TKT Essentials Online Trainer Guide

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Online trainer guide
Overview
This document provides information for trainers on the Online TKT Essentials course at http://courses.britishcouncil.org/pub/tkt/. If you are not familiar with TKT, you can find comprehensive information about the exam as well as sample tests, resources and a TKT glossary on the Cambridge ESOL website at http://www.cambridgeesol.org/exams/teaching-awards/tkt.html. Email support is available at TKTEssentials@britishcouncil.org. Last updated 20 May 2009.
Table of contents
Course description and objectives .................................................................................................................. 2 Trainer preparation.......................................................................................................................................... 3 Participation..................................................................................................................................................... 3 Course features and tools ............................................................................................................................... 4 Forums .................................................................................................................................................. 4 Focused discussion forums individual to each unit ............................................................................ 4 General discussion forums specific to each module .......................................................................... 5 Wikis...................................................................................................................................................... 7 Documents.............................................................................................................................................. 8 Resources ............................................................................................................................................. 9 Reflective Journals................................................................................................................................ 9 Exercises............................................................................................................................................. 10 Assignments........................................................................................................................................ 11 Polls..................................................................................................................................................... 12 Optional activities ................................................................................................................................ 13 Appendix Further reading........................................................................................................................... 14
An English global product Last updated: February, 2010

The British Council, 2010
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The United Kingdoms international organisation for educational opportunities and cultural relations. We are registered in England as a charity.
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Course description and objectives
The course structure and content of the TKT Essentials course is based on the syllabus of the Cambridge ESOL Teaching Knowledge Test (TKT). Specific learning outcomes are listed at the beginning of each unit. This course is 100% online (although some centres do decide to offer face-to-face supplementary sessions) and comprises three modules divided into a total of 33 units varying in length between 90 and 180 minutes, plus an introductory unit which should be completed regardless of how many modules your particular cohort will be completing. The modular nature of the course allows for centres to decide to offer part of the course (e.g. only module 1) if that better suits the requirements of your partner organisation or the time restrictions available. Preparation An introductory module aimed at familiarising course participants with the learning platform (called Moodle) and establishing a supportive online learning community (1 unit; 1.5 hours) Module 1 Language and background to language learning and teaching (18 units; 31 hours) Module 2 Lesson planning and use of resources for language teaching (8 units; 16.5 hours) Module 3 Managing the teaching and learning process (7 units; 13 hours)
Each unit of the TKT Essentials online course consists of: a set of interactive online activities using Moodle e.g. discussion forums, assignments and collaborative learning activities which you, the trainer, will moderate and/or grade, plus a variety of exercises which are marked automatically on the site trainer notes in PDF format
The learning platform for TKT Essentials is Moodle, a Web-based environment for delivering course content and managing students. If you have already worked with Moodle you will find many features of the site familiar. In addition to this guide, you will find supporting documentation, tutorials, etc. available on the Trainer Materials page, accessible from the Admin section of the top navigation menu (see Figure 1). NB: Only trainers and administrative staff can see this section of the TKT site. If you cant see it when logged in as a trainer, or if your course participants can see it, please contact TKTEssentials@britishcouncil.org to rectify the problem.
Figure 1 - Where to find trainer support materials
TKT Essentials follows a constructivist approach to online learning in other words, the trainers role is that of a moderator or facilitator, helping and assisting the course participants to create their own understanding of the topic through discussion, collaborative exercises, building on what they already know and reflection of how to apply this knowledge in their own specific context. (See the appendix for further information.) A good online trainer is not one who answers every question instantly; rather, it is someone who encourages people to engage in dialogue, remains supportive and builds confidence in the course

