Electronic Village Online 2015 – Dr. Nellie Deutsch

Electronic Village Online (EVO)

Every January-February, the Electronic Village Online (a project of TESOL’s Computer-Assisted Language Learning Interest Section) brings together ESOL educators from around the world to engage in free, collaborative, online professional development sessions. Last year, we had over 4,000 participants in 18 sessions. EVO sessions are facilitated by volunteer moderators like you, who get together online for four weeks in the fall to prepare their session and familiarize themselves with the culture of the EVO. Sessions may be on any topic in ESL/EFL and are free and open to all interested parties. They do not carry academic credit, and formal certificates are not awarded for participation.

Instructions for TESOL EVO 2015 Proposals

You are invited to submit a proposal to EVO2015. We recommend that you check one or both of these sample proposals to get an idea of what a successful proposal should look like before you do your own. (Please note that as these proposals are from a prior year, the format is slightly different from this year’s format.)

Proposals will be vetted by the EVO Coordination Team in late September – early October 2014. If your proposal is accepted, your moderating team can participate in the four-week moderators’ training (October 20 – November 16, 2014). At the end of the training, if your proposal and syllabus are complete, you will receive final approval from the Coordination Team in early December, and your proposal will be included in the Call for Participation, which is made public in mid-December. EVO sessions begin on Monday, January 12, 2015 and conclude on Sunday, February 15, 2015.

Due Date for EVO 2015 Proposals

The due date for completing proposals is Monday, September 1, 2014. We encourage you to complete the proposal form even if you do not have all of the required information. You can edit your proposal freely until the deadline, September 1, 2014. If you have any questions, please send inquiries to the EVO Coordination team.

Instructions for Submitting a Proposal

Request permission to edit the wiki. Allow at least 24 hours. (You will need to create a free account with http://pbworks.com if you do not already have one.)
When your request is approved, create a new page using the option “Use a template.” Use the title of your proposed EVO session as the page title. (You may change this later.) Note: Avoid spaces in your title. You can use underscores, hyphens, or periods instead of spaces.
Fill out the proposal form by clicking Edit at the top of the page and typing between the horizontal lines, in the table cells, or after the colons.
If you have a session logo, you will need to upload the logo to the wiki before you can paste it into the box.
Save the page.

Invitations

You’re invited to give an EVO Session for 2015. EVO offers teachers many opportunities to learn to teach with technology in the face-to-face class, the blended learning or hybrid class, or in the flipped classroom. You may follow us and contribute as moderators or as learners. Moderators receive free training on how to teach online in and out of the EVO sessions.

Moodle for Teachers (M4TEVO15)

This intensive five-week workshop is designed to engage the participants in theoretical and practical aspects of online learning and teaching with a Learning Management System (LMS) called Moodle. Participants or Moodlers as they are called will be introduced to the Moodle philosophy and course development tools. By successfully completing the program, participants will have acquired the knowledge and skills needed to create basic Moodle resources and activities for blended online learning (BOL) or blended learning (BL) courses. As online learners, participants will understand online learning from the student’s perspective, so they can prepare their future courses with the learner in mind.

IATEFL YLT SIG EVO 2015

The IATEFL YLTSIG EVO 2015 sessions will examine teaching English to Young Learners and Teens from around the world using using storytelling and drama, games, and action songs.

International Writing Exchange (IWE-EVO15)

The International Writing Exchange (IWE) started by Ruth Vilmi in 1993 with EFL students at Helsinki University of Technology (TKK) together with undergraduates from around the world. The courses ran in six-week courses or rounds with weekly writing tasks, throughout the year until 2005, when Ruth retired from her post at TKK. In June 2006, IWE celebrated the 50th Round of the IWE and started an intercultural counterpart, the ICE. In 2010, Ruth Vilmi searched for a new place. Dr. Nellie Deutsch, a friend and colleague, took the challenge and started hosting IWE from the fall of 2010.

What is IWE about?

The audience at IWE is international with students and teachers from higher education and high school (seniors) from around the world. The teachers bring the students to the online course by introducing them to the program in the computer room or in a regular class. The students introduce themselves and discuss various topics such as:

1. Cultural Differences
2. Daily lives
3. Technology
4. Future Careers
5. Marriage

Where does IWE take place?

1. WizIQ for the live online classes and for teachers to collaborate and plan the content and activities of the courses.
2. IT4ALL Moodle site for private password protected site for the teachers and their students for ongoing topic discussions and to get a certificate of completion for the participants and for the teachers as teachers.