Integrations Into English

Teachers and Computers

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Fri, 20 Oct 2006 11:55:03 PDT

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Teachers in the news

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Thu, 12 Oct 2006 22:15:24 PDT

Things happen just as fast in the world of academia as they do in the news. In fact, academia is an integral part of the news. Public schools are a part of our country, and therefore news about them, colleges, teachers, and other topics of education are important. Educational news is always changing and we need to stay "up" on it.

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WriteToMyBlog - Free Web Word Processor for your Blog

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Wed, 11 Oct 2006 05:18:03 PDT

Okay, so I was cruising web 2.0 sites and found writetomyblog. Before I go any further, I'll just show you an example.

(This is an Example Post Created Using WriteToMyBlog)

You can use WriteToMyBlog to get control over your posts. You can use headings, fonts, sizing, positing, color, highlights, wrapping, linking and so on. If you want more control over the way your Blog displays its content then use WriteToMyBlog , it's feature packed but still easy and familiar.

Are you a good speller? I'm a terrible speller, but it's a lot easier having our built-in AJAX multilingual spell checker. Didn't understand what I just said, don't worry all you need to know is it works. Try it out for yourself.

Heard of tagging? Get's a little tiresome having to insert the HTML code manually; we'll you can now tag the easy way, just type them in the tag field.

The Easy Way to Have Tables in Your Posts
WriteToMyBlog	Makes	Adding
Tables	To	Your
Blog	Posts	Easy!

It bills itself as "a free web word processor for your blog".

Okay so I was playing around with it for about an hour. I still haven't explored it fully, but found a few interesting tidbits I thought I'd share with you.

Seems great for people like me who need help improving the look of their blog posts. It seems like it has a pretty extensive list of formatting features.

Works terrific in Firefox(except be ready to disable adblock before you try inserting links or pictures).

One of the things I started wishing for immediately was firefox extension of this thing. But I'm going to test this out in ittybitty browser.

This is my first post, and really just a test, using writetomyblog, so I'm sorry for the lack of links and a more comprehensive review. I'll be sure to post a better review after I've had more time to play around with the service.

Tags: WriteToMyBlog, blog, blog+client

Interesting Integrations-theme based teaching

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Tue, 10 Oct 2006 03:33:59 PDT

TES ICT Blog: Videoconferencing in the classroom

By joedale

03 October 2006 at 10.30

Videoconferencing in the classroom

Videoconferencing can help promote real communication and global citizenship, says MFL teacher Joe Dale

Videoconferencing

has great potential for connecting classrooms anywhere in the world and motivating language learners in authentic conversation.

Educational establishments from primary to university level have been exploring the possibilities of the technology recently to allow learners to communicate with each other and share ideas in real time.

‘Whodunnit?’ is an article written by Primary Consultant, Alison McGregor in the Autumn 2006 ELL Bulletin

from The National Advisory Centre for Early Language Learning

(NACELL) about a videoconferencing event which took place in Oldham this year.

The article describes how Alison and the Oldham City Learning Centre

(CLC) supported local primary and secondary schools to use their videoconferencing equipment in a themed murder mystery day. Pupils got into the swing of things by:

dressing up in different disguises
questioning witnesses
making a photofit picture
working out the whereabouts of the murder suspects
making arrests

View full article...
Source blog
Simply put, theme based teaching is teaching around a theme. Let's say you choose eskimos. You may teach your students by showing a video on how they live, their language, history, the food they eat, the animals in their area(along with their biology), and have them write up their individual findings. Through thematic teaching you cover many different subjects in the same class, and it can be much more fun and engaging for your students.
I've found some great sources on the net that put this type of constructivist teaching to new heights, and through in my two-cents as well.

