Hi Everyone!
Week 7 is almost over. I've learned quite a lot these past few weeks and these last days I really enjoyed the course.
Nicenet has proved to be an important way for communicating.
I think it's great that the topics in this course are immediately implemented and we grow as learners.
Padlet is a fast-forward tool, helping us turn even the one-computer classroom into a fun-zone.
The process is as important as the end and so we learn to learn. Learners find meaning while exploring and their contribution is vital.
When we, as teachers, also become Autonomous Learners, we discover that by using our curiosity and responsibility, ideas are connected to form, through an effective process. In reference to the first linguistic metaphors, knowledge is not only necessarily poured from a jug, but created and redefined in a collective process.
Our class PBL is going great, and with some guidance, my students are showing progress whilst having fun.
I have been writing in the log and look forward to working with them next week on some other tools.
Awaiting Week 8,
L.
Sunday, May 25, 2014
Sunday, May 18, 2014
Trig 101
Hi readers and fellow classmates,
I don't know what about you, but I found this week difficult.
Somehow, the PPT task took over. I learned a lot from the readings and clips, yet the work was tedious.
The articles and what you wrote on Nicenet reinforced my beliefs that triggering and engaging students are crucial in the learning process, especially in larger classes.
My student's PBL will be based on http://www.tagxedo.com/
and then they will work on their own stories on a storyboard creator.
Based on what we did so far this week, my class will "play" with their text, using different fonts and colors. This will be done on a text that was read in class and for a post activitiy they will be doing some peer assessment and a "Show and Tell".
This week was definitely insightful and I hope to continue this voyage,
L.
I don't know what about you, but I found this week difficult.
Somehow, the PPT task took over. I learned a lot from the readings and clips, yet the work was tedious.
The articles and what you wrote on Nicenet reinforced my beliefs that triggering and engaging students are crucial in the learning process, especially in larger classes.
My student's PBL will be based on http://www.tagxedo.com/
and then they will work on their own stories on a storyboard creator.
Based on what we did so far this week, my class will "play" with their text, using different fonts and colors. This will be done on a text that was read in class and for a post activitiy they will be doing some peer assessment and a "Show and Tell".
This week was definitely insightful and I hope to continue this voyage,
L.
Saturday, May 10, 2014
Focus on Learning
My tech days are comprised of experiments. As new types of learning require new types of assessment, I find myself being inspired by the websites I'm familiar with already and those which are new to me.
My students enjoy diversified lessons and once they're taken to the computer room they emerge as responsible creative learners helping their peers and enjoying the process.
When I design Performance-Based Tasks for the computer room, I always precede them with an enabling activity, for instance, before teaching them a lesson on the "Hall of Fame" song, they were to guess or talk about the concept: "Hall of Fame".
I first conducted a brainstorming activity and then gave them the lyrics and we went over the vocabulary.
Then, at the computer lab, they were asked to watch the song clip and answer questions on a file handout. Then – in groups, they decided how they will present the song in class. Since they really like singing and performing, this was a welcomed challenge.
In such a Learner- centered classroom, students are free to work at their own pace.
The authentic song, with which some of them were familiar, enabled me some flexible mentoring and guiding for evaluating their work and correcting them.
I usually approach each and every one of them to check their progress and assist them.
PBL works great with my student population for oral and written skills.
I can set rubrics and they can know ahead what they're expected to do.
Again they know they'll be evaluated inclusively, therefore the pressure is off, their motivation increases and their performance will improve.
Some of my recommended websites for PBLTasks:
http://www.colorincolorado.org/ - great for reading skills
www.ldonline – for working with the learner-disabled
www.readwritethink – similar to the first site, with numerous activities
www.brainpop.com – many ideas on many subjects
http://www.isabelperez.com/ - CALL methodology, links, songs and grammar
www.aesopsfables.com – great listening and reading activities, including lesson plans
http://www.schrockguide.net/ - great assessing and rubric tools, great lesson plan ideas
www.scholastic.com
http://kids.nationalgeographic.com/
http://www.discoveryeducation.com/teachers/ -– great clipart, check out their "Puzzlemaker"
http://www.timeforkids.com/ - need I say more?
One more way to have a pre- activity for PBL is to take them on a field trip. Some years ago I had worked in High School with LD learners.
