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Speaker 1: OTAN, Outreach and Technical Assistance Network.

Danielle Silverman: So thank you, everyone, for joining our session today. Just before we officially get started with Aaron and Victoria's presentation, I just wanted to quickly introduce myself.

My name is Danielle. I work for Burlington English. So I've been with Burlington for about three years now. And I've also worked with Culver City for the whole time that I've been with Burlington.

And they are just such an amazing program. They're really just at the forefront for all the new technology and always looking for new ways to engage their learners. Whether it's with new tech or new methodologies, they're always just at the forefront of all of that. So I'm really just here to support them in showing you-- in showing you the amazing things that they do and answering any questions that you all might have. And then I'll let Aaron and Victoria take it away.

Aaron Mendleson: OK, thank you.

Victoria Bian: Thank you, Danielle. All right, Aaron, did you want to go ahead and just--

Aaron Mendleson: I'll share, yes. Let me bring this up. I think that's the right button. So waiting for my mouse. And go over here.

So thanks for joining us for today's presentation, maximizing technology for effective instruction using the Triple E Framework. I'm Aaron Mendelson.

Victoria Bian: And I'm Victoria Bian. I'm the ESL coordinator at Culver City Adult School. So thank you, everyone, again for joining. Before we jump in, just a little bit of background. And then I'll give it away to Aaron.

When Burlington English connected with me about presenting at the symposium, I felt it would be a really valuable opportunity for one of our veteran teachers to share their hands-on approach to incorporating Burlington English in the classroom. And Aaron, our ESL level 3 teacher, brings an absolutely remarkable level of insight into student engagement.

So without further ado, we have a really packed presentation full of amazing content. I am thrilled to pass it over to Aaron. Aaron.

Aaron Mendelson: Thank you. Thank you, Victoria. So let me just fix that. Yeah, when I was asked to share how I use Burlington English in the classroom, the first thing that came to mind was how I use the Triple E Framework with Burlington English-- there's that-- as well as with another tech tool I use.

I had recently completed the Triple E Framework course that OTAN offers. And even though I'm a newbie, the Triple E Framework has made such a positive difference. And that's why I'm going to share how it's empowered me to maximize technology in the classroom, specifically with Burlington English and the learning app clip. First, let's take a look at what the Triple E Framework basically is.

Part 1, overview of the Triple E Framework. The Triple E Framework was developed by Dr. Liz Kolb, a clinical psychologist from the University of Michigan School of Education. It was designed to help K through 12 teachers provide guidelines on using technology more effectively in the classroom and has since been adapted for use in adult education. The framework is comprised of three components-- engagement, enhancement, and extension. Let's take a look at each.

Engagement redefined-- a common feature of instruction is to establish group dynamics in learning. However, technology in the classroom has traditionally been an individual experience-- students with headphones on engaging with tech alone. Now educators are shifting from the model of isolated learning to one that's more collaborative.

In chapter 4 of her book, Learning First, Technology Second-- The Educator's Guide to Designing Authentic Lessons, Dr. Kolb redefines engagement from solitary use into something much more synergistic. So according to Dr. Kolb, true engagement involves being social and focusing on the learning goals by spending time on task with other students. Aha, so it's OK for students to work and focus on the learning goals together while using a learning tech tool. In fact, it's imperative.

As well, the social aspect of working together gives students more opportunities to employ higher cognitive skills. Good to know. Well, let's look at enhancement.

Enhancement-- adding value to the learning process. Before using the Triple E Framework, I'd hook my students up to the learning tech, pray this would somehow help them learn English, and throw the switch. I had no idea how this tech was going to work or if it would be any better than not using it at all. And since I had no idea, neither did my students. They were left on their own to make sense of it.

Dr. Kolb writes, value-added enhancement of learning through technology is when the tool is somehow aiding, assisting, and scaffolding learning in a way that could not easily be done with traditional methods. This is the level where learning can become personalized and more relatable to the learner. This is when technology is really starting to change how learning occurs to make it more meaningful to the learner. Aha again.

Now my questions are, first, How is the technology going to enhance learning for my students? And second, if it doesn't, what can I do to help enhancement happen for them? So engagement is about creating co-use and time on task. Enhancement is about adding value to the learning experience. But what about extension?

Extension-- testing knowledge through life experience. Quote, "Experience is a hard teacher because she gives the test first, the lesson afterward," from Vernon Law, legendary baseball player and coach. Well, if this is true, then teachers should teach lessons that stick with students after class ends.