* Writely-Online word processor where multiple people can access and edit the same document
* Suprglu-site designed to organize multiple web sources into one page. Teachers could use this to organize all their students blogs into one page so they only need to go to one place to view everyones blogs.
* Chat programs-theirs many Instant Messenger programs out their and many children all over the world already use them, like:Yahoo IM, MSN messenger, ICQ, and AOL instant messenger. Thier are also many all-in-one messengers that allow you to speak to anyone regardless of what program they are using. One such program is Trillian. Many instant messengers today also come with a live videoconferencing option that is free to use.
* Youtube-video sharing site where students and teachers could upload video for anyone to view. Their are other similar sites like Vsocial. I just listed Youtube because it's one of the more popular video community sites out there. This service would be great to use when sharing lesson plans with others, and you can post the videos on your own site/blog.
* Wikispaces-many people are familiar with the online collaberate knowledge site Wikipedia, but you can also get your own free online wiki that lets you create and organize your own content. In most cases you can even costumize options like who can add to the site.
* Language translation-their are many sites out their that let you write letters and translate them into other languages, as well as translating whole sites. Here's just a few: Google Translations, babelfish, and Dictionary.com Translator.

I'm sure there are many more WEB 2.0 sites out there that let people share, collaborate, and communicate in many ways.
When we start learning how to better communicate and work with people all over the world, and at an early age, we are better prepared for the new global economy we live in.
I encourage you to read the full article and come back here and share your ideas and comments with me.
*edit*
Hilly mentions some things she learned from different cultures. I highlighted those selections from her blog post. I just wanted to add to my above example on things kids could learn from other cultures as they try to communicate and work together. Thematic teaching really is a powerfull tool.

Sumie Beach Camp

By hilly

The Sumie Beach Camp was a wonderful experience, each and everyone of us adults and kids learned a little something about a different country in those 2 days. I for one, learned about fishing with a gigantic net. We pulled the net in, in two separate teams. I even caught a fish bare handed! Granted, the poor fish was also stepped on accidentally by me while I was trying to catch it. It was rather freaky holding on to a live (but dying) fish - especially one that is barfing blood. eek!

Oh, and did you know that it takes 13 hours to get to London by plane from Japan? Or that 500 Euro is approximately 70,000 yen? And the Southern Cross is a part of the Australian flag? Those are some of the things we managed to glean from our country presentations. (Unfortunately, our American intro sucked in comparison to all the other countries... so much for not packing the night before and end up forgetting important stuff! すみません！)

(click on photo below for the set of photos)

This is me looking disgusted after I realized my fish was vomiting blood. Poor fishie. We ended up eating them deep fried with some awesome light batter... really yummy too!

NCLB update

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Sun, 08 Oct 2006 10:49:57 PDT

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More news on English as a second language

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Sun, 08 Oct 2006 09:27:37 PDT

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english esl , tesl ,
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ESL information

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Sun, 08 Oct 2006 09:02:31 PDT

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My new blog and changes to this one

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Sun, 07 May 2006 19:25:27 PDT

Maybe I'm getting carried away with this blogging thing, but semester's almost over so I think it's ok for now.

I started a Japanese history blog. It's mainly contained to video, but I will be providing audio(to give my 2 cents on videos I find), and pictures(photos, links, books, etc...).

I'm going to provide a voicemail and other interactive links so I can hear what other people think. I might mess up on the historical facts and it will be nice to give readers/viewers a way to 'correct' me:)

It's still really new, but here's a sneak peak(of sorts).

Japanese History Through Pictures

I'm also planning to make yet another blog, and move all the posts I keep making here, over to it. This has kind of turned into a less professional 'personal' blog, and I want to correct that.

Children of Japan 1941

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Sun, 30 Apr 2006 23:36:23 PDT

Dailymotion blogged video
Children of Japan 1941
Video sent by KumagayaRocks

I pulled this from www.dailymotion.com It's mildly interesting.
Children of Japan"
An instructional sound film produced by Erpi Classroom Films Inc,1941,10 min 33.
Source: http://www.archive.org

Plongeons-nous dans la paisible vie d'une famille japonaise de la classe moyenne au travers de la charmante famille Yamada et de ses enfants Yukiko et Taro.

New "Comfort Women" Squidoo lens

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Wed, 26 Apr 2006 11:40:35 PDT

I created a lens on the Comfort Women. It needs some tweaking, but much info is there already. I encourage everyone to check it out. I am trying to create information "stages" to appeal to a wide audience. For instance, the lens is for people that don't want to spend a lot of time learning about the women, yet there's links and resources they can visit if it piques there curious. I am also making another blog about them. I hope to have much more info on that site. I can't spread myself too thin between different blogs and such so much of what I'm doing will be a one time thing. Once I have the lens edited--that's it. Same with the blog. Although, with the blog, I will want to set up a comfortable atmosphere for people to supply comments and ask questions.

