The AILA Congress offered the opportunity once again for members of the Scientific Commission on Learner Autonomy in Language Learning to come together and share their most recent research. The central focus of this opportunity was provided by the SC Symposium entitled ‘Relationships between Learner and Teacher Autonomy: Realities and Responses’, a theme which had been identified in 1999 at the previous symposium in Tokyo.
Following an introduction by Bill Savage (freelance consultant, Thailand) and Terry Lamb (University of Sheffield, UK) describing the framework, aim and process of the symposium, three papers explored the concept of autonomy. The first, by Phil Benson from Hong Kong University, focused on teacher and learner notions of control, and this was followed by Turid Trebbi’s (University of Bergen, Norway) paper on consciousness-raising and its potential for increasing freedom from control. The final paper in this section was presented by Hé ø/lè ð/ne Martinez from the University of Kassel, Germany, who described her study of student-teachers’ beliefs about autonomy.
Following
questions and discussion of the first set of papers, the symposium continued
with a series of papers focusing on ‘realities and responses’. The opening
paper in this section, by Sara Cotterall and David
Crabbe from Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand, examined the
realities of constraints on autonomy from learners’ perspectives as revealed
in an interview-based study. This was followed by a paper by Sada Daoud
(Al-Isra Private University, Amman, Jordan) which explored the potential of
teacher-initiated action research for enhancing teacher autonomy and, in turn,
learner autonomy. Richard Pemberton and Sarah Toogood then presented
a paper (written in collaboration with two other colleagues from Hong Kong
University of Science and Technology, Susanna Ho and Elza Tsang) describing
the way in which collaborative work by teachers provided a practical way of
ensuring that their self-access center provided an environment conducive to
teacher and learner autonomy. The final paper in the symposium, by Jonathan
Shaw (Asian Institute of Technology, Bangkok) addressed a different form
of teacher collaboration, namely team-teaching, and its potential for empowering
teachers to learn about student learning in an autonomous context. Following
a wide-ranging and stimulating discussion, the symposium ended with a brief
summary by Terry Lamb, in which he referred to the many manifestations
of autonomy which had been described, and stressed the need to recognise that
different contexts provide different types of constraints on autonomy, some
internal, some external, some real and some perceived. The symposium had provided
positive and practical examples of empowerment, in which teachers and learners
had found ways of overcoming such constraints. He also highlighted some of
the innovative approaches to researching autonomy which had been adopted by
the presenters.
Consistent
with the theme of autonomy, an innovative approach to symposium organisation
was adopted for Singapore. Short versions of the papers had all been placed
on the website in advance, and some electronic discussion had been encouraged
by the authors (though unfortunately technical problems at the wrong moment
limited the discussions). Authors then presented a brief summary of their
papers in the symposium itself, but also provided questions for everyone to
consider. These questions will be revisited in the near future through discussions
on Auto-L. The intentions which lay behind this were that it would enable
a wider population to take part in the symposium than those able to attend,
and that it would allow for more time to spent discussing the relationships
between learner and teacher autonomy.
Following
the symposium, the SC Business Meeting led to the election of three new convenors:
Ana Maria Barcelos, Terry Lamb and Richard Pemberton. Thanks were expressed
to the outgoing convenors, Sara Cotterall, Leni Dam, and Bill Savage, for
their energy and commitment over the years. The new convenors hope to build
on the very firm foundations of the SC by encouraging a more collaborative
research community, though the development of projects and regional conferences.
Of course, many other excellent papers on the theme of learner autonomy were presented at the AILA conference, apart from those in the symposium. It is now the intention to publish two volumes of papers: one which will describe the history and content of the symposium itself, and another which will disseminate other conference papers on autonomy.
Terry Lamb
University of Sheffield