Yesterday's class was pretty fun. I've been on wiki's before but never created one and I like the prospet of using it as a tool for our final project. I like how a lot of these technology programs are meant to increase and harness the power of communicating within an online forum. Similar to Twitter, Wiki's offer a great deal of resources for getting ones voice heard.
I thought James' presentation was well done. He highlighted some very interesting ideas of Twitter and am glad to say that I learned a fair bit. Although I wonder how effective it would be for providing vast amounts of authentic input? I see Twitter more as a great way of submitting/answering questions to the teacher or class. For spreading ideas and little bits of knowledge. I think that through other websites like facebook, twitter could be incorporated into the huge world of social-media sites.
I'm glad that I teamed up with Dira and Xu for the project. We work good together and have a lot of things in common. We decided that our topic of interest for the final project is "travel". I thought about this last night and like the idea of task-based instruction activities in which students would have to go and look up airline dates and prices on real travel websites like Orbitz or Priceline and answer a number of questions. They could also lookup the weather for their destinations and seek general information regarding popular places to vacation. I think this topic opens up a whole new world to task-based learning when combined with the internet for language enhancement. It's also given me some ideas on what I will do for my Technology Demonstration in two weeks.
The discussion that we had in class was a pretty good one. I enjoyed thinking about James' point on the R of RAT. I do admit that I somewhat disagree with the point that he made regarding using technology just to get used to it. That made me question the goals of a language course. You're not there to learn about computer programs etc...., although learning new programs could be a part of a thematic unit. I think that basic instructions on computer use should be save for a technology class like I had back in middle school. But, I see his point in accustoming students so that their level of anxiety lessens and more language can be utilized.
I'm replying to your post in reverse order. I don't know why.
ReplyDeleteI see your point about CALL, and I think I have been confusing amplification and replication. I learned that in the small discussion yesterday. I also like what you said about technology being a thematic unit. I've been thinking about the class I taught last semester. Students didn't come to that class to learn about health and wellness, but that's the content I taught, so I don't know.
You have a really interesting idea for an activity. I would have never considered using travel pricing websites, but I like it a lot.
Finally, good point about getting one's voice heard. This is definitely positive reinforcement for expressing oneself in class.
Thanks for the post, James. The thought of the online travel activity just popped into my head, since I search for random desitnations out of MSP... Yes, I know I'm a dork! But, I enjoy imagining that I can afford to go to those places hehe. $350 RT to Puerto Rico during December!!!! lol
ReplyDeleteAnyways, I see it as more Theme based than Task-based. Although, they would be doing task-based question/answer activities. I think this is just a prime example of what could potentially be done about any topic. If we were teaching something related to shopping, students could go onto walmart.com or bestbuy.com and price goodies that they wanted/needed. Anything along them using the Internet to amplify an activity that could be done with a magazine or a phonebook.
Good job with the presentation by the way.
I also want to emphasize how much can be done through collaboration. Interestingly enough, group assignments seem to be more easily done as graduate students but it's more difficult to accomplish as practising teachers. One must be intentional about collaboration then.
ReplyDeleteI am glad that our group got an excellent topic and some great outlines in mind. I also hope we won't face too many technical troubles during our wiki building process.
ReplyDeleteI can see your point, Esther. As teachers the challenge of working together intensifies because everyone is in "preofessional competition" with each other. While as students we don't know most things regarding many areas of ESL and therefore have an excuse to be unintentionally ignorant. lol
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