reflection+on+Yüce+college+conference

** REFLECTION ON YUCE COLLEGE CONFERENCE ** 7th Foreign Languages Teacher’s Conference held by Yüce College was the first formal conference for me. Before that conference, I did not attend to any conference about foreign language teaching. Actually, I had thought that it would be very formal conference; therefore I would be bored with listening to speakers; however, the speakers in conference were very great and I really enjoyed it. The speaker whose talk I want to mention about is Dr. Anna Maria Pinter. She is Associate Professor of ELT/ Applied Linguistics at the Centre for Applied Linguistics at the University of Warwick, UK. She is programme leader for the MA in Teaching English to Young Learners. The topic which she presented about was differentiated learning related with autonomy and learning strategies. Her topic interested me because it was new for me. I had not heard about differentiated learning in our courses or outside the classroom. As far as I could learn from her talk and a short research, differentiated learning or instruction involves providing students with different opportunities to acquire the lesson content and to make sense of what is happening in the class so that every student in the class can learn efficiently regardless of student differences in ability. Actually, I think differentiated learning supports the theory of multiple intelligences because according to this theory, people may have different cognitive abilities. For example; a child can learn to multiply, add or subtract easily and have logical-mathematical intelligence, and another child can have more difficulty on those task; but this does not mean that the first child is more intelligent than the second child because maybe the second child can learn those tasks with different approaches or s/he has different abilities in different topics, that is to say, s/he has different intelligence such as spatial, linguistic or other intelligences. In this sense, differentiated learning emphasizes that children may have different intelligence, therefore teachers provide different opportunities for children to enable and encourage each student to realize their abilities and full potential in these abilities. Actually, I totally agree with Anna Maria Pinter about this topic. The other subject mentioned by Anna Maria Pinter was autonomy. According to her, autonomy means understanding what learning, understanding about self, resources and evaluating outcomes; therefore, it is very important. The most important reason is that autonomous learners are very motivated learners as well. These children begin to enjoy what there are doing in the class and they begin to have a lot of fun. In this way, teaching and learning happen more easily in terms of both teacher and students. Another reason why autonomy is very important is that autonomous learners begin to take responsibilities, take charge and be aware about learning and learning processes. These make learning and teaching easier, as well. Consequently, I enjoyed the conference and I learned a lot of things from the speakers, especially Anna Maria Pinter. I agree about what she mentioned in the conference and I want to apply them in my future class. ** Comment by Seda Akbaş ** **Comment: ** First of all, I share the same feeling with Sinem in the sense that this is the first time for me to attend a formal conference in ELT and at the beginning I have shared the same expectations with her considering it would be very formal conference; therefore I would be bored with listening to speakers. However, as she states the speakers in conference were very friendly and effective and I had a great experience spending time with them. I share Sinem’s ideas about differentiated learning and learner autonomy which are important issues in language learning as I understood from the conference. I really like the examples she provided to indicate the different learning styles. For example; a child can learn to multiply, add or subtract easily and have logical-mathematical intelligence, and another child can have more difficulty on those task; but this does not mean that the first child is more intelligent than the second child because maybe the second child can learn those tasks with different approaches or s/he has different abilities in different topics, that is to say, s/he has different intelligence such as spatial, linguistic or other intelligences. I believe this highlights the importance of using differentiated learning styles in EFL classes especially in our country since our students are lack ok different learning opportunities. Learner autonomy is another important aspect regarding constructive approaches. If we want our students to construct their knowledge in second language, we need pay attention their autonomy. As Sinem states these children begin to enjoy what there are doing in the class and they begin to have a lot of fun. In this way, teaching and learning happen more easily in terms of both teacher and students I would like thank Sinem for this reflection which is quite detailed and informative J
 * Sinem ATEŞ / 1734557 **