Strategies on Improving College English Teachers’ICT Teaching Competence in Post-epidemic Era

Tianjin University Renai College,Tianjin,China Email:liuyandream@163.com

[Abstract]COVID-19 has affected people’s work and life,as well as China’s higher education.Under the background of COVID-19 prevention and control,online teaching offers a good way to implement college English teaching.Teachers’ICT Competence plays an indispensable role in constructing and implementing online teaching.This thesis will make a comprehensive analysis on ICT teaching competence,expound some practical problems of online teaching,put forward some professional standards for college English teachers,and introduce effective strategies to improve teachers’ICT competence.In the post-epidemic era,the application of ICT in college English teaching can promote the efficiency of English teaching,offer some references for further development of online teaching and set up a smart teaching model.

[Keywords]College English;ICT;teaching competence;post-epidemic era

Introduction

In 2020,COVID-19 broke out in the world and became a worldwide epidemic,which has affected people’s work and life,as well as China’s higher education.In order to cut off the spread COVID-19,almost all the teachers and students from primary schools to universities have stayed at home for the first half year in China.Though regular classes have been suspended,universities and colleges in China immediately offered online teaching for students so they can continue their study from their homes.In fact,online teaching brings a great challenge to teachers.Due to the prevention and control of COVID-19,teachers and students can’t communicate with each other face to face,which causes many problems especially concerning online teaching.

Nowadays new information technologies such as big data and artificial intelligence(AI)have been applied in different aspects of live.The integration of new information technologies and traditional education has brought a new form of education for Chinese higher education.Almost all the universities and colleges engage in the campaign to carry out online teaching,which requires teachers to master advanced technology and integrate it into the whole process of teaching to achieve high quality teaching(Bauer & Kenton,2005).Therefore it is compulsory for teachers to increase their ICT competence to achieve successful online teaching.

During the process of pre-construction and implementation of online teaching,teachers encountered many difficulties owing to the lack of ICT competence.This paper will make a comprehensive analysis on ICT competence of college English teachers,so as to offer some references for the further development of College English.

Concept of ICT Competence

ICT is an abbreviation for“information and communication technology”,which is derived from the“IT”field.It is a new technical field formed by the integration of information technology and communication technology.ICT is a method to process information through a variety of software and hardware.It is usually used to process,distribute and exchange information.For the last decade,ICT has been applied in educational field and broken the limitation of face to face teaching.This thesis will introduce the application of“ICT”in college English teaching and research on the teacher’s ICT competence.

ICT competence refers to the ability to use digital technology,communication tools and networks to solve problems properly(Haydn,2007).It includes the ability of using information technology to retrieve information,manage information,evaluate information and exchange information.In educational field,ICT competence of teachers contains two aspects:ICT ability and ICT awareness.ICT ability means that teachers can make good use of information and communication technology to receive and process information,to organize the teaching process,to evaluate students’learning effect; while ICT awareness refers to teachers would like to accept the concept of ICT teaching and are willing to adopt ICT into their class so as to improve students’learning skills and improve the quality and efficiency of teaching.

Difficulties in the Implementation of Online Teaching

During the period of epidemic prevention and control in the first half year of 2020,college English teaching was transferred from traditional classroom teaching to online teaching directly.With the help of information technology,students can continue to study at home.Though this new teaching model can cultivate students’autonomous ability,many problems are also exposed.Here are the major barriers occurring along with online teaching.

Teachers’Lack of Sufficient ICT Knowledge

When giving online lectures,English teachers met some problems in selecting teaching resources and operating platforms.The root reason is that English teachers haven’t grasped sufficient ICT knowledge.Most English teachers are familiar with office software,such as Word,Excel and PowerPoint,but they are not familiar with the method of editing videos and operating various online teaching platforms.College teachers are short of ICT teaching competence,because they seldom use teaching APPs such as Dingding,Tencent Classroom in traditional classroom teaching.A majority of teachers knew little about the functions and operations of these APPs.Generally speaking,most English teachers are not experts in modern information technology,consequently they encountered various technical problems.Considering the popularity of online teaching,teachers must face the reality and be willing to acquire some basic skills such as the selection of teaching resources,the operation of teaching platform and the management of online class activities.English teachers must follow the trend and get sufficient knowledge about modern information technology.(Bi,2019).

Students’Problems in Adapting to Online Teaching Immediately

During the epidemic prevention,students are isolated from others,they have to use different kinds of platform to communicate with teachers and classmates and to take part in online classes.The first problem which students meet is that they don’t know how to join in the class when using various platforms.What’s more,it is rather difficult for them to get used to online teaching.They can’t concentrate on the lecture when facing the screen of mobile phone or computer instead of teachers.As a matter of fact,most students haven’t used these platforms before so they have to spend much time adapting to them,which reduces the efficiency of teaching.When they meet some problems,they can’t get teachers’help immediately and they can’t discuss the problem with classmates.What makes it worse is that the internet in some countryside areas is very weak,which can’t help students get access to online classes normally.All of these makes students have a feeling of frustration.

