Training EFL teachers online: how to improve results among adult learners (based on the experiment in Skyeng School)
Abstract
The paper considers the organizational aspect of EFL teachers’ professional development with a view to improving the educational results of their students. The author suggests a way of determination of the necessity for professional development, a way to organize the process of professional development and the means of measuring the effectiveness of this process. The fundamental didactic principle of the proposed approach is the timely on-the-job professional teacher`s development. At the beginning of the paper, the author discusses the changes that came along with the development of the EdTech market, online tools in education, opening up both new requirements and new opportunities to solve the problems of all participants of the educational process. Among the burning problems of the participants of the educational process are the following ones: the individual educational request of the student, the requirements of companies for the competencies of employees and candidates in the market, the influence on the student's result by the teacher’s training, the automation of teaching aids and tools for their analysis. One of the main demands of our time is, surely, the development of separate competencies, such as: social, emotional and digital activities of a person, the ability to be flexible in relation to circumstances, the ability to learn and relearn. The ecosystem solution of the listed problems is considered by the author as the most effective way, which is designed not to separate, but to unite the efforts that coordinate the goals of each of the participants and satisfy their needs. It is proposed to influence the student's result, formulated by themselves in accordance with the market or individual educational needs, by providing teachers with timely training and support for conducting a good first and subsequent lessons. As the evidence of the effectiveness of the considered approach, the main part of the article views the experiment of the training center team responsible for the training of 10,000+ English teachers at the Skyeng online school. This part provides an exhaustive description of the project, the proposed tools, training formats and metrics to calculate the effectiveness of the experiment; for the purpose of clarity, charts and other visual decryptions are added. The paper ends with a glossary, which will be useful to all experts experimenting in education, but especially for teachers, methodologists and managers of educational programs.
References
1. Bondarenko, N.V. (2015). Nepreryvnoe obrazovanie kak faktor nakoplenija chelovecheskogo kapitala [Continuing education as a factor in the accumulation of human capital]. Nepreryvnoe obrazovanie kak faktor nakoplenija chelovecheskogo kapitala [Nauchnye trudy: Institut narodnohozjajstvennogo prognozirovanija RAN [Proceedings: institute of economic forecasting RAS], 13, 5-10 (in Russian).
2. Evenko, L.I., & Lagenen, N.E. (2016). Novyj shag v distancionnom obuchenii biznesu [A new step in distance learning for business]. Biznesobrazovanie [Business education], 2 (38), 13-15 (in Russian).
3. Kuznetsova, L.V. (2017). Biznes-obrazovanie kak zveno nepreryvnogo obrazovanija [Business education as a link of continuous education]. Kreativnaja jekonomika [Creative economy], 13-32 (in Russian).
4. Leontyeva, I.A., & Rebrina, F.G. (2018). Primenenie distancionnyh jelektronnyh uchebnyh kursov v obrazovatel’nom processe vysshej shkoly [Application of distance e-learning courses in the educational process of higher education]. Vestnik Cheljabinskogo gosudarstvennogo pedagogicheskogo universiteta [Bulletin of the Chelyabinsk State Pedagogical University], 3, 114-124 (in Russian).
5. Medvedev, D.A., & Mangusheva, L.S. (2016). Sistema distancionnogo obuchenija WebTutor [Distance learning system WebTutor]. Analiz i sovremennye informacionnye tehnologii v obespechenii jekonomicheskoj bezopasnosti biznesa i gosudarstva [Analysis and modern information technologies in the economy of business and state security], Moscow: PRUE. G.V. Plekhanov, 504-506 (in Russian).
6. Netologija-grupp, Issledovanie rossijskogo rynka onlajn-obrazovanija i obrazovatel’nyh tehnologij [Netology-groups, Research of the Russian market of online education and educational technologies]. (2020). (in Russian).
7. Richter, D., Kleinknecht, M., & Groschner, A. (2019). Chto motiviruet uchitelej uchastvovat’ v professional’nom razvitii? Jempiricheskoe issledovanie motivacionnoj orientacii i ispol’zovanija formal’nyh vozmozhnostej obuchenija [What motivates teachers to participate in professional development? An empirical investigation of motivational orientations and the uptake of formal learning opportunities]. Pedagogika i pedagogicheskoe obrazovanie [Teaching and teacher education], 86, 3-7 (in Russian).
8. Topkayaa, E.Z., & Çelikb, H. (2016). Vosprijatie uchiteljami anglijskogo jazyka, ne javljajushhimisja nositeljami jazyka, o professional'nom razvitii: posledstvija dlja jetapov kar'ery // Procedury – Social’nye i povedencheskie nauki [Non-native English language teachers’ perceptions of professional development: implications for career stages]. Procedury – social’nye i povedencheskie nauki [Procedia – social and behavioral sciences], 23, 6-9 (in Russian).
9. Vasiliev, K., Roshchin, S., Maltseva, I. et al. (2015). Razvitie navykov dlja innovacionnogo rosta v Rossii [Skills development for innovative growth in Russia]. Moscow: AlekS (in Russian).
10. Yurkofsky, M.M., Blum-Smith, S., & Brennan, R. (2019). Rasshirenie rezul’tatov: izuchenie razlichnyh koncepcij obuchenija uchitelej v onlajn-opyte professional’nogo razvitija [Expanding outcomes: exploring varied conceptions of teacher learning in an online professional development experience]. Pedagogika i pedagogicheskoe obrazovanie [Teaching and teacher education], 82, 2-8 (in Russian).
Review
For citation:
Berezin N.S. Training EFL teachers online: how to improve results among adult learners (based on the experiment in Skyeng School). Professional Discourse & Communication. 2020;2(4):63-80. (In Russ.) https://doi.org/10.24833/2687-0126-2020-2-4-63-80
Email this article 