We used to take them to an outdoor mall near school where their task was to read the signs in English. Then we discussed in class the possibilities for using some of the vocabulary we saw (authentic material) to produce a written/oral presentation (i.e.: a
T-shirt, a slogan, a sales pitch).
Students who write well can do a comic life strip about their own world using templates and rubrics. They can help their less -skilled friends in pair and group work.
I also think that biographies are an interesting topic. You can easily find materials on biography. com, History Channel or learning media. My students have written about Walt Disney and Neil Armstrong. Ilan Ramon was the Israeli astronaut who perished in space and I have asked them to write about both astronauts – thus, HOTS and critical thinking were used, by comparing and contrasting.
WebQuests are truly great for students to quench their thirst for curiosity.
This encourages them to read but they are not even aware of the reading process and they can find a great many links and ideas.
Zunal. WebQuest and Questgarden are wonderful. There are nice rubrics for "webquesting".
If we are to allow more learning – we have to give our students more autonomy.
Assessment can be based on holistic, formative, summative and analytic tools, but we have to bear in mind each and every student's needs.
I hope to learn much more next week,
L.
My students enjoy diversified lessons and once they're taken to the computer room they emerge as responsible creative learners helping their peers and enjoying the process.
When I design Performance-Based Tasks for the computer room, I always precede them with an enabling activity, for instance, before teaching them a lesson on the "Hall of Fame" song, they were to guess or talk about the concept: "Hall of Fame".
I first conducted a brainstorming activity and then gave them the lyrics and we went over the vocabulary.
Then, at the computer lab, they were asked to watch the song clip and answer questions on a file handout. Then – in groups, they decided how they will present the song in class. Since they really like singing and performing, this was a welcomed challenge.
In such a Learner- centered classroom, students are free to work at their own pace.
The authentic song, with which some of them were familiar, enabled me some flexible mentoring and guiding for evaluating their work and correcting them.
I usually approach each and every one of them to check their progress and assist them.
PBL works great with my student population for oral and written skills.
I can set rubrics and they can know ahead what they're expected to do.
Again they know they'll be evaluated inclusively, therefore the pressure is off, their motivation increases and their performance will improve.
Some of my recommended websites for PBLTasks:
http://www.colorincolorado.org/ - great for reading skills
www.ldonline – for working with the learner-disabled
www.readwritethink – similar to the first site, with numerous activities
www.brainpop.com – many ideas on many subjects
http://www.isabelperez.com/ - CALL methodology, links, songs and grammar
www.aesopsfables.com – great listening and reading activities, including lesson plans
http://www.schrockguide.net/ - great assessing and rubric tools, great lesson plan ideas
www.scholastic.com
http://kids.nationalgeographic.com/
http://www.discoveryeducation.com/teachers/ -– great clipart, check out their "Puzzlemaker"
http://www.timeforkids.com/ - need I say more?
One more way to have a pre- activity for PBL is to take them on a field trip. Some years ago I had worked in High School with LD learners.
We used to take them to an outdoor mall near school where their task was to read the signs in English. Then we discussed in class the possibilities for using some of the vocabulary we saw (authentic material) to produce a written/oral presentation (i.e.: a
T-shirt, a slogan, a sales pitch).
Students who write well can do a comic life strip about their own world using templates and rubrics. They can help their less -skilled friends in pair and group work.
I also think that biographies are an interesting topic. You can easily find materials on biography. com, History Channel or learning media. My students have written about Walt Disney and Neil Armstrong. Ilan Ramon was the Israeli astronaut who perished in space and I have asked them to write about both astronauts – thus, HOTS and critical thinking were used, by comparing and contrasting.
WebQuests are truly great for students to quench their thirst for curiosity.
This encourages them to read but they are not even aware of the reading process and they can find a great many links and ideas.
Zunal. WebQuest and Questgarden are wonderful. There are nice rubrics for "webquesting".
If we are to allow more learning – we have to give our students more autonomy.
Assessment can be based on holistic, formative, summative and analytic tools, but we have to bear in mind each and every student's needs.
I hope to learn much more next week,
L.
Saturday, May 3, 2014
Getting Your Class Connected
Hi
The Internet is a plethora of learning materials. As teachers we need only dive in and instruct our students to join us. We can use it for writing E-mails, creating Web Pages and class websites, and much more.