The goal of extension is to make the lesson more relevant for students outside of school as well. Dr. Kolb writes, if technology can somehow aid or enhance the ability to create these real-world connections, then learning is being extended outside of the classroom walls and into students everyday lives. Engage, enhance, and extend. With this basic overview, let's explore examples of each, starting with engagement in Burlington English.

Part 2-- augmenting a Burlington lesson with engagement. Culver City Adult School's ESL department uses Burlington's core textbook as our primary learning material. My level 3 class uses the low intermediate textbook or what I call the purple book. This is how I prepare a lesson in module 1, lesson 6, review of future with will and "be going to."

First, let's go to the course and lesson planner. Burlington's course and lesson plan. Here, I can access the lesson plan and the general course information, which I'll use in a moment. But first, let's open up the lesson plan.

Creating lesson objectives by unpacking the correlations. Page 1 of the lesson plan is the lesson overview. I'll glance at the about the lesson to get the gist. But what's really important to me are the correlations listed, which can be found in the general correlations. Here, I can actually look up the references in their respective resources.

First, I want to know how this lesson is connected to the CCRS, which is the College and Career Readiness Standards. L-1 pertains to CCR Language Standards anchor 1. Quote, "Demonstrate command of the conventions of standard English grammar and usage when writing or speaking," quote. HP specifies that English learners can form and use the simple verb tenses.

Next, I look up the correlations to the English Language Proficiency Standards, ELPS, specifically Standard 10. "An English language learner can demonstrate command of the conventions of standard English to communicate in level appropriate speech and writing," unquote. I can also check the exit skills listed here for level 3. By the end of English language proficiency level 3, an English language learner can, with support, use simple phrases, use simple clauses, reduce and expand simple, compound, and a few complex sentences.

Finally, I want to know how these correlations line up with the LARAEC course outline exit skills for level 3. I didn't find the ELPS L-1 dot HP listed here, which is form and use the simple verb tenses. But I did find, quote, "Produce simple, compound, and complex sentences," unquote, which we just saw listed in the ELPS.

But wait, there's more. Maybe I can tap into other exit skills to engage, enhance, and extend student learning, like adapt language choices and style according to purpose, task, and audience with developing ease and various social and academic contexts and show developing control of style and tone in spoken and written texts.

We'll see how these two skills will be utilized later. In any case, I now have a solid understanding for what my objectives are. And they will strongly influence my lesson plan's architecture. From these unpacked correlations, I write a student-friendly version on my main whiteboard. Let's take a look.

Lesson objectives. Number One, Form and use simple verb tenses. Two, use simple phrases and clauses. Three, produce simple, compound, and complex sentences. Four, adapt language choices and style. And five, show developing control of style and tone in spoken and written texts.

This homemade list of class objectives helps my instruction to be more on target and keeps me from just teaching to the book. Also, students will have a better picture of what the lesson is about. Last but not least, the lesson objectives are also aligned with the course outline exit skills. Next, I check out Burlington's lesson plan.

Reviewing Burlington's WIPPEA lesson plan. With the learning objectives on the board, I consider what to use or lose from the lesson plan. First, I decide if I want to use the warm-up. Then I scan the activities in the WIPPEA model.

Next, I go through each activity in the ICL, looking for opportunities to engage, enhance, or extend. Here's an example of engagement using activity 8 in module 1, lesson 6, located in the Practice and Apply section of the lesson. I just want to show where that is. Turn on my cool laser pointer. It's right down--

Engage! Aye-aye, captain. Creating engaging exercises in activity 8. In this activity, the directions are use "be going to" and the phrases below to describe what the people's plans are for this weekend. I recently taught this lesson. First, I introduced the model of the exercise that we see with Maria.

Then I scaffolded the exercise with Andre. After confirming that the class understood, I assigned each of the four teams in the classroom one of the other four exercises. Team one focused on Tina, team two Billy, et cetera. Each team worked out their answers at their respective team tables. And then a volunteer from each team wrote the results of their work on their team boards.

After that, I reviewed the work with the class. The task assigned was completed. However, co-use and time on task and engagement includes going from a passive following the directions model to a more proactive let's create our own thing situation. This is what we did.

Make yes-no questions. I went back to the main board and scaffolded making a yes-no question with the Maria and Andre exercises. Then I had each team make a yes-no question on their team board. Picking up the pace, I walked the class through each team exercise, checking their work.

Next, I went back to Maria and Andre and modeled a "wh" question using where. I then invited the class to create a where question. Again, I assess the work and made any corrections that were necessary.

