Virtual exchange in teacher education programs from Brazil and USA: outcomes and challenges

Calvo, Luciana Cabrini Simões; Hartle, Lynn C.

doi:10.1590/1983-3652.2024.47921

Acessibilidade / Reportar erro

Brasil

Español English

sumário « anterior atual seguinte »

Sumário

Dossier • Texto livre 17 • 2024 • https://doi.org/10.1590/1983-3652.2024.47921 copy

Virtual exchange in teacher education programs from Brazil and USA: outcomes and challenges

Intercâmbio virtual em programas de formação de professores do Brasil e EUA: resultados e desafios

Authorship SCIMAGO INSTITUTIONS RANKINGS

Abstract

Virtual exchanges (VE) are important initiatives to include pre-service teachers (PST) in internationalization practices with others at a geographic distance while they remain in their own contexts of learning (Internationalization at Home – ( Beelen; Jones, 2015BEELEN, Jos; JONES, Elspeth. Redefining Internationalization at Home. In: CURAJ, Adrian et al. (eds.). The European Higher Education Area: Between Critical Reflections and Future Policies. Cham: Springer, 2015. p. 59–72. ). VEs contribute to the development of intercultural and global attitudes as well as foster digital and technological competencies. This paper shares the results of a 2022 and 2023 VE eight-week project with pre-service teachers enrolled in second language acquisition-related courses at state universities, one in the US and one in Brazil. This article analyzed data from periodic and end-of-semester surveys and narratives as well as from their interactions and tasks in different digital platforms to explore the outcomes and challenges of the VE. The results discuss the perspective of the involved professors and students as well as established VE teacher education contexts (such as Hanks ( 2019HANKS, Judith. From Research-as-Practice to Exploratory Practice-as-Research in Language Teaching and Beyond. Language Teaching, v. 52, n. 2, p. 143–187, 2019. DOI: 10.1017/S0261444819000016.
https://doi.org/10.1017/S026144481900001... ; Godwin-Jones, 2019 GODWIN-JONES, Robert. Telecollaboration as an Approach to Developing Intercultural Communication Competence. Language Learning & Technology, v. 23, n. 3, p. 8–28, 2019. Available from: http://hdl.handle.net/10125/44691 . Visited on: 28 Aug. 2023.
http://hdl.handle.net/10125/44691... ) to share insights regarding the virtual exchange experience on PST’s global perspective-taking about teacher education and language teaching. Qualitative analysis revealed patterns of desired student outcomes: interactional skills; the development of information, communication technology skills; intercultural communicative competence; content, cultural, language learning, and contextual knowledge. Analyses also illustrated the challenges to those outcomes, such as busy schedules, class format, and difficulties in communications and interactions.

Keywords:
Brazil and US; Virtual exchange (VE); Pre-service teachers (PST); Second language acquisition (SLA); Outcomes and challenges

US Preservice Teacher (PST) Course	Brazil Preservice Teacher (PST) Course
Course: Intro. teaching English Language Learners (ELL)	Course: English Teacher Education
*Required course to teach all subjects/grade levels in the State in the US because most schools “Submerge” Emergent Bilingual students in General Ed classrooms.	*Required course in the third year of the Language Arts Undergraduate Program.
Format: Asynchronous Web course, (Asych. format to accommodate student sched-ules).	Format: In-person.
PSTs 2022 = 18 PSTs 2023 = 21	PSTs 2022 = 16 PSTs 2023 = 22

2022	2023
Week 1: PSTs were assigned to one of four teams for Cross-Cultural Student Inquiry projects and the professors explained the project. The topics of their projects were: 1) K-12th Grade language teaching & learning in Brazil & USA; 2) Bilingual K-12th Gr. education in Brazil & US; 3) The status of foreign languages in Brazil & US; 4) How teacher education programs in Brazil region & US state prepare to teach/ support English/other languages of K-12th Gr. During this first week, the US professor participated in one of the Brazil classroom meetings and the professors explained the project in a synchronous class for Brazil students. This was recorded and the video was uploaded to Google classroom for the US students to view since their class was asynchronous.	Week 1: PST self-selected which team to join (to promote ownership of the task) to one of five teams. Added a fifth topic to accommodate larger classes in 2023: Contextual information about Brazil and State in US & their Education System. Added Watch Video general information about what is COIL/ Virtual Exchange & our Cross-Cultural Collaborations (Video explanation); Read short article; then Post reflection. Added a Padlet Intro. activity - post a picture of yourself and about 50 words to describe yourself. Repeated the virtual meeting with professors and Brazil students; four US students attended & others watched the recording.
Week 2: Students asynchronously exchanged and commented on each others’ VoiceThread autobiographies to get to know each other (Per faculty directions: on how to use VoiceThread, required content, and grading rubrics).	Week 2: Autobiography as 2022.
Week 3: Student-lead & faculty-guided discussions to organize their plans for carrying out their crosscultural inquiry projects (Per faculty directions: on required content and grading rubrics).	Week 3: – Repeated the discussions. Added a Periodic Progress 1: Semi-structured Narrative post: Students shared their perceptions of the Introductions activities of Week 1 & 2).
Weeks 4 and 5: Students worked on their Cross-Cultural Collaboration pro-jects; Each team conducted library and internet research on the selected topic (Students chose ICT for meetings, planning, and collaboration on the project content).	Weeks 4 & 5: Students worked on their Cross-Cultural Collaboration projects in similar ways to 2022. Added a Periodic Progress 2: Semi-structured Narrative post: Students shared their perceptions of their collaborative process, working in teams on the project.
Week 6: Synchronous Presentations (all chose to use PowerPoint).	Week 6: Synchronous Presentations (PowerPoint or Canvas).
Week 7: Semi-structured Peer evaluations of other teams’ cross-cultural projects, and reflections through a survey on the process and projects of their own team’s cross-cultural project.	Week 7: Semi-structured survey on the process and projects of their own team’s cross-cultural project. Added a Final Narrative of an aspect of the project and included a picture symbolic of the experience.
Week 8: Faculty met to collaboratively grade, using the grading rubrics and analyzed the projects regarding related ICT used for content, pictures, Live Google meets presentations, and organization.	Week 8: Faculty met to collaboratively grade, using the grading rubrics and analyze the projects regarding related ICT used for content, pictures, Live Google meets presentations, and organization.

Consistent Features to Continue	Adaptations/Additions
Use of Google Classroom as the Platform for organizing the tasks and communicating with the students;	Helping the students with WhatsApp communication;
Organizing students in groups for interactions;	Designating a US & Brazil PST leader for each team;
Use of Padlet for Introductions;	Providing common materials (readings and videos) for all the groups;
PST-lead & faculty-guided discussions;	Schedule of synchronous meetings for the discussion
Collaborative tasks;	of the topic of the project;
Reflections through a survey and a final narrative.	Use of Zoom breakout rooms for synchronous groups interactions.

Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais - UFMG Av. Antônio Carlos, 6627 - Pampulha, Cep: 31270-901, Belo Horizonte - Minas Gerais / Brasil, Tel: +55 (31) 3409-6009 - Belo Horizonte - MG - Brazil
E-mail: revistatextolivre@letras.ufmg.br

Acompanhe os números deste periódico no seu leitor de RSS

[1] ^* Email: lcsimoes@uem.br