Online collaboration as a way of professional development of the teacher

For any school teacher especially for foreign language teachers who cares not only about successful completing of the curriculum bat also wants his students were able to understand themselves and to cooperate with others using language as a condition and means of interaction it's very important and significant to provide constant self-improvement of their professional skills and develop themselves as a person of the modern world.

This article discusses the possibility of different Internet technologies and resources as effective mechanisms for supporting the professional development of teachers

Why does teacher need Internet technologies?

Modern society expects schools to create conditions for the formation of a child's socialization abilities, finding his place in life, knowing not only a theory, but the ability to apply their knowledge in practice in real life to solve real problems and challenges. Teacher's task is to create conditions for practical language learning for each student, to choose such training methods that would allow each student to show their activity, their creativity. So the main purpose of learning a foreign language in high school is formation of communicative competence. All other tasks (education, mentoring, developing) can be realized in the process of its implementation as main one.

Modern teaching technologies such as cooperative learning, project methodology, the use of new information technologies, the Internet - resources help implement the communicative approach to learning. This approach involves learning to communicate and the ability to form cross-cultural interaction that is the basis for the functioning of the Internet. The Internet is a universal information and telecommunication infrastructure for a global community in which information, resources and ideas freely move through national borders. In this Internet projects are the educational technologies that allow their members to solve their educational goals through the organization their own activities in cooperation with partners and colleagues from different countries using the Internet resources

Communicating in real language environment, provided by the Internet, students find themselves in these situations. The inclusion in the online collaboration with colleagues from different countries is an effective resource for school teachers to solve these problems.

Online cooperation is a joint activity of people united by one goal through the use of transnational association of computer networks or in other words information / telecommunication resources [1]. Basic technologies of support of an effective Internet cooperation of teachers and students from different countries are educational online projects, online professional development courses, online conferences and online meetings. In conjunction with meetings in the various conferences, summits and festivals they allow participants to develop effectively, ensuring quality of education for their students.

The great benefit of use of Internet resources in the educational process is the development of intercultural competence of its members, i.e. their familiarity with different cultures, ways of co-determination of their interaction and interpenetration of each other, the formation of cultural universals, necessary for achieving mutual understanding and fruitful cooperation in direct communication. Using Internet resources in my lessons and in extracurricular activities, I came to the conclusion that international educational Internet - projects help to unite the efforts of students and teachers from different countries, provides an opportunity to find like-minded partners to implement ideas to achieve specific goals.

Online Resources of Professional Development

There are many educational Web portals, Internet networks offering introduction of ICT in education. For me, one of the resources of including our school in the organization of international cooperation are the projects of iEARN (International Educational and Resource Network).

iEARN is a non-profit organization made up of over 30,000 schools and youth organizations in more than 140 countries collaborating on the global Internet through projects. Reservations iEARN (www.iearn.org) offers a large number of educational projects on various topics aimed at developing communicative competence students.

By joining the project, teachers and students are included in the interactive online Collaboration Centre to meet other participants and engage in ongoing projects, coordinated by their peers from around the world. Besides the fact that everyone can choose a project that most closely matches the content of the curriculum on the subject, each of the iEARN project should answer the question " How does this project can improve the quality of life on the planet? " By participating in projects of iEARN students form and develop skills of collaboration with their peers in the local and global scale, allowing them to be successful in life.

Participation in iEARN allowed me to meet with members of the international community and to join ongoing projects, coordinated by young people from around the world. Through participation in projects of iEARN students together with teachers form and develop skills of collaboration with their peers locally and globally, as well as come across an understanding and awareness of their role in society.

So participation in the project "Learning Circles" provided an opportunity to understand and improve the technology of participating in the online projects and organization of my own project. And participation in such projects as "Card Exchange", "Special place", allowed me to understand that high school student's participation in national and international Internet projects is an important stage of their entry into the world of universal culture, the condition of their awareness of their national identity, the effective possibility of forming true patriotism, patriotic consciousness. Besides all this, participation in these projects helped me to organize my own project "Together with birds ", which is one of educational projects in iEARN.

The project "Together with birds appeared in 2006. Initially it was conceived as an ecological. Its goal was to launch and implement social and environmental initiatives aimed at changing the ecological health of the region through the study of the world of birds of the region in collaboration with teachers and ornithologists. But as soon as it became one of iEARN projects has gained a little different meaning Participants from different countries (USA, India, Canada, Argentina, Israel, etc.). joined the project. So English became the language of communication in it.

Being an English teacher, I care how my students are motivated to learn the language. Making sure that the students interact with their peers from other countries, I noticed that the level of their language skills, communicative competence has increased, as well as interest in the language. So organizing and coordinating our own Internet project in conjunction with other projects became my way of students' motivation to improve their communication practices not by the marks but through understanding that a foreign language is the language of the living modern communication, networking, socialization and self- growth.

