ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES OF USING THE ELP

Taking into account my personal teaching context, what would be the advantages and disadvantages of using ELP with my groups?

First, I think it’s very important to know the mean of “ELP”.

“ELP” it’s a document in which those who are learning or have learned a language-whether at school or outside school- can record and reflection their language learning and cultural experiences.

As a Primary teacher, I think that the implementation of the ELP to promote plurilingualism, race cultural awareness, make the language learning process more clear to the student and foster the development of learner autonomy according the European Council established, is a wonderful idea.

I think ELP is a positive way to develop the plurilingualism and cultural exchange. This can permit students to go abroad to continue their studies in different parts of the world. In addition, it is a good way to introduce the electronic material in class. The self- assessment is a very important innovation because they check what they have done and later they correct it. Furthermore, they can consider it a motivational factor for them.

The ELP permits students to know their skills and results of their learning process with the help of a tutor at the beginning. They recommend starting this learning system to children over 14 years old, when they are studying in secondary.

In my opinion I think teachers should implement the ELP at early years when students are in primary (year 5 and year 6) with the help of the teacher.  The support teacher wouldn’t be in a full time because they need to learn how to be independent and learn autonomy, for this reason, they have to take into account the rhythm and needs of their students. The role of teacher should be less dominant, because she will guide in the learning-teaching process of students and teacher will achieve that her students will become as competent as possible in verbal and non-verbal communication.

As a conclusion, I believe that the ELP is an exellent tool for self-evaluation, and increasingly will be used in most schools, but I think that you will need time to get people into this method.