Activity 14: Essay

Final activity. THE essay!

As a final activity of this course, we are required to write an essay on whichever topic we find interesting related to the ideas raised during the course. At the moment, the essay is on process. Until now, I have collected the necessary data and have been analysing them. I have been building an idea on how I want to go about it.

Activity 13: Evaluating blogs as a previous step for creating our own

How does blogs look like?


Before the creation of this blog, we were required to search on Internet for blog. This was asked so we could have an idea of how blogs look like and to start thinking on how we wanted our blog to look like. Then we were asked to provide a comment on a couple of them. This is my contribution analysing two blogs about language self-learning:






http://www.helping-you-learn-english.com/Learn-English-blog.html

This blog has various links to different levels of English learners.
The left column has a long list of links which help users to work on specific parts of the language such as pronunciation or grammar.
The right column has adds.
The central part of the blog is a kind of forum, where the people who had a doubt is answered. I like this part because it has the feeling that someone is really helping you and other people can benefit from it as well.
http://english-trainer.blogspot.com/

In contrast with the previous blog, it looks like a more professional cared page. It seems it is meant for advanced level learners or teachers of English as a foreign language.
It looks really nice. It had already more than 20.000 visits!The left column as well as the right one has various links with information of different aspects of the language and of language teaching.




The reasons behind:

Here comes the moment when I have to explain why my blog looks like this. There is a simple reason, but I'm sure it's not the one that will please our teacher. It looks like this just because I thought it would look nice!


Let's be more serious now. Since the blog does not contain a lot of information I thought the best thing would be to have only two columns. I didn't like the templates provided by Blogger. For this reason I googled "free templates blog" and I found a lot of nice websites with hundreds of them, divided by different types of categories. I chose one and downloaded it. Afterwards I just had to add it. Then, at this point I only had to work on it.

Since I am (or try to) be orgonized with the things I do, I decided to keep the same format on each entry I was going to post. So you can see that every post has a tittle (Activity X:) and a subtittle (which refers back to the entire activity). There's also a least a picture on each post, which once again refers to the activity I'm commenting on. Before adding the "real" material (the ones we've been handing in) I wrote a short comment.

Moreover, I decided to add useful links, such as Hot Potatoes. Most of the websites were completly new to me and I liked many of them. For this reason I thought it would be nice to post them on the right column.

On the whole, I would not change a word of all what I wrote during this course. Perhaps I would have done the listening activity differently if I had known what I was really asked to do, I did not understand fully what I had to do.

That's all folks!

Activity 12: creating a listening activity

Listening Acitivity creation.


As we were asked to create a listening activity and to provide the clip I came up with the following idea:

Listening Activity

Level: intermediate onwards.

Aim: work on pronunciation.

Before: The teacher asks students if they know what “tongue twisters” are. S/he can give an example in English, so the students will understand exactly what they are. Then, the teacher gives the students a paper with the following text:

Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.
A peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked.
If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers,
Where's the peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked?

Activity: At this point, the students will be asked to try to read it aloud. It will sound as a mess in class, but they will have fun trying to say it. Afterwards, the teacher will play the following sound track: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AnStAXLw4LY&feature=related (it is a song with the Peter Piper tongue twister). As an option, the teacher can also record his/her own voice reciting a tongue twister of his/her own choice.

If the teacher wants, s/he can ask the students if they want to try to sing it together.

After: The teacher choose a couple of tongue twisters from the following link: http://www.uebersetzung.at/twister/en.htm and ask the students to learn by heart the one they like the most, reminding they will be asked to recite it in class the next day.


Afterwards, we were required to create exercises with HotPotatoes based on the listening activity we have created:

Since there were not too many options considering the type of activity I created, I decided the best option would be to do a puzzle.

I really found Hot Ptatoes a very good tool. I have used crosswords quite often in my lessons and I always found it difficult and most of the times really boring to create them by myself. I am sure I will use it from now on!

