has made the present possible. I'm so happy to have met many younger colleagues, the future and hope of Ukrainian education who are teaching English using new techniques that help their learners to develop better communicative skills, to get a good command of a target language and finally to become educated members of a global village who understand each other and live in harmony.

P.S. The week that comes to the end was also very active. On Monday Valentyna & I dedicated all our classes to the Conference and demonstration of the film about Ostroh Academy. Students looked at us with curiosity & I guess why? The Conference changed us & no doubt all the participants. It has encouraged me to work better, to try the issues I have learned listening to colleagues from different parts of Ukraine and abroad. Students observing the emotions I shared with them became more interested in the things I have shared. They've understood that teachers are also learners because of long life learning, even they(teachers) discover some important things and are very much enchanted(crazy) at them. On Tuesday I conducted additional classes at Gymnasium to catch up. On Wednesday I participated in a cross cultural Conference at Drahomanov University presenting my new textbook for University students " Mykhailo Drahomanov: Socio- Cultural Portrait of a Scholar". That was an interactive presentation that needed students participation. In the end I told about TESOL in Ukraine,demonstrated all the stuff we had got at the Conference and , of course, the film about Ostroh Academy. On Thursday I visited Nizhyn Pedagogical Lyceum participating in a practical seminar and again sharing my impressions about the event in Rivne, the welcoming University and the trip to Ostroh Academy. I do believe so much that new members are going to join TESOL after bright emotional information. Today is Friday, the end of the week, but I'm still in Rivne watching the photos on line& recalling the moments of the event....:)

More to say ‌ Olena Tarasova, Merited teacher of Ukraine,Head of Foreign Languages Department,Kyiv-Mohyla Collegium It is difficult to choose which event was the best, as well as it is impossible to overestimate such events where we can share, discuss, improve, learn from each other, socialize and talk over the most urgent questions, get bright ideas and simply have fun. Moreover, I made so many new friends and met my old ones. My interest was on-line education and possibilities to use everything computers can give. Thanks to Thomas Santos, Peter Serdyukov, Nina Ljulkun and many others I got valuable information, advice I needed so much and addresses of numerous sites. My colleagues' activities inspired me to look for new ways of presenting materials, techniques and methods. For me the conference was like a gulp of fresh air. Now I 5

know what I need to continue my work and develop myself. I see new directions and I think I'm ready to start thinking over some new Project which I hope will be supported. I'm grateful to the organizers and hosts of the Conference and personally to Olena Franchuk for inviting me. I got so many new impressions, bright ideas that it'll take time to straighten them out. I was impressed by my Ukrainian colleague working abroad who managed to build their careers and become successful and I'm sincerely proud of them.

Natalia Reutska, English teacher, Khmelnytskyi gymnasia #1 named after V. Krasitskyi. …We took full advantage of being technologically equipped in room 408 that enabled us to get acquainted with the learning on-line systems: Blackboard Learning System and e-College learning system. The participants benefited greatly from the talk of Prof Peter Serdukov, USA the expert of on-line learning course designer and course facilitator.

Good news is that on-line education is coming to Ukraine. In the fast changing world it is impossible to use the same teaching models and the same assessment practices as we used to apply 10 years ago.

Lidia Storozhenko on behalf of Melitopol and Zaporizhya groups “If you have an apple and I have an apple and we exchange these apples – then you and I still have an apple each. If you have an idea and I have an idea and we exchange these ideas – then each of us has two ideas.” These Bernard Shaw’s words express the main purpose of the conference – we came there to exchange ideas and share experience. As the train pulled up at the station we got off the carriage and into a sunny, cheerful and welcoming city. That first impression lasted until the end of the conference. We enjoyed its welcoming and easy atmosphere, perfect organization and, of course, bright and exciting presentations. Among the most remarkable ones my colleagues named “Teaching ESP to Adults” by Sue Sroda; “Writing in the English Language Classroom” by Maya Rogava, “Designing ELF Listening Lessons Using Authentic Texts” by Miranda E. Wilkerston and Molly Smith; “Using Video in the Foreign language Classroom” by Fausia Abliakimova, “Teaching English to Young Learners” by Kateryna Uryvalkina” We were especially impressed by our cultural tour to Ostrog.

Special thanks to the organizers and a lot of thanks to the presenters.

Dmitriy Yenygen, Kerch Institute of Economics and Humanities.

So, XV TESOL-Ukraine Conference is over…

There is much to recall. You see, one wise man once said: “Life is not the moments that passed, but the moments that you remember”. I can’t but say that every single second spent in Rivne lives in my memory. It was the first TESOl conference I visited. And I must confess that I don’t have any pity. I liked it all. I liked the conditions we lived in,

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we ate in, we walked in, we breathed in…But moreover I managed not only to have a nice rest, but also to grow professionally.

During the first day I visited two workshops – one of them was devoted to the topic “Character and Leadership”. It was organized by Svitlana Kurysh. It was amazing, because I got acquainted with a new international program – American Studies Summer Camp. And it appeared to be helpful for me personally. Additionally, Svitlana shared the presentations she had brought from the US devoted to American Studies and prepared by people from all over the world. It was unique to learn how different people perceive America differently.

After that we visited the workshop by Alla Razan “Communicative Approach in Teaching Grammar”. That was interesting for me as well, she managed to systematize the main principles of communicative approach applicable to grammar teaching.

Next day I participated in the work of the session led by Olena Tarasova and Natalya Reutska. First of all I am very grateful to them for excellent session management. We spoke about miscellaneous topics – starting with the independent testing in Ukraine and finishing with a brilliant report of Peter Serdyukov about on-line teaching and learning. I learnt much from this very session and even got some professional pieces of advice.

It would be even impossible to tell about everything I liked in Rivne, in general everything was astonishing and very European. For sure, great thanks must be said to the organizing committee and to our great Conference Lady. Thanks a lot. It was really unforgettable.

For more responses of the Feedback Survey after the Conference read at: http://twurl.nl/zwjvzg For more pictures visit: http://twurl.nl/huuc6o

ENGLISH

LANGUAGE SPECIALIST Program in Action.

Rivne, 2010

During the world crises when the state-supported universities are poorly financed we look for all possible both internal and external sources to put education, research and innovations on an equal footing, within a long timeframe. By doing so, we try to sustain the former achievements and try to offer both English teachers and students of our faculty new opportunities that will fill the innovative gap and develop the integrated “knowledge triangle” that effectively combines education, research and innovation. Having great experience in developing TESOL Networking project, supported by RELO in 2006, we established long-term links between our University and regional TESOL groups, “Window on America” program, English Teachers Recourse Center located in the regional library, Rivne Regional In-service Teachers’ Training Institute, working hand in hand in the field of in-service professional teacher training (for more info see the TESOL Newsletter issue #11,2006).The success of the project has challenged many English teachers at the University to look for some changes in the methodology of language teaching/learning. This ensured their understanding that intercultural issues should be integrated into education at all stages, and that young people must be given all the tools they need- language proficiency, for example.

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Following a proposal made by the RELO office at the U.S. Embassy to invite an English Language Teaching or Applied Linguistics expert to support two-week project in the area of teacher training, the Foreign Languages Faculty of the Rivne State University of Humanities eagerly applies for the program for the period from April 5– April 18, 2010. We planned to involve in the project not less than 240 English teachers and students. There were 8 permanent groups of 15-25 participants each of in-service teachers (from the University, and secondary schools, mostly TESOLers) and students, which made up about 90 participants. The rest 150 participants (pre-service teachers, students, administrators, the city Department of Education officials) had free attendance for the trainings.

Mary Sue Sroda, PhD in Linguistics conducted the training sessions with great success.

Pre- Conference days were attended by 30 English teachers who benefited the training sessions a lot.

Visit the site for pictures: http://twurl.nl/f85o04 Mary Sue Sroda is currently working for the Murray State Center for Teaching, Learning and Technology as Scholar-in-Residence. Her areas of research include integrated skill methodologies, technology in teaching, and models of intercultural competence. So she shared her experience about such Centers in the article that follows.

Mr. Hal Rice, Director of the Murray State University CTLT, Professional Staff member of Murray State University Dr. M. Sue Sroda, Graduate Director of the Murray State University Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages Program, CTLT Faculty Scholar-in-Residence and Consultant

A Brief History of CTLT at Murray State University, Murray, Kentucky Faculty professional development in the context of higher education in the United States has been receiving much more attention in the past few decades--the past twenty-five years have seen the establishment of a national faculty development organization (The Professional and Organizational Development Network), and many universities across the US have established programs or departments to examine and support excellence in teaching. Some universities connect these programs, which address changes in teaching and learning research, with units which also support faculty in adapting to rapid changes in technology. The following is the chronology of the development of such a center for teaching, learning and technology at a comprehensive state university in the rural US. Since 2001, Murray State University has worked to provide a continual program of faculty training, with particular but not exclusive regard to the impact that technology has had and will have on university teaching and learning.

In the mid 1990’s what was known then as the Faculty Resource Center (FRC) was moved to a new Information Systems unit formed on campus.

FRC was primarily a unit that provided check-out equipment such as overhead projectors, film projectors and slide projectors for faculty use. The unit also ran a photographic processing service to produce both black and white photographs and slides for educational use.

The newly formed unit was called Academic Computing and Technology Services (ACTS).

While many of the former services provided by FRC were continued, new responsibilities involved the increased use of digital technology in education.

Email support and web development were areas of emphasis for the new unit.

Workshops were now offered in converting slide presentations to electronic methods such as PowerPoint. Services to convert old 35mm slides to electronic images were added during this period.

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Faculty was provided training in the development of web pages for teaching purposes using HTML tagging.

Around 2001 it was determined that the University needed a unit to support and train instructors to become more effective teachers. Funds were allocated by the state to create a teaching and learning center to accomplish this task.

