Week 15

Thursday, April 27, 2017

WEEK 15:  Using technology to provide feedback

Rate: 5

This week I read an interesting and pretty important article about “HOW TO USE TECHNOLOGY TO PROVIDE FEEDBACK” which explains the advantages and disadvantages of using it and also it provide good example to implement it in the classroom.

Something I want to remember from this article is the benefits of using screen capture software. Teachers, which are the most commonly user of this element,  use this programs to provide feedback to their students in such an interactive way that seems a face to face feedback. Showing a website and explaining it during the feedback can help greatly students due to everything will appear in one single video and they would not need to look for extra explanation. Also, it allows teachers to provide a lot of feedback in quite a short period of time which becomes a listening practice. Something that made me read more about it was that teachers who may notices a specific problem that a whole class is having, can easily write out the key points in Microsoft Word and then record themselves taking them through the points and what to think about. It is particularly useful in distance learning contexts because teachers and students never meet. Finally, it may also have certain advantages for dyslexic students as it relies less heavily on text. The only drawback that these programs may have is the cost for some of the most proficient one which include more tools and option for recording.

Week 14

Thursday, April 23, 2017

WEEK 14:  Students´ participation in the classroom

Rate: 4

This week I read the articles “10 Benefits of Getting Students to Participate in Classroom Discussions” and “Increase Student Interaction with "Think­Pair­Shares" and "Circle Chats"” which state the importance of involving students to participate in classroom discussions. 

Something that made me want to read more about was the benefits of students´ participation in the classroom when learning a second language. Participation in classroom foster students to get involves into a discussion and allows them to interact with classmates. Also, it provides student-students feedback when sharing their thoughts and any mispronounced word is corrected by themselves. Furthermore, teacher can analyze students’ responds and provide the adequate corrections.  Beside that participation can be used to balance who’s contributing in class and how much. It is important to include everybody into class activities even though their contribution in minimum because In such way students will be able to develop their speaking skills.

Something I learned from this article and that every teacher should know was think­Pair­Share. It explains the process teachers should follow to incorporate students into a discussion. Educators firstly should ask thought-provoking questions and give some time to learners to think about the possible responds. After one or two minutes, students should be asked to share their ideas with a classmate. During this process teachers can monitor them to verify their production. And finally, teacher can ask students to share with the whole class what they   were discussing about the questions.

Week 12

Thursday, April 05, 2017

WEEK 12:  How to develop meaningful projects with students´ help

Rate: 4

This week, I read an article about maximizing the benefits of projects work. My initial reaction to it was Intrigue. I thought finally an article that explains how to create projects in which students can get involved with.  And indeed, it presents heavy arguments about involving students in the creation of projects to foster them utilize a second language.

Something I learned and I immediately wanted to share with a college was that the basis of successful projects. A project should focuses on real-world subject matter that can sustain the interest of students. Also, it requires student collaboration and, at the same time, some degree of student autonomy and independence. In the same way, a project can accommodate a purposeful and explicit focus on form and other aspects of language. And without forgetting, that it is process and product oriented, with an emphasis on integrated skills and     end-of project reflection.

Something I learned and that I immediately wanted to share with a colleague was the ten-step process to maximize the potential benefits of project work.  It explains how to develop a project taking into consideration students´ ideas for deciding a project´s topic with the teachers´ guidance.  It is greatly important because students are capable to obtain a feeling of ownership to the project.  Also, instructors are able to designs language-improvement activities to help students successfully present the final outcome of the project. Such help may focus on skills for successful oral presentations, effective written revisions and editing, persuasive debates, and so forth.

To sum up, teachers should structure their curricula around topics of relevance to students in various vocational areas, so that students will have an idea to perform the investigation. Also, teachers should provide the correct environment and elements to use during a project, in such a way students feel supported by the instructor or guide in any improvised circumstance.

WEEK 11

Thursday, march 30, 2017

WEEK 11: Using Mobile Phones in the Classroom

Rate: 5

My initial reaction to this article was curiosity about the activities it will present of the Usege of Mobile Phones in the Language Classroom. 

Somethings I learned from this article and that every teacher should know were some interesting ideas to implement in the classroom. Here are some examples to develop each of the English skills. 

Reading

Use mobile phone memory to distribute reading material: Teachers can share unlimited reading materials for their students. Students can easily download this material and start to read it wherever they want in their phones. To emphasis the task, teacher can ask their students to use the voice recorder to take notes about the books while they are reading. The books, along with students’ reflections, can then be discussed during the next class. Also, it is ideal to ask student to use blogs, twitter or any social networks to describe their routine along the day.