Next, I returned to Maria and Andre and had the class help me build dialogues with the yes-no and "wh" questions, ending with self-created information. For example, voila. After having volunteers read the example dialogue and answering questions, I had the teams work together to build their dialogues.

Then they wrote them on their team boards. After the work was done, I checked it again, with the classes held. Finally, I had two volunteers from each team demo their dialogues. The last part of the exercise, students paired up and practiced the dialogues from each of the four teams.

This exercise augmented the task assigned by the activity. But did it also create engagement? Fortunately, the Triple E Framework includes rubrics for each component. Let's take a look at the one for engagement.

Dr. Kolb created three possible answers to these questions-- absolutely, somewhat, or not at all. So before I begin, I'm going to change does to did in order to evaluate my success in class.

Did the technology allow students to focus-- to focus on the task of the assignment or activity with less distraction, time on task? Absolutely, everyone worked together to complete the task. Number two, did the technology motivate students to start the learning process? Absolutely, teams could not move forward until they were in agreement.

Number three, did the technology cause a shift in the behavior of the students, where they moved from passive to active social learners, which is co-use or co-engagement? Absolutely. This is my favorite part. Each team consisting of micro levels create a path where everyone crosses the finish line together. Leading and following becomes very fluid, depending on the skills needed to complete the exercises.

But what about the lesson objectives? How many were fulfilled? Let's take a look.

Lesson objectives, number 1, form and use simple verb tenses. Yes. Use simple phrases and clauses. Yes. Produce simple, compound, and complex sentences. Well, simple sentences but not compound or complex ones. Or adapt language choices and style. No.

Show developing control of style and tone in spoken and written texts. No. Engagement helps me accomplish numbers 1 and 2. Soon, we'll see how I accomplish the other three using enhancement and extension. But let's take a moment to answer a few questions. Any questions so far?

Danielle Silverman: No questions that I'm seeing so far, at least not in the chat.

Aaron Mendelson: OK, all right, let's continue. On to enhancement. Part 3, enhancing in-class learning with Burlington's student lessons. The $6 million man, folks. It took a lot of money to enhance this cyborg. Here's how I use enhancement to enrich Burlington student lessons for a lot less.

Burlington Student Lessons, module 1, lesson 6, activity 8. Burlington Student Lessons is an online student workbook. In the in-class lesson, the class worked on making statements using "be going to." In Student Lessons, the objective here is to unscramble words to form questions.

Here, I had each team do the exercise using laptops at each team table, also projecting it on the main board. I scaffolded number 1 and then assigned numbers 2 through 5, one for each of the four teams. All of the exercises were done first on their laptops. And then the teams wrote their assigned exercise on their team board.

Reviewing the answers. After the work was completed, I revealed the answers. The Burlington English exercise was technically complete. But what if I upped the stakes?

So I went back to number 1. And I had the class help me create a short answer in the positive form. Yes, she is. Then I had the teams create answers to their questions in the positive form.

After they did and put them on their boards, I introduced making clauses with the following conjunctions-- and, but, if, and after-- and scaffolded a compound or complex sentence to the answer. For example, this. Is she going to look for a job soon? Yes, she is. And we're very happy for her.

Next, each team worked on their exercise with an assigned conjunction and phrase. The teams worked together and posted their answers on their team boards. But numbers 2 and 5 required imagination because they're "wh" questions. So teams 1 and 4 had to adjust. If a team finished early, they were encouraged to work on other teams' exercises at their team tables. Finally, a volunteer from each team wrote their team's work on their boards for all to see.

Here are a few examples. Making compound/complex sentences. After the work was checked and reviewed, I had students pair up and practice the questions and answers on the board. So let's check the rubric for enhancement to see if this exercise was on task. As before, I'm going to change does to did since this evaluation is based on experience.

Number one, did the technology tool aid students in developing or demonstrating a more sophisticated understanding of the content and that it created opportunities for creation and production over consumption? Absolutely. As mentioned, the students went from making statements to making questions and, finally, creating answers to these questions.

Number two, does the technology create scaffolds to make it easier to understand concepts or ideas? Absolutely. Well, that's the purpose of student lessons. I scaffolded student exercises in the classroom for future use of student exercises off campus.

Number three, does the technology create paths for students to demonstrate their understanding of the learning goals in a way that they could not do with traditional tools? Well, that's debatable. But see, Burlington's student lessons are designed to simulate or-- to simulate a workbook but also giving students the freedom to practice off campus anytime, anywhere. The workbook in a backpack isn't as user friendly.

