MY PLE - REFLECTIVE POST

Hello everyone!

This is supposed to be our last post for this English course and I must admit that I am a bit sad because the years spent at the university seem to be almost over. Since I am not going to continue my studies (and thus my ‘formal learning’), I grasp the opportunity to reflect on my PLE (Personal Learning Environment). Needless to say, as Sarah (our English professor) told us, there is not a single definition of PLE and, since everyone has their own way of learning, there are no right or wrong solutions for our mind maps. In this post I would like to share with you my reflections as far as the English language is concerned and what could we do to achieve a higher level of competence.


In the image above you can see my mind map. I decided to use the world map as the background of my key concepts related to my learning process because English allows me to communicate with most of the people around the world. Therefore, our abilities and competences are the key to open new words and to discover new cultures. In today’s world more and more people do speak some sort of English (some people are native speakers, some use it as a second language and many other people learn it as a foreign language); as a consequence, English is becoming a global phenomenon and having a good command of it is, of course, extremely useful.


But the question is: is formal learning enough to learn a foreign language? Indeed, formal education such as school and university are important, but they are not the only tools available. I think that most of us had a narrow vision of the situations where we could learn a foreign language, and they coincided, more or less, with formal lessons, difficult translations, heavy grammar books and the like. And we were wrong. I wasn’t aware of the potential of Web 2.0 as a learning tool until this year. As my mind map reveals, the words that may be linked with formal learning are fewer if compared with other entries, such as Skype, YouTube, blogs etc.


I confess that it was not so easy to organize all the tools and the opportunities I have at my disposal to improve my language skills and make progress. At first I decided to divide the key nodes according to the kind of materials used (audio- paper- visual- virtual etc.), but then I changed my mind and organized the mind map into four main sections: INFORMATION, PLACES AND PEOPLE, CULTURAL SKILLS and LANGUAGE SKILLS. In my opinion this is the best way to integrate both formal and informal learning experiences and to connect a range of resources within a personally-managed space. As a matter of fact in the section INFORMATION I listed how I collect information and how I save it. I gather information from my teachers, but I rely also on the Web (Wikipedia, Delicious, OPAC online...).A part from paper notes, everything is stored on the Internet or in my computer (blog, bookmarks, tags, GoogleDocs...). PLACES AND PEOPLE are important, too. My knowledge of English now depends on my university education, my job as a clerk in the export department of a leading company in the heating sector (a way of enriching my vocabulary with technical words such as gasket, control panel, lead, ignition probe etc.), experiences abroad (scholarship in Malta, courses in English in Broadstair, international trade fairs...) and a virtual place: the Web 2.0, where I can ‘meet’ bloggers and share my experience with other people on social networks. CULTURAL SKILLS too play a great role for those who want to have a good command of a foreign language; in this section I grouped both formal ways of learning (literature courses, formal lessons etc.), but also informal tools (YouTube, movies, chats and forums). The latter outnumber the former. Last, but not least, I created a section for ‘pure’ LANGUAGE SKILLS, where I listed the four main areas of a language: reading, writing, speaking and listening. In this big area, my job now has a leading position for the development of my abilities and helps me to interact in English more effectively. Films in the original language and videos on YouTube together with media Websites and music are other opportunities I have to improve.


I noticed that ‘formal learning’ is only a minor part of my learning process, so when I will finish the University I would not have any problems in keeping my English updated and this is great! I also realized that giving private lessons could be an interesting way to refresh some grammar issues. As we discussed in class, learning is up to us. We have no excuses for giving up!


To conclude, during this semester I had the opportunity to see that everyone’s learning can benefit from a savvy use of technology. Thanks to the many tools offered by the Internet we can take control of and manage our own learning without much effort. I strongly believe that reflecting on our language-learning process is extremely useful because it gives us the opportunity to understand our strengths and our weaknesses while setting our targets for the future.

I hope to hearing from you soon,

Break a leg!

Bye