The Provost of the University consulted with the director of the ACTS unit to find the best way to create such a unit. Since the use of technology in the classrooms had become so integrated in the learning process it was decided that the new unit would be combined with the ACTS unit.

Funds were allocated to add one and one half staff to the ACTS unit and to change the name of the unit to reflect the additional responsibilities.

This new configuration of ACTS would be called the Center for Teaching, Learning and Technology (CTLT).

Since the old ACTS staff were not active instructors in classrooms it was decided to use some of the new funding to allow the unit to purchase time of experienced faculty members to act as consultants in the development of teaching and learning opportunities.

The unit decided on a rotating approach to filling the consultant role and to call them FacultyScholars-in Residence serving a one year term. The scholar was chosen on the merits of being an excellent instructor and the use of technology to enhance the learning experience for students.

The scholar must also be a tenured faculty member and are usually have been recognized by their peers as outstanding in their field.

The Scholars will usually have a project in mind to work on during their year of residency in CTLT. They also typically conduct workshops and assist the unit in planning and delivery of campus-wide events such as the annual Teaching and Technology Forum, Summer Blitz workshops and 12 Gadgets of Christmas event.

Some of the former Scholars continue to work with CTLT on projects or training related to teaching and technology CTLT also researches and compiles information about emerging technology or new technologies that will or may have an impact on teaching. There are two current projects E-readers and digital texts: A group of faculty and technical experts from across campus conducted a trial of several models of e-readers with respect to the possible uses of readers and/or digital texts in university courses of various disciplines. The result of this project will be presented at the Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education annual conference in May 2010.

Online Courses: Since the online course offerings at our university are currently available for only a few graduate degrees, CTLT is preparing training for professors to transfer other courses to online format using the university course management system and the online virtual classroom program, Elluminate, and other online resources.

For more pictures visit: http://twurl.nl/b4go8p

Susanna Emirilyasova, English Language teacher Fauziya Abliakimova ,Senior English Language teacher Crimean Engineering Pedagogical University

MUCH ADO ABOUT OUR AMAZING CONFERENCE

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MOTIVATION IS SOME KIND OF INTERNAL DRIVE THAT ENCOURAGES SOMEBODY TO PURSUE A COURSE OF ACTION HARMER Knowledge is widely-known to be power allowing people of different age to open “the door” to the striking world of research. It is true that participation in a conference is a challenging and exciting endeavor but the experience gained by the participant becomes quite advantageous and beneficial afterwards. Thus, Crimean Engineering Pedagogical University encouraged the inquiring minds by offering them an opportunity to participate within the II All-Ukrainian student conference “Aiming At Discoveries That Will Make A Difference In The Community”. This special and unforgettable event was held on March 26-27, 2010 in Simferopol, capital of our sunny peninsula. The members of the Organizing Committee are truly grateful to the US Embassy and Peace Corps for their help in sponsoring II All-Ukrainian student conference.

Over 200 active and enthusiastic participants from all corners of Crimea and various regions of Ukraine took part in the conference making it a bright event to remember. It was the first time that we greeted participants from Kiev, Nikolaev, Krivoy Rig, Odessa, Dnepropetrovsk, Khmelnitsky, although some of our guests, namely participants from Kerch, Sevastopol, Melitopol, Chernigov, Kamianets-Podilskiy, were participating in our conference a second time. But all of them – new and already acquainted with us - undoubtedly got a great amount of astounding impressions.

One of the core goals of the organizers was to create such an atmosphere in the section work that would reveal the best potentials of the presenters’ research. By showing true interest to all participants’ reports, by asking deep questions and involving listeners in a discussion on the issues raised in a presentation we managed to achieve this goal.

It is common knowledge that the huge advantage of conference participation is that students observing other presenters’ research findings assess their own progress, set themselves objectives for the future. So, the stimulating and challenging atmosphere of the conference enabled many freshers to advance their presentation skills and deepen their knowledge on various topics.

There were many chances for participants’ self-expression at the conference as the topics on which they could present their research were numerous: they could report in the sections “Methodology”, “Linguistics”, “Literature”, “Country Studies”, “ESP”, and “Topics of General Interest”.

The organizers of the conference were perfectly aware that conducting a research work takes time and a lot of effort. This is why we decided to award best presenters with certificates for excellence of the content and manner of presentation. It is not surprising that many participants got this award as the level of presentations has improved significantly and it was our pleasure to give this honorable award to many students.

Conducting such a big event is not an easy task: we spent many sleepless nights, had arguments and whatever, but now we can claim one thing: we benefited this event no less than our guests since we 10

had a chance to evaluate our own level of teaching English, to see where we are and what direction we should go in organizing students’ research. Another benefit of the conference was that apart from broadening our outlook it enabled us to make friendships that are most likely to last a lifetime. The organizing committee along with a Peace Corps volunteer Simone LaPray hope that our efforts will yield good results indeed.

Feedback from the participants: Alime Churlu(Crimean Engineering Pedagogical university): Year after year All- Ukrainian student conference at Crimean Engineering Pedagogical university continues to attract students from different universities of our country. As well as in the previous year, the conference proved to be informative and exciting. Meeting new people, sharing experience, discovering new worlds— so many opportunities were given to us. We drew inspiration from bright ideas and explorations, and this became an encouragement for the future. I am looking forward to the conference next year!

Anna Akopian, Olena Lohvinova, Voktoria Garbarchuk, Kateryna Bochko,Olha Vlasova, Hanna Raspopova The students from Melitopol Institute of Public and Municipal Administration of the “Classic Private University” Dear organizing committee of the All-Ukrainian student conference “Aiming at discoveries that will make a difference in the community”!

We, the students of Melitopol Institute of Public and Municipal administration, are writing to express you our gratitude for the event you have organized.We can say that the II All-Ukrainian student conference “Aiming at discoveries that will make a difference in the community” was a great success.

Thank you for your hospitality and kindness to us.

We are sure such events are really necessary for students from all Ukrainian institutes, universities and colleges. The conference held at your university was very useful and interesting. It gave us a chance to get so much new information and learn a lot about the latest and most interesting achievements in different fields of science. Very important challenges of social life were described and possible ways of solving them were suggested. Besides, it was a great opportunity to communicate with many clever people, extend our horizon, show knowledge in the topic researched and, of course, have a great time.

All the sections provided a great diversity of topics which we listened and discussed with pleasure. It was very interesting for us to meet students from different places of Ukraine and see what their research interests are. We could also evaluate our level of English. The conference was a good motivation for us to improve it.

We appreciate a good atmosphere created at your conference, all the people around us were so hospitable, kind and eager to help! The concert was very nice and memorable.

Unfortunately we were not able to attend the excursion. But we are almost sure it was great as well.

As far as we know the students from Melitopol participate in your conference every year and we will be very happy to take part in it next year.

Safie Ablyalimova (Crimean Engineering Pedagogical university): This is the first time I’ve taken part in the conference like this and I truly enjoyed it a lot. I’m still under the impressions, as it allowed me to make a lot of friends from different cities of Ukraine. I’ve had a chance to broaden my outlook by listening to various presentations made by other students. It’s worth mentioning that it was a useful experience for me, because now I know what the conference is like and I do hope it will help 11

me in the future. Thus I’ve made up my mind to participate in different conferences and I believe I’ll enjoy them as well.

Tetyana Kyryusha (Chernigiv State Pedagogical Shevchenko University) I am writing to give my feedback.

I liked the conference very much, especially our section (Methodology). The reports were rather interesting and even new for me, so I can say that I have learnt much during these 2 days. We were met with a great respect and nice treatment. The excursion was interesting but not rather long. I was happy to see so many young scientists from different corners of the country and get new acquaintances. I still have a will to come to you next year.

Thank you.

Reshat Emiruseinov (Crimean Engineering Pedagogical university): Last month (March 26-27) I participated in the II All-Ukrainian Student Conference, but to tell you the truth my impressions are still on. During the conference I made a lot of friends from very different towns and cities of Crimea and Ukraine as well. All presentations were very interesting, instructive indeed and I really enjoyed this experience. When presenting my research firstly I felt confused but later I found it of great interest to share some new information with the rest of the students. I look forward to the next student conference to take part in.

Sabrie Trosh(Crimean Engineering Pedagogical university): It’s been my third conference experience, but still there is no conference alike. This time I was really amazed by the great scale of it. I made a lot of friends from Kerch and Sevastopol Universities and, besides, I got acquainted with other smart students from different cities of Ukraine. I presented my research within the section “Modern trends in Linguistics”. Scientific-related works were devoted to the style, neologisms, terms, etc. Within our section the modern ways of translation and its peculiarities were discussed. The scientific research ‘Dead Languages” struck me most as it was quite challenging. Although it was introduced by the first-year student, it was on the high level. Thus I’m willing to point, that for some students it was their début in making public speech, for more experienced presenters this conference was a chance to share their new research which has been fruitful. I’d like to say that success is achieved by diligence, that’s why the students’ effort and interest have made a real successful deal in the Scientific World. I want to thank all participants and managers for making such a great holiday for us!!!

Olga Zemskaya(Crimean Engineering Pedagogical university): I would like to share my feelings about II All-Ukrainian Student Conference. It took place in Crimean Engineering Pedagogical University. Every year students from all over Ukraine come to Simferopol to share their knowledge in English, their cultures, traditions and ideas. We have a great chance to discuss different vital, political problems, some problems of society; we can make new friends and establish new contacts.

Moreover, we are able to communicate with native speakers, to improve our speaking skills. Believe me, it’s a wonderful possibility to know new interesting people and to promote the level of knowledge of language. You cannot skip this event. As for me, I participated in this conference two times and it helped me greatly. So we are awaiting new meetings and new friends. Join us, use a chance to perfect your English.