Now let's look again at the lesson objectives. Number one, form and use simple verb tenses. Yes. Number two, use simple phrases and clauses. Yes. Number three, produce simple, compound, and complex sentences. Yes. Four, adapt language choices and style. No. Number five, show developing control of style and tone in spoken and written texts. No. Before I share how the third component, extension, accomplished objectives 4 and 5, are there any questions?

Danielle Silverman: Nope, still no questions.

Aaron Mendelson: OK. Next, extension. Part 4, extending student learning with Flip. Flip by Microsoft gives students the ability to record videos and audios and then edit and select music for them. And it's free.

I first started using it two years ago when it became the focus of my SMART goal. Any Flip users in the house? Feel free to share in the chat box how you use it if you do. In a moment, I'll share how I use Flip to extend the grammar and writing focused lesson. But first, as a starting point, let's take a look at a dialogue exercise in Burlington English.

Dialogue practice-- a problem dressed up as a solution. Here's an example of a dialogue exercise one can find in any textbook. Students practice the model on the left and then substitute a section of it with variations on the right. OK, cool.

But other than substitution, students don't have much involvement with the structure and dynamics of the dialogue. There's no skin in the game. Because of that, students readings can be a bit one dimensional.

As well, they don't retain many of the speaking skills they're practicing. In my opinion, prefab dialogues don't bring students closer to conversation practice as I think they should. So I call this a problem dressed as a solution.

Proofreading-- getting students involved. Here is an exercise with a challenge my students enjoy and for the right reasons. They have to fix the sentences. Students like to tinker, put things together, and repair things, especially in a collaborative way.

And I love how this kind of exercise engages students' cognitive thinking. Inspired by this exercise, I asked myself, What if students had to repair dialogues? That aha moment helped me create this extension exercise. Provide a solution dressed as a problem in seven steps.

Step 1, assign a bad dialogue. This dialog, similar to the proofing exercise from Burlington English, has grammar problems. But also, no punctuation and some capitalization is missing. This bad dialogue became a project-based exercise using Flip. Here's how. First, I had each team work on correcting this dialogue at their team tables, also assigning each team three lines of dialogue to correct on the board.

Next, volunteers from each team shared their proofed version of the three lines of dialogue on the board. After each team finished, I reviewed the work with the class. In this clip, we talked about choices in punctuation.

Step 2, review grammar. B, "I can't tell you where I am going tomorrow the phone is ring." A, "Me no answer it." B, "You should to answer it."

Here are three lines from the dialogue that the students were proofing. In Burlington's activity, students focused only on each line as a separate exercise. But in this case, students had to make sense about each line in context to the whole dialogue. This created variations of corrected work, which is awesome because conversations ensued. In the next slide, I had a conversation with the student about his correction of "Me no answer it."

This line was part of team 3's work. Their solution was, "I won't answer it." I explained to the class that in some instances, there is more than one way that a sentence can work. But any variation in a sentence can change the nature of the dialogue. What's awesome is that this process of unpacking allowed students to get inside the text and take ownership for their choices. Skin in the game. Here is the dialogue with corrections. After all the work was corrected and discussed, we moved on to the next step.

Step 3, practice the dialogue. Granted, it's a short clip. But you can see how static the work was. As usual, the students basically read to each other.

I wanted their dialogue practice to feel more connected and authentic. To accomplish this, I gave my students a "what if" question. Now, before I share this question, I want to give a little background to the inspiration for this question.

A teacher's "what if," Mehrabian's model. Albert Mehrabian, once professor emeritus of psychology at UCLA, created what became known as Mehrabian's model, which stated that communication is 55% facial expressions, 38% vocal, and only 7% verbal.

This model has been contested through the years. But studies have shown that nonverbal communication plays a vital role in social exchange. Quote, "The field of non-verbal communication, NVC, has a long history involving many modalities, including face, voice, body, touch, and interpersonal space; different levels of analysis, including normative, group, and individual differences; and many substantive themes that cross from psychology into other disciplines." This is from the abstract in non-verbal communication, co-written by Judith Hall, Terrence G. Horgan, Nora A. Murphy, published in the National Institute of Health's National Library of Medicine.

Step 4, add body language to dialogue. Up until now, students have been working from an academic perspective. After students practice the corrected dialogue, I introduced performance dynamics, which you can see. I've got all these different symbols on the left before each sentence.

So these included structured body language symbols and effective tonality that's inferred by the dialogue's punctuation. You see that on the right. Scaffolding this work was crucial.