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participants whilst they use the course materials and discussions to construct their own understanding of the subject matter. The TKT Essentials online course is asynchronous, i.e. the communications that occur within the site are not in real time. The use of forums is the main means of communication between participants and trainers.
Trainer preparation
Ensure that you are familiar with the TKT Essentials course materials before the start of the course. Each trainer will need to: Copy the discussion forum starters and set up the initial wiki frameworks see the Trainer Materials page for tutorials on how to do this. Try the exercises in each unit to ensure that they work. You may find it helpful to reflect on what you feel the learning objectives are for each exercise. Read the materials in the external links; do they suit the needs of your learners? Are there any other links that you might like to suggest to your learners, e.g. links to local content that will be particularly useful to the teachers taking this course? It is always important to check that links work, even if you have used this course previously. A reality of Web-based materials is that pages move, links to documents stop working, activities start misbehaving. If you do find a problem with the site or a dead link, please contact TKTEssentials@britishcouncil.org as soon as possible so we can make the necessary changes; early notification of any problems will help us to resolve them before they become an issue for your course participants!
Participation
Active participation is an important component of constructivist learning. This is especially important in an online environment, where people stand a greater risk of feeling isolated and potentially unsupported. Participation occurs on a number of levels: between course participants, with the trainer, engagement with the learning materials (be they text, video or an activity), and internal dialogue or reflection. It is therefore important to remember that someone who is not making frequent postings may still be participating in other ways which are less visible to you. If you have concerns about the extent to which someone is participating, you should: Verify through technical means (i.e. checking logs on the course site see Figure 9) whether or not they have accessed a reasonable percentage of the materials. Contact the participant to ensure they are not experiencing technical difficulties; if they are simply too busy or in circumstances which may prevent them from studying effectively (e.g. dealing with a family crisis, problems at work/home, gone on leave), check when they expect to be able to re-join the group more actively. In some circumstances, it may be necessary to contact the persons employer or notify whoever has paid for them to complete the course. Although care should be taken not to create unnecessary stress for the participant, or to needlessly trouble the employer/sponsor, it is also advisable to avoid a situation where a participants absence from or lack of participation in the course comes as a surprise to their employer/sponsor.

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Course features and tools
Forums
Forums are used in two ways on the TKT Essentials site: each unit has topic-based forums which focus specifically on the material covered in that unit, each module has three overarching forums which are more general, catch all discussion areas provided to cater to all the other issues that arise during a normal course.
Well look at these in closer detail shortly. In the context of constructivist learning, forums are where a lot of the learning process takes place. Course participants should be encouraged to engage with the ideas of others as much as possible, challenging ideas appropriately to extend the limits of what they already know. The trainers role is not to provide the answers, but rather to guide the course participants to creating their own understanding of the issues. Encourage course participants to post discussion threads that clearly indicate what the topic under discussion is. Poor subject line examples would be Help!, I dont understand better examples would be Where do I find which group Im in for the exercise in unit 2.7?, How do I use the audio player?, or Whats the difference between process writing and peer-reviewing?.
Focused discussion forums individual to each unit

Most units feature at least one forum which addresses specific topics. These forums need to be started by the trainer for each group you are working with e.g. if you have three groups, then each forum thread will need to be started three times. The content and title of each forum thread (see Figure 2) is provided for you on the Trainer Materials page, along with a tutorial on how to correctly set up the forums for your group(s). It is your responsibility to ensure that all the forums mentioned in the Trainer notes for each unit have been copied over for each of your groups. Not all units have forum thread starters; e.g. Units 1.4 and 1.8 dont have text files. If you are in doubt, check the forum which you think is missing a text file the instructions will say something like Begin a new discussion topic called , implying that the course participants start the discussion threads themselves.
Figure 2 - The different components of a forum posting

The British Council, 2010 The United Kingdoms international organisation for educational opportunities and cultural relations. We are registered in England as a charity.
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The forum materials are intended to cater to as wide an audience as possible, but you should review each forum to ensure that the tone/content is appropriate for your specific context. You are free to change them if necessary; however it is worth bearing in mind that the content has been reviewed by a TKT specialist, so it may be wise to adhere to it as closely as possible. As participants move through the materials, you will need to read forum threads frequently to: ensure participants have correctly understood how to respond; does the task ask them to start a new thread of their own, or to respond in the thread started by the tutor? check participants have correctly understood the task and are answering it appropriately; a little confusion initially is not a disaster, but if it becomes apparent that several of the course participants have misinterpreted the task and are not on the right track, you should step in to set them on the right track again verify that responses are not simply way off track. This may indicate that someone hasnt understood the task, or that they need additional input to be better able to respond to the question. It may be prudent to reply to the person individually rather than in the public forum to ascertain what is going on. weave together responses (i.e. bring together similar comments/observations posted by different participants) from different participants to create a more cohesive discussion. check that course participants havent overlooked any fundamental issues (refer to the key concepts in the Trainer notes for each unit) related to the discussion topics; if, as the discussion flags, the points still havent been raised, you may want to make a posting prompting the participants to consider these issues. signal when discussions have effectively finished and it is time to move on. This might be done by providing a summary of the discussion (also a good task to give to course participants once they are comfortable with the platform and with their group).
Some forums are used to divide groups into sub-groups (see 1.2 Lexis, section 4 as an example). These groups then work together on a task this task is often carried out using another forum. In these instances, forum starter messages are provided as above. However, these threads are examples only and would need to be changed for your groups. Each unit has a search tool (see Figure 3) that can search forums.
Figure 3 - The "Global Search" tool
General discussion forums specific to each module

There are three kinds of general discussion forums where you and the course participants can raise any topics not specifically related to the topics under discussion in the units.