Comfort Women presentation coming soon

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Tue, 25 Apr 2006 00:08:01 PDT

OK, so I don't have the first presentation done...yet. Sue me:) But I will have it up soon, and I also have another presentation I'll be posting with a .doc file, pictures, and podcast.

As for an update on me. I'm almost done with my semester, and I will be taking one Pre-summer session course. It's a literature course on american romanticism.

...to hold you over

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Fri, 07 Apr 2006 22:35:55 PDT

I have some projects I'm working on in a couple classes. Presentations that I am "converting" for my blog, so You'll get an idea of what I'm doing for school this semester. With 3 literature classes, it's a lot of reading...a lot! Basically it's read and discuss, read and discuss, write paper, read and discuss.
I thought I'd put up this video to hold you over. I found this along time ago and liked it. What I think is special about this video is the lighting effects. Whoever did the lighting is amazing. There's a scene a good ways into the video that has all the colored lights and stage lights flashing like crazy and "glaring" on camera. At first your first reaction might be to squint(it's alot like seeing tons of camera bulbs going off in front of you. But it's amazing because you don't squint. It's actually all quite pleasant. I don't know how he managed the right amount of filters and such but it's really cool.

New Squidoo

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Tue, 04 Apr 2006 10:04:44 PDT

I found Squidoo and created a "lens" for Integrations Into English. I don't have a lot of stuff on it right now, except a pretty good booklist I started(pictures included). Check it out.

Near future plans

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Tue, 21 Mar 2006 13:54:13 PST

I've recorded one of my literature classes and thought I'd translate it into a lesson for the blog. I think I'm going to split it between 2 or 3 podcasts. I'm gathering pictures and video to go along with it. We went over a fictional story written about Japanese-American family dealing with being uprooted and sent to an internment camp. I got some great audio from a video played in class. It was just part of the video to give some background on what Japanese-Americans went through in America after the attack on Pearl Harbour. I'll be sure to mention my plans in the first of the podcasts on this subject, seeing as how I'll have a lot of media going along with the podcasts and I don't want the people downloading the podcasts remotely to be left out.

Also I wanted to get a little feedback, so I made a poll.

Tokyo video guide

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Tue, 14 Mar 2006 22:53:16 PST

As you should be able to tell by now...I'm really interested in Japanese culture, and those of you that have been listening to the podcast, you know I plan on moving there after I graduate.

I don't know how long it'll be before I see Tokyo(I'll be trying to settle a bit south of there, closer to Osaka) but I liked this clip.

IIE #04 "Scool is busy"

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Sun, 12 Mar 2006 20:54:03 PST

Finally, another podcast. I recorded this while fixing a late night snack. Thanks for being so patient while I was busy with college. I should have time to get another podcast out next week.

Direct Link

Here's the "how to" video on stirring that I mentioned in the podcast. Thanks to japancast.net where I found it.

Books, books, books

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 13:26:44 PST

I thought I'd post a picture of some of the books I read. I don't read all my books straight through. A lot of them are reference books and are more for me to 'refer' to from time to time. Although sometimes I do flip through them like a regular book. Plus I just want to keep everyone interested. I really haven't forgotten about the podcast. I've just been really busy. I'm in midterms and hopefully things will slow down enough, when there over, for me to work on a new podcast. Plus I'm really trying to get Integrations Into Eigo off the ground.

Quickclip of Japanese Garden

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Wed, 08 Mar 2006 12:27:37 PST

I thought this was a neat little video showing some details inside of a Japanese Garden

New English Teaching Method for Japanese

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Tue, 07 Mar 2006 16:14:19 PST

In this months Hiragana Times there's an article about a new English teaching method that has been garnering rave reviews in Japan. Professor Onishi who has a Japanese television show called "Haato de Kanjiru Eibunpou"(English Grammar Feeling By Heart) where he has been teaching english by throwing out the old boring grammar book. Instead of the traditional way of teaching the basics of grammar with a textbook, which has many students bored causing them to do poorly, Onishi uses what he refers to as teaching cores.

