13/05/2013
Teach housing vocabulary using this Housing Pinterest board or create your own board.
Huts
Apartments, bungalows and townhouses
Federation Houses, Victorian Houses and more
Posted in Pinterest |
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10/04/2013
Insightful Edudemic article on what it means to be a learner today and the role of the educator within the learning process.
“21st century learning to me means that students are connected to other learners and resources throughout the world preparing them to become problem solvers and communicators. They construct their learning and have relevant, authentic work and assessments. Students are comfortable collaborating with others in and out of their classroom. They have good digital citizenship and know how to use multiple technology resources. Students also show creativity, problem solving and leadership. 21st century students know how to explore, have curiosity about the world, are accountable and know how to take initiative. “Thanks to technology and the Internet, all children now are children of the globe, not just children of the neighborhood where they live.” (Jacobs 2010 p. 107) My definition of 21st century learning evolved through my own educational experience, professional readings and research.”
http://edudemic.com/2013/04/what-21st-century-learning-means-to-me/
Posted in Teaching |
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02/04/2013
I've loved Google Reader for many reasons. It saves the day when you end up with extra time in class or if you are looking for more interactive activities for your students. You could subscribe to several English learning sites which have great podcasts. You could favourite articles. You could access them from any computer so need to copy and save on a disc or usb. You could also view Google Reader on Flipboard to check for the latest feed while on the go.
What can I use to replace Google Reader now? I will have to explore the suggestions in this link. Anyone try any of them? http://kikolani.com/google-reader-alternatives-rss-reader.html
Posted in Reading, Social Media |
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19/03/2013
Workflow lesson for describing celebrations – beginners to advanced
Objective: To develop a cross-cultural understanding of celebrations and the oral and written language to describe it so that it leads to a written simple description or report. The level of text complexity depends on the students intermediate or advanced language skills.
eLearning tools: Pinterest, Interactive Quiz, YouTube, online teaching and learning websites
Teaching and Learning Cycle
Building the context and vocabulary
These activities can engage students in conversations about the topic.
- Brainstorm and elicit kinds of celebrations learners have experienced.
- Elicit vocabulary from the Englishinsider Pinterest Celebrations board.
- Watch videos or documentaries of celebrations, take notes of vocabulary and describe what is happening. Videos on New Years Eve, Chinese New Year etc can be easily found on YouTube.
- Complete Celebrations Vocabulary Interactive Quiz 1 either together as a class, in pairs or individually.
- Elicit a discussion on how people celebrate birthdays in different countries, what the milestone birthdays are and what are appropriate gifts for different ages.
- Elicit a discussion on how people celebrate the New Year in different countries and compare similarities and differences.
- Draw a chart on board under country and gifts to compare the differences and similarities that come up during the conversation.
Modelling the report genre
These activities can be teacher centred if the students require full support for developing their understanding of reports.
Joint construction of a report
These activities can be done in pairs so students support each other in developing the language together.
- Find images on Pinterest or Google images on different types of celebrations. Organise images on a board according to type of celebration.
- Complete the Interactive Quizzes on Gift Giving and/or Reports in pairs.
- Orally describe a festival or celebration students have experienced. Write a list of questions they can ask each other or have students write their questions and answers.
- Research and write a description of a celebration in pairs.
- For advanced learners, complete the Festival Cloze Reading and Speaking activity from the Worksheets page.
Independent construction of a report
- Write a report on a festival.
- Post report on a class blog, wiki or Moodle or share on this site on Holidays and Celebrations.
Posted in Workflow lessons |
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05/03/2013
This teaching and learning cycle is useful for teachers in planning a lesson. It helps you think through how to approach teaching a text or resource and how learners may experience the learning process progressively working up to independent construction. It was first developed by Rothery as part of a literacy teaching project in Sydney. For more comprehensive information about this pedagogy see this online paper at Design Literacy Pedagogy (pdf).
I’ve used this as the basis for developing new workflow lessons which integrate elearning tools, social media tools and ESL activities.
Posted in Teaching, Workflow lessons |
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22/02/2013
Makes me think that there are many benefits in learning to speak another language. Learning to see the world differently, think differently provides many cultural insights and brings you closer to understanding one another.
Posted in Language, Speaking |
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17/02/2013
I’ve just published a new quiz on reports describing Milestone Birthdays and New Year Celebrations across different cultures.
The two cross-cultural reports in this quiz build vocabulary and knowledge of the structure and language features of reports. Each report begins with a vocabulary check activity and then the multiple choice quiz. Questions are shuffled each time the learner attempts the quiz. The questions ask learners to choose the correct vocabulary to complete a sentence and to check their comprehension of the text. Overall, there are 28 questions in the quiz.
- The Milestones Birthday report gives information about what the coming of age and milestone birthdays are in different countries. It has 12 multiple choice questions.
- The New Year Celebrations report describes New Year Celebrations in English-speaking countries, Latin-American countries and Asian countries including Chinese New Year. It has 14 multiple choice questions.
This quiz is a nice follow up from the Celebrations Vocabulary and Gift Giving quizzes or as a stand alone quiz.
Take a look and leave your feedback at either of these stores
Posted in Reading and Vocabulary Quizzes |
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04/02/2013
Workflow lesson for describing and talking about food – beginners to advanced
Objective: To develop language for describing food in an oral and written context.
Elearning tools
Teaching and Learning Cycle
Building the context and vocabulary
- Name food items in supermarket advertisements, on excursions to the grocery store and in the Food Vocabulary Quiz.
- Identify food from the Englishinsider Food Vocabulary Pinterest board.
- Students create their own Pinterest food board based on a grocery list or ingredients for a recipe.
- Srudents create a Pinterest board for categories such as fruit, vegetables, dairy, meats etc.
- Collect and pin favourite recipes to share and talk about in pairs and small groups on a Pinterest board.
- Share photographs of food or meals they have cooked via Facebook.
- Search free recipe apps such as Epicurous and Taste to read recipes and become familiar with ingredient and cooking related words.
- Talk about the most common food items, ingredients and recipes from their own culture in pairs and small groups.
- Ask students to respond to questions about food from their own country by creating a Facebook poll
Modelling the text
- Identify and read main structural and language features of an online recipe – Ingredients, Method, food and cooking related vocabulary, action verbs, step by step instructions.
- Practice understanding recipes by completing Food Recipe Interactive Quiz 2, reading print or online recipes, watching online cooking shows and taking notes.
- Complete Food Report Interactive Quiz 3 and discuss the structure and language of reports.
Joint construction of text
- Watch Food Safari or another cooking show, take notes and re-write the recipe in pairs.
- Share the recipe by explaining it to another student.
- When the recipe is completely written, share it on Facebook. Documents can be uploaded to a Facebook Group page. In this way, a collection of recipes can be shared.
- Write a simple report on food in pairs after watching a food documentary.
Independent construction of text
- Student write a recipe by themselves and with the Camera function of the iPad record explaining the recipe.
- Upload video recording of student to a wiki, blog or Moodle or to Show Me.
- Survey students so that they self-assess their oral performance or conduct a peer to peer assessment.
- Students individually write a simple report describing food from their own culture and upload to wiki, blog or Moodle. Documents can also be uploaded to a Facebook Group page.
Posted in Workflow lessons |
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