Vitaliy Sadich (International Humanitarian University), Odessa 12

It is so pleasant to remember the days spent at the Simferopol conference. The first thing worth mentioning is the level of organization of the conference. All participants were treated with great respect: students were met at the railway station, got good lodging, were treated to lunch and coffee breaks.

There were six sections at the conference according to the topics of presentations. To tell you the truth, we were very anxious before presentations as all participants demonstrated high standard of preparation and quality of research done. The fact that the language of the conference was English gave a special appeal to the conference. It goes without saying that section work was conducted in a very friendly atmosphere. There was no hint of competitiveness, we all were equals and got a chance to obtain new knowledge and enjoy the exchange of ideas and discoveries.

A big cultural event - excursion to Yevpatoria – was a pleasant and unexpected surprise to us. The excursion enabled us to sink into the ancient history of Crimean Tatar people, to get to know their lifestyle, culture. Attending a mosque we could sort of “feel” the spirit of the ancient epoch. Visiting another site – an old city wall - gave us another glimpse of the history of Yevpatoria.

In conclusion I would like to say that such event as this gives us an opportunity to acquire new knowledge and practical skills. I am sure that next year many more students from Odessa universities, as well as from all over Ukraine will attend this conference because one gets an unforgettable experience at events like this.

For more pictures visit: http://twurl.nl/dknayj

Dmitriy Yenygen, Kerch Institute of Economics and Humanities

Fashion Show as a Part of Annual Foreign Languages Decade.

One more great event took place in Kerch Institute of Economics and Humanities – Fashion Show, that was a part of annual foreign languages decade in our university.

Such fashion parties are usually organized by the freshmen – the first-year students. Annualy, after finishing the topic “Fashion&Clothes” at their oral speaking class they must work out conception, philosophy of the event, prepare costumes and their descriptions and present their masterity on the stage. On such days the whole institute gathers in the assembly hall to enjoy the show whish is breathtaking every time. The secret point of annual Fashion show is that all costumes are to be created and not bought or taken somewhere. Moreover, students should not only develop a good gait on the catwalk, they must comment on their costumes, their subject-matters, techniques and philosophies.

This year was not an exception. Our newcomers organized their show in two groups. The main conception of the first one was to show the development of fashion through ages and cultures. Here they presented the Soviet Union Style, Ancient Egypt fashion, Prehistoric outfit, the Olympic goddesses’ fashion, the style of the Brazilian carnivals and hippie culture. I must confess that the participants really managed to cut the mustard, their presentations were as that of professionals, they showed magnificent creativity, captivating style, outrageous materials, good English command and artistic skills.

The second group decided to organize their demonstration as a kind of country study workshop. They prepared costumes which could somehow be related to different world countries and they commented on them. For example, the spectators could enjoy the dresses-national flags of the UK and the USA, 13

the Netherlands, Turkey, Greece, Iceland, Spain, Scotland, Ukraine and so on. I can assume that we, being huge welcoming audience, who were skillful enough in country study, managed to learn some new facts about mentioned above countries – and this is a plus in favour of the presenting group.

They were really interesting and informative, in addition, they were creative, powerful and quite unique.

In general, the fashion show was a great start in the artistic career of our first-graders due to the fact, that our faculty is famous for its art festivals, drama theatres and other artistic endeavours.

For more pictures visit: http://twurl.nl/m4cygh

11th Annual American Studies Summer Institute: "Change in America: Perspectives on the Obama Administration" At Yevpatoriya Branch of Volodymyr Dal' East-Ukrainian National University June 7-11, 2010 The Public Affairs Section of the U.S. Embassy in Kyiv in cooperation with the Yevpatoriya Branch of Volodymyr Dal' East-Ukrainian National University announced the 11th American Studies Summer Institute: “Change in America: Perspectives on the Obama Administration” which was hosted by the Yevpatoriya Branch of Volodymyr Dal' East-Ukrainian National University in Yevpatoriya from June 7 –11, 2010.

Based on an open competition, forty junior university lecturers and researchers from throughout Ukraine were invited to attend this popular summer event.

This intensive summer institute program was designed to include lectures, seminars and discussions and focused on the three main topics – race/immigration,(Courtney L.Tollison, Ph.D. Myron Stachiw) environment/energy ( Daniel Charles, Jeff Yankow, Ph.D, Timothy Standaert), and foreign policy (Allan J. Lichtman, Ph.D., Courtney L. Tollison, Ph.D., Stephen Shulman) to provide an opportunity to discuss real changes that have taken place since President Obama’s election, and how foreign audiences’ views of America has changed as a result. American professors and other specialists conducted the lectures and discussions.

Some photos from Yevpatoriya are available in the Internet, use the link below. Enjoy! http://twurl.nl/e7kav3

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Oksana Chugai, M.A., Teacher of English Head of Foreign Languages Department Gymnasia “Euroland” of European University

Exploring E-Teaching and E-Learning with TESOL We all are aware of the generation gap when we encounter our students. They were born digital, they live in a different world full of technological wonders. Sometimes we, teachers, feel alienated, when our students speak about things which are natural for them. Such situation creates misunderstanding and even obstacles. Using technology has become a necessity we cannot deny anymore. Step by step, e-teaching has become a real thing, or rather, a miracle, and we want to be part of.

It became possible with TESOL-Ukraine Teacher Development Summer Institute, funded by the U.S. Embassy “COMPUTER TECHNOLOGY IN EL TEACHING/LEARNING” held in June (2125), 2010. Its aim is to provide continuous professional development and sustaining an ELT professional network in Ukraine. The goal of this Summer Institute was to examine challenges EFL professionals face in the Digital/Technological Age and explore e-teaching and e-learning tools.

The Institute was for teachers of secondary schools and universities, TESOL-Ukraine members. It exposed teachers to effective tools of teaching with web resources and software. The program introduced participants to different types of technology they could use in their teaching to encourage target-language practice with peers and native speakers.

Every day participants of Summer Institute came to Kamyanets-Podilskyi Ivan Ohienko National University and met trainers invited by the U.S. Embassy – Sean Conley and Thomas Tasker. I think it would be interesting to learn more about people who actually conducted Summer Institute. Sean Conley is the chair of the department of English language studies at The New School University in New York City where he manages a department that includes ESL programs, a TESOL Certificate program and directs an online and blended MA in TESOL with concentrations in Teaching and Curriculum Development. At the Summer Institute he focused on Experiencing, Evaluating and Creating WebQuests, using Quandry Software and Hot Potatoes.

Thomas Tasker from Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania has been currently working as a U.S. DOS Senior English Language Fellow in Kyiv. Previously he led professional development courses for in-service Korean secondary school teachers; led TEFL certificate courses in Czech Republic; taught introductory linguistics course and course for International Teaching Assistants (ITAs) as well as ESL intermediate to advanced levels in an intensive English program at the Pennsylvania State University. At the Summer Institute he introduced participants to using Wikis, Voki, Voice Thread, Second Life, Audacity and Podcasting for Receptive and productive purposes, using Corpora for English language research.

It is impossible to ignore the place where the 5-day training took place. “Flower on stone”… said famous Ukrainian poetess Lesya Ukrainka about Kamyanets-Podilskyi. The city is a real museum under the open sky. In all, there are 175 monuments of history and architecture in Stary (Old) Kamyanets. In this respect, Kamyanets is second only to Kyiv and Lviv. The location of the city is unique: the historical Old City lies on a peninsula, surrounded by high rock walls, enclosing the Smotrych river loop in a circle.

Many participants of Summer Institute came to Kamyanets for the first time and in the afternoon they had an opportunity to go on excursions. The organizers provided guided walking tours to the Old Fortress and to the Old City, as well as guided bus tours to Kryvcha Kristal cave and to Khotyn Fortress. Grand castles, enigmatic labyrinth of caves, picturesque landscapes, churches, cathedrals 15

and other places of interest, full of secrets and mysteries, strike imagination and leave everlasting impression on the visitors.

It is necessary to mention that all the participants from different regions had a very good command of English, basic knowledge of using Information Technology, active listening and communicative skills which helped to create a unique atmosphere of co-operation and mutual understanding between participants and trainers. Sometimes it was challenging even to have a break according to the schedule because of hot discussions on the ways of adaptation the new tools to different teaching environments. All the participants showed ability and willingness to work in teams, to solve technical and even psychological problems while conducting and presenting projects.

The last day of Summer Institute…The last minutes before all the participants, trainers and organizers of this event return to their cities and towns. With certificates in our hands and tears in our eyes we try to understand what compels so different people from different places come here to face new challenges. The goal of the Summer Institute was achieved – different types of technology are at our disposal in EFL classrooms which surely will encourage English language practice and eliminate the generation gap.

ENGLISH UNDER GLOBALIZATION: Krzysztof Jaskuła the Celtic Department of the Institute of English Studies John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin, Poland Celto-Slavic connections at the Institute of English Studies of KUL, Poland The English Institute of John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin is not a typical department of English studies in which students are allowed or forced to study nothing more than the English language. As a rule, any department or institute of English is concerned with providing its students with high-standard education both in English and about English. This one, on the other hand, offers its students a broader linguistic and cultural perspective, not only that connected with other Germanic languages, like German or Dutch, which students can also select as their favourite courses, but also with another group of tongues, namely Celtic. All this is conducted in the spirit of comparing and analyzing as many (usually) Indo-European languages as possible, so as to enjoy their variety, to concentrate on their uniqueness and to pinpoint possible similarities. Analyses of different aspects of mostly Celtic languages frequently result in remarkable MA theses produced by our under-graduates.

It goes without saying that staff members also deal with Celtic languages in their papers, conference talks and dissertations.