"Every grammatical part has one core, one essential, fundamental 'intuition.' Once you get the core you can use it to learn other smaller derivative points. You don't have to build up usages or memorize any rules, you just attack the core. It's a very efficient way of learning"

I have been looking around for info on the net. So far I've come up empty handed. If anyone knows any URL's or more info on this, I'd love to see it. I'm hoping to find an episode, clip, or even just some photos of professor Onishi or his show. I know that someone from NHK TV discovered him which had a great deal to do with him getting publicity. He's even having a series of new books published soon.

Also the late post comes from a combination of being busy with school, and google's server temporarily down during the one shorthttp://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=20609135 time I actually tried to post. So I've thrown in a couple Quickclips to keep you all happy, and coming back. These are two clips of the openings to "Densha Otoko" a new popular show in Japan about an Otaku who meets a beautiful woman and she starts to like him. I haven't watched the whole series but I may.

Have a good day and a great week!

Integrations Into Eigo "Update"

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Wed, 15 Feb 2006 10:53:55 PST

Hello, and welcome to this update of a future sister site to Integrations Into English called Integrations Into Eigo.

The site design is simple, and ready to use. However it is not ready to open.

I'm working on a series of vodcasts, as well as podcasts. I'm still working on the formats, and gathering the resources I need.

I have recently been practicing with video software. I should note: I do everything for free. I don't have the money(right now) to put into buying higher quality software or anything fancy. I made a preproduction video clip of a possible intro to the Integrations Into Eigo vodcast. I was aiming for "Goofy". I have a couple more ideas but I think this was a great start. Enjoy the short clip, and let me know what you think.

Lots of new stuff, but surprisingly...no audio:(

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Mon, 13 Feb 2006 13:47:52 PST

Yep, another week of no audio. Looks like I've gotta put some extra work into the podcast to make sure these mistakes don't happen so often.

I found this video from real english.

I actually found the video on Google video. I think it's a great example of teaching language acquisition. The more senses you involve increases the learning potential.

Another little video is of some young kids singing.

I think a large majority of American teachers teaching young kids in ESL are women. You can see that it must be fun and gives them a feeling of accomplishment, and they think the kids are cute, and so on and so forth. I myself will be happy to teach any age group. I think it's important to teach more people multiple languages but you need to look beyond that. You should always think about what's next. I don't just mean what's next for your class, or next assignment but what's the next big step. We need to learn how to constantly better language acquisition across the globe. We also need to keep in mind that we are also constantly improving our own education here at home, and apply that. You really have to take a lot of things into consideration. Bettering yourself and the world is more than just teaching a 4th grade class for 5-10 years. Think about the people who are moving and shaking the earth, and what they did to get where they are at(in any profession or education) You have to think big. I am looking forward to teaching ESL, but I will be thinking beyond that. About improving the educational standards, developing my own curriculum, ALWAYS learning more to better myself.

I am also thankful to places like google video, for now I can have video casts as well as just audio. I have a cheap little miniDV. It doesn't have a lot in the way of features, but I had bought it just for a simple point and shoot, so that's OK with me. I created a little cam test. I think I got some very good quality video out of the camera. It is a bit dark, but that's not the cameras fault. It was at night and pretty dark in the room already.

I really want to thank my listeners and everyone visiting the site for being so patient with me.

I've been pretty busy with classes. My literature classes all have me writing papers that are due around the same time. So I've been a little overwhelmed. It's a lot of reading, you know. Some fun, some not so fun. I've really enjoyed covering the book "The Woman Warrior" Written by a Chinese-American. I love Eastern culture. Specifically I concentrate my interest on Japanese culture, but I like other Eastern cultures as well, so It was fun to read.

I've started doing more with the blog. I've been slipping in more personal interests into it, and I think that's cool. It gives the blog, and podcast, a little more life.

