EDUCATION IN TIMES OF CHANGE

Christina Gitsaki – Research Coordinator Center for Educational Innovation, Zayed University (United Arab Emirates)

The field of Education in general and language education in particular has long been criticized for being too slow in adopting much needed changes commensurate with the sweeping social changes brought on by globalization in the information age. This session will first discuss change in Education from a number of different perspectives highlighting factors that in the past have inhibited long- and short-term change in the field. Following that, the session will address key points relevant to Language Education with reference to the local context, will explore the role of research and technology in improving human learning potential, and provide a set of concrete recommendations and guidelines for major stakeholders, such as educators, educational leaders and policy makers, in an effort to successfully plan and implement small and large-scale projects that can bring about change in the field.

 

Prof. Dr. Christina Gitsaki is the Research Coordinator at the Center for Educational Innovation, Zayed University. During her 22-year career in higher education she has contributed to the field of Education in a number of different capacities such as applied linguistics lecturer, pre-service and in-service teacher trainer, textbook author, project manager, curriculum leader, editor, and researcher. She served as the UNESCO Chair in Applied Research in Education in the UAE and later as the Assoc. Dean of the Foundations program at the Higher Colleges of Technology. Before coming to the UAE, she worked at The University of Queensland in Australia, where she educated pre-service teachers and supervised Masters and Ph.D. students. Prof. Gitsaki has worked with Education Queensland and The Learning Federation of the Curriculum Corporation, Australia on state and federal education projects such as the creation of digital Learning Objects for K-12 ESL students. Prof. Gitsaki has presented her research at over 130 International Conferences, has been an invited speaker at various professional events and she has published 72 papers in refereed journals and book chapters. She is the author, editor and co-editor of 12 books on language education pedagogy and research.