In addition, the organization of my own project has also become my way of self-development and professional growth. The project now has its own blog (http://togetherwithbirdsen.blogspot.com/). Information is put by the students both in Russian and English languages.

Active participation in iEARN projects allowed me and my students to become participants of another project «Adobe Youth Voices» (AYV). Belarus AYV program first started in 2008 (www.newlineclub.net/ayv) with the support of members of the educational community iEARN-Belarus (www.iearn4u.com). The program AYV is a support for students and teachers from around the world to describe the world around them, influence on it through the presentation of their interests and concerns with the use of various types of media assets (video, graphics, etc.).

Activity of AYV-Belarus program participants includes participation in online courses for teachers of our country. This program is for those who own the new information technologies and want to integrate them into education. AYV program includes organizing the youth media festivals, advising school teams to use new educational resources at the lessons and in extracurricular activities and socially active schools in the interests of sustainable development in their regions. This program has become another resource that is based on studies showing that the motivation and participation are essential for learning.

During training sessions of AYV program, built on research and help students realize that their motivation and participation today are necessary conditions for ensuring the quality of education, teachers and school communities from 11 countries except Belarus were involved. For me personally participating in this program was an additional opportunity to use the resources of new information technology in the classroom and in extracurricular work with students of different levels and stages of learning. In 2008 I participated in on-line courses in the program, and after the successful completion of the course, I has been invited as an online facilitator four times (1 time per year) of these courses.

As a result of exploring the possibilities of the program my students and I had an idea to create an the Internet-club of our Gymnasium. We started implementation of our ideas last year. To date in our Gymnasium the project "Internet Club WEP_19» is rather successful. The main goal of the Internet-club WEP_19 is to promote the expansion of the information space of school community. Through the work of the club students get the ability to learn through life, updating and improving the subject skills received at the lessons to changing conditions. A willingness to address various issues in multicultural situations is formed. Students develop their own resources necessary for learning any language which is important in view of the changing socio-cultural differences in the modern world.

Effects and consequences

I believe that effective learning can take place only in relation to real life and in the application of everyday experience of students in training. In the same vein, AYV projects are designed to ensure the transfer of skills of young people, through the use of video, multimedia, digital art, WEB, animation, and audio tools to explore and comment on their own world.Что касается учащихся, то у них появилась возможность языковой практики с носителями языка.

Young people, including in international cooperation, pass a kind of professional development courses. They had the opportunity to demonstrate their professional development meeting «face to face» during the International Youth Summit which was held in August 2011, 2-7 at the University of Santa Clara (California, USA)

The right to participate in the Summit school teams gets in the result of a multi-stage selection by an international team of experts. One of the winners of this year's selection became the team of our school. The main criterion for selection was the active participation of our team in the program, enthusiasm, talent and desire to contribute to the prosperity of our country, creating their own media products for sustainable development.

As participants of the II International Youth Summit we cooperated with other participants from around the world and representatives of the media sphere within five days. We were able to share our work and achievements to develop relationships with colleagues from other countries. We also have acquired new skills to create an open educational environment for the sustainable development of our Minsk region. As a result of this communication the idea of an international cultural project by students from Romania, Brazil and Belarus "Contrasts" has appeared. It is assumed that through the implementation of this project, participants from these countries will be able to meet with the culture and way of life, traditions and customs, characteristics of the partner countries.

During the Summit, both my students and I were able to get full-time training in five-day professional development courses, during which we learned new techniques and devices to expand our creative abilities to apply them in the future to improve our performance and output on a higher level of quality.

This program helped me to extend the possibility of using information technology in the classroom and in extra-curricular work for pupils of different levels. During the program I went through a kind of professional development courses through international cooperation. Later I was able to apply this experience in my classrooms.

It's is quite difficult to integrate the use of information technology (internet resources, online meetings, conferences, etc.) in the curriculum. However, possession of the knowledge and skills that I have acquired in the course of the program AYV, helped me deal with it. For example, while studying the topic "Friendship" in English lessons, students of grades 9, knowing the principle of using software ADOBE, created a video clip «The Best Friends» as a project. Work and learning in online AYV program added ​​in my personal development as a professional English teacher the ability to provide my students the opportunity to speak freely the language at a level that allows them to become world-class professionals in any field of their professional activities.

Summarizing all the above, it should be noted that participation in the international Internet projects teachers and students to expand their capabilities, achieving better result, promotes professional growth, provides many additional features to realize themselves as a person and as a professional to find new ways to address emerging issues and challenges in the implementation of the business. Support of distant learning and professional development provides the exchange of experience of successful implementation of educational projects that have made significant changes in the practice of education, and the exchange of ideas and models of a training program to improve the quality of education.

Literature

1. Новые педагогические и информационные технологии в системе образования: Учеб. Пособие. / Под ред. Е. С. Полат. – М., 1999.