My thoughts on autonomy...

Having 'done the reading' and mulled over the questions, I offer the following..
Do I engage with autonomy? As Klaus stated, one of our key roles as EAP tutors is undoubtedly that of encouraging students to take responsibility for their own learning in higher education and making them aware of how central this is to succeeding in academic life in the UK. To many of my students this is a big challenge for them (though I think it's fair to say that it is also a challenge for many UK students too). However, I'm not sure that I'm comfortable with the idea of myself as an 'academic life coach' (though think it's a lovely term, and am thinking of proposing it as an alternative within the literature to 'teacher'!).


Obstacles to engaging with autonomy? Many of my undergraduate students admit that they are strongly goal orientated (need that IELTS 6!) and do not have strong intrinsic motivation (though lots of external family pressure) which would seem a poor starting point in terms of their own autonomy as learners. I was interested in the links drawn between 'a sense of personal autonomy' and 'the development of intrinsic motivation' in Deci and Ryan's self determination theory (Benson's article p 29). I wondered whether by finding ways of promoting and developing a student's sense of personal autonomy over the learning process it is possible to have any tangible impact upon intrinsic motivation? I would hope so.


Ways of engaging learners in the process of taking responsibility for their own learning and decision-making in class? When I first started teaching EAP I found that many students expected extremely teacher-led classes and were uncomfortable with anything different from this. In previous teaching contexts (European based) I had been used to a fairly collaborative approach to prioritising/selecting classroom content and was taken aback by how students seemed to interpret offering options as a weakness as a teacher on my part.

I found that it was only by starting to explore students' own expectations of learning, the teacher and the learning process (through stem sentence activities and the like) that we were able to discuss the rationale for a less teacher-centred approach and start to put it into practice. The issues in class were often as basic as getting students to speak out, take part in a communicative group activity or answer an open question I threw out to them (ie take basic responsibility for their learning). I found that students often reacted positively to a different approach once they could see the rationale behind it. However, it can take time to build up group trust and for students to feel comfortable with approaches different to those that they are used to. These activities also take up a lot of classroom time.



Exercising greater teacher autonomy? I suppose I see this course as a way of increasing my autonomy, in that it gives me a chance to reflect upon the theories as well as the practice of EAP; by distancing myself a bit from the hurly-burly of frontline classroom teaching I'm hoping I'll be able to understand and find means for addressing issues.


Technology and autonomy? I thought that using optional reflective ejournals with students would be a good way of keeping in touch with them (and might suit students who find it hard to find their voice in class). It would offer students an opportunity to direct their own learning, give feedback and make suggestions for future classroom content. I haven't done anything about it yet, though. I think 'optional' is important here because I'd like this use of technology to be something students engage with because it's a useful tool to them, rather than a hoop they have to leap through.