Reflection... Now, Voki speaks for me!

Linking!

A school links project is a project carried out by schools that are far-away. This project may have different purposes, but for me the main goal is connecting students with others that may have a different way of seeing the world.

There are different web tools that can help us develop a school links project. Some of them are eLanguages, ePals and iEARN. When carrying out a school links project, it’s important to bear in mind the aim of the project and the learning objectives.

I think school links projects are important since students can relate with peers from other cities or even countries and share their ideas about different topics. Students from both schools can develop their language skills in a non-traditional way that may be of interest for them. I’ve thought about school links projects before because I’ve attended a summer course in Greece in 2010 to learn Greek language and culture. This experience was really important for me and sharing it with other people made it even more significant. Since then, I believe that sharing a learning experience with other people that are learning too can be great fun and have excellent results for all the learners and teachers!

Hello Technology!

The course...

Técnicas Informáticas Aplicadas a la Enseñanza de la Lengua Extranjera helped me understand that technology can be applied to the classroom in different ways. Including technology doesn’t mean asking students to hand in a narrative printed or just listening to a song in class. Technology can be really interesting for students and for teachers. It can help us deal with different topics; there are a lot of web tools that can be used for it; games can also be part of a lesson and it doesn’t mean our class will be a mess. During this course, I’ve learned lots of things; I’ve realized that technology can help us develop a different way of learning; lessons don’t need to be boring or just rely on a course book. Now, I am in a position to re-think about my future practice and how I want it to be. We live in the 21^st century and technology is part of our lives, so why shouldn’t it be part of our lessons? If I keep exploring the different tools technology provides, I’ll probably learn lots of things and apply them to my lessons. There are many experts on the web that share their knowledge about technology in the class... This is really interesting and profitable, like the course!

I’m looking forward to learning more and incorporating ICT in my classes!!

ICT and the Curriculum... Everything can change!

This experience took place in Buenos Aires, Argentina. A teacher from a private school analyzed feedback from teachers and students, and felt that something needed to be changed in the way English was taught. She said that the problem began on the reliance on a course book when it came to deal with the subject. After a lot of reflection about this and consensus, the course book was abandoned and teachers began to design their curriculum and materials, taking into account the students' needs and interests.  This change was also aimed at integrating technology in the curriculum. The teacher implemented a project about digital storytelling that then was published online. Different web tools were used in order to carry out this project. For example, students selected some famous paintings and wrote a narrative "that linked the stories together." Then, with Windows Movie Maker, they created an animated slideshow and recorded the soundtrack for it. Another example is the recreation of part of "Midsummer Night's Dream" by Shakespeare using different tools, such as animated movie-making software Zimmer Twins.

In this case, TPCK was applied to change the curriculum. The topics (content knowledge) did not change; some of the activities (pedagogical knowledge) did change because of the addition of technology (technological knowledge). When it comes to SAMR model, we will see that the Redefinition level was achieved since the tasks that are given can only be accomplished by the use of technology (the teacher maybe thought of them before implementing this curriculum – she encouraged the use of technology in class - but because of the total reliance on the course book, they could not be put in practice.

Pigeonhole, Label, Neaten…

A PLN (Personal Learning Network) is a network of websites that you use for developing your learning. This can help you to be in contact with colleagues or even experts; find information of your interest in a simple way; and be up to date. On the Internet, we can find a lot of information; we should try to turn this information into knowledge by evaluating it and reflecting about it.

My PLN is relatively new but I’m finding it really useful! It consists of a blog, an account on Scoop.it and another account on Diigo. I think that it’ll expand since every day I learn about different web tools and websites that can help me!

Lessons don’t need to be boring!

Games can be great fun and they can help us to deal with different topics.

Including games in the classroom can be interesting not only for children but also for teachers. Students usually like playing and many times they learn a lot of things when doing so! Why shouldn't we take this and try to use it in our lessons? We can have a good time and learn a lot of vocabulary from games, for example. Lessons should be enjoyable for everybody. I think that teachers enjoy while teaching, so why shouldn't students enjoy during their learning process?
Now that I've read about it, I think that I will try gamify my lessons; I've never thought about it before. Now, I'm in a position to say that games are not a waste of time but another way of learning! Graham Stanley proposes on his blog a lot of games that you should try. I’ve tried “CharlesDickens’ London.” It’s really interesting to learn about him while playing! But… I’ve lost, so I’ll try again!

Topics + Organization = TO? No! Content Curation

Curation has to do with the selection, organization and documentation of things. This applied to content and technology can be really interesting. There are different tools with which we can archive digital assets. One of these tools is Scoop.it.

With this application you can bookmark articles, blogs, websites, etc, that you find interesting and organize them according to the topic they deal with. Moreover, you can follow other accounts; for example, you can follow experts in the topics you selected.