The sea of resources for reading and writing practice is never ending.
Getting connected means also learning from both teachers and classrooms from all over the world. There are many live interconnected lessons happening just as I write.
I have been using ads from New York magazines for years in K-12 and beyond. I believe this is where Learners apply their critical thinking to compare and contrast a few ads. It is also a visual tool. On the Internet we as teachers can access this tool to provide authentic materials for our students.
I have been using The Learning Network from the New York Times website on many occasions.
When students are asked to describe in writing, or review a book, a film, a festival or a ceremony, they use combined learning skills. They can "visit" a theater/movie website, read a review, watch a short clip on Youtube or even take virtual trips around the globe and describe destinations. They can then "land back" in their country or hometown and write about it.
E-Books are a wonderful way for Audio-Visual Learning. They can be adapted for younger EFL Learners and later used in class weblogs. Story map is a great way of using graphic maps in the-based LD EFL classroom. Mei Ya Ling ("3 Extensive Reading Activities for ESL/EFL Students Using E-Books") provides good links for this.
I think with Remedial Teaching it is best to dedicate at lease two sessions for each writing task, but bare in mind the attention span factor and try to diversify activities.
Internet-based Literature can be used by learners as a post-activity. They can show and teach the stories to younger relatives, reenact these stories in class, using vocabulary they have learned and even create simple stories in writing (with or without illustrations) and speaking. Thus they practice English outside the classroom. There is a back and forth process going on, involving not only teachers and students, but also the entire community through the kids' oral skills (teaching others what they've learned through web reading and thus getting a sense of higher motivation and confidence) and writing and publishing on the web.
This is not to say we'll forget about real books and putting pen to paper. We have an English Book Club at School and an extensive library.
Technology should be used soundly and with pedagogic scaffolding in mind.
I believe students should use the keyboard as one of their main learning tools and become active learners.
If we as teachers learn to combine old and new, and do it well we'll soon be stepping into a "New World" where students will actually have fun learning English.
So let's enjoy the ride,
Liat
The Internet is a plethora of learning materials. As teachers we need only dive in and instruct our students to join us. We can use it for writing E-mails, creating Web Pages and class websites, and much more.
The sea of resources for reading and writing practice is never ending.
Getting connected means also learning from both teachers and classrooms from all over the world. There are many live interconnected lessons happening just as I write.
I have been using ads from New York magazines for years in K-12 and beyond. I believe this is where Learners apply their critical thinking to compare and contrast a few ads. It is also a visual tool. On the Internet we as teachers can access this tool to provide authentic materials for our students.
I have been using The Learning Network from the New York Times website on many occasions.
When students are asked to describe in writing, or review a book, a film, a festival or a ceremony, they use combined learning skills. They can "visit" a theater/movie website, read a review, watch a short clip on Youtube or even take virtual trips around the globe and describe destinations. They can then "land back" in their country or hometown and write about it.
E-Books are a wonderful way for Audio-Visual Learning. They can be adapted for younger EFL Learners and later used in class weblogs. Story map is a great way of using graphic maps in the-based LD EFL classroom. Mei Ya Ling ("3 Extensive Reading Activities for ESL/EFL Students Using E-Books") provides good links for this.
I think with Remedial Teaching it is best to dedicate at lease two sessions for each writing task, but bare in mind the attention span factor and try to diversify activities.
Internet-based Literature can be used by learners as a post-activity. They can show and teach the stories to younger relatives, reenact these stories in class, using vocabulary they have learned and even create simple stories in writing (with or without illustrations) and speaking. Thus they practice English outside the classroom. There is a back and forth process going on, involving not only teachers and students, but also the entire community through the kids' oral skills (teaching others what they've learned through web reading and thus getting a sense of higher motivation and confidence) and writing and publishing on the web.
This is not to say we'll forget about real books and putting pen to paper. We have an English Book Club at School and an extensive library.
Technology should be used soundly and with pedagogic scaffolding in mind.
I believe students should use the keyboard as one of their main learning tools and become active learners.
If we as teachers learn to combine old and new, and do it well we'll soon be stepping into a "New World" where students will actually have fun learning English.
So let's enjoy the ride,
Liat
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