Computer-Assisted Language Learning: Insights for Language Teachers

Visual CVs in the English Classes: Writing for the 21 Century!!

noreply@blogger.com (Ammar Merhbi) — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 00:16:00 +0000

It's no question that the notion of literacy has transcended beyond the written word to include the combination of visuals and words. Writing skills has also evolved into the art of combining the written word with visuals such as images and videos. Our students themselves are disengaged from the writing and are more tuned in to the “Visual Word”.

For the past two years, I have turned the common CV assignments, part of the writing sessions with my grade 11 students, into Visual CV assignments. The results were remarkable, and I am writing this post to share it with you.

I was first fascinated by the visual CVs when I came across some. Professionals using PowerPoint + images + words to produce stunning visual CVs and resumes that stand out. I first did my own visual resume and decided that my students should also do it, besides their traditional paper CVs.

Students first wrote their traditional paper CVs which would serve as the basis for their Visual CVs. As high school students, they didn’t have enough experience or skills to make their CVs. So, I encouraged them to pretend they are now working in the profession they envision themselves doing and write down the experiences, education and skills that they would have gained along the way.

After they were done with the first part of their assignment, the paper CVs, I modeled some great visual Resumes. This gave the class enough material to discuss. They had to deconstruct those visual resumes, and we discussed what made them so communicative. By the end of the discussion, students came to realize that images mean more than words and that’s what they did.

Guided by their paper CVs each student chose keywords and turned them into images on their CVs. Each students started a Google presentation and shared it with me. This enabled me to give each one of them timely comments and suggestions. After they were done, each presented before the class and each shared his Visual CV on the internet. Below are some example of visual CV’s produced by my students.

Students were completely engaged. Their attitude towards writing has shifted to pleasure writing. Their motivation was heightened. But what was really remarkable is how low-achievers have improved in their writings. This is due to strengthening their willingness to communicate through not only text but also images using PowerPoint as a tool and the Google platform as a medium