The Celtic Department was established in 1980s and it has become a unique feature of our institute ever since. We have employed native speakers of either Welsh or Irish (who are always, at least, bilingual) as full-time teachers or visiting lecturers. In both cases, the lecturers have been useful in teaching our students how to communicate in both English and one of the Celtic tongues. On our website one can find crash courses in both Irish (http://www.kul.pl/art_611) and Welsh (http://www.kul.pl/art_418.html). All our students in the first year are offered a course in Celtic culture as well.

The linguistic family of Celtic includes three main languages still spoken, that is, Irish in Ireland, Welsh in Wales (UK), and Scottish Gaelic (Scotland, UK). There are also minor languages such as Breton (Brittany, France), Cornish (Cornwall, UK) and Manx (the Isle of Man, UK), the last two being practically dead and undergoing the process of artificial revival. All of these, despite the fact that most people consider English as the only language officially spoken in the British Isles, are still 16

used by larger or smaller linguistic communities (of course except Breton, which is not used in the UK).

With reference to their structure, Celtic languages are special in numerous ways. They are most ancient in Europe, apart from Greek and Latin, and they provide linguists with a wide range of linguistic phenomena which are not necessarily found elsewhere within the family of Indo-European tongues.

Above all, Celtic languages are famous for their phonological individuality, namely, for word-initial mutations of consonants. These consonant alterations are historically motivated and, from the viewpoint of synchronic phonology, they seem to be inexplicable. In any event, a number of students find it fascinating that a word, e.g. a noun, which begins in a particular consonant as such, that is in isolation, changes its initial consonant in connected speech according to what word precedes it in a sentence. For example, the Irish word for ‘cat’ is cat, pronounced with the initial voiceless sound ‘k’ (as in the Russian word как). This sound is changed to the fricative ‘x’ (as in the Russian хорошо) in the phrase a chat, meaning ‘his cat’, while it is transformed into the voiced sound ‘g’ in the phrase a gcat, meaning ‘their cat’, with the first sound of the noun pronounced like that in the Russian word город. As mentioned above, such changes cannot be accounted for from a contemporary viewpoint.

Nonetheless, diachronic investigations are carried out in our department and significant publications are made in either monographs or collections of articles.

Another characteristic trait of Celtic languages is a syntactic property which is called word-order. In most Indo-European tongues, sentences are constructed according to the following pattern: SubjectVerb-Object (SVO). For example, They eat dinner (English), Oni jedzą obiad (Polish), as well as many translations of this sentence into other Indo-European languages will display this SVO order. In Celtic languages this is not the case, though. The Irish version of this simple sentence is Itheann siad an dinnear, where Itheann is the Verb (3rd person plural), siad is the Subject (pronoun – ‘they’), while an dinnear is the Object. This means that word-order in Celtic languages is different, that is, VerbSubject-Object (VSO). Despite different varieties of more or less complicated sentences, this pattern of VSO invariably holds true. Such a word-order is typical of Classical Arabic, Classical Hebrew, Classical Maya or Hawaiian, which are anything but Indo-European. Thus, typologically, Celtic languages offer a linguistic mystery which can be approached and, possibly, solved by our students and post-graduates. Accordingly, appropriate studies are conducted and publications are made in respectable linguistic periodicals.

Our department is also in touch with analogous institutes in many countries. From the very beginning, we have been cooperating with Celtic scholars from Ireland, Wales, Austria and Germany. Thanks to the development of digital technology and fast communication, our staff members, under-graduates and post-graduates are in contact with linguistic circles scattered all over the world. The exchange of information is rapid and fruitful. Technology apart, personal relations are equally important.

Recently, thanks to our participation in two Celto-Slavica conferences held in Dubrovnik, Croatia, and Łódź, Poland, we have established close links with Russian scholars working at the University of Ulster at Coleraine, Ireland, as well as those who work in Moscow. We exchange ideas and inform each other about the possibilities of publishing our scientific accomplishments. Our own periodical, Lublin Studies in Celtic Languages, is released more or less once a year and contains either monographs or collections of articles (http://www.kul.pl/art_612.html).

As regards the propagation of Celtic culture, our department organizes Celtic Days every year.

During such events (this year these days were organized in May), talks are delivered by speakers who show their views concerning Celtic art, mythology, music and literature, as well as those who wish to present the results of their scientific research to a wider audience in a less formal way. The speakers come from a range of countries and are frequently well-known specialists, but our students as well are offered a possibility to deliver their maiden speeches and share their views on different aspects of Celtic culture. This year also a screening of Celto-oriented movies was organized, a workshop on 17

spoken Breton was arranged and concerts of Celtic music were held in nearby pubs and university halls.

All in all, our Department of Celtic seems unique in this part of Poland and Europe, although similar departments are still formed. Our uniqueness stems from our tradition of more than 20 years, from our adherence to hard scientific work and from our openness to fresh ideas which are provided by both our under-graduates and post-graduates on the one hand, and well-known scholars of Celtic languages on the other.

Biographical note about the author: Krzysztof Jaskuła (http://pracownik.kul.pl/krzysztof.jaskula) graduated from KUL in 1996, after presenting his Master of Arts thesis devoted to Old Irish vowels. In 2004 he defended his PhD dissertation in which he dealt with sound changes occurring in and before Old Irish. He is now working in the Celtic Department of the Institute of English Studies of John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin, Poland, conducting a Bachelor of Arts seminar, teaching English phonetics, phonology and Old Irish.

Maxim Sergeevitch Fomin, Lecturer in Humanities, The Research Institute for Irish and Celtic Studies, University of Ulster.

Societas Celto-Slavica Celtic scholars from the Slavic countries have worked indefatigably for many years in nurturing and developing Celtic Studies. Their increasingly close links with scholars and scholarship in the West – particularly since the time of the break-up of the former Soviet block – have led to a situation in which there is now a significant body of scholarly work being produced by Slavic academics of Celtic languages, literatures and culture. Moreover, much of this work is informed by traditions, methodologies and insights which are, to varying degrees, quite new to Celtic scholars from the West.

Following discussions with various Celtic scholars from the Slavic countries, the foundation meeting of Societas Celto-Slavica took place in Moscow at the Institute of Linguistics in July 2004 in the office of the late Professor Viktor Kalygin. In addition to Professors Kalygin, Séamus Mac Mathúna and Tatyana Mikhailova, the meeting was also attended by Drs Natalia O’Shea, Nina Chekhonadskaya and Grigory Bondarenko. Dr Maxim Fomin was appointed the Secretary of the Societas in absentia.

The First International Colloquium of Societas Celto-Slavica, hosted by the Research Institute for Irish and Celtic Studies at the University of Ulster, was held at the University’s Coleraine campus between the 19th and 21st June 2005. The aim of the Colloquium was to take stock of the history and present state of Celtic scholarship in the Slavic countries and to examine parallels between the Slavic and Celtic traditions.

The Colloquium was attended by scholars and students from many Slavic (Poland, Russia, Czech Republic) and Celtic countries (Ireland and Wales) and also from other countries such as the United States, Germany and Sweden (bill.celt.dias.ie/vol4/displayObject.php?TreeID=3697&TypeID=7). Since then, there have been four colloquia organised. The Second and the Third Colloquia of the Society were held in Moscow (13-17 September 2006, jointly hosted by Moscow State University and Institute for Linguistic Studies) and in Dubrovnik (18-20 September 2008, hosted by Inter-University Centre).

The most recent one, the Fourth Colloquium of the Societas was held in Łódź, Poland, between 13-15 September 2009, and it focused on various aspects and dimensions of Celtic cultures, languages and literatures. It was well attended by scholars from Ireland (both North and South), Wales, Germany, USA, as well as from Poland, Ukraine, Russia and Czech Republic.

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The presence of Celtic cultures in the present-day Ukraine was discussed by members of the Societas at its various colloquia. At the Inaugural colloquium, Dr Alexander Falileyev of the National University of Wales (Aberystwyth), examined toponymic data from the Ukraine in order to determine possible Celtic presence in the area.

In the absence of inscriptions of Roman date containing Celtic placeand personal names and the lack of onomastic information by ancient authors, he pointed out that not a single river-name of Celtic provenance has been securely attested in the territories of the “Eastern Celts”, be it the Balkans or North-Western Dacia, and that one must proceed with extreme caution in dealing with this subject. At the Fourth Colloquium, Dr Gennadiy Kazakevich of the National Taras Shevchenko University of Kyiv, touched upon the late La Tène scabbard with open work decoration from the Przeworsk burial n. 3 of the Gryniv cemetery (Upper Dniester area). He pointed out that the Gryniv scabbard belonged to the same art style as the Gundestrup cauldron.

The Society has its office at the University of Ulster at Coleraine (represented by the Secretary of Society, Dr. Maxim Fomin) with its branches in the Lomonosov Moscow State University (represented there by Joint President of the Society, Professor of Celtic, Prof. Tatyana Mikhailova) and in the University of Łódź (represented there by the Dean of Philological Faculty, Prof. Piotr Stalmaszczyk). The Society’s President is Professor Séamus Mac Mathúna (Director of Research Institute for Irish and Celtic Studies, University of Ulster, Coleraine).

It is hoped that the new Society will provide a forum for the promotion of research and development of Celtic Studies in the Slavic countries and will lead to closer links and exchanges between Celticists from the West and the East.

Biography of the author: Maxim Sergeevitch Fomin (http://www.arts.ulster.ac.uk/research/celtic/a-z/fominm.htm) is Lecturer in Humanities at the Research Institute for Irish and Celtic Studies, University of Ulster. He previously held the positions of Research Fellow (2006-07), Assistant Editor of eDIL project (20032006), Research Scholar at the Faculty of Arts at the National University of Ireland, Cork (20002003), and Assistant Lecturer at the Moscow State University (1998-1999). He was also a Consultant to LDT project of the Institute and Research Associate at CELT project, Department of History, University College Cork (2001-2003). He remains in a close co-operation with Supplement to eDIL project, directed by Prof. G. Toner.