Activity 11: Voki

We were required to create our own Voki and this is the result:

http://www.voki.com/pickup.php?scid=3727025&height=267&width=200

If for some reason the link does not work properly, please try the following link:
http://wildfire.gigya.com/facebook/preview.aspx?fb_sig_api_key=f7667e9ebccf2157d6f15f991a5e3ce9&wid=525645741&p=bHQ9MTMwMjYxNzY1MzY%2ANiZwdD%2AxMzAyNjE3NjU4ODUzJnA9OTc1MDcyJmQ9MDAwJTIwLSUyMFZva2klMjBXaWRnZXQmbj1mYWNlYm9vayZnPTEmbz1iNTY3YzY4YzkxYTc%2AYTM4YWJiNmExNDQwMTNhOGNhZCZvZj%2Aw&s=1

Activity 10: Top five lists on ideas for listening teachers

Providing a comment about the article:


After analysing the article, we had to provide comments about it. These are my comments about the lists suggested in the mentioned text:

Ideas given by David Numan:

1.     Link task with real life: important thing to do to engage students. (I believe in this.)

2.     Wide range of input: in this way students will get used to accents and rate of speech speed. (I believe this is a good point.)

3.     Listening strategies: have not thought on it when writing my own list and I think it is nice to be thought or adviced on how to go about this kind of task. The teacher has experience as a student as well and can put him/herself on the students’ shoes to give tips.

4.     Encourage practice outside classroom: this sounds very nice, however, I believe it is difficult. Ts should try to “cover” the activities in order not to look as a task but as an entertainment.

5.     Encourage to reflect on their learning: nice way to give motivation. (Thought I do not think this is so important to be placed on this list.)

Ideas given by Jack Richards:

1.     Testing vs teaching: one of the best ways to deal with this kind of activites. If students feel pressured to understand every single word and that they will be graded it will probably create a bad atmosphere for the learning process.

2.     Pre, while, post listening activities: good organization of activites is one of the key points for a successful lesson (and obviously, for the learning process. This is why I think this idea is quite linked to number 4.)

3.     Authentic materials?: I do not believe this is so relevant. In the beginning of the learning process there is a high difficulty to understand and follow tracks. For this reason I do not think this should be on the list.

4.     Listening to develop comprehension and acquisition: opinion already expressed on number 2.

5.     English as an international language: I think this is important as long as we are dealing with at least a certain level of proficiency.

Ideas given by Michael Rost:

1.     “the right stuff”: important to please students and encourage them to work. It helps motivation and most importantly to establish a good “relationship” with the language.

2.     Spoken language: this can only be important when having students of a certain level of proficiency.

3.     Interpersonal listening: I think this is interesting. However, I think this should be done before doing listening activities. It will help students when engaging on oral activites and then the next step would be deal with it in listening activities.

4.     Interpretation: this help students to creat a “native” thinking. It is nice to encourage students to expect things. I think this also helps on creating motivation.

5.     Memory: I believe the person who wrote this list was thinking on a certain type of students and not about all types of levels. I do not think this to be so important.

Ideas given by John Flowerdew and Lindsay Miller:

1.     Bottom-up vs top-down: I think that starting with bottom-up strategy is quite daring. I think this is the most difficult way to do listening activities, this is why I think this method should be exploited with more advanced students (even if both ways are good.).

2.     Individualization: I have the feeling this is about acquiring listening strategies. It has already been commented in another list.

3.     Cross-cultural: I like this point, in some way is like relating to real life as well. A nice way to establish the “relationship” with the language and to be more open-minded.

4.     Contextualize: this is important. There must be clear instructions. Organized activites as secondary activites to understand and work the vocabulary found in the track.

Activity 9: commenting on Wikies created by fellow students

However being very active in this subject, I was not aware that we were required to provide written comments on the Wikies presented. For this reason, I cannot add any further information about the activity.

Activity 8: "New Trends in Using Technology in the Language Classroom"

After reading the article and discussing it in class, this is the comment I posted on the forum:

Following the lines of my comment made in class...

I suggested that in the end we still need the help of a human person. Nowadays with all the technology that exists, we are still struggling to build a machine capable of understanding what we utter.

It is undeniable the fact that using technology appeals students in a positive way, creating motivation to work on learning.

The option that caught my attention was the one of conference lessons. It is a nice option to be exploited. In this way the student does not have to leave his/her house and only needs internet connection in order to have real contact with a native teacher that will solve all doubts. However, I found it intriguing that: "Ironically, teleconferencing language courses are more readily accepted by

faculty curricular committees as being equivalent to the classroom experience".

In fact, to say the truth I did not know there were so many technological options to learn a foreign language. But still, the support of a real person is always needed, not only when using technologies, but also from the student point of view. I am sure most students feel lost when approaching learning a language without the support of a teacher (or any person with knowledge of the language) in any kind of way.

