TECHNOLOGY-SUPPORTED ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING: CREATING MEANINGFUL AND PERSONALIZED STUDENTS’ LEARNING EXPERIENCES

Bandung, UPI

The advance of Internet technology has brought about major changes in today’s society in the ways they do things. In reality, this technology has turned out to have profound impacts on education as well, in particular, on how teaching and learning processes are undertaken. Sadly, despite the widespread availability of computers, cellphones, and Internet access in Indonesia, students’ competencies in Maths, Reading, and in English are still low.

Such an evaluation of the current condition was expressed by Prof. Dr. Nenden Sri Lengkanawati, M.Pd. in her speech at an English Language Teaching workshop at Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia entitled “Technology-Supported English Language Teaching: Creating Meaningful and Personalized Students’ Learning Experiences.”  This workshop, organized by MGMP Jawa Barat, TEFLIN Jawa Barat and Banten, and Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia, took place in the Postgraduate School Building of Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia on November 16, 2019. There were 70 participants totally in the workshop coming from various towns in West Java.

According to Prof. Dr. Didi Sukyadi, M.A., the Workshop Chair, the purpose of this workshop is to promote English teachers’ professional development in terms of undertaking teaching and learning English by using technology. Currently, although teachers are generally able to use technology for their purposes, they are mostly still unable to make the most of their skills in using technology for teaching English in their classrooms.

Prof Dr. Didi Sukyadi, M.A. added “English teachers need a vehicle to hone their skills by attending teacher development workshops and in the future we are going to publish an ELT journal where they can share their research insights with other teachers.” Thus, it appears that this workshop has a significant value for developing teachers’ professionalism and competence.

The main part of the workshop was guided by Pupung Purnawarman, M.Ed., Phd. and Dr. Finita Dewi, M.Pd. In addition to a researcher of education media and technology, Pupung Purnawarman, M.Ed., Ph.D. is currently the Deputy Dean for Student Affairs of the Faculty of Language and Arts Education, Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia. Meanwhile, Dr. Finita Dewi, M.Pd. is a lecturer of English education at PGSD Kampus Daerah Purwakarta.

In the workshop, Pupung Purnawarman, M.Ed. Ph.D. discussed the theoretical aspects of the use of technology for teaching and learning English. On the contrary, Dr. Finita Dewi taught the participants how to use online resources for teaching writing and listening. At the end of the workshop, Dr. Finita Dewi demonstrated various English games using online sources. This workshop was highly appreciated by the audience. They learned a very useful lesson, namely using technology to make students’ learning more meaningful and personalized.

(Text: Ruswan Dallyono, Photos: Lukman Hakim)