He completed his PhD thesis (Early and Medieval Irish), a comparative study of early medieval Irish and early Indian kingship, in 2003. Earlier, he completed a C. Sc. Philos. dissertation (Philosophical Anthropology, Philosophy of Culture and Religious Studies) at the Philosophical faculty, Moscow State University, in 2002, on the concept of ideal rulership in early cultures.

METHODOLOGY: Oksana Chugai, M.A., teacher of English Head of Foreign Languages Department Gymnasia “Euroland” of European University

Reflection on Collection or Pitfalls of Writing 19

The Independent Testing… These words are closely connected with our life nowadays – teachers and students can see if those years of teaching and learning are not spent in vain. Reading and Writing – two main skills are tested, Reading belongs to a closed part, which is checked by a computer, and Writing belongs to an open part, which is graded by examiners – specially trained teachers of English.

This year I, being a teacher of English and supervisor of the 10 th form, decided to take part in checking of so-called an open part of the Independent Testing. I supposed it would be useful for me to analyze all the varieties of papers with typical mistakes, strong points and pitfalls to share with my colleagues and students afterwards.

Unfortunately, I could not analyze the data statistically, because my goal was to focus on the quality of the papers, not on the quantity. Anyway, I will try to describe the main types of test papers.

First, I should remind my readers about the tasks students had to complete.

Task 1 Read the text below. Think of the word which best fits each space (47-50). Use only one word in each space. Write your answers on the separate answer sheet.

The Keys: 47 – around/round/across 48 – from 49 – looking 50 – can/could/will/would/may/might Task 2 51 You have found out that the local council is planning to build a new supermarket not far from your school instead of a sports centre. You have decided with your friends to write about this plan to the major newspapers published in your city/region. Write a letter to the editor of an English language newspaper in which you: • say why you are writing • explain why sport is important to people • explain why a supermarket should not be built in your area • give your reasons why a sports centre would serve your city/region well Write a letter of at least 100 words. Do not write any dates and addresses. Start your letter with Dear Sir or Madam, It was the task. And what was the outcome? The worst test paper was a blank one, of course.

Nothing was written by a student – not a single letter. Such work received 0 points according to all criteria for Task 1 and 2. The same amount of points was given if all the answers in Task 1 were wrong and the amount of words in Task 2 was not 100, but less.

More important for us, as examiners, were papers which contained the necessary amount of words in Task 2 (at least 100) – such writing could be evaluated, even if all the answers in Task 1 were wrong. I checked more than 200 papers, and only few had four or three correct answers in Task 1.

More often there were two correct answers, or even only one. Some students couldn’t think about anything suitable at all, so they decided to have fun. These are the answers of some of them for Task 1.

47 Babulia Don’t Amerika

48 Speki worry Afrika

49 Mne be Antarktika

50 Kolobok happy Frost 20

Babushka

kozlika

ochen

lubila

Now about Task 2. Some students misunderstood the task completely. Instead of writing a formal letter to the editor about plans of the local council, they introduced themselves and their families, described their hobbies and friends. Few wrote using the English alphabet, but the words were Ukrainian or Russian (like “Babulia Speki…”), sometimes they asked the examiners to be kind and put some amount of points. Some decided to write about the building of a new supermarket not far from a sports center, supposedly not noticing the word “instead”. But such letters were not numerous.

The biggest amount of letters started with “Dear Sir or Madam”, or at least “Dear Sir”, “Dear Madam”, as it was stated in the task. Most students gave the reason for writing, explained why sport is important to people (sometimes instead of sport wrote about a sports centre, which was a mistake), why a supermarket should not be built and gave reasons why a sports centre would serve their city/region well. Some even used proverbs, sayings or idioms to support their ideas. Unfortunately, because of lack of time I couldn’t put them down, but in the process of checking I noticed how diverse the endings of the letters were. So I decided to write out the most unusual ones and after a while I had a collection of different ways of finishing the letters.

Some students put down the correct phrases corresponding to the formal style like ‘Sincerely yours’ or ‘Faithfully yours’, but instead of their names they had something else, for example: School student ; Leavers from school 14 ; Children ; Readers Some put down the date, their address and the name finishing the letter, which was completely wrong: The 7th of June 2010 Ukrainsta St Town Nevomnyrt Gorbatyuk Ann Some forgot about formal phrases, finishing the letter with the words: Your readers Your. Yaroslave!

Inhabitants of Dnipropetrovsk A student of the town A director of the school From school President’s Some students used informal ways of finishing the letter like: Hope for your help! Students, parents and teachers Good luck Thank you. Good bye God bless you With best wishis, samebody With best wishes, your constant reader Buy! Luba I shall login your answer Julia, xxx Spelling mistakes added misunderstanding: I am looking forward for your replay Some confused writing with speaking: Thank you for listening. I wish you make write choise 21

Some included wishes typical for postcards May you be lucky!

Some were too informal conveying passionate feelings: I love dear Sir or Madam, Karolina Love, Oksana Some were completely confusing: Yes off koss Some – just funny: Your pupil and the newspaper.

Good bay.

I hope my humble collection will remind teachers and students how complicated the process of writing is. Whatever mistakes are, we can feel the degree of confusion and despair while facing the problem of producing a written text. When teaching English we should remember that only using basic writing instructions, putting emphasis on vocabulary acquisition and learning strategies will build composition skills our students need to be successful writers.

Wojciech Malec Catholic University of Lublin, Poland

Multiple-choice Test Items: Some Tips on Writing Good Distractors.

Introduction The greatest challenge in the construction of MC items is the production of good distractors (incorrect choices), no matter how many. According to Haladyna et al. (2002), all distractors must be plausible.

Furthermore, they must be plainly wrong, contrary to the keyed response, which must be unquestionably correct. While intuitively obvious, the application of these rules poses a major difficulty in the context of a collocations test, as opposed to, for example, a test on irregular verbs, in which the correctness of the response is not a matter of degree.

Collocation test items Consider the following item, which is supposed to target the collocation thrilled to bits: (1) He was ____ to bits when his giant vegetable took first prize.

A thrilled B delighted C pleased D pumped The degree of linguistic unacceptability of two distractors, delighted and pleased, raises doubts which are difficult to dispel with the help of dictionaries. On the one hand, the collocation in question occupies a separate subentry in MED (2002), OALD (2000) and CLAD (2003), which might suggest that thrilled cannot be replaced with another past participle to form a synonymous expression. On the other hand, to bits is listed on its own in MED and OALD as meaning (1) ‘very much’ (He’s thrilled to bits, I love you to bits) and (2) ‘into small pieces’ (The book fell to bits in my hand). This, coupled with the failure of BBI (1986) to include thrilled to bits at all, might be interpreted to mean that we 22

are not dealing with a fixed phrase, but rather with a free combination of the lexical item thrilled and the expression to bits.

For resolving such uncertainties, a computer concordance program such as SARA (1997) proves to be an indispensable tool. In the British National Corpus (BNC, 1997), 22 occurrences can be found of thrilled to bits, 1 instance of pleased to bits, and none of delighted to bits. Incidentally, one dictionary does recognise pleased to bits as a collocation (LDOCE, 2003). As a result, delighted should be retained as a distractor, and pleased replaced with, for example, excited, which does not cooccur with to bits in the corpus.

Alternatively, pleased might be kept and treated as incorrect simply because, given the choice, thrilled is much better company for to bits. It is also possible to regard pleased as unacceptable merely on the basis of the fact that pleased to bits does not belong to the official collocations list (as specified in the syllabus) that the students are supposed to have studied for the test (cf. Read, 2000: 174). Such practice, however, would doubtless be unpopular with the students themselves, who would certainly consider it unfair to be penalised for using what appears to be correct language. It might be interesting to investigate the influence of such decisions on students’ levels of motivation.

Distractor plausibility In general, the plausibility of distractors can be aimed at by making sure that they are: (A) the same syntactic category as the answer, (B) semantically related to the answer, (C) common errors. In effect, the above is a recapitulation of two guidelines given in Haladyna et al. (2002), which recommend that the choices should be homogeneous in content and grammatical structure. Semantic affinity can sought by consulting a thesaurus. Common errors can be found with the help of resources, e.g. LDCE (1987), and by considering the language that students produce in class.

One source of common errors that is worth reflecting on when writing distractors is the incompatibility of collocational patterns in the test takers’ first and second languages. By way of illustration, consider the potential distractors in the following items: (2) a) He says hoards of people have been ____ photos of the sunflowers.

Key: taking Distractor: making b) Her ____ went completely blank.

Key: mind Distractor: head c) He’s always ____ her compliments and buying her flowers.

Key: paying Distractor: telling d) Sam is ____ a party on Saturday.

Key: throwing Distractor: making The distractor in (2a) shows promise because this is a common mistake stemming from the fact that in many languages, including Polish, people literally ‘make’ photos. Similarly, the distractors in (2b– d) are all examples of typical errors made by Polish learners of English; compare the English collocations with the following Polish equivalents: (b) poczuć pustkę w głowie (‘feel emptiness in one’s head’), (c) powiedzieć komuś komplement (‘tell sb a compliment’), (d) robić imprezę (‘make a party’).

Common sense The guidelines given above, or any other item-writing advice for that matter, are not hard-and-fast rules that may never be broken. For example, the options in (3) are not semantically homogenous: (3) If you’re going to be a successful politician, you’ve got to ____ the part. a) A see B fit C watch D look 23

b) A match B fit C suit D look c) A match B fit C watch D look Does it mean that they are unacceptable? On the one hand, a testwise student will immediately notice that in (3a), fit is different from the other distractors, which pertain to eyesight; in (3b), match, fit and suit all relate to appropriateness and harmony; and in (3c), there are two pairs of semantically related choices. However, as long as the item-setter does not consistently write items in which the answer is conspicuously different from the distractors, or items in which there is always one distractor that stands out in stark contrast to the remaining choices, testwiseness will not contribute much to the variation in test scores. This is an area worth further investigation, though.