Speaking

Use the mobile phone for a language exchange: teachers could encourage reluctant student to start speaking by stablishing a language exchange with students who want to learn each other’s native language.  They may use skype or any other app to stablish contact with the other person such as imo, whatsapp, etc.

Writing

One interesting technique to motivate students to develop their writing skill is circular writing. Teachers should ask students to create a story together by contributing one text message at a time. Each student writes a sentence or two and then sends this on to the next student, who adds another message, and so on until the story is complete. The teacher is copied and has a record of the story as it emerges.  Other interesting activity is the use the Text Messaging feature for tandem learning. In this activity two students who wish to learn each other’s native language pair up and exchange text messages.

Listening

Use the Voice Memo Recorder feature to record language from media outlets: students are asked to collect language samples from TV or radio to analyze where they were collected, and provide feedback. And as the previous activity, teachers can ask students to interviews or conversations they engage in outside the classroom to periodically provide feedback in the classroom. Remember that the main objective of these activities is to get students to use the language as much as possible.

Vocabulary

To build a vocabulary lot in students while learning a second language, teachers have the option to take notes on the English they read or hear outside of school and either present the notes to the class or send them to you as a text message. Instead of giving regular homework, you can ask students to hunt for specific language forms (e.g., common nouns, the past perfect tense, formulaic expressions), and the student who collects the largest number of correct samples wins. Learners have a tendency to tune out when a classroom lesson is over; this activity helps circumvent that problem by breaking the boundary between class time and daily activities.

My favorite quote from the article was “phones are ideals tool to support learning, which states that learning is more likely to take place when information is contextually relevant and can be put to immediate use.” I consider this truly important because if students have access to relevant information for practicing a second language, they will find learning easy and interactive.

  

WEEK 10: ONLINE COLLABORATIVE WRITING

WEEK 10: ONLINE COLLABORATIVE WRITING  

Tuesday, March 21st, 2017

Rate: 3

This week I read about “Online Collaborative Writing Using Wikis” my initial reaction to this article was impression because I have never heard about wikis and I was really interested to know more about it.

Teachers, when trying to incorporate meaningful activities into the writing curriculum, use the internet to find an interactive alternative to motivate students to write, and research. Some of the software that allows people to connect, to communicate, and to collaborate online are blogs, wikis, and podcasts.

Something I want to remember from this article is the necessary elements for the writing pedagogy. The elements are: (1) a large amount of writing practice, (2) several varieties of texts and motivating tasks, (3) opportunities for revision and feedback, and (4) models of acceptable texts.

Moreover, wiki is a website where anyone can edit anything anytime they want. It is used for online collaborative writing activities. Teachers can use wiki to motive their students to work in collaborative online software by giving them easy task in which they can express their own ideas about any topic of interest (family, experiences or school life).

Something that surprised me in this article was that getting students to work in groups to express their ideas foster them to organize the ideas in a proficient way. Also, students obtain feedback from their classmate which is encouraged because they do not feel the pressure of being monitored by teachers. This also allows students to accept and deal with positive or negative criticisms. And, teachers, with or without knowledge about the use of wiki, can have free access to this website. By following the initial instructions, teachers can help their students to work with this tool.

What surprised me in this article was the fact that it is easy for teachers to be monitoring and supporting the process of their students’ writing as they have free access to this tool. To conclude using wikis writing projects is an effective tool to develop students’ writing skill. To conclude, wiki is a great too to help students to develop their writing skill and to teacher to be in touch with the new technology and renovate their teaching techniques. 

WEEK 8: HOW TO USE DICTIONARIES TO LEARN VOCABULARY IN A BETTER WAY

Tuesday, March 9^th, 2017

Rate: 4

This week I read the articles “Online English-English Learner Dictionaries Boost Word Learning and   Using Technology to Assist in Vocabulary Acquisition and Reading Comprehension” in order to analyze the importance of integrating  online dictionaries in the classroom to make students to create their own vocabulary.

Something I want to remember from this article are some the suggestions this article offer teachers to help students to learn English.

