Photo Album of ELFs 2006

Now that the program is over,
we can always look back to some of what they had done.
Here are some of their activities in Indonesia:

At orientation

Also at orientation

Still at orientation

Visiting the American Corner at UIN Jakarta

Bruce when giving training in Bontang

Bruce n Andy at CBC Conference in Bandung

Johanna giving a general lecture

Kevin at UIN Colloquium - 3

Mike at a Roundtable Discussion

Tom leading a Cultural Immersion workshop

UIN/IAIN Colloquium 3

Group discussion in Colloquium 3

Group discussion in Colloquium 3

Immersion Program - IAIN Walisongo English Club - Semarang

The Walisongo English Language Club (WEC) is the only campus-wide organization at IAIN Walisongo which endeavors to promote the use of English as a means of both academic and social communication. It is a fantastic organization, and I have had the privilege of working closely with this club over the past two years of my fellowship. However, while the WEC has over 200 members from all faculties at IAIN Walisongo, it has been difficult to get the members to attend events and outings which the WEC supports and funds.
As such, two weeks ago, I was approached by the new president of the WEC, Kurnia Muhajarah, to see if we could brainstorm different ideas for an upcoming WEC event. Our main purpose was not only to motivate the members of the WEC to attend, but also to inspire them to use English throughout the event. As a result of our brainstorm, Kurnia decided to hold an all day immersion program at Limut Waterfall Regency Park. The purpose of this immersion program, called “English Village”, would be to motivate the members of the WEC to use English all day by playing games, putting on skits, going on hikes, and buying food from WEC-run warungs (the students worked these stands and the other members has to speak English in order to purchase food and water). During the day, English Language Fellow, Matthew Pizzorno, also agreed to hold a series of speeches and discussions on how to motivate themselves and each other to higher levels of English proficiency.

Outcomes of the event:
The event was a great success. Limut Waterfall Regency Park is about an hour and a half outside of Semarang. At first, I was unaware of this and as I drove my motorbike out to the immersion program early Sunday morning, I got the feeling that the event would not be as well attended as it should be. However, my fears were unfounded as I found around 60 members in attendance upon my arrival. They were all busy setting up the “English Village” and were really excited to have a native English speaker there.
Overall, I felt that the immersion program was a great success. However, I also think that it could have even been better if a few dosen from IAIN Walisongo had attended. Even though the event was held on Sunday, it would have been great for some of the lecturers from IAIN Walisongo to be there if only to practice their own English skills. In spite of this, the WEC members and I had a wonderful time. Again, I was reminded how excited the students at IAIN Walisongo are at having an American at their school. Many of these students have never had the opportunity to meet and speak with a native English speaker, and it is a privilege for me to give them this opportunity. As an English Language Fellow, I was honored to help organize and take part in such a wonderful event.

ELT Journal Writing Workshop in Bandung

Heather Philips and Damon Anderson facilitated a 3-day workshop on ELT Journal Writing in ITB Language Center, Bandung. This workshop was actually the program of FKSU (Eastern part of Indonesian University Forum) and RELO was requested to provide the facilitator(s).

The objective of workshop was to encourage ELT practioners to write qualified journal and to be able to publish their writings in an international journals. The worshop was attended by 13 lecturers under FKSU, 1 from UNIPA Manokwari, 2 from UNCEN, Jayapura, 3 from UNSRAT Manado, 2 from UNPATTI Ambon (RELO gave partial travel grant), 2 from UNHALU Kendari, 2 from USD Yogyakarta, and me.

Some of the pariticipants were ready with their paper, some were really novice in the area of writing.

Heather was the main facilitator and Damon came on the second day to fill up and strengthen the information as he has a fast knowledge as editors.

From the workshop we learned that it was indeed tough to get our journal published in an international reputable publication, since our style of writing was different. We also learned that each publication has its own style and requirements. Rejections were something normal and no need to have a hard feeling over it. However, most of us decided to give it a try.

