WE CANNOT DIRECT THE WIND BUT WE CAN ADUJST THE SAILS

Five years ago, we embarked on a journey. This forced us to examine adapt and adopt solutions to ameliorate our EAP program. A key aspect of the current socio-economic reality is to support learners in increasing their foreign language skills and other competencies required in today’s technology mediated society and help them enhance their employability on the job market.

Technology has both revolutionized the way we learn languages and created a sense of urgency in the need to modernize the initial and ongoing training of professionals in our field. This paper presents such a project of a college EAP team with diverse backgrounds.
A virtual staff room, self-reflection surveys, professional training, ongoing support and course audits have been key elements in the process of empowering and enabling the team to make changes in the way they plan, deliver and assess their teaching.

Research has shown that inadequate, inappropriate professional development is a significant barrier to the successful implementation of change in general and one including technology integration in particular (Kopcha, 2010). In addition, Koehler and Mishra (2008) identify content knowledge, pedagogical knowledge, technological knowledge, and combinations of these as necessary for effective teaching with technology. Based on these principles we moved forward to create more holistic and blended courses.

CEFR learning outcomes have become a standardized element in planning, delivering, and assessing learning. This talk outlines how we motivate, empower, guide, and support the ESAP staff with the essential skills to be active players in the ever-changing educational landscape.