Problems of Online Platform in Offering a Stable Learning Environment

Online teaching can break through the limitation of time and space and change the way of teaching,the way of learning,the way of management,as well as the mode of education.While it is totally different from classroom teaching,teachers cannot get the feedback from students immediately and they are not sure whether the students are listening to the lecture,whether they can follow the pace of teaching,whether they use the platform correctly.Teachers have to rely on the platform to get feedbacks,therefore teaching platform becomes a crucial factor for ensuring successful online teaching.However the hardware and software of many universities have not been updated for several years,they can’t offer a stable service for teachers and students.When a large number of students are taking the same class or the same examination,the operating system will become very slow.Meanwhile some students who live in the countryside with weak signals can’t register for the class on time or can’t take the examination successfully.The instability of operating system has become a major obstacle to online teaching.

Professional Standards of College English Teachers in Post-epidemic Era

At the age of Educational Informatization 2.0,ICT has become an indispensable tool to promote students’academic performance.College English teachers should be familiar with the basic skill of information and communication technology and apply it into the whole process of teaching.

Comprehensive Understanding of the Concept ICT Teaching

Educational informatization has brought great changes to the teaching mode and teaching method of college English.Traditional classroom teaching is out of date and must be changed to meet the requirement of higher education.Online teaching and blended teaching which depend on the advancement of ICT are the choices of most teachers.Thus teachers have to get to know the concept of ICT teaching.In fact it means teachers can master essential knowledge of information technology and apply it their teaching.For example,teachers can make a PPT and display it in the class,edit the video according to the teaching contents or give some online teaching.In post-epidemic era teachers must take advantage of ICT and make a good teaching design.All in all their teaching philosophy should be updated with the development of ICT so as to achieve successful teaching effects.

Effective Organization and Evaluation of Curriculums

College English teachers should be equipped with information and communication technology to organize the curriculum effectively and to evaluate students’learning effects precisely.With the popularity of MOOC,there are a large amount of online learning resources,teachers have to choose the suitable resources to match students’learning level and achieve the teaching goal.Teachers should organize the class by applying advanced technology,for example preparing the lecture by using office software,assigning homework through network platform and evaluating students via big data(Rhode et al.,2017).In addition,teachers should take advantage of information and communication technology to stimulate students’interest in English learning.

Evaluation is an important part of teaching,which can reflect the teaching effect and measure students’real level.In the past teachers usually evaluate students by holding the final examination,which emphasizes on scores of students and neglects the process of learning.In order to encourage students to pay more attention to each class and stimulate their interest in learning,teachers have to adopt process evaluation in college English teaching.If teachers correct each student’s test paper by their hands,it will increase their workload enormously.With the wide application of various platform,it is advisable to utilize online evaluation system.For instance,Pigai Writing System can evaluate students’composition immediately and offer some suggestion for modification.Students can revise their composition over and over again and the Pigai Wring System will record the final version’s score.This kind of evaluation will promote students’writing level directly.Therefore teacher should evaluate curriculums by using various teaching platforms.

Mastering Various Teaching Methods

Single teaching method can’t meet the need of online teaching.Teachers should combine ICT with appropriate teaching method to improve the quality of teaching.In regular classroom teaching,teacher can communicate with students directly and help students solve problems immediately.While online teaching separates teacher and students in terms of time and space and teachers have to depend on ICT to give lectures.Teachers must extend their teaching method to flipped class model,blended learning model,task-based teaching model,and so on.

Chaoxing is a popular teaching platform in China.Teachers can depend on Chaoxing to set up a smart teaching model.First teachers can upload the teaching materials to Chaoxing before the class.Students must preview the materials on time and teachers can supervise them through Chaoxing.During the class,teachers can organize some teaching activities such as presentation,group discussion and role play to check whether students have grasped the knowledge.After class teachers can assign some homework and hold some examinations through this platform to consolidate the knowledge.By applying multiple teaching methods,teachers can set up a smart teaching model with the help of ICT(Hu,2020).

Updating Information Technology Continuously

ICT develops rapidly in recent year,which help people communicate more conveniently.When it is applied in the field of education,it brings revolutionary reform.Teachers and students can engage in the same class even though they are thousand miles away.Students can register for some courses which are offered by prestigious universities.Facing all the challenges,teachers have to update their knowledge continuously.They should be familiar with all kinds of software and teaching resources and be good at choosing proper teaching platform to organize the class.They should know how to instruct students to use these resources and how to achieve effective management and evaluation.For example,Tencent Classroom is a brand new technology that teachers haven’t heard before.During the online teaching period,most teachers were asked to use this platform to give lectures.So teachers manage to use this platform proficiently with the help of technical experts and self-learning.In the future,there will be more technologies applied in college English teaching,so teachers must update their information technology and cultivate the habit of lifelong learning.