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Plenary, technical and social forums carry across the whole module rather than being specific to any one unit in fact, all hyperlinks will point respectively to the plenary, technical and social forums set up in the first unit of each module (i.e. the Getting started unit, plus units 1.1, 2.1, and 3.1). All participants are initially subscribed to these three forums. This means they will receive email updates from the forums when there are postings. It is possible, but not encouraged, to unsubscribe to forums on the forum pages. Because these three general forums are not linked to each module, the Search Forums tool (shown in Figure 3) will only return results for the plenary, technical and social forums if you search in the first unit of each module (i.e. the Getting started unit, plus units 1.1, 2.1, and 3.1).
Plenary forums There will often be questions or topics that arise during a course that are not specifically related to the issues addressed in the focused discussion forums in each unit. The plenary forums are a way to capture these discussions, without them being hidden away in a topic- or unit-specific forum. Often issues will be relevant to more than one unit for example, something initially discussed during unit 1.3 Phonology may become relevant again in unit 1.8 Speaking. It is a good idea to establish some guidelines for how the course participants will organise postings in the plenary forums e.g. all postings for Unit 1.1. Grammar could start with 1.1 Grammar in the subject line. This will help people to find postings more easily in the future. Technical support forums We all have different levels of computer expertise, and being in an online environment means it is especially important to be able to get prompt technical help when we need it. Encourage your course participants to always use the technical forum rather than contacting you directly with a problem, for the following reasons: If they are experiencing a problem, its quite possible someone else in their group may be experiencing the same problem. Seeing that someone has already asked how to resolve an issue can be reassuring (Phew, Im not the only one!), and therefore can reduce feelings of isolation/incompetence. Often there will be another course participant who will know how to solve the problem, or be able to make some sensible suggestions. Encourage this, as it means that problems can get resolved far more quickly than if people simply wait for the trainer to respond. Being able to refer people to a specific thread (you can just paste in the relevant URL) which outlines how to resolve an issue is an easy way to cut down your workload!
There are many factors (e.g. Internet connection speed, operating system1, browser2, plug-in3 version) that can influence why a person is experiencing a particular problem. Dont be afraid to ask for more information before attempting to resolve a problem for which you cannot see an obvious
1 2
Common operating systems are Windows, Apple (also called Apple Mac, Mac or Macintosh), and Linux. Common browsers include Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Opera 3 Common plug-ins used on the TKT Essentials site are Adobe Reader (previously called Acrobat Reader) and Flash.
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answer knowing exactly what the person is trying to do, and what they are trying to do it with, can make trouble-shooting much easier than trying to second-guess what is happening. Ensure you check the technical support forums regularly (at least every second day). If neither you nor a course participant are able to resolve an issue, please escalate it to TKTEssentials@britishcouncil.org as soon as possible.
The TKT team monitors this forum and may reply when action is needed that cannot be carried out by local trainers or administrators (for example, fixing dead links, correcting errors in the content). However, picking up on any other problems such as course queries, browser problems or accessibility issues is the responsibility of the tutor/administrator.
Social forums Social interaction is the glue that can make or break an online learning experience! Being able to have a discussion with your peers about a particularly inspiring book or film, having a grumble about an especially difficult class you teach, or talking about some other topic which is not specifically related to the coursework can create some of the most important bonding experiences for online learners, and promote a greater sense of belonging and support which of course leads to greater satisfaction with the course. Ensure you check the social forums regularly (at least every few days). You may like to post something yourself to get the ball rolling initially; it is often very intimidating for a course participant to be the first person to post in a forum, especially if the purpose of the forum is not as tightly defined as those addressed by specific topics in each unit. Encourage as much interaction as possible, by: avoiding over-responding yourself; if course participants feel that you are the person who is most likely to respond, they are less likely to become engaged in these discussions and may feel they are somehow intruding on your territory. Allow time for others to respond before posting yourself. asking questions that will facilitate engagement from other course participants. Ask openended questions rather than yes/no questions, encourage others with different experiences to respond and consider what may have contributed to the different experiences, etc.
Wikis
A wiki is a collaborative writing tool. Everyone can contribute to the creation of the finished product, and all course participants have equal editing rights. A history of edits is available and previous versions of the wiki can be recalled if necessary using the History tab (see Figure 4).
Figure 4 - Viewing previous versions of wiki pages using the "History" tab
Note that both trainers and course participants see all four tabs in Figure 4.

