The session at TESOL entitled "Continued Scaffolding Outside the ITA Classroom" explored ideas to foster ITA development outside the classroom. Four collaborations were described which developed ITA pronunciation, pedagogical skills and cultural awareness while celebrating the "gift of the stranger".

David Smith and Barbara Carvill's paradigm as described in The Gift of the Stranger: Faith, Hospitality and Foreign Education was the inspiration for the external program design for international teaching assistants (ITAs) at The State University of NY in Stony Brook (SBU).

 

After describing the context of the program, the four collaborations were presented. These collaborations are professional workshops, tutoring sessions for the ITAs by the students in the MA TESOL Program, planned social interaction with peers and senior citizens studying at the university, and lastly, involvement of MA TESOL candidates in the ITA program exit mini teaching. The session ended with future directions for further support as well as a challenge to other universities.

 

First, the context of the program at SBU involves 120 internationals taking our ESL courses in Spring, 2004. The ITAs are placed into 3 levels of English as a Second Language (ESL) instruction depending on their IELTS, TSE or SPEAK Test scores: ESL 591 for intermediate speakers, ESL 596 for high intermediate speakers and lastly, ESL 598 for advanced speakers. All 3 courses focus on pronunciation improvement, pedagogical skill development and awareness of North American academic culture. There are 31 MA TESOL Candidates in our LIN 578 Field Experience in Adult and Tertiary Contexts course and 31 students in the LIN 571 Curriculum Design and Evaluation on the College Level course. For LIN 578, teacher candidates must complete 50 hours of field work in adult and tertiary contexts.

 

The first collaboration is the professional workshop run by MA TESOL students for the ITAs. These workshops vary in nature, but they cover topics called, "American Ways for ITAs" and include such topics as individualism, privacy, time, ways of reasoning, customs, family life, sports and communication issues, to name but a few. The ITAs who are mostly PhD students gain a lot from the MA TESOL American graduate student interaction. The MA TESOL group also starts to appreciate the many gifts and talents of the international population.

 

The second collaboration also involves the MA TESOL population helping the ITA population through weekly one-on-one tutoring sessions. Each MA TESOL student needs to tutor 3 hours/week for 12 weeks. Each ITA is tutored for one half hour per week. These sessions mostly focus on pronunciation improvement while forming bridges between American graduate students and international graduate students. This one-on-one interaction greatly enriches both the tutors and the tutees.

 

Conversation partners and social activities outside the classroom form the third collaboration. Senior citizens studying at the university volunteer time to meet and talk with international teaching assistants. Many wonderful friendships have formed due to this collaboration, making this a win-win situation for both populations. Teachers of the ESL courses also arrange get-togethers outside the classroom to further social interaction and cultural awareness.

 

The last collaboration involves MA TESOL teacher candidates who evaluate the final mini teaching presentations of the ITAs who need to exit the ITA Program. These MA TESOL students provide part of the audience for the ITAs. The ESL faculty and colleagues of the ITA form the rest of the audience. This experience gives the teacher candidates practice evaluating college level academic oral discourse. During these sessions, the university is greatly enriched by the diversity and talents of the "strangers" among us.

 

In the future, the undergraduates and young children in the university day care center will also be approached as further possible collaboration populations.

 

The challenge is to look around at our university contexts and explore areas for future collaborations while realizing that the real gift to our universities is the "stranger" within.

Best, R. (Ed.). (2000). Education for spiritual, moral, social and cultural development. London: Continuum.

Bigger, K. S., & Brown, E. (Eds.). (1999). Spiritual, moral, social and cultural education: Exploring values in the curriculum. London: David Fulton.

Civiklh, J., & Muchisky, D. (1991). A collaborative approach to ITA training: The ITAs, faculty, TAs, undergraduate interns, and undergraduate students. In J.D. Nyquist, R.D. Abbott, D.H. Wulff & J. Sprague (Eds.), Preparing the professoriate of tomorrow to teach. Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt.

Smith, D., & Carvill, B. (2000). The gift of the stranger: Faith, hospitality and foreign language education. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans.

Stevick, E.W. (1990). Humanism in language teaching: A critical perspective. Oxford: Oxford University Press.