Strategies to Improve College English Teachers’ICT Teaching Competence

Given the investigation of current college English teaching,we can know successful teaching bases on the joint efforts of teachers,universities and society.The following strategies are put forward to improve college English teachers ICT teaching competence.

Enhancing ICT Teaching Awareness

As we all know ICT is a necessary medium to boost educational reform,but college English teachers’ability to adopt ICT teaching is far from satisfying.They should have a sense of urgency to renew their knowledge of ICT continuously.ICT is developing so quickly that it is impossible for teachers to master all the knowledge and skills once for all,so they have to make a systematic plan to promote their teaching competence(Capan,2012).In the post epidemic era,teacher’s ICT competence becomes a dispensable element to fulfill the requirement of online learning.All in all college English teachers must change their attitude toward education informatization.The application of ICT in college English teaching is not to use ICT in every course every day,but to choose proper technology in proper occasion.For instance,teachers can check students’attendance by using APPs,they can hold examinations through teaching platforms,and they can know about students learning activities according to the data offered by teaching platform.All of these will improve the efficiency of teaching and help teachers gain more support from students and institutions.

Offering Multiple ICT Training Programs

Teachers,as the main body of establishing educational informatization,must improve their ICT competence.Colleges and universities should offer more opportunities to train them.Current training program focuses on professional knowledge instead of technology knowledge.Generally speaking,teachers’ICT competence more or less is influenced by their gender,age,professional title and educational background.Therefore colleges and universities should offer different kinds of training program according to teachers’ICT level.First of all,self-learning is the most convenient and effective way to cultivate teachers’ICT competence.They can participate in some online lectures and search some relevant teaching resources to enlarge their knowledge.What’s more,they should communicate with colleagues to share some precious experiences.It would be better for teachers to form a teaching reform team so they can exchange up-to-date skills and knowledge.There should be some training courses for teachers who can’t integrate ICT knowledge into English class freely.While teachers who have grasped advanced knowledge of ICT should be offered more chances to attend academic seminar to broaden their horizon and learn from technical experts.

Constructing ICT Teaching Resources

It is compulsory to stress on the significance of teaching facilities in realizing educational informatization.Advanced software and hardware facilities can guarantee the availability and stability of online teaching.Therefore colleges and universities must offer enough funds to install new computer devices and systems and spend a fixed amount of money maintaining the running of these facilities.It is necessary to invite some computer experts to update the teaching facilities timely and help teachers operate them correctly.

It is useful to construct some audio classrooms to cultivate students’listening and speaking skill.Universities should offer a better learning environment for students and arouse their enthusiasm to study actively.The operating system is also very important to ensure successful teaching,so teachers should improve their ICT competence to operate the system proficiently.

It’s advisable to construct information resources database so teachers can share the teaching resources freely and get inspiration from other teachers’resources.The resources database has to be updated from time to time to meet requirements of teachers and students.Teachers must choose the most suitable resources to improve the efficiency of teaching and cultivate students’language ability.

Providing ICT Policies Support

In the 21st century,high quality teaching can’t be achieved without the aid of ICT,so more and more countries are engaged in setting up standards to support educational reform.In 2018,the Ministry of Education issued“Educational Informatization 2.0 Action Plan”and a new round of educational revolution is aroused in China,which leads to the wide application of ICT in education.While related policies need to be established in the future to promote the reform and innovation of teaching methods and to enlarge the application of ICT.College English teachers must follow the trend and take advantage of ICT to prepare the lecture,to give the lecture and to manage the class.Besides,teachers can provide personalized support to students according to the data collected from teaching platform.Finally teachers can make a record of every student’s learning activity,analyze each student’s learning effect and adjust the teaching plan when necessary.Policymakers and university leaders should encourage teacher to participate in educational reform and provide enough support in terms of policy and fund.

Conclusion

In 2020,many educational activities are transferred to online teaching in order to prevent the spread of COVID-19.Even though the epidemic has been taken under control in China,online teaching model will be together with us in the future because it can enhance the communication between teachers and students,enrich teaching contents and improve teaching quality.College English teachers must grasp this opportunity to set up a smart teaching model with the help of information and communication technology.A couple of factors may affect online teaching,but teachers’ICT competence plays the most important role.College English teachers must upgrade their knowledge in ICT to achieve high quality teaching.Policymakers and university leaders also need to set up a good environment for teachers to launch educational reform.Only in this way,can college English make good use of online teaching and overcome the barriers.

Acknowledgements

This article is the research achievement of Tianjin University Renai College Research Project(Project number:202001).