I've also been working on my other site, and podcast--so I guess that AND my schooling has contributed to not having a podcast this week. Anyway, I had it pretty much set up, then I started discovering all the cool blogger skins available. So now I don't know. I found one that is kinda neat, but it just isn't functioning the way I'd hoped. I'm trying to get help with it, but it's kind of at a stand still right now. So I'm also still looking for another skin. The one I found, I became kind of attached to.

Finally I'll end this weeks post with a couple videos I found on human development. This is an introduction to a course being offered at Wheelo(c)k college.

Yeah, it's best use is for a student who is deciding whether or not to take the course. However it kinda talks about what I was just saying about learning, and continuing to learn. You may not see it explained right-out, but she talks about developement of a person(including the brain) Well if you start thinking about it and how a person develops throughout their life, you'll see how you need to present material to them. We can think, by seeing this video, that there's ways we are learning...how people learn, and that affects how we teach. It's not being cynical or thinking negative, or being pessimistic. It's actually taking everything into consideration and learning to get the most out of life, and how to better help individuals and the world.
Here is another video relating to the first that better explains what I'm trying to say with my very poor speaking(typing) skills

If you're confused at what I mean, or how I think this relates to the video, or anything else you want to ask, just leave me a question in the comments...or email it, or even better, it would be great to hear it, and play it on a future podcast, so you could call the voicemail.

OK well, that's it for today. I'll leave you with this one last video( a fun one). I don't understand enough Japanese, but it's pretty easy to tell from the video that it's impressions of what technology, and our lives, could be like in the near future. It shows different aspects of life-shopping, talking on phone, school, etc...each introducing some cool futuristic gadget. Totally fictional, mind you.

I look forward to hearing what you have to say, and I'll answer every single question I get.

Have a good day, and a great week!

Excellent Video of Japan

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Fri, 10 Feb 2006 07:16:06 PST

Dave let me share this. I should also mention I originally discovered it on Herro Flom Japan podcast

Dave is a photographer and his site is professorbright

Homework special #01

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Thu, 09 Feb 2006 13:11:00 PST

Take a look at this video:

Why is the latter part of the movie scene so funny, by American standards of humor?

Is it funny to other cultures? if yes, why?

And finally add any other thoughts you have.

IIE #03 "Integrations Into English Curriculum"

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Sun, 12 Mar 2006 20:32:13 PST

I'm very excited about this. Last semester I had the opportunity to propose developing a new type of curriculum for English. This is very preliminary and didn't even establish for what grade level, but what it did do is open up some doors. Of course there will be some things I can't do until I'm in Japan, but there's still a lot I can do now.

I now have the time and resources to work on another project I've been thinking about. Developing some ESL curriculum. Particularly some curriculum for teaching English in Japan. I'd prefer doing this work in Japan, but I'm just too excited about it to wait until I move. Besides, there's a lot of groundwork I can lay before I go, that will speed up the process.

One thing I want to do, that'll be a lot of fun(I think) is to use you guys/gals as my guinea pigs:)

I started using writely.com to create some online content, and I will continue to update it and post it on this blog. It will require me to talk somewhat to explain a lot of the content and help you better understand it, but that's what podcasts are for, rigtht?

What does this mean for my podcast? Well, it means I will be steering the content a little towards a Japanese audience, but it's still very important to keep in touch with an English speaking community.

Initially I'll be talking(in the podcast) about some of the things I've mentioned here, and more. I'd like to establish some connections with people teaching english in Japan. I'm going to be getting some of the newer curriculum being used in classrooms right now.

For now I posted a horrible mix of words and ideas in a recent document I created on writely.com These were random thoughts I just laid out the other night. I didn't really organize my thoughts so I know how unprofessional and childlike it seems, but that's part of the joy of sharing my work with you. You can watch it come alive and develop right before your eyes.

So without further delay, here's what I've written so far.
Integrations Into English

MP327 minutes
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IIE #03 "Delay"

noreply@blogger.com (Mobly) — Tue, 31 Jan 2006 20:44:02 PST

I'm very sorry, but because of the problems I'm having with the site, I have to postpone episode 3. I decided to wait until next week to release it. Again, I'm sorry, and I hope you will all return to hear episode 3 next week.

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