Construct validity Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the underlying concern in distractor development is the impact they have on the construct validity of the interpretation of scores from the resultant test items. Scores from a language test can be interpreted to indicate the degree of test takers’ mastery of a particular language use domain (cf. Bachman and Palmer, 1996: 21–22; Bachman, 2004: 269). In the light of this, consider the following items: (4) a) I’d like to ____ your attention to the problem of pollution.

A pull B draw C bring D grab b) All ____ must be submitted to the board of management.

A aplications B doccuments C proposals D repports If the purpose of a collocations test is to assess students’ ability to merely distinguish words that often go together from those that do not, then item (4a) does not adequately measure the construct because it is potentially misleading (three of the options, i.e. draw, bring and grab, collocate with attention).

If, on the other hand, knowledge of ‘use in context’ is part of collocational ability, then the item in question is perfectly acceptable because only draw can be used in the context given above (cf. bring sth to your attention; grab your attention, with no prepositional phrase). Conversely, scores from trick items such as (4b) cannot be logically used to make inferences about test takers’ knowledge of collocations since what the item apparently measures is orthographic rather than collocational knowledge (every option is collocationally appropriate but only proposals is spelled correctly).

Furthermore, if items are constructed in such a way as to provide inadvertent clues to the right answer, or to any of the wrong answers, for example when they are consistently like (3a) or (3b) above, test scores will be affected by factors other than the construct being measured.

Conclusion It is important to remember that the distractors in a multiple-choice test item should be unambiguously incorrect, but plausible. Moreover, we should make sure that the entire item is relevant to whatever it is that the test purports to assess. Insofar as any given test item contributes to test score variance that is irrelevant to the interpreted construct, the meaningfulness of score interpretations will be jeopardised.

References Bachman, L. F. (2004). Statistical Analyses for Language Assessment. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

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Bachman, L. F. and Palmer, A. S. (1996). Language Testing in Practice. Designing and Developing Useful Language Tests. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

BBI (1986). The BBI Combinatory Dictionary of English. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company.

BNC (1997). The British National Corpus. Version 1.00. Oxford: Chancellor, Masters and Scholars of Oxford University.

CALD (2003). Cambridge Advanced Learner’s Dictionary on CD-ROM. Version 1.0. Copenhagen: Software TEXTware A/S. Haladyna, T. M., Downing, S. M. and Rodriguez, M. C. (2002). A review of multiple-choice itemwriting guidelines for classroom assessment. Applied Measurement in Education 15, 309–334.

LDCE (1987). Longman Dictionary of Common Errors. Harlow: Longman Group UK Limited.

LDOCE (2003). Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English. Fourth edition. Harlow: Pearson Education Limited.

MED (2002). Macmillan English Dictionary. Version 1.2.003 Full. Macmillan Publishers Limited.

OALD (2000). Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary of Current English. Sixth edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Read, J. (2000). Assessing Vocabulary. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

SARA (1997). Version 0.941. Oxford: Chancellor, Masters and Scholars of Oxford University.

THE WORLD OF LITERATURE: Prisyazhnyuk Nadya, Kovalska Nataliia National Technical University of Ukraine “KPI” TRANSLATION PRACTICE CHALLENGES We are involved in preparing our students to take part in the business life of the Ukraine and the world. The graduates of the Linguistic Faculty at the National Technical University of Ukraine ‘KPI’ work in different spheres (e.g. embassies, plants, factories, enterprises, oil and mining companies; translate documents; act as interpreters or tourist guides, serve as secretaries, etc.). That is why lectures should take into account requirements and needs of the Ukrainian society by equating training with employment. Learning can, and should, be seen in the context in which it takes place.

Learning is not just a mental process; it is a process of negotiation between individuals and society.

Society sets the target (in the case of ESP, performance in the target situation) and the individuals must do their best to get as close to that target situation as possible. In the learning process there is more than just the learner to consider. In preparing our students, we as curriculum designers should map out priority issues related to various aspects of the developments in the modern world. Students are encouraged to have field visits at different kinds of enterprises to be familiar with their functioning.

The most challenging activity for our students is their translation practice. It is organised twice – at the 3rd and the 5th year. It is designed to prepare linguistic undergraduates to fulfil the expectations of their future employers with respect to their language and translation skills. By means of this translation practice we try to simulate the real-life situation for our future translators as they are proposed to translate authentic scientific and technical texts in urgent need for the specialists at more than 20 faculties of our Technical University. The practice has become the integral part of the program presupposing education and professional development of linguists translators. It goes without saying that the students of the Linguistic Faculty have a great opportunity to be in touch with the on-going process of research development and cooperation through their translation practice. The 25

best students are often invited to work as interpreters and translators to diverse international events organized by the International department of ‘KPI’ (international conferences, talks, round tables etc.) as well as those of Ukraine.

Practice design can be seen as a kind of activity and as such it can be studied as a translation process. The typical subprocesses of the translation process (needs, text analysis, text translation, reviewing, editing) can be applied to practice design, but it makes it easier to draw on.

For translation practice our students are equipped with: the background knowledge about the country; profound knowledge in the theoretical spheres of translation; practical experience from their classes in translation training; helpful individual translation diary for practice with elaborated steps in translation process; two tutors to supervise their translation practice; self-assessment form.

The background knowledge about the country The students have the background knowledge about the country of a target language: the facts, norms and values of the nation’s culture; verbal and non-verbal behaviour accepted by the given ethnic culture; cross cultural-differences.

Profound knowledge in the theoretical spheres of translation The students start their practice after having mastered such disciplines as: Linguistics, Theory of Communication, History of Translation, Theory of Translation, Contrastive Grammar, Neology, Contrastive Stylistics, Information Technologies Translation, Computer Studies and Applied Linguistics, Translation of Scientific and Technical Literature.

Practical experience from their classes in translation training At the intermediate level of English our students face the challenge of translating specific texts in such spheres as: economics, general engineering, computing and electronics. Internet, computerized classes and enormous amount of dictionaries in any form help them a lot as well as their theoretical background: search for translation unit, mega text concept, translation algorithms and translation transformations etc.

Helpful individual translation diary for practice with elaborated steps in translation process This well designed printed diary is being constantly developed and is a helpful tool for the students to be well organized during the procedure of practice itself. Following the instructions in the diary they can easily do their translation step by step. We implement a diary study after the translation practice is finished. One of the aims is to obtain feedback by understanding the student’s feelings and attitudes towards various aspects of a real life translation process. This feedback could give us a chance to reconsider the students’ needs and the content and exercises to be included into the preliminary course of translation training. Second, we were aiming at giving students an opportunity for self-exploration and reflection on professional growth and its relationship with a team work Two tutors to supervise their translation practice One tutor is the specialist from a technical faculty and the other one is the lecturer in translation training at the Linguistic Faculty. By means of this triad: student/technical specialist/lecturer in translation – we definitely simulate the real- life situation for our future translators and interpreters. In this role-play they are: translator/customer/consultant. The student is a translator of any technical text, specialist from the technical faculty plays the role of an ordinary customer that orders the translation of the authentic text and the lecturer in translation training is a real life experienced consultant or expert in different spheres of language and translation techniques.

Self-assessment form Practical experience proves that students’ self-assessment form can be designed and effectively used at the end of their translation practice. This form beginning with the phrase «To improve my skills in translation it would be advisable/better for me…» to help students analyze their strong and weak points in translation.

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Long before their translation practice started students must be taught some pre-translation exercises. Special attention should be paid to summary writing.

Summarizing is a highly challenging activity for the students because it compels them to think in an economical way and to produce the main idea of the text even before its translation.

The role of the lecturer is important in creating students’ confidence in translation. S/he can be regarded as a facilitator who gives guidance and advice when necessary; assists in doing translation; checks them. The students’ common mistakes can be presented on the board (or on the computer screen) with the lecturer’s commentaries.

Thus, translation training is considered to be a double-sided process involving both students and tutors. While the lecturer may be the authority on the target culture, language translation, s/he cannot possibly anticipate the entire difficulties students encounter in translating scientific/technical texts.

Now our students even ask for translation practice because they appreciate its merits and look forward to it. Most students enjoy their interactive practice because they are actively involved and can discuss their translation. More importantly, students acquire the ability, the desire, and the means further to develop language skills and translation skills.

Above all, this practice makes the materials for translation meaningful. The main principle of students practice is their independence. Working independently, working together in teams, the students come to realize that translation is not fossilized knowledge, but is a rich and vigorous resource.

We hope that the introduction of such methods of learning and teaching will be effective in that they encourage our students to get ready for their translation practice at the University as well as at their workplace in future.

Olha Chufitskaya The Volodymyr Dahl East - Ukrainian National University

Using Poetry and Songs in EFL teaching Introduction Many times teaching of the English language falls short of fulfilling its goals. Even after years of English teaching, the learners do not gain the confidence of using the language in and outside the class. Real communication involves ideas, emotions, feelings, appropriateness and adaptability. The conventional English class hardly gives the learners an opportunity to use language in this manner and develop fluency in it. Thus, the main purpose of the language teaching course, that is developing skills in communication, is unfortunately, neglected.

An attractive alternative is teaching language through poetry and songs, because it gives a context for listening and meaningful language production, forcing the learners to use their language resources and, thus, enhancing their linguistic abilities.

Benefits of Using Songs in the Language Classroom Language teachers can and should use songs as part of their classroom teaching repertoire. Songs contain authentic language, are easily obtainable, provide vocabulary, grammar and cultural aspects and are fun for the students. They can provide valuable speaking, listening and language practice in and out of the classroom. Some key reasons songs can work exceedingly well in the foreign language classroom include the following: 27

• Songs almost always contain authentic, natural language.