I find Scoop.it really interesting because I can have as many topics as I want and the page makes suggestions of different articles or websites I may find of interest.

My blog

Here goes a QR Code that should lead you to my blog!

Speaking skills

There are some web tools that are really interesting and useful when it comes to develop speaking skills.

One of them is Brainshark. This web tool allows people to add voice to your PowerPoint presentations.

Another web tool is Voxopop. It’s a good way to improve speaking skills and collaborative work.

The third one is Woices. This is an interesting tool to develop speaking competence and a different way to deal with geography.

Brainshark can be used in order to present the results of a research project. Students can make a PowerPoint presentation with the most important items of their projects. Then, they can add voice to it with Brainshark and share their presentations on their blogs so all their mates can see them at home.

Voxopop can be used for creating a story. You can set up a Voxopop account and start a talkgroup. Each student can have a specific day to record a part of the story. Before recording it, she/he will have to listen to what their mates uploaded.

Woices can be used in order to make small presentations of different places. Each student can be assigned a place to describe (features, weather, most important places to visit, etc.) and create a Woiceguide.

I’ve tried Woices! Here goes the link to my Woiceguide http://woicesguides.com/guides/488

Web Tools

Some days ago, I was reading my mate’s blogs and I found something that caught my attention… “Wordle”

This web tool creates “clouds” of words that can be used as kind of “brainstorming” during a lesson. In order to create a cloud, you can introduce an URL (from where the website will choose words) or a text. I think that giving students the same or different clouds made up with words from a story they know and ask them to write a new one can be really interesting; they are asked to be creative and original and, I think, for them this is a challenge (trying to create something completely different from the things they know).

Criteria:

* Availability: This web tool is for free; so everyone can have access to it.

* Digital Literacy: This is the capacity to efficiently and critically navigate, appraise and generate information using digital technologies. ‘Wordle’ can act as a tool to start thinking critically about a word, as the term literacy implies.

* Accessibility: This criterion has to do with whether the web tool can be used with different platforms. For using ‘Wordle,’ you only need Java applets.

* Prolonged use: This web tool can be used a lot of times since the content of the word cloud can vary according to the topic you are dealing with.

* Registration: There’s no need for registration.

* Security: In the FAQ section, there are some advices in order to report non-desirable content. However, the web tool lacks a moderator or filter.

* ‘Wordle’ is really easy to use and understand. The stages to create a word cloud are explained very well and they should not bring any problem.

So, let me present you my Wordle!

The words were taken from a narrative I wrote for the Language I course.

Twister!

TPCK in action!

This is a case of Cross Curricular Story Writing. At Terakki Foundation Schools (in Istanbul), a class worked on a writing project that involved not only the English department but also the art and ICT ones. The project consisted of “creating an audio-enabled talking book.” Children were asked to write a story based on two characters created by two of their mates; then, the ones that felt more confident when talking recorded it by using special software. After this, using another program, Adobe Creative Suite 5.5, the book was created and, finally, published as an e-book.

After this project, the class created a website that consists of different games in order “to help other children learn English.”

You can “read/listen” to this story via iBooks. Here goes the link https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bubble-and-pebble-story/id444909635?mt=8

And you can find these interactive games on http://www.bubbleandpebble.com/

In this case, we can see that TPCK is applied to the lessons. The teacher wanted to deal with common themes (content knowledge) through “fun-based activities” (pedagogical knowledge) and used different types of software to do so (technological knowledge). If we have a look at the SAMR Model, we'll see that the Redefinition level was achieved since this task could only be accomplished by the use of technology, and also because, probably, the teacher wouldn't have thought about it without technology.

This Cross Curricular Story Writing project is really interesting since students can see how different subjects are related. Technology, in this situation, was a tool that children not only used to learn but to help other children learn English. I think this is of great importance, because through this project of creating a website, students were asked to apply all their knowledge (TPCK!), be clear, creative and solidary. It is important to bear in mind that while we teach English in our lessons, we are giving our students different tools to exploit in different situations and we should lead them to be cooperative. Many times, technology can help us to do so… We only need to give it a try!

So many links to remember!

Diigo is a very useful tool since it lets you save different websites and have access to this list wherever you are; you don’t need to use the same computer you were using before!! This is great because if your computer isn’t working, all the websites you considered important and, therefore, saved on Diigo are there for you to consult (and there’s no need for you to look for them in the web again; just log into your account, look for the link and click!). The most interesting detail is that you can use tags to classify the websites, so they are really at hand (if you save a lot of them).

This is just one of the many things that you can do with this amazing website!

Hope you find Diigo as useful as I do!

TK or PK or CK?? All together... TPCK!

Twitter or Twister?

I think you can give the second one a whirl!!