Here are some photos from the sessions:

Mulawarman Samarinda Activities - Bruce

Speaking Club: Weekly, each Saturday morning from 9:00 to 10:30

The focus of this project is on production so there are a lot of games, role playing and other activities. Since they are all training to be English teachers there are also discussions on how these games and other activities can be utilized in the classroom. Students are very curious about western culture and ask many questions. The participants are very eager to practice their English with me and enjoy the time we spend together. The impact of this project will be that these pre-service teachers will come away with a better understanding of English and how to teach it. They will also gain a better impression of Americans and American culture and will pass it on to their students

Workshop for university lecturers and pre-service teacher
Date: March 11th, 2006
Title: Communicative Speaking Activities
Participants: 23

The focus of the workshop was to familiarize participants with various types of communicative speaking activities. There was also a presentation and discussion on the theory behind them. Most of the activities practiced were taken from the “Books in a Box” collection so participants were able to learn how to utilize some of the materials and see their value in teaching as well. The week after the workshop I was able to observe participants use activities practiced at the workshop and apply some of ideas gained from it in their own teaching. They have also been coming to me to look through some of the books to use other activities from them.

English speech contest Judge
Host Institution: SMPK 22 middle school, Samarinda
Date: March 4th, 2006

I was asked to be a judge for an English speech contest for middle school students. The theme was computers and the internet. All the students put forth a good effort and I was impressed with their performances and the obvious time they put into preparing. They represented about 8 or 9 different middle schools in Samarinda and they were well supported by their classmates who came to cheer them on. The impact of my participation is that I am able to interact with a group of students I would not usually work with on a regular basis and further public diplomacy in the local area.

News Reading Contest in Surabaya - Matt Helping Andy

Event: February 25, 2006 - Surabaya

The English News Reading Contest was intended to give local high school students an opportunity to display and improve their English language skills. While the competition focuses on reading comprehension and public-speaking, the students have ample opportunity throughout the event to practice different language skills (listening and speaking) in a variety of settings. Along with this, the students were exposed to the atmosphere that surrounds higher education, an experience that can only help them as they move forward as future scholars.

Outcomes of the event:
The event was a great success. English Language Fellow, Andrew Alkire, acted as the event’s Master of Ceremonies and did a tremendous job. The contest started with entertainment for the audience which included the contest participants, their parents and teachers, and the judges (around 300 people). The entertainment included dancers, a band, and a musical performance by English Language Fellow, Matthew Pizzorno. This was followed by the News Reading Contest which had two separate rounds. In the first round, the participants were split into 9 groups. The students then read a written news statement and were judged on four criteria. These included pronunciation, fluency, mastery (the contestant’s ability to comprehend the text), and performance (both linguistic and non-linguistic). After this round, two students were chosen from each group for the final.
Overall, the level of competition was fantastic. The students not only demonstrated their understanding of English reading and presentation skills, but they were also able to show their overall command of the English language. This was apparent from a question/answer session and impromptu conversations with the Fellows throughout the day. Taken as a whole, it was a wonderful experience not only for the students, but for the English Language Fellows.

Books in a Box for Madrasah - by Matt - Semarang

The Books in a Box program is a great way to provide badly needed educational materials to schools and organizations which would normally not have access to similar resources. As such, at the 2006 Indonesian English Language Fellow Mid-Year conference Damon Anderson informed the English Language Fellows that the RELO office would like us to actively look for schools that were in dire need of English teaching materials. With this in mind, I went back to my host institution, IAIN Walisongo, and began to ask the lecturers and administrators if they knew of any schools that would be interested. After a few days, I came in to contact with Ruswan, whose wife is the principal at a Madrasa located an hour outside of Semarang. I thought this would be a perfect opportunity to present this contribution from the US State Department and RELO to an Islamic elementary school and hold a workshop on how to best utilize these resources.

Outcomes of the event:
Upon arrival at Nahdadul Ulama Madrasa IB Tidaiyahearly early Saturday morning, I was immediately struck by how excited the participants were to have me there. Brangsong is an extremely small village, and the villagers have little contact with Americans. With this warm and friendly welcome, I knew that the event was going to be a success. I began the workshop by telling the teachers and principals that the ‘Books in the Box’ was a gift to this particular Madrasa from the US State Department and RELO. However, I also informed the teachers and principals from other elementary schools that they were welcome to come and utilize these resources. Upon saying this, the room grew extremely silent. I thought I had done or said something offensive, but after a few minutes the participants began to tell me how grateful they were. They also expressed their surprise. Apparently, they were under the impression that the United States was unwilling to help Madrasa and Pesantren because they produce future terrorist. I assured them that this was not the case, but I think the gift has gone a long way in changing the opinions of the teachers and principals in attendance. Fantastic! After this, we had a very fruitful discussion on how to utilize the ‘Books in a Box’ resources. Basically, this talk revolved around how the materials could be used to help the student pass their exams.
Obviously, this event was a great success. While the workshop was great, I feel that the most important thing was showing the principals and teachers that America is indeed willing to help improve the educational climate in Indonesia. I am sure that the participants will return to their respective schools and tell their peers and students this

