Reflections on readings 2/23

I think that the tips for teaching writing with CALL mentioned in chapter 4 of the CALL textbook were very useful especially the one that suggests teaching students how to benefit from interactive help and feedback from the computer. I believe that teaching students through CALL writing activities such as blogs can encourage them to continue writing outside the classroom (bigger audience).

In “Writing to mean: Computer-mediated feedback in online tutoring of multidraft compositions” article, I truly agree with the author that teachers should be focusing on the question-form comments because I really think that this strategy will push students to be independent learners.

As far as the question posed in “Can learners use concordance feedback for writing errors?” article is concerned, I think that if concordances can help students in correcting vocabulary and grammar, then why not use it? But I think that students cannot depend on it for content and development of supportive ideas. So, they can use it for a specific purpose but they will still need their teacher’s guidance and feedback.

TESOL with Jing

This video podcast features a conversation between two teachers of English as a second/foreign language who give a quick tutorial for a very powerful computer screen capture software called Jing. The video also presents multiple scenarios on how to use this tool for teaching English as a second/foreign language.

Useful websites:
Jing
Screencast.com

Pros & Cons of Voicethreads

Based on chapter 6 of the CALL textbook, I would say that voicethreads are just like other technology-based tools, which all have both advantages and disadvantages that ESL/EFL teachers should be aware of when using them. Generally speaking, I think that voicethreads can provide a good opportunity for practicing oral language outside of the class. However, I believe that voicethreads can be useful ONLY if they were well designed and integrated into the lessons especially by providing explicit online learning. I think that one of the main advantages of this software is allowing its users to embed audio and video media, which can be really useful for authentic learning. Also, a big plus of this CALL tool is its interactivity feature, which allows students to practice speaking while interacting with other speakers. However, voicethreads have some disadvantages such as the over reliance on the teacher’s feedback and corrections in order to maintain improving his/her students’ speaking and pronunciation skills. Another limitation of this software is that students will only learn one variety of English only (teacher’s variety of English), and does not expose students to a variety of pronunciations of English (dialects & accents).

English with Jennifer

Please check out this ESL vocabulary expressions video lesson inspired by Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, provided by the English instructor, materials writer and consultant “Jennifer ESL”.

http://www.youtube.com/user/JenniferESL?blend=2&ob=1#p/u/10/lc8gLJWZS3o

So I’m going to evaluate this lesson from the point of view of an instructor:

First of all, I liked how the presenter linked the new vocabulary to her hometown and that she introduced them in an authentic thematic way. I also liked the fact that this video was recorded in an unconventional setting that actually reflects the topic that the lesson was inspired from. However, the background noise of the street seemed a little distracting to me.
Unlike the rest of the video presenters, I liked the fact that her tone, pace and body language were natural. I also appreciate the fact that she did not overwhelm her students with a huge amount of new vocabulary, but I think that this 8 minutes video could’ve introduced a little more expressions than the few ones presented by the instructor. Overall I think that this was a successful video as it provided students with a plenty of room for practicing the new expressions and most importantly for providing students as well as teachers with a list of references to consult at the end of the video.

Learning English with “Misterduncan”

Please check out this hilarious ESL video that I came across on YouTube while searching for some “good” ESL videos:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CjvN6FTtB60&feature=channel

So I’m going to evaluate this video from the point of view of a student:

First of all, I would say that although the instructor’s tone and body language were very odd and sarcastic, his unconventional way of presenting his lesson has actually attracted my attention and made me want to continue watching his lesson. As an ESL speaker, I liked the fact that his speech was transcribed in the screen, which would assist the overall comprehension. Misterduncan’s introduction about slang was good as he presented some useful information about slang language. I also liked that he introduced slang in both British and American English. However, the amount of new words presented was overwhelming, and he did not leave much room for practicing the new vocabulary. As a student I prefer chucking these new vocabulary into more than one video and giving me some space to practice.

Learning Vocabulary online

The following web site is designed to teach ESL/EFL students useful vocabulary and grammar skills through several CALL activities like multiple-choice quizzes, fill in the blanks tests, matching exercises and crossword puzzles. The activities are sorted into six levels from easy to difficult. There is also an additional section in this website that includes bilingual vocabulary quizzes covering several languages.

I really think that this is a very useful website for learning and reinforcing vocabulary learned especially due to the variety of topics covered in this site. ESL/EFL students can learn vocabulary about several topics that are categorized under nouns, verbs, adjectives, opposites, idioms, phrasal verbs, homonyms, abbreviations, slangs and many more. I truly like the homonyms’ section as it can improve both students’ vocabulary and spelling skills.

I personally would use the exercises of this website as post-task activities for my students to help them practice and reinforce vocabulary learned.

Here is a link of my vocabulary CALL website: http://a4esl.org/

ESL/EFL CALL Website

The following web site is designed to teach English as a second/ foreign language to ESL/EFL students through a combination of CALL activities. The site is designed for different levels and contains several sections for vocabulary, speaking, grammar, listening, reading, writing and other linguistic areas like idioms, proverbs, slang expressions and anagrams.
As far as reading is concerned, this website has a very interesting section that combines the listening and reading skills by providing ESL/ EFL students with readings from different genres that they can read and listen to along flash/MP3. There is also a YouTube videos link that supplements the listening & readings section.
Teaching reading through this CALL website depends on your students' level as well as the genre of your text. One of my ways of teaching reading is to provide prereading, reading, and postreading activities like having students make predictions, listen to the MP3 before, while or after reading the text, summarize it, or relate the reading to their personal experiences.

Here is a link of my CALL website http://www.manythings.org/

I hope you find it useful for your students!