As we could read on the article, a study showed that the results of a group learning online compared with the traditional classroom environment are not too different. For this reason, I keep insisting that there is a lot to do in this aspect of learning. Though, this does not mean that I believe technology has no place in the learning process. Completly the opposite, I believe that nowadays we live in the digital era and everybody feels eager to do things that call their interest through using electronic devices. However, I have this nostalgic idea towards teachers. I do believe they are extremely important to the learning process.

Activity 7: the actual creation of a Wiki

 Welcome to ClilSportsUab!

After many sessions working on Wikies our product can be seen in the following address: http://clilsportsuab.pbworks.com

Activity 6: Evaluating websites as a previous step to the creation of our own

What is a Wiki? How does it look like?

Before creating our own Wiki, we had to analyse websites. However, we were not asked to upload any contribution to the Moodle forum.

Activity 5: Mystery stories and the creation of an activity based on them

My activity proposed after surfing on the suggested websites was the following:

The original idea has been adapted from a lesson plan found in the mysterynet.com.

AIM: A collaborative task which intends to call students attention to creative writing. Ideally the students will have already mastered a great deal of vocabulary such as adjectives and also good use of verbal tenses.

FOCUS: (obviously) on mystery stories and on the vocabulary, tense and style related to this genre.

LEVEL: at least pre-intermediate upwards.

 

TIME: probably 2 sessions.

PROCEDURE: warming up, activity and follow on.

WARMING-UP

The teacher starts the lesson asking students if they like to read. In case they do: which type of novels, magazines, etc. S/he can ask if they have ever watched a movie based on a book they read. Finally, s/he asks whether they like mystery stories. The teacher can for instance invite one of the students (or 2, not more because it will be too long) to explain very briefly which is his/her favourite story and why. (In case the students are not very collaborative that day, the teacher can also explain his/her favourite story or movie). This activity will probably take from 10 to 15 minutes.

                                                              ACTIVITY

   The teacher divides the class  into groups, depending on the number of students. The class can be divided in 4 or 5 groups. The teacher asks the students to arrange the tables in such a way they can face they companions. At this point, s/he explains they are going to have to make up their own mystery story inspiring themselves in a picture they will receive. (The teacher can find them on google images by typing: mystery, scary, fear, blood stain, chains, prisoner or also by names of horror/suspense movies.)

   The students are said to write a page or two (more or less, this depends also on the teacher’s criterion). S/he must give tips on how to start, for instance: “Jennifer was walking back home...”, “The postman came as everyday, but today he had a strange look”, “It was Friday and Mary was watching a movie alone at home.”, etc. Remember that the story must have some certain characteristics such as a scary mood.

   The teacher asks the students to make up a list of possible events the story can have, so in this way they will be already developing the framework of their “master” piece.

They are going to read their stories to their friends in a further lesson and will be judged by their own friends in class. However, the teacher can choose to have them writing a story with no end and in the next class get them to exchange their stories and write the end of their friends’.   

Examples of pictures that can be used in this task:

 (because of technical problems, the pictures can be seen in the file sent through Moodle) 

                                                              FOLLOW ON

Depending on the advices of their friends, students will have to refine their story so as to include the changes. After this long activity, the teacher can continue with the mystery story theme by bringing some short mystery story to class to do some reading comprehension. An alternative to this is to have the students doing small presentations of their favourite stories and movies. This would only be appealing to a class which has shown an interest towards this genre, otherwise it would be highly demanding. Consider they would have to do some research on stories and read them, it will be time consuming and it would also back off the student a lot. Moreover, it would make the student feel uncomfortable presenting it in front of the whole class.

A nice alternative to this is to ask them to explain a personal story, something that happened which has scared them a lot.

Activity 4: Sir Ken Robinson video lectures us on the educational system

Changing Education Paradigms:

We were asked to watch the video and then comment on it on the forum.

This is my comment on the issue raised in the clip:


The video sheds light on the educational system in global terms. I agree that the system is not the most adequate, however in my opinion everything sounds as an utopia. Though it explains the evolution of the educational system and its weak points, it does not give solutions to it. To change the system would mean a change in the mind of society and it will take decades to be able to do something. Because of this, what it would be nice, in my opinion, it is to adapt the system we have to call students attention.