1). Corpus-based dictionaries which means the content is based on real-world spoken and written discourse when words, definitions, and examples are selected and organized. In other words, it helps learners of English to focus first on frequent words and meanings by comparing the meaning from different resources to proceed to memorize more words and their meanings.  2). Word frequency. This refers to know how frequently words are used in overall written and spoken discourse. It is very helpful information to English learners so that their can verify what words should be learned first. 3). Collocations refers to words combinations that typically go together with the words.  Students easily can look for a word on whether online dictionaries or printed version to identify if that word can be together with others to make other meaning or going deeper and find colocation mistakes of that word.  

4). Authentic examples. Students can discover the meaning of words but it is essential to have a dictionary that provides how to use words in real context. With this extra effort students fully acquire those words, the meaning and its use in real context to be applied later. 5). Topical vocabulary indicates how the words relate semantically to different categories. Also students can have synonyms and semantic webs to indicate different word usages and to illustrate how a single word relates to different concepts.

My favorite quote from this article was “good readers have a rich vocabulary, and similarly, a rich vocabulary is one of the key elements that ensure reading proficiency” with the suggestions before, teachers can enhance students reading skills and at the same time teaching a useful technique to enrich their vocabulary in an efficiently way.

WEEK 7

WEEK 7:  INTEGRATING INTERNET IN THE WRITING SYLLABUS

Wednesday, March 1^st, 2017

Rate: 4

What surprised me in this article was how to incorporate this online component into the curriculum. Teachers should consider students´ level of English before giving them a lecture so that, they would not be struggling with the vocabulary and it will seem reachable. Also, Students should be instructed in the use computers before using it with an educational purpose. They should know how to operate the Internet browser, how to search for sites using a search engine, how to save sites or print them out, how to copy information and paste it into a word-processing program, and should have necessary typing skills.

Moreover, the role of the teacher in a wired classroom is essential.  Teachers should be extremely prepared. They should have examined the content of the sites that students are going to view. They should have some emergency lessons to do in case of a connection breakdown. And also they need to be monitoring students' work to verify if the viewing material students are accessing is appropriate or not for them. And to develop a proficient online lesson, there are some elements which are indispensable.  Teachers should have his disposal a computer lab with Internet access. The speed of the connection should be enough to be utilized by the whole class without having a connection breakdown.

Something that made me want to read more about the topic was how to incorporate writing to students without seems it as an assignment.  Assignment such as writing a letter to a friend can be meaningful for students. But, teachers firstly need to give necessary instruction   of the task, the time they will have to complete the activity.  Also, teacher should give students the information or phrases they can use to connect one idea with another. Writing a formal letter, as before, the instructions should be given before the activity and the resources they will use. Keep in mind that, teachers should give the necessary instruction of the task students are able to do. It might seem so difficult to engage students to  write because they think writing is boring, but  make them be part a discussion of an any current problem of the society or  let them give suggestions  of a topic they feel interested.

Something I learned from this article and that every teacher should know was that the most difficult part of constructing the reading hobby is the lack of practicing of the foreign language to develop the vocabulary   needed to rapid growth in English proficiency. Also frustration is the one of the major problem students face when reading because they are force to stop the lecture to look for the meaning of a word interrupting the continuity of reading.

Additionally, the reading material teachers decide to use in the classroom in pretty important to take into consideration. There exists a great amount of websites that offer a wide range of materials, topics, difficulty levels and sophisticated illustrations­­ sometimes accompanied by oral readings with animations. Even if one's EFL students don't have easy access to the Internet, it is possible for teachers with Internet access to download and print out materials for student use.

Week 6: Developing speaking, listening and writing skill with the use of web

Wednesday February 22, 2017

Rate: 4

Something that calls my attention was the increase in the development of communication programs, audio and video to offer a wide variety of possibilities for teachers to compile activities around listening such as watching related videos, holding conversations in real-time, etc. nowadays, teachers are integrating  the technology in the classrooms to foster the improvement of students´ skills (listening, speaking and writing) of a second language, but there is still a lack of comprehension in how to use CALL with a communicative purpose.

Something that I learned and that every teacher should know was that the communicative activities on the internet can be categorized as receptive or interactive.  The receptive activities, in the oral skills, refer to the information students receive from the websites in form of text, images, audio and video. This can be used for teachers to provide to students extra material for improving their listening and speaking skills. Also, the interactive activities refer to interact with a person or a group of people from others countries through the internet and computers.

To conclude, integrating technology to develop students´ listening and speaking skills can be such  a useful element in the classroom and out of it. It is because students can have more interaction with the language and with native speakers.  Also, they can find unlimited resources to practice and learn at the same time. 

Week 5: critical thinking and technology can work together or not?