I started with a mock introduction. Pointing to myself, I said, I'm Aaron. Pointing to another student, I said-- excuse me. Pointing to a student-- I'm sorry. I'm going to start again.

Pointing to myself, I said, I'm Aaron. Pointing to a student, I continued with, And you are? Then I reversed it. Pointing to another student, I said, I'm Aaron. Then pointing to myself, I said, And you are?

Then I ask, Which version makes more sense? After the correct response, I made the point that we use our bodies in conversation. Then I asked, What if we used our bodies in conversation practice? Let's give it a try.

Step 5, students sync body language with speech, example 1. So then I scaffolded all of the body language symbols in the dialogue. After the class demonstrated competency, I then told the class that each team was a production company with a director, a director of photography, one or two script supervisors, and two dialogue speakers. They must first practice the dialogue, synchronizing the body language with the text as well as pay close attention to the punctuation in order to know how to speak the lines. Watch team 2's work as they practice the exercise.

You can see that every member of the team was connected to each other, spending time on task. Everyone was paying attention not only to what was being said but also to how it was being said. Speakers were adapting the text to their style of speaking in sync with their body language and affected tone. The script supervisors and director also paid close attention to the speakers' work based on their knowledge of the body language symbols assigned to the text.

Step 6, have students film their dialogues. Once the team felt that their work was ready, they started recording Flip videos of the dialogue. As you can see, this team needed more practice.

Also, their audio was overwhelmed by another team that was working across from them. But this didn't stop them from staying on task. As well, they were enjoying their process. The person giggling at the end of the clip was the videographer. Teams recorded several takes. And some teams also took turns, rotating roles and responsibilities.

These teams learned, practiced, and recorded their dialogues during one class. No one had their work memorized. But everyone knew what they were doing.

Step 7, have a showing of students work. After students recorded their works in progress, there was a viewing of their work. Here's one example, "Going to the Store."

Here's the dialogue produced and directed by team 2. And it's by no means a finished-- so this dialogue was produced and directed by team 2. It's by no means a finished product but nonetheless represents a lot of work that went into creating this in the span of a three-hour class.

What's more, it's the culmination of every component of the Triple E Framework. With engagement, students embodied co-use, time on task, and proactive learning. With enhancement, they used technology that couldn't have occurred in its absence.

The intensity and focus of their work-- let's see. I got lost. Yeah, the intensity and focus of their work crystallized to create something they could experience and learn from. And with extension, they utilized skills that will have tremendous carryover in their future professional and personal endeavors.

When each component of the Triple E Framework is successful, they build on each other and become something more than just the sum of their parts. In closing, let's check in with the rubric for extension as well as the learning objectives established at the beginning of this lesson. Let's see. One moment, please.

So does the technology create opportunities for students to learn outside of their typical school day? Absolutely. Does the technology create a bridge between school learning and everyday life experiences? Absolutely. Does the technology allow students to build skills that they can use in their everyday lives? Absolutely.

And in regards to the lesson objectives, the students formed and used simple verb tenses. They also use simple phrases and clauses. They didn't produce simple, compound, and complex sentences. But they reproduced them. They had to correct them. And then they had to use them correctly.

We could see that they adapted their language choices and style with the project-based exercise. And they showed developing control of style and tone in spoken and written texts. So they accomplished the lesson objectives as well. A work in progress. One moment, please. OK, I'm just making an adjustment here.

As mentioned earlier, I'm a newbie when it comes to the Triple E Framework. But I'm very excited about how I can improve my instruction with it. The framework is easy to use. And its rubrics are effective in helping me not lose sight of the learning objectives when using technology tools.

Now I feel much more capable at using Burlington English and Flip with greater command and creativity. I don't get lost in teaching to the book in Burlington English or be mesmerized by all the bells and whistles to Flip. The learning objectives always come first.

By the way, the next Triple E Framework orientation is March 8th, 2024, 12 o'clock noon. Yes, this is an unsolicited, shameless plug. Seriously, though, I can't recommend the training enough.

My presentation only scratches the surface of what the framework is and can do. The gold mine of tools and information one gets in the course is priceless. Check out the orientation books to learn more.

I want to thank-- give thanks to the Triple E Framework creation team of the course. I want to give thanks to Danielle Silverman and Danilo Perez from Burlington English, also to Dr. Cardenas, principal of Culver City Adult School, the Culver City Adult School ESL department for their help and support, my technical advisor and ESL coordinator, Victoria Bian. And last but not least, the level 3 AM and PM students were allowing me to share their hard work. So thank you, everyone. And that is the end.