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These wikis need to be started by the trainer for each group you are working with e.g. if you have three groups, then each wiki will need to be started three times. Check the Trainer notes for each unit to confirm that you have copied over the right materials, and what needs to be done to moderate each wiki. The contents and page titles for each wiki are provided for you on the Trainer materials page, along with a tutorial on how to correctly set up the wikis for your group(s). It is your responsibility to ensure that all the wikis mentioned in the Trainer notes for each unit have been copied over for each of your groups. Not all units have wikis. Some wikis are multiple pages, some are only single pages. The text files indicate how many pages there are for each wiki.
Try not to take over ownership of the wikis it is work which is being collaboratively created by the course participants, not dictated by the trainer. If you notice that participation is flagging, you may decide its necessary to send an email to the course participants or to post a message on one of the forums. You may suggest to your course participants to write their initials or name after their additions/changes. This is great for monitoring purposes, but can have a disadvantage if the document is meant to be truly collaborative because some participants may be reluctant to change a peers work. You will need to judge the situation according to how your group is interacting and working together. Formatting is a bigger issue in some cultures than others if writing text in ALL CAPS is considered inappropriate (usually perceived as screaming in Anglo cultures, and quite rude), then this is something that needs to be discussed with your group(s). Likewise for writing in red text etc. Decide how you are going to tackle posts which are off-track or simply incorrect. Will you contact the person directly by email, wait for a while to see if another participant corrects the work, change it yourself, or take some other approach?
Documents
Documents on the site are usually in PDF format, to ensure that they display consistently regardless of operating system. Documents are used as activities or exercises for the course participants; if appropriate an answer key has been provided so that participants can check their own work. PDFs should open in a new window; this is to prevent people closing the window thinking its the PDF they are closing, only to realise they just closed the whole TKT Essentials site. Check all links before you start the course with your group(s). If you experience any problems, try the following: Ensure you have the latest version of Adobe Reader (a link is provided under Help & support in the top menu of the TKT Essentials site).

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Figure 5 - Options on the "Help & support" menu
Try opening the same link with a different browser. If neither of these resolve the issue, please contact TKTEssentials@britishcouncil.org as soon as possible and we will investigate the problem further.
Resources
Resources is a term used by Moodle for a variety of different things. On the TKT Essentials site, it is usually used to describe a page that has additional information, pictures, or occasionally sound files. Resource pages are often used when the materials they contain would make the unit home page become excessively long and increase the amount of time needed to load the page. The materials on the page are often meant for passive interaction the participants may simply have to read them, for example. Check all resource pages are opening correctly before you start the course with your group(s). If the resource page contains links to audio files, ensure they are working correctly. If you experience any problems with resources, please contact TKTEssentials@britishcouncil.org as soon as possible and we will investigate the problem further.
Reflective Journals
Reflective Journals offer a way to promote reflective practice as a way to help course participants link theoretical ideas with the practical elements of their own work. As such, the intended audience is not the trainer, but rather the participant him/herself. Course participants may initially be a little confused about this, perhaps even starting entries with Dear tutor, especially if they are very used to education systems where the teacher/trainer marks everything and there is little emphasis on self-monitoring or reflection. That said, the benefits of engaging in reflective practise are well documented. Further reading on the value of reflective practise is provided in the introduction to the journal. Make it clear to your students early on what your approach will be for the journals. Will you be giving constant feedback? Will you be giving any feedback on them at all? Will they be assessable? Be aware of managing your time. If you commit to lengthy responses to the journals, then you will create a lot of work for yourself. Remember that, even if you are going to provide some sort of grade for the reflective journals, their true worth is in what the participant has contributed rather than what the trainer contributes.

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Exercises
Exercises have been created in two different ways on the TKT Essentials site Moodle Quizzes and Author Plus, an external piece of software that has been imported into Moodle. See Figure 6 and Figure 7 for examples of what these different interfaces look like when viewing the exercise.
Figure 6 - An Author Plus exercise
Figure 7 - A Moodle exercise
Moodle exercises appear as Quizzes in the breadcrumb navigation trail. Clicking on the word Quizzes will take you to a list of all Moodle quizzes for that unit.
Author Plus exercises appear as SCORMs/AICCs. Clicking on the link for SCORMs/AICCs will take you to a list of all the Author Plus exercises for that unit.
Together, these two interfaces allow for a wide variety of exercise types e.g. true/false, drag-anddrop, multiple choice, etc. Both Author Plus and Moodle exercises are self marking, i.e. the site does this for you. It is quite possible that course participants may have questions about the responses provided or why an answer was deemed right or wrong. Encourage them to use the plenary forums for this, as it can widen the discussion to include others who are interested. Some exercises will allow for more than one attempt; others allow only one. Ensure you check the exercise grades at the end of each unit. These can be used to indicate not only whether or not a participant is keeping on top of the work load, but also how well they are doing. If a participant has consistently low scores, individual counselling about how to improve there scores is usually advisable. In order to check exercise grades, follow these steps:

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1) From the unit home page, find the Administration block on the left hand side of the page, and click on the link for Grades. (See Figure 8)
Figure 8 - Checking grades
2)
This will bring up an interface similar to Figure 9, where you can see individual score results and also the total for that unit. Note that the Grader report shows results for both Author Plus and Moodle exercise. NB: The course total is for that individual unit, not a cumulative score for the entire course!
Figure 9 - The "Grader report" interface to check scores for exercises
Assignments
The Assignments tool is a way for you to request students to submit a piece of work which you will mark. In this way it is quite different to a collaborative document. Assignments can be re-submitted. If a student re-submits an assignment, you should receive notification of this. If you intend to mark only the first submission, you should inform your students of this although you may need to be a little bit flexible if, for instance, a student has uploaded the wrong version of their work and contacts you about this. Some assignments have specific examples of suggested answers; you will find these in the trainer notes. As a general guide for marking assignments, encourage your course participants to refer to the Cambridge TKT band descriptors, accessible from the Help & Support tab in the navigation menu (see Figure 10).
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Figure 10 - Where to find the Cambridge TKT band descriptors
Decide what your policy will be for re-submission; what happens if a student erroneously submits an incorrect version of an assignment? What if their submission is so poor that it indicates they are unlikely to pass the TKT exam (if they are taking the exam), or are struggling with the course (if they are doing the TKT Essentials course for professional development)?
Polls
As the name suggests, a poll is a way of gauging peoples reaction to something, or getting an indication of preferences about a given topic or situation. In the TKT Essentials site, they are often used as a way for the group to get a feel for what are the prevailing trends within the group. Results to a poll will not normally be displayed until after the participant has responded to the question. Overall results can lead to some interesting observations about what your participant tend to do, and can provide the stimulus for discussions about why this might be or what the implications of their actions (or changing their actions!) might be. Monitor the poll responses, and encourage people to respond in a timely fashion the benefit of the poll is not likely to be realised if only a few people respond. To review the responses, click on the View x responses in the top left hand corner of the poll (see Figure 11). (NB: After people have started to respond, you will notice that the View 0 responses changes indicate the number of responses available.)
Figure 11 - Viewing responses in Polls

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Optional activities
Optional activities offer a way to extend the course. If time permits, the trainer would normally want to encourage participants to complete these activities. Alternatively, they can be used as a way to revise content later by referring back to the optional activity for those who have more time later in the course.

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Appendix Further reading
Constructivist learning
ASCD The definition of constructivism. Includes some excellent resources. http://www.ascd.org/portal/site/ascd/menuitem.d36b986168f3f8cddeb3ffdb62108a0c/ Dimitrios Thanasoulas Constructivist learning http://www.seasite.niu.edu/Tagalog/Teachers_Page/Language_Learning_Articles/constructivist_lear ning.htm Online tutoring e-book Building an Online Learning Community http://otis.scotcit.ac.uk/onlinebook/otisT304.htm Wikipedia Constructivism (learning theory) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constructivism_(learning_theory)
Reflective practice
David Boud Using journal writing to enhance reflective practice http://www.education.uts.edu.au/ostaff/staff/publications/db_31_boud_in_english.pdf Learning and teaching Reflective practice http://www.learningandteaching.info/learning/reflecti.htm James Kelway Reflective practice module http://www.kelwaydesign.com/whitepapers/Reflective_Practice_Model.html

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TKT Essentials Online Trainer Guide

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Online trainer guide

An English global product Last updated: February, 2010

Figure 1 - Where to find trainer support materials

An English global product Last updated: February, 2010

An English global product Last updated: February, 2010

Focused discussion forums individual to each unit

Figure 2 - The different components of a forum posting

Figure 3 - The "Global Search" tool

General discussion forums specific to each module

An English global product Last updated: February, 2010

An English global product Last updated: February, 2010

An English global product Last updated: February, 2010

Figure 5 - Options on the "Help & support" menu

An English global product Last updated: February, 2010

Figure 6 - An Author Plus exercise

Figure 7 - A Moodle exercise

An English global product Last updated: February, 2010

Figure 8 - Checking grades

Figure 9 - The "Grader report" interface to check scores for exercises

An English global product Last updated: February, 2010

Figure 10 - Where to find the Cambridge TKT band descriptors

Figure 11 - Viewing responses in Polls

An English global product Last updated: February, 2010

An English global product Last updated: February, 2010

An English global product Last updated: February, 2010

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