Wednesday, February 15, 2017

Rate: 4

My initial reaction to this article was how possible is to make active and reflective students when integrating technology in the classroom.

Something I learned and that immediately wanted to share with a colleague was that educators should think in terms of teaching students to understand, analyze, synthesize, and evaluate evidence.  But how do we know that our students are learning and how can we eradicate the barrier of Sedentary lifestyle student could have. First of all we do not have to underestimate the ability to reason. In poor counties education is based on memorizing to pass an evaluation discarding any change for learners to analyze the content and go deeper.  We must understand that we should spend our time teaching students how to learn (that is, how to read the text actively and analytically and to think in the same manner) rather than using the classes to dictate information (p.2, Ken Bain).  

Something else I want to emphasis is that our brains love diversity.  Each student is a different world and each of them will process the information in a different way. That is when technology is able to provide unlimited resources to teach in a different way.  By using pictures diagrams, time lines, etc., students are more able to understand concepts. However, we should be clear that technology is just to expose to students different concepts of the reality and at the same time let them to analyze and process the information to produce their own concept of it.

A belief of mine that was confirmed was the use of technology to get through the material faster. Teachers who use visual aid such as PowerPoint presentation (ppp) should not try to cover a complex topic in on single class. Instead, educator could use ppp to give students the opportunity to draw their own conclusions based on videos or pictures in a sequence.  Also, Schools should make more effort to test students using visual media that just asking them to prepare PowerPoint presentations.

Week 4: how important is to integrate internet in the classroom?

Week 4:  how important is to integrate internet in the classroom?

Wednesday, February 08, 2017

Rate: 5

My initial impression for this article was “another reading regarding CALL” but when I started reading it my mind was changed. Something that I learned from this article and every teacher should know was the use of internet as a personal tutor for students or teachers.  Nowadays, the internet has become a fundamental element for almost everybody and teachers are not the exception. So here I show you how important it is.

A belief of mine that was confirmed was the internet for advice and analysis. For Advice:  maybe you, once in your life as an English-learner, have misunderstood an English topic such as the use of restrictive Clauses and Nonrestrictive Clauses. For such reason, internet can help you to discover unlimited resources to understand easily any topic and use them as a guide. 

Here I left one link which is a perfect example of these resources. http://www.quickanddirtytips.com/grammar-girl

For analysis: to have a better understanding of  English words, there are also many websites which provide you the meaning of any word you want to know and also the context it is used. Here I left you a sample website. You just enter a word and you find many ways to use it. 

http://www.webcorp.org.uk/live/

For Activities:  internet can provides teachers a great amount of websites with interesting examples and tasks that can motivate students to continue practicing while playing. Freerice.com is a page that gives a word and some other for you to guess the meaning. If you win, you will be helping to feed poor people. 

What surprised me in this article was the use of the internet as a tool to foster creativity and communication. What really bother students is to have homework assignments without a specific purpose for them. However, internet seems to be the solution. Some websites such as http://www.drawastickman.com/ or http://www.makebeliefscomix.com/ provide an interactive platform. The http://www.drawastickman.com contains a series of interactive mini games that ask the user to follow some commands like draw a tiger costumer around me. And the second one allows you to create your own comic by adding pictures with movement and text. They both challenge students to continue with the task until it is done. This are tools that teachers can use in their classes to change it a bit. Also for communication, we have    http://alice.pandorabots.com/   which is a program that allows the user to communicate with it by receiving answers of any question you have asked at the moment. That chat can be used for teacher to see in which area their students are failing.

Something that made me want to read more about was selecting an. For selection content, what is pretty important to know is what kind of content to show students. We cannot only take an article to make an activity in the classroom. We have to consider whether to use authentic or semi-authentic material and its usability.

WEEK 3: the benefit of using podcasts in the classroom

WEEK 3: the benefit of using podcasts in the classroom

Thursday, February 2, 2017

Rate: 5

Something I want to remember from this article is verb system and imagery system of students. The verbal system, in my own words, is the capacity of the students to process linguistics information and the imagery system is the ability to create mind maps.

These two elements, for us as teachers, are really important if we want to start using podcasts in our classes. therefore, incorporating podcasts in our classes, such as videos or audio models of input or to be more specific explaining a topic with details and demonstrating on-line listening, reading, speaking or writing strategies with real examples, helps learners to have better understanding and retention of the listening strategies and the real examples make the students feel confident with the topics because they seems more understandable.

