Conference «Cambridge University Press» – an innovative approach to online learning
As we have already written, Cambridge University Press organized an online conference for educators and distributors, which took place from January 26 to 28. More than 100 specialists from all over the world took an active part in this conference, including the teachers of the Dalchyn Education Center.
The main topic of the second day was: «Digitalization in the educational process and updating of educational material». Experts from Cambridge University, Kasia Brzoska and Roxana Herescu, shared their experience and knowledge about digitalization in pedagogy. During the presentation, Roxana emphasized the development of cognitive skills in learning English as a second language, while Kasia Brzoska demonstrated the transformation of habitual teaching methods into digital. Also the use of kinesthetic methods in online classes was demonstrated.
The next important point for discussion was: «New directions in the practice of examinations and testing». Leading experts of Cambridge Assessment John McNeill and Victoria Watkins acted as speakers in this area. The participants were presented with the Test & Train application, which helps students to prepare for exams as efficiently as possible, facilitating the work of teachers and developing the skills of self-education and self-improvement. Victoria Watkins talked about the growing popularity of the Cambridge Assessment’s LinguaSkill, an international test that is widely used in many countries. «Linguaskill is an online test that evaluates all four language skills: reading, listening, writing and speaking. The test makes it possible to choose the skill that needs to be tested and evaluated. This test is suitable both for those wishing to enter universities, and for assessing the language skills for employers. Topics for the test include study and work, future planning, travel and technology», says Victoria. It is noteworthy that recently Dalchyn has signed an agreement with Cambridge Assessment, the developers of the Linguaskill test, and now this test can be taken in Turkmenistan.
The second day of the conference was closed by Geraldine Fichard and Anna Bolla with the theme of promoting updated content of educational literature for primary and secondary students. Many resources are still in development, but will soon contribute to more efficient assimilation of the material. Experts emphasized the fact that the pandemic and the subsequent transition to distance learning in many countries of the world led to a rapid growth in demand for online technologies in education and a shift in emphasis to distance learning.
According to experts, the pandemic has led to a significant change in «technological behavior», ranging from the transition to meetings in the format of video conferencing, online training, and ending with online shopping. As a result, there has been an explosive growth in the use of new technologies, i.e. the five-year growth forecast was achieved within five months.
According to the teachers of Dalchyn, the conference was very useful: new methods and new aspects of teaching will be added to the educational practice of the center. Among them: the formation of metacognitive competencies in students through the visualization of information through online resources, the introduction of new methods of preparation for online testing, the use of the updated online portal CLMS (Cambridge Learning Management System) and much more.
