Learner Autonomy

As we read in Samuel's writing it is crucial for an English teacher to help his/her students to develop their autonomy, should try several activities in the classroom and can adopt learner training/awareness activities accompanied with the textbook.
One of these activities is Brainstorming. The technique referred to as brainstorming is used when you want students, working together, to generate ideas on a specific topic. As such, it can be a useful and enriching tool in English speaking classroom and a means of showing students that they are collectively capable of generating far more ideas to improve their learning process than they believed. This in turn, leads to an increase in their autonomy of learning and self-responsibility.
I believe, however, that different techniques including the ones that can be applied with or without the latest technology can be used successfully to enrich the classroom and promote learner autonomy.

One of these techniques Brainstorming can be useful in a wide range of areas as a device to help students identify their over-all classroom dynamics. Most importantly, it improves the quality of student participation, student production in class and increase their own autonomy.

Here are some explicit defines from Wikipedia. I thought to share with you as they seem really interesting:

Principles of learner autonomy could be:

• Autonomy means moving the focus from teaching to learning.

• Autonomy affords maximum possible influence to the learners.

• Autonomy encourages and needs peer support and cooperation.

• Autonomy means making use of self/peer assessment.

• Autonomy requires and ensures 100% differentiation.

• Autonomy can only be practised with student logbooks which are a documentation of learning and a tool of reflection.

• The role of the teacher as supporting scaffolding and creating room for the development of autonomy is very demanding and very important.

• Autonomy means empowering students, yet the classroom can be restrictive, so are the rules of chess or tennis, but the use of technology can take students outside of the strictures of the classroom, and the students can take the outside world into the classroom.