This often contrasts with the contrived, stilted language found in many student texts. Of course songs can also go to the other extreme by using overly crude, foul or otherwise objectionable language.

With careful screening, an extensive library of usable songs for language learning can be compiled.

• A variety of new vocabulary can be introduced to students through songs.

Songs are almost always directed to the native-speaking population so they usually contain contemporary vocabulary, idioms and expressions.

• • • • • • •

Songs are usually very easily obtainable.

Students can experience a wide range of accents.

Grammar and cultural aspects can be introduced through songs.

Songs help to develop an aesthetic taste (expressing feelings and sentiments) Songs contain words and expressions of high frequency and offer repetition.

Singing helps to acquire a sense of rhythm.

It facilitates memorizing when it is associated with a linguistic item.

Poetry and its advantages in EFL teaching Although most ESL students may be years away from understanding a Shakespearean sonnet, there are many ways to introduce students to poetry and use it to boost their language skills. First of all, teachers need to consider their students’ language level when choosing poetry material. There are a lot of written poems that are accessible to intermediate-level students; the vocabulary is simple and the themes, including racism, poverty, love, and work are relevant to many students’ lives.

Students can practice listening comprehension by filling in the missing words of a poem that is read to them. A poem can introduce or reinforce target vocabulary around a theme; a pre-reading exercise can involve defining or using those words.

One of the most creative and satisfying ways to get students to apply their poetry knowledge is to have them write their own poems. Teachers who introduce their own work as models demonstrate to students that anyone can be a poet.

Incidentally, poetry can offer many pleasures: • pleasures of sound and meaning; • of images and symbols; • of speech, feeling and thoughts • in addition to linguistic benefits poetry can foster the aesthetic sense of students.

Poems are usually composed of condensed words and vivid images. Reading them can make students more receptive to imagination and improve their ability in appreciation of beauty.

PARTNERSHIP NEWS: Hawai’I TESOL/TESOL Ukraine Partneship.

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My First Online Learning Experience: Findings from the “Blind Side” By: Keita Takashima

“What could an undergrad student contribute to the development of a new online course?” was my original question prompting me to do this project. The new administration of the university I attend decided to reach out to more nations, focusing on countries and people in the Pacific Rim, through distance learning. After the first online EIL course was developed as a pilot course and distributed, I was hired as a student researcher to help evaluate the effectiveness of the online English language course. With my education and training in TESOL and Cultural Anthropology, I immediately became curious about understanding the culture of technology-mediated learning and what the students go through that was different than what they would experience in a traditional classroom.

Having been inspired by an anthropology professor, Rebekah Nathan (2005), who conducted an ethnographic participative observation at a university by “enrolling” as a new freshman, I decided to become one of the students in the pilot online course and study with other students. While being a student, I could make qualitative observations and gain understanding of what the students experienced in the course.

The course I enrolled was a twelve-week intermediate English Reading/Writing course taught during Spring/Summer terms of 2009. To make this project more interesting, I took the first half of the course from on campus while being a full time student, and the latter half of the course from Japan while working full time as an intern. Besides having a great time being a student in the online course for the first time, I was able to observe the classroom from a critical point of view. My unique status as a student researcher helped me reveal a “blind side” of the online course – what the teachers and the developers could not see, and the students are hesitant or careless to report. In this paper, I would like to tell stories of my participative observation and discuss the experience from a student’s perspective.

At the early stage of my participation, I had an incident that made me realize the challenge and limits of advanced technology use in the language learning course. As a student in the course, I was required to take weekly online chapter tests. The test was composed of chapter comprehension and vocabulary in multiple choice and matching styles. While I was moving my mouse around to manipulate the cursor on the screen from one question to another, I realized that a small box was popping up when the cursor went over some of the words in the test questions. I moved the cursor to one particular word, held it there, and was shocked to find that the box had a translation of the word in Japanese! The Japanese Windows operating system on my computer comes with a built-in automatic translation program. It is a very innovative and user-friendly program that supports nonnative speakers’ English web-experiences; however, it totally defeats the purpose of taking tests because the translation gave me the answer to most of the questions. I doubt that any international online students in the course have had English operating systems on their computer; thus, my assumption is that most of them had a similar translating program in their native language. This is surely a security issue on the provider’s side, but seriously, who tells your teacher that they have a cheating tool provided by the technology? I cannot think of a solution to this challenge, but in the 29

near future, some kind of security must be implemented as we plan to start giving university credit to the online students.

Despite the rapid and never ceasing development of new and better technology, the technology sometimes fails to perform the task we command. One of the most frustrating things that happened to me while I was taking the course was that my computer decided to freeze while I was submitting a test to the learning management system. Perhaps it sounds like I am exaggerating my frustration, but it was a threat to my grade because there was a one-time-only limit on the test. The choices I had were either to wait until something miraculous happened on the computer or to shut down the computer and forsake the test, and neither of them was a reasonable solution for me. In other words, I was stuck. After I made the agonizing decision to shut down the computer and lose all of my work on the test, I sent an email to the teacher and found out that she could remove the attempt, and I was able to take the test again. The technology failure regarding the test was compensated for at the end, but the psychological pressure and the feeling of powerlessness over the situation made my learning very difficult and frustrating for a time.

The challenge of being an online student was not only technological, but also pedagogical. When I went back to Japan to do my internship, I was taking the second half of the course. Like many of the students in the course, I had to work every weekday and work on the course assignments after I came home from work. One day, I set aside a couple of hours at night for working on the course tasks; however, when I returned home and opened the course website, the assignments for that week were not available, so I refreshed the webpage and waited patiently; still there was nothing. As I had learned in doing my research, distance education theories support the idea of student self-regulation and time management as crucial factors for success in an online learning (Moore, 1972, 2007; Garrison, 2003), and I was responsibly in charge of my learning on that day until I found the content was not there. My self-regulation and commitment to study on that day was forcefully taken away, and I was very discouraged. Moreover, I had to find another time to work on the tasks I was planning to do that night which led me to fall behind the schedule. The teacher would not find this an issue in a traditional classroom because she would be able to alternate the class schedule or fix the issue, but in the online course, the absence of the teacher made the learning impossible with no access to the course materials.

If I have to choose which one of the technological or pedagogical failures was more challenging for my online learning experience, I would say the pedagogical failure was more frustrating and difficult to manage because 1) technological failure was something I had no control over, 2) pedagogical failure was not my responsibility, and 3) pedagogical failure could have been avoided if the teacher was aware of the course structure and the content. Thus, my suggestion from the observation is that the teachers and the providers of distance education should be consistent in managing and keeping the course up-to-date.

From my unique experience of being a participative observer in the online English language learning course for 12 weeks, I was able to understand some of the challenges specific to online learning and gain perspective of the learners’ experience in online learning. Revealing the “blind side� of the online course helped the developers know about this type of security problem and have a more complete picture of the course - the gap between the teacher and the learners was drawn closer.

Despite the time and energy it takes to complete, I strongly encourage considering a research project such as mine to gain deeper understanding of the course itself, how the learners function in the course, and if there is anything causing unexpected difficulties for the learners in your class.

References Garrison, R. D. (2003). Self-directed learning and distance education. In M.G. Moore & W.G. Anderson (Eds.), Handbook of distance education (pp. 161-168). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

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Moore, M. G. (1972). Learner autonomy: The second dimension of independent learning.

Convergence, 5(2), 76-88. Retrieved August 4, 2008, from http://www.ajde.com/Documents/theory.pdf Moore, M. G. (2007). The theory of transactional distance. In M. G. Moore (Ed.), Handbook of distance education (2nd ed., pp. 89-105). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Nathan, R. (2005). My Freshman Year: What A Professor Learned By Becoming A Student. New York: Penguin Books.

Ray Sasaki

MCSA’s Unique Student Council Fast rewind to 2001 where an ESL-6 class discussion on Hawaii’s social services leads to a greater discussion of how students could develop a sense of building to the community by contributing to those services that serve the most vulnerable in our community. As a lesson in planning and conveying ideas clearly, the class discussion continues for a week as the students suggest that an organization would be more effective than one student’s efforts. The discussion escalates as the students hammer out the imagined organization’s purpose, logistics, and mechanics, and most importantly, how the organization could involve all MSCA stakeholders.

Coincidentally, the WASC Accreditation Visitation Team is visiting MCSA and that ESL-6 teacher is among many to be interviewed by the visitation team and elaborates on his class’s discussion when queried, “Cite examples that exemplify how MCSA demonstrates inclusion.” The example stirs an enthusiastic response from the team, further development of this discussion is one of the team’s recommendations to the school’s administration, and the MCSA Student Council is born.

Fast forward now to 2010 where after almost a decade, the MCSA Student Council continues to be distinguished as the only student council in the community adult school system nationwide and grows each year with the students, faculty and staff, and administration working cooperatively in familiarizing students with public meeting protocol and Robert Rules of Order, improving the school’s environment, contributing to the community, and providing each a voice as stakeholders.

All day classes from Pre-Literacy to GED select two council representatives per semester, and class representatives must discuss proposed projects with their fellow classmates and cast their votes according to the consensus of their class. Projects undertaken by the Council may be suggested by anyone through his respective representative. Each semester the Council elects its executive officers and teachers serve as advisors for one week thereby involving as many as possible. Meetings are called-to-order and adjourned promptly once a week for forty-five minutes between morning and afternoon classes with a brief agenda and minutes for each meeting prepared and distributed to all by each advisor.