Nowadays even young children are sensible to technologies and eager to use them. So it would be nice to use it in the classroom in such a way as to keep up the attention. Some schools are trying to implement the use of netbooks in the classroom, but from what I have seen untill now, they only distract children even more. Before bringing technology to class, teachers should be trainned. Just consider the amount of money this would mean! Morever, think about the time it would pass from the moment this training course is prepared, taught to teachers and finally implemented in schools. This means that only in some years we would be able to come into terms with creating a "good use" of technology in the school.

Besides the use of technology, the video also raises up different and very interesting issues. My favourite part is when he says that we are educating children that will finish school in 10/15 years from now and we cannot even predict how the world will be in 5!

From my experience, after studying in Brazil, Spain and after living in Italy and The Netherlands, one very important thing is the role of the teachers. In Spain and in Italy for instance I have the feelling that students do not respect the instructor and the school itself. Teachers are not mean to educate students as their parents "should" (inverted comas because they do not do it) educate their children. I think this is very important when trying to change the mind and how schools/teachers are seen. What should be learnt at school are maths, science, etc and not ethics and moral. These should be taught at home.

Activity 3: An idea on how to help young students

Learner Advisor:


After analysing a web with tips (learner advisor) with the help of my friends, we came up with the idea of helping young students in the following way:

AGE: 6-8 years

LEVEL: Elementary

AIM: to learn and process vocabulary through visuals in a funny and entertaining way. The main objective is to create as many connections as possible between the word and the concept itself.

PROCEDURE: The activity is meant to be done throughout the whole course.

At the beginning of the course the teacher tells the students to paint/draw every word they have understood and memorized in a flashcard. For example, if they are learning animals they have to draw and color the animals they have worked on. Periodically, the teacher may ask one of the students to show their "lion flashcard" so that the student associates the meaning with the picture.

ACTIVITY: The teacher introduces the new vocabulary which for example appears in a song: swim, fly, run, climb, jump, etc. The teacher asks the students to create their new flashcard (See procedure). The teacher asks the students to relate the new vocabulary with the one previously learned (categorization).

Ex: classify the animals according with the action they usually perform.

Animals: lion, dolphin, monkey, parrot, kangaroo, dog, cat, etc.

Verbs: swim, fly, run, climb, jump, etc.

In this way, the vocabulary is constantly used during the course.

by: Dàmaris Castilla,Sofia Chtchepetova, Antonella Cittanti, Ana Cuenda and Laura Rodríguez.

Activity 2: Language Learner Advisor

Our comemmt about the advices found in the webpage:




By: Dàmaris Castilla, Laura Rodríguez, Ana Cuenda, Antonella Cittanti and Sofia Chtchepetova.


We think that this webpage is intended to motivate independent learning.The language used is very direct and motivating. The material they propose can be easily found, thus encouraging the student even more. The figure of a teacher is not mentioned, so you have to find out your own methods, strategies and try to organize yourself and your time because there are no deadlines. There is a wide range of possibilities in order to learn and practice the language according to your own level and learning style. Depending on your level you can choose which activities you prefer: for instance, if your level is Elementary, you would probably choose listening to music rather than reading a newspaper which is much more difficult to understand. It gives you tips on where to find real language but it is not explained how to exploit these sources. Compared with Module 1, we find that the main difference is the role of the teacher. In Module 1 we need the teacher to guide you and moreover, you have to evaluate yourself.


What can we create with useful tools?

Internet is packed with lots of useful links. There is a special one wich, for some unknown reason, I liked a lot. Wordle can create a nice mix with random words you add, here you can see one I specifically created for this course:

http://www.wordle.net/show/wrdl/3670701/Self_learning_uab

Activity 1: Is this really a self-learning virtual course?

Let's comment on a chapter from one:


When I finished reading the document, I had the feeling that it does not really seems to aim at helping students to be that free! First of all, the language used in the introduction seems not directly addressed to the students themselves:

"activities that will encourage you to test your level of English"

"familiarize yourselves... with those aspects related to foreign language learning."

The objectives of this module try to make students to reflect on the aspects of autonomous learning. At this point I thought: if this is meant to help students to work, why would they have to think about the aspects related to autonomous learning? I think autonomous learners are not worried about the aspects of autonomous learning, but rather interested in suggestions on how to study alone.

When referring to the type of language, I also found that it just covers the issue in the sense that students do have deadlines. They still have to deal with timing. However, I found it positive that they have to keep contact with other learners and, most importantly, to the teacher. I find it nice to "use" the teacher as another tool/source.

I'm really convinced this work does not aim at making students autonomous, but rather to make they work autonomously.