AmCor Presentation in IAIN Semarang - from Matt

Rationale for the event:
The American corner is, without a doubt, the best place to procure resources and conduct research at IAIN Walisongo. However, even with the plethora of resources available, the staff at the American Corner is still having a few problems with getting the students and teachers from IAIN Walisongo and Semarang to come utilize the facilities. As such, the Consulate General in Surabaya and the AMINEF office in Jakarta sent representatives, i.e. Brian Himmelseib (representative from US Consulate General in Surabaya), Erica and Isye(representatives from AMINEF and Fulbright in Jakarta) in order to hold a presentation on Education in the United States. It was thought that if the American Corner hosted an event in which experts gave presentations on topics in their respective fields, people would not only learn more about education in the United States, but they would also come and see the resources the American Corner has to offer. In this way, these visitors would be motivated to return to utilize this great resource more regularly.

Outcomes of the event:
The event began with a presentation from Brian Himmelsteib about applying for a visa to the United States. This was followed by a brief question and answer session. After this, Erica and Isye gave two different presentations on studying in the US and how to go about applying for a Fulbright fellowship. These presentations were great and definitely elicited the most questions from the students. I believe that this is because they gave their presentations in Bahasa Indonesian. The participants definitely felt more comfortable using their native language. As such, they asked more questions and learned more about higher education in the United States. This was followed by a presentation from Matthew Pizzorno on the Next Generation TOEFL. Again this was followed by a question and answer session.

Tom Randolph in Yogyakarta

I was not on the loop for too long,
or it was Tom's way not to brag about what he was doing,
except from the CC I got when he sent email to Mike or Damon.
But I got emails from friends telling me how baneficial it was to join Tom's series of workshops in Gajah Mada University. Then, I dared myself to ask him about the series. My friends who joined the workshops promised to write back with fuller report soon. Tom sent me a short email about the coming series.

Here is a cut-paste of parts of his email:

April 3, the workshop will be on the topic of " "Teaching the Productive Skills, II", with a focus on process writing/academic writing, and "drama" techniques.
I do not recall the next one, but it will be April 17, and in May on Assessment principles.

Attendance has been pretty solid,with 25 being the quiet end and 45 in a torrential downpour last Monday (Active Grammar and Vocabulary) being a recent triumph. Like your roundtables, topic choice does have something to do with it, I guess.

Generally there'sabout a half hour of lecture, a half hour of me leading workshop activities, and then a couple of hours of small-group brainstorming/activity planning, followed by six or seven microteachings by participants of the whole group, and fun Socratic feedback while we go, so microteachings get better and better as we go along.

From me, this is something really great worth to know.
Great job, Tom. Hope I hear more.

Cheers,

My Apology

All,
My apologgy for not updating the blog.
Things have gone so much. I am overwhelmed.

And....
not getting any feedback nor comments nor posting from anyone of you actually had dimmed my enthusiasm in updating this blog.

Anyway...
things might get better...
I will use this as a practice for myself.

Cheers,

Mid-Year Conference 2006

Fellow Mid-Year Conference was held in the Marriott Hotel, Jakarta, on January 27-29, 2006. You must puzzled, then, amazed. A conference on a weekend? It started on a Friday at 2 PM, and was closed on a Sunday, at 4:30 PM.

The conference was really great and fruitful. Each of the 11 participants, RELO Damon Anderson and RELO Assistant Kun Herrini took turn facilitating a session creatively, from an Oprah Winfrey-like TV show, military-style, class-like, love-hate voting, and many more. Impressive!!

What's more important is that from the conference we learned just how much each had actually done in and with the institutions, how much impact had everyone made. From the sessions also we really learned best practices from each other and even got ideas of how to make the next 5-month of the program be more useful, more creative.

We might not have another chance to get together again in a full team until the end of the program this year, but we can intensify our communication and sharing information using the mailing list and also this blog. Please do not let each of our program in 11 different posts just be gone unidentified. Let more people benefit from this program, directly - by participating in our program, and indirectly - by reading it through the publication of it.