For almost a decade and through the Student Council, the over one thousand immigrant students at MCSA continue to learn about American governing and meeting procedures while increasing advocacy for a myriad of community charities: from the annual Great White Elephant Sale for AUW, health walks, rallies at the State legislature for the preservation of community adult schools, annual Christmas caroling concerts at several senior care facilities and children’s hospitals to coordinating drives for the Hawaii Food Bank, School Supplies for Tots, Meals on Wheels for seniors and the disadvantaged, River of Life Mission, school wide Flu vaccinations, the Hawaii State Library, and Hawaii Public Radio just to name a few.

The Council’s newest and most anticipated project is the weekly Farmers’ Market which will commence this summer. The market was conceived by the Council to generate income to assist 31

MCSA in becoming more self sufficient. Also, through the suggestion of a council representative, a mini library of books donated by the students for everyone’s use will be initiated this summer.

Over the years, the MCSA Student Council has continued to grow in addressing students’ concerns thereby providing each a direct voice to the administration and in developing students as assets to their new community in which they live.

With ten years at the McKinley Community School for Adults (MCSA), Ray currently teaches ASEHigh "Critical Thinking", the highest course in the ESL program where all students do lessons electronically and is a precursor to GED. A former instructor at UH Manoa, Ray came from the private sector as the principal and founder of ADR Productions, Inc., Hawaii's largest model/talent agency and production company. At MCSA, Ray is the Student Council Mentor, a member of the school's Leadership Team, the Community Advisory Council, and the former Honolulu district coordinator for the No Child Left Behind tutorial program.

For more pictures visit: http://twurl.nl/0gsjxi

ANNOUNCEMENTS: Dear all, Happy to get back to you all. Find the new info about TESOL awards and grants at this link: http://tesol-ua.blogspot.com/2010/09/awards-and-grants-to-attend-tesol.html The first TEA ILEP Lesson Plan Contest IREX is pleased to announce our first ever Lesson Plan Contest Theme: Global Perspective Between October 1 - November 1, 2010, IREX will be accept Lesson Plans that have been created by alumni of the TEA and ILEP programs and that are connected to the contest theme: Global Perspective.

Global Perspective refers to anything that includes cross-cultural concepts and teaches students about the world around them. It is possible to connect any subject to the Global Perspective theme, whether you teach Math, English, History, or Science. The theme of Global Perspective is challenging and exciting -- have fun with it!

How to enter: 1. Use the attached Lesson Plan Template to create your lesson plan. You can also find this Template in the Groupsite File Cabinet, in the folder called "2010 Lesson Plan Contest."

2. Create a new lesson plan -- or adapt one that you are already using -- and make sure that it is clearly connected to the theme: Global Perspective. The winning lesson plans will successfully show a complete lesson (including learning objectives and an assessment) that emphasizes a Global Perspective in learning.

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3. Submit your lesson plan by uploading it to Groupsite no later than November 1, 2010. Go to the Groupsite File Cabinet by clicking on "Share" in the menu bar above. When you are in the File Cabinet, click on the folder called "2010 Lesson Plan Contest" and upload your Global Perspective Lesson Plan to this folder. Be sure the title of your lesson plan includes your name!

In mid-November, IREX will announce the winners of the contest. Winners will receive a one-year subscription to PD In Focus, an online professional development site for teachers that provides access to research-based, interactive, and ongoing resources and activities. PD In Focus includes an extensive library of video clips showing research-based teaching practices in action, as well as written materials for teachers.

I hope many of you will enter the contest! Good luck!

-IREX British Council | BBC TeachingEnglish http://twurl.nl/vhcjjp ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ TeachingEnglish Newsletter 08 September 2010 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ As we await the arrival of a new writer in our regular Guest Writer series why not check out the famous names in our back catalogue here http://twurl.nl/1ziaan ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Facebook http://twurl.nl/jjxqn7 Facebook http://twurl.nl/caagiu Keep up to date with the latest updates on TeachingEnglish via our Facebook page.

Kids website http://twurl.nl/t3qqrl LearnEnglish Kids http://twurl.nl/fs8a82 Children can develop their English skills with topic-based games, songs, stories.

LearnEnglish website http://twurl.nl/x1a450 LearnEnglish http://twurl.nl/r01p65 Develop your English, with language games, downloads, stories and articles.

BritLit http://twurl.nl/m8l6o6 The aim of BritLit is to help teachers from around the world to exploit English literature in the ELT classroom.

PremierSkills http://twurl.nl/j481vg Premier Skills http://twurl.nl/fvc4ft Enabling learners and teachers to communicate in two of the world's global languages - football and English. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Welcome to the TeachingEnglish newsletter. This week we have an article from the archives on learning styles and teaching, some suggestions about how to get your students writing poems and a useful article on how to establish the ground rules in your classes.

As always there are contributions from our readers including a question about how your own language learning influences your teaching and a question from Valeria 33

in Argentina who wants to know how you evaluate speaking skills.

Best wishes, Duncan TeachingEnglish Team | British Council | BBC Follow us on Twitter http://twurl.nl/6520ma Find us on Facebook http://twurl.nl/htbmh4 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Learning styles and teaching Ellis (1985) described a learning style as the more or less consistent way in which a person perceives, conceptualizes, organizes and recalls information. Your students' learning styles will be influenced by their genetic make-up, their previous learning experiences, their culture and the society they live in.

Read more http://twurl.nl/e01cy2 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Poems for the future Here are some suggestions to help get your students writing poems based around the theme of the future. Firstly, you could begin by brainstorming topics related to the future through acrostic poems or pictures. Ask your students to imagine they're living in the year 2100. What's life like? What can they see around them? How far has space and technology advanced?

Read more http://twurl.nl/6tofy3 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

How to evaluate speaking skill?

Hi everybody! My name is Valeria. I'm a teacher of English from Argentina. I'm carrying out a research paper on How to evaluate speaking skill. Have you ever reflected upon this issue? What aspects do we have to take into account when evaluating speaking? How can we help our students develop those aspects? What do you think about this?

Read more http://twurl.nl/yuh6nc ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Establishing the ground rules Good classroom management skills are essential to the smooth and efficient running of any classroom. But, no one is born knowing all the 'tricks of the trade' and most teachers learn the hard way, by their mistakes! Most of us (I hope!) can remember feeling completely out of their depth in a classroom situation at some point in their teaching careers.

Read more http://twurl.nl/ja6i0r ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Second language acquisition theories x practice My question is:How has your own learning of second language acquisition influenced the way you teach? In what ways did you change your teaching to maximize your students` learning after having studied about some of the principles of L2 acquisition?

Read more http://twurl.nl/pjtbte 34

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TESOL Worldwide Calendar of Events: Conference Listings ================================== October 2010 ================================== 1-4. TESOLANZ, "Context and Communication: Mediating Language Learning," Ving's High School, Dunedin, New Zealand. E-mail mmcm@hotmail.com. Proposal Deadline: Feb-1-2010. http://www.clesol.org.nz/2010/home.html 8-9. Georgia TESOL, "Beyond Borders," Hyatt Regency Hotel in Downtown Atlanta, Atlanta, Georgia, USA. E-mail hboldt@emory.edu. Proposal Deadline: Apr-30-2010. http://www.gatesol.org/new ================================== November 2010 ================================== 4-7. MexTESOL, "Revolutionary Teaching, Independent Learning," Cancun, Quintana Roo, Mexico.

E-mail piawhite@hotmail.com. Proposal Deadline: May-15-2010. http://www.mextesol.org.mx ================================== December 2010 ================================== 4. Applied Linguistics, Association of Korea (ALAK) International Conference, "Interdisciplinarity in Applied Linguistics," Korea University, Seoul, Korea. E-mail alaksecretary@gmail.com. http://www.alak.or.kr

Call for Submissions: Dear TESOL members, 35

On this page we bring to your attention the main rules set for submissions for the TESOLUkraine Newsletter. Following the requirements you will easily choose the field and format for your article. You will save your time and efforts while preparing it and ensure the best result for it as to be accepted for publication either in the TESOL-Ukraine Newsletter or in any other TESOL International journal. The Editorial Board may suggest the author to send the material for partner’s TESOL-Hawaii Newsletter. You are always welcome in your articles to share researchbased practices, to report on practice at all levels and in all contexts that is grounded in theory and has immediate relevancy to practitioners.

In our coming issues of the TESOL-Ukraine Newsletter we plan to open the rubric: English in the 21st Century World: Issues Related to Teaching EFL/English as an International Language.

Book reviews should be between 300 and 500 words and should evaluate books relevant to teacher education practice and theory.

The main requirements to the material submitted: 1. The submission must be original and not a revision or restatement of extant research in the field.

2. The submission must not have been previously published or be under consideration for publication elsewhere.

3. Authors may use British or American spelling, but they must be consistent.

4. The authors should submit manuscripts electronically to the Editorial Board of the TESOLUkraine Newsletter. Submissions should be in Microsoft Word or compatible program. Please submit figures, graphs, and other graphic elements in a standard graphic format (e.g., JPEG) or Excel. Tables should be created in Microsoft Word or compatible program.

Authors who want to submit video or music files should contact mykalisa@gmail.com for further information.

5. All quoted material must be cited in text and in a reference list.

English in the 21st Century World: Issues Related to Teaching EFL/English as an International Language.

These articles can be related to both students and teachers of English as an International Language and may encompass questions related to the status of English in the context under discussion, policy, practice, and the cultural aspects of language teaching and learning. We expect to have the submissions which will focus on the ways in which English language learners around the world must master language functions that will prepare them for success in a global society whose technology is changing and developing on an almost daily basis. Submissions should discuss these new language demands and how teachers are addressing these demands in their teaching. In addition, submissions may discuss innovative and effective ways that emerging technologies (Facebook, Wikis, blogs, Skype, etc.) have been incorporated into English language instruction.

The Editorial Board will be thankful to authors of the new rubrics and always welcome the material for our traditional sections of the Newsletter.

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