A belief of mine that was confirmed was the benefits of podcasts. Some teachers say that use of this CALL can extend class time. This might be extra tasks for some students but for second language- learners who only have fewer hours in contact with the language is the perfect tool to have more audio input to practice their listening skills. Also, learners have the facility to gain more exposure to different types of spoken English since some of the speakers on the podcasts have heavier accents than others.

Something I learned and that I immediately wanted to share with a colleague was students feel that the podcasts with a demonstration component of some sort were more informative than the podcasts which summarized and expanded on concepts previously covered in class.

WEEK 2: Does metacognition really work?

Sunday, January 29,2017

WEEK 2: Does metacognition really work?

Rate: 5

The Reading for this week share interesting information about Effectiveness of the Integration of ICT Tools and Activities to Foster Awareness as the First Stage to Reach Learning Autonomy.

Does metacognition really work?

Something I learned from this article and that every teacher should know was metacognition. The metacognitive process takes place along with thinking processes. This means that the mind becomes aware of itself. Metacognition has to do with students’ awareness of their own cognitive processes and the regulation of these processes in order to reach a specific goal so that a reasonable assessment can be made about present and future performance.  However, making our students aware of their own cognitive process seems to be a complex problem.it is even more difficult if students do not care about going to school. In some cases students see education just a way of wasting their time because they do not find it interesting or really important; the metacognition is kind of far.

On the other hand,  the use of CALL in the classroom required that students become independent, self-motivated and self-evaluating.  This innovation required a syllabus oriented to improve students´ proficiency and the role of the teacher is critical in order to offer accompaniment, support and preparation to avoid any distractor students have while using resources provided by open content creators and online networks.

Something that made me read more about was the experiment developed to demonstrate the effectiveness of the metacognitive in students.  In this project, students firstly were asked to identify their wish focus on base of their weaknesses or interest. Also, they were given instructions about how to develop a proficient writing and how to correct themselves without the assessment of a teacher. I would like to develop an experiment like this because it could help students to be aware of their own process of learning. This in our country could become an important way to help those students who consider drop school at early grades. With this program they could be able to overcome their learning problems and become conscious of their reality. And it is important to highlight that students who are aware of their process of learning become a benefit for their families and the country.

WEEK 1_Technology in the classroom advantage or disadvantage ?

The reading for this week share interesting information about computer-assisted language learning (CALL). Computer-assisted language learning is in other words the study of computer´s application for language teaching and learning which has been used since 1970 by teachers to facilitate to students an integrate way of learning a foreign languages.

The article “Computers and language learning: an overview”  explains an overview of current teaching practices and research related to the use of computers in the classroom by giving a brief history of computer-assisted language learning (CAL), a survey of current practices  and research and prospectus toward the 21st century. 

What surprised me in this article was the results students have when using any program to learn languages.   The used of them has revealed an interesting result in students who have gotten computerized error feedback in which they have improved their writing more than those who received only generalized feedback.

However,  the different and the wide variety of programs  that teachers have used to provide a new mechanism of  teaching a foreign language in the classroom represent a  cost in the use of these programs which make them unreachable for a great number of  Educators and students and even less if they have never bought through internet. Also, the teachers´ training to use any of these programs means an additional cost for them or any institution that is considering integrating such programs in their classrooms.

Here are some of the mentioned programs in the reading. In case you are interested to get any of them in order to develop your skills, each representative picture has a link for you to downloader or subscribe.

ELLIS Master Pronunciation -

click here to downloader  

http://www.formavision.com/ellis/masterpron.html

American Accent Program -

click here to subscribe 

http://americanaccentcourse.com/

 speech viewer -

click here to downloader  

https://blogsomosespeciales.wordpress.com/2010/03/04/speechviewer/

Something else I want to remember from this article is that CALL represents a benefit for students and teacher but a disadvantage if they cannot use it correctly. The majority of the students enjoy working with different programs because they have grown with the technology since a very early age. However, without any proper education in the use of CALL, students are not capable to distinguish when a text or information is from a reliable source or not. Hence, schools and teachers are forced to educate their students in how to distinguish when the information is Truthful, to verify and provide the necessary information students will use in any task or assignment.  





NOTE: I would rate the article with 4. It is because the article provides relevant information about the CALL since it stated. Also, The new perspective of CALL that is currently implemented in the education system, it is really interested and important to know because teachers that use this element in their classes should be updated and this article gives a brief explanation of it. And, it shared different programs´ names for you to look for it.