WEEK 03 (19 – 25 October 2009)

Using Technology in Teaching; Skill Areas: Listening, Pronunciation, Speaking Resources; Saving Bookmarks on Delicious

  • Using technology effectively in teaching
  • Useful sites for aural/oral skill practice
  • Saving bookmarks (favorites) on Delicious
  • Learning objectives for this week, using the Audience-Behavior-Condition-Degree (ABCD) model:

Learning Objectives
Using technology in teaching
Condition: After reading the articles below about using technology in teaching
Audience: Participants in this course
Behavior: Will explain how they might use technology to improve their students’ aural/oral skills
Degree. In at least one post on Nicenet.

Aural/oral skill-building website
Audience: Participants in this course
Condition: After reviewing at least two different speaking, listening, and/or pronunciation websites in terms of use in their classes
Behavior: Will share comments about the sites, including the target audience, skill(s) enhanced, and an overall recommendation
Degree. In at least one post on Nicenet that includes the web pages (with URL).

Using Delicious.com to store useful links
Audience: Participants in this course
Condition: After reading the instructions about using Delicious.com
Behavior: Will create and begin to use their own Delicious site, and share the URL of their site
Degree. Including at least three links with appropriate tags (category descriptions)

 

READINGS

TASKS

Readings are required! Go carefully through them and use them to help form a basis for your postings in the weekly discussions. Please work on both topics this week.

Readings

Delicious.com Social Bookmarking

Using Delicious: Use this to help you create your own Delicious page
www.uoregon.edu/~dhealey/techtips/sept2009.html

Teaching aural/oral skills

Best Practices in Technology and Language Teaching (PDF file)- read about listening and speaking in this; you don’t need to read the whole thing
www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi-bin/fulltext/121675554/PDFSTART

Developing Listening Skills with Authentic Materials (Word .doc file)
www.elthillside.com/up/files/article4.doc

Speaking lesson plans (teacher resource)

One Stop English
www.onestopenglish.com/section.asp?sectionType=listsummary&catid=59414

Speaking lesson plans:
www.eslpoint.com/lessonplans/speakinglessonplans.html

Websites to explore:

Listening (student resource)

Randall’s Cyber Listening Lab: www.esl-lab.com/ 
This is one of the few websites that includes pre-, during, and post- activities. It’s organized by topic and level.

Pronunciation

Pronunciation links (student and teacher resources)
www.uoregon.edu/~dhealey/138/pronlinks.html

Pronunciation Tips from the BBC – exercises, videos, quizzes
www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/grammar/pron/

Additional resources:

Listening RealEnglish video – advanced; multiple dialects
www.real-english.com/reo/1/unit1.html

Pronunciation Thought groups (video)
nadeen-grammar.blogspot.com/2009/04/thought-groups-part-1.html

Best Sites to Practice Speaking English (Larry Ferlazzo) – high use of tech
larryferlazzo.edublogs.org/2008/03/17/the-best-sites-to-practice-speaking-english/

The Pedagogy-Technology Interface in Computer-Assisted Language Learning (academic article)
lands.let.kun.nl/literature/neri.2002.3.pdf

Weekly Requests and Reminders: 
Continue your blog at www.blogger.com. Post a reflective comment on this week’s work, where you talk about what you did, what you learned, and how you might apply that information in your teaching. Think about all three topics for this week when you consider what to write in your blog.

Discussions: Go to Nicenet, log in, and participate in this week’s topics. Topics will be posted on or after October 25, Pacific time.

  1. Create your own page on Delicious.com and save at least 3 bookmarks. Share the URL of your page here with the group. It will look something like
    www.delicious.com/healeyd
    (that’s my page)
  2. Read one of the articles about CALL for listening, speaking, or pronunciation skills, and take a quick look at some of the lesson plans. Remember that technology can be used by the teacher in preparing as well as used with students in the class. Explain how technology could be helpful in improving your students’ aural/oral skills.
  3. Look at two or more of the skill-building websites with an eye to what would work for you in your class. Please share with the group
    1. Which website you used, and which specific activity/web page. Please include the title of the page and the URL.
    2. What English level/age of students could best use this site, and what skills it enhances
    3. Your overall recommendation about the site.

    Make sure you add the ones you like to your Delicious page!