6.3.4 Control and Monitoring

Traditionally, in language learning the teacher has occupied a central role. Often, she served as the only language model for the students. In the case of the Audio-Lingual Method, teachers needed to be in control in order to correct mistakes and to ensure that students used correct forms. Thus, teachers provided the structures that students used and students were expected to use these structures only. Although the emphasis on control shifted more towards the student in Communicative Language Teaching, nonetheless, there persisted a tendency on the part of many language teachers to exert a certain control, if only by carefully assuring that the language to which students were exposed passed or filtered first through them.

It is not surprising then, given the legacy of the Audio-Lingual Method that many beliefs expressed in the context of this study reflected a need to control, monitor and filter language content. One teacher lamented the fact that when her students use the Internet she does not "have control over what vocabulary is used or the complexity of the grammar structures". However, beliefs expressed by teachers in this study suggest that the challenges teachers appear to face in relation to OLEs and control relate, not only to language content, but to broader and more complex factors. Some beliefs related to the need for teachers to monitor students in order to prevent them from accessing "inappropriate" or "adult-level" sites. Whether students are "going into areas where they should not" or simply stumbling onto sites "quite innocently", leads many teachers to question what their role or reaction should be. While some teachers perceived their role as one in which they must help students "make appropriate choices", and "be responsible ‘cybernautes’" and "continue to monitor" others believe they must "set up clear guidelines and consequences for online behaviour". Some teachers explained how they controlled access to sites through preparation, preplanning, guided searches, previewing and testing of sites and having objectives for sites. Still others believe that it is through "un véritable travail pédagogique" that we can ensure proper use of OLEs by students.

This diversity of solutions to the problem perceived by teachers points first to the fact that it is an issue about which they are uncertain and uneasy and, secondly, to the fact that they are faced with the characteristic of OLEs that contrasts more than perhaps any other with the learning environment of the classroom. Newhagen and Rafaeli, (1996) described how the Internet treats censorship as noise and is designed to work against it. The physical and institutional structures ensure that the classroom is bounded, not only by four walls, but by the structures, rules, procedures, schedules and a strictly controlled and prescribed curriculum. Becker (1991) argues that use of technology "will require teachers and administrators to modify their concepts of appropriate and inappropriate teaching behaviours, to reprioritize the value of different types of instructional content, and to change habits and assumptions that guide their classroom and school management strategies" (p.8). Teachers’ beliefs related to control and monitoring suggest that they have not come to terms with the differences between these two environments. The beliefs suggest that, while teachers may welcome technology’s ability to simulate reality, they may be wary or unaccepting of its ability to generate reality.

Teachers’ beliefs about control and monitoring can also relate to beliefs about time and the curriculum. In terms of the curriculum, the problem with the lack of control over which sites students access may relate to teachers’ belief that what they do in the classroom should conform to the prescribed curriculum. Thus, the site should be preferably didactic in nature, relate to course objectives, provide evaluation and support the goals set forth by the teacher. Beliefs such as: "It is wonderful to let a student go and discover what s/he may and watch the excitement. But how do you grade that?" point to concerns about reconciling the demands of the curriculum, on one hand, and the needs of the learner, on the other. The legacy of the Direct Method’s insistence on use of the target language, may influence teachers’ beliefs that they must spend time monitoring sites and students’ activity, otherwise "kids will go to English sites and translate later".

Teachers may also wish to monitor to ensure that students are on the site which the teacher has chosen and on which the other students are expected to be. The Cognition and Technology Group at Vanderbilt (1996) observed about the traditional classroom that students are taught the same thing at the same time. In the traditional classroom, teachers can ensure with some ease that this is indeed the case. Students can all turn to the one page at the one time. However, in OLEs, not only is the temptation there for students to choose their own destination, but the facility to accomplish this is there as well.

In terms of the relationship between time and control, beliefs centre around the need to ensure that students are monitored and controlled so that time is not wasted and so that students remain focused on the site or task assigned by the teacher. The issue of time effects beliefs about control and vice versa. To ensure that students are on task and using the sites that teachers deem suitable or appropriate, teachers must spend considerable time, testing, previewing, and preplanning. Given that time is limited and somewhat rationed in the school setting, the belief in the need to preview sites or extensively plan will result in considerable loss of time for the teacher no doubt resulting in frustration. Concerns that students will "sneak in" their own sites, or that they might discuss topics on chat lines over which the teacher has little control and thus "waste time" highlight our attention on the importance of recognizing students’ goals. Ensuring that students are on task may not be accomplished easily through increased control but, instead, through a transfer of control from teacher to student whereby the student is given an opportunity to help determine the path for learning. Williams and Burden (1997) remind us that learners learn in ways that are meaningful to them which means that teachers will need to allow for individual preferences and personalities. They also remind us that learners learn better if they feel in control of what they are learning.

Beliefs related to control and monitoring have been noted in other studies and literature. Singhal (1997) in her identification of challenges related to use of the Internet for teaching languages, argues that censorship may be a concern to language programs and instructors given that the Internet offers access to all types of issues and topics, some of which are unsuitable for children. Calderhead (1996) observed that preservice teachers start with control-oriented belief systems that emphasize the importance of maintaining order, good discipline and guiding the activities of the children and that when teachers enter full-time teaching, they once again revert to a control-oriented belief system. Honey and Moeller (1990), in their study of computer use among teachers, found that teachers who used more traditional classroom practices feared that technology might "alter their relationship of control and authority with their students". Stuebing et al. (1994) focused more specifically on the role that the physical environment plays in bringing about change in teachers’ practices and noted that the traditional model of school organization emphasizes student control and teacher-centred didactic approaches to teaching and learning. The beliefs identified in this section support the findings and conclusions of these authors.

In summary, teachers’ beliefs about control and monitoring may relate to more fundamental beliefs about the teacher’s role, students’ role and about learning in general. How learning is both conceptualized and organized, how goals are set and paths are determined will likely influence teachers’ acceptance or rejection of the nature of OLEs. In a project- or theme-based approach in which students have determined the path for learning and set their goals, external control is replaced by intrinsic control, and monitoring is replaced by guidance. These beliefs also point to an expectation that OLEs can or should provide boundaries similar to those which would exist in TLEs. Control and monitoring will no doubt represent one of the most difficult issues with which teachers will have to grapple with as they begin working in online environments.

The following section focuses on teachers’ beliefs about students and use of OLEs. This section will help us better understand where efforts might begin to ensure that teachers allow students to adopt a role that accommodates learning in OLEs.