‘Putting Theory into Practice’ English Language AUL@W Projects

Wendy Anderson

Lecturer, English Language, University of Glasgow

AUL@W / English Language projects

Two pilot projects:

1. ESOL volunteer training project

2. Oral History fieldwork project

ESOL volunteer training pilot

8-week Volunteer Tutor course

6-month Volunteer Placement

ESOL volunteer training pilot

Student 1:

Female, Junior Honours

Worked with a 19 year old Pakistani man, newly arrived in Glasgow

Part of Red Cross ‘Life Skills’ course

Role included: helping him write a diary, work on job interview skills, communication skills

ESOL volunteer training pilot

Student 2:

Female, Senior Honours

Worked with groups of 10 females, organised by Scottish Refugee Council, various ages, nationalities, educational backgrounds.

Role: work on ‘language survival skills’, e.g. finding locations, vocabulary for food shopping, doctor visits, telling the time

ESOL volunteer training pilot

Student motivations:

• Appeal of teaching; gaining experience• First step towards a qualification • Working with a voluntary organisation

Relevance for:

• Degree course• Job prospects• General life skills

Oral history fieldwork project

Training:

• Oral history fieldwork and interviews• Recording equipment • Ethics and copyright• Transcription of speech data

Fieldwork:

• Glasgow Women’s Library• Supporters Direct

Oral history fieldwork project

Benefits to students:

• Connections with Department’s Honours courses • Students gain original spoken language data for

dissertations etc.• Experience in recording and transcribing• Engagement with project and community group

Some challenges:

• Student expectations • Maintaining momentum with a non-embedded course• Workload (esp. with regard to sustainability beyond

life of AUL@W project)

Student feedback (from Oral History project):

• “…it has been a great experience. … Carrying out the first interview in my life was rather nerve-wracking but I think I coped quite well. … I’m expecting that having the project on my CV can help me stand out among others…”

• “I feel it has given me a chance to extend my learning and also see how the university curriculum can be applied to careers in the outside world - something which can often be hard to imagine during lectures!”

• Professionalism• Creative thinking (planning an interview)• Persistence • Confidence

Pilot projects and students

HEA Employability Profile for English

• Use advanced literacy skills to communicate effectively in an appropriate style

• Apply sustained written and oral arguments coherently and persuasively• Analyse and critically examine diverse forms of verbal and textual

communication• Adapt the critical methods of the discipline to a variety of working

environments• Gather, sift, interpret and organise substantial quantities of diverse

information in structured ways• Organise their time and workload as developed through the planning and

delivery of written assignments, presentations and project work• Exercise independent thought and judgement• Comprehend and develop intricate concepts in an open-ended way that

involves an understanding of aims and consequences• Work with others through the presentation of ideas and information and the

collective negotiation of solutions• Understand, interrogate and apply a variety of theoretical positions and

weigh the importance of alternative perspectives• Handle information and argument in a critical and self-reflective manner• Use IT effectively to retrieve, evaluate and present information

Pilot projects and students

HEA Employability Profile for English

• Use advanced literacy skills to communicate effectively in an appropriate style

• Apply sustained written and oral arguments coherently and persuasively• Analyse and critically examine diverse forms of verbal and textual

communication• Adapt the critical methods of the discipline to a variety of working

environments• Gather, sift, interpret and organise substantial quantities of diverse

information in structured ways• Organise their time and workload as developed through the planning and

delivery of written assignments, presentations and project work• Exercise independent thought and judgement• Comprehend and develop intricate concepts in an open-ended way that

involves an understanding of aims and consequences• Work with others through the presentation of ideas and information and the

collective negotiation of solutions• Understand, interrogate and apply a variety of theoretical positions and

weigh the importance of alternative perspectives• Handle information and argument in a critical and self-reflective manner• Use IT effectively to retrieve, evaluate and present information

Adapt the critical methods of the discipline to a variety of working environments

Gather, sift, interpret and organise substantial quantities of diverse information in structured ways.

Work with others through the presentation of ideas and information and the collective negotiation of solutions.

‘Putting Theory into Practice’ English Language AUL@W Projects

Wendy Anderson

Lecturer, English Language, University of Glasgow