Here are some pictures taken at the conference:

Bruce, TV Show and ETC Bontang

In terms of distance from airport, Bruce's post is the farthest. From the airport he has to take a taxi for more than 2 hours.

One of Bruce's highlights in his hosting a weekly, live, call-in Television Program every Monday Night, 9:00 to 10:00. The broadcast can be watched in Samarinda City and the surrounding areas in East Kalimantan.
Here is what he wrote re the program:
Every Monday night between 9pm and 10pm I co-host an English language television program called English Night. It is a live call-in show where viewers call and ask questions or make comments about that night’s topic to me and the other co-host(s). The topics usually pertain to learning and speaking English. I also use the program to promote materials from RELO (Books-in-a-Box)as well as projects I am involved in (teacher training workshops) and to educate people about the English Language Fellowship (ELF). We get an average of two to three callers each show and have many interesting and lively discussions with the callers and each other. We get a lot of good feedback from the callers about the show and I feel has a positive impact on the community


On January 11- 13, Bruce gave a kind-of workshop and immersion program for 3 days, where he met and interacted with young learners, adult learners, and teachers.
Here is what he wrote:
I went to English Training Center (ETC) in Bontang at the request of the teachers and administration of that school to allow students and teachers an opportunity to interact with a native English speaker and use the target language in a communicative way through games and other activities. This was also an opportunity to meet with teachers to answer their questions about English teaching and professional development. This was part of an outreach program I am doing in partnership with my host institution to promote English language education in the area in and around Samarinda. The schedule for each day was for me to meet with adult students in the morning for a two hour session, elementary school students in an early afternoon two hour session and middle school or high school students in a late afternoon two hour session. Many challenges occurred during the course of the event regarding coordination organization between teachers and students mainly because of the large number of students participating in each session. However, the event was very productive and all participants enjoyed the event. As a result, I was asked to return for future events and to conduct workshops for teachers at ETC and the public schools in Bontang.

See pictures below:

Access Microsholarship in Pabelan Pesantren

One of the Access Microsholarship 2005 recipients was Pesantren Pabelan, about 30 minutes drive north of Yogyakarta. It is a very open pesantren whose Kiai is so moderate, knowledgeable, and wise.

On January 14, Damon Anderson, Tom Randolph and me attended a closing ceremony of the English program for the Non-Elite Youth in Pabelan. The program was a complimentary of the community development program sponsored by UNDP and Bappenas and run by Yayasan Trinia Rahman. RELO with the Access Microscholarship sponsored the English program. It was a very simple ceremony attended by representatives from all the sponsors. All were thanked equally, nothing was exagerated. In simple ways, the Kiai, the teachers and the students expressed their gratitudes. It was a touching ceremony.

We learned a fundamental teaching that 'Ilmu adalah Amanah", knowledge is a duty. You get it and you have the duty to practice it, apply it, and spread it. The sponsors did give duty to the teachers, and the teachers had done their parts. Now, the amanah is in the hands of the students.

Here are some of the pictures we took from the ceremony:

All were involved in an animated discussion at the Kiai's house:




Damon gave a short program closing speech in Bahasa Indonesia and then together with the VIPs handed out certificates to the teachers and students:







Then, all students posed with their classmates, teachers and donors' reps:

UIN/IAIN Third Colloquium & ELF Mid-Year Conference

The Third UIN/IAIN Conference will be held in UIN Jakarta on January 25-27, 2006. All Indonesian ELFs will join this, and the ELFs hosted by UIN/IAIN will bring along 1 (or 2?) of their counterparts. Kyle and Mike are arranging this colloquium. Hope this will be another big bang in the efforts of improving English Language Teaching in the UINs/IAINs and also in fostering cooperation and standardization among them.

The Mid-Year Conference will follow, Jan 27 - 29, 2006 in JW Mariott Hotel, Jakarta. The plan of holding it in Puncak area was not quite feasible in terms of distance. All the Indonesian ELFs will be there and hope that the other ELFs from the region (Malaysia, the Philippines, where else?) will also be able to participate. Mike is working hard arranging everything. Like the Mid-Year Conferences held in Bangkok in the previous years, we hope that this 2,5 day meeting in Jakarta will be able to add the insights, renew the spirit and everyone will benefit from it to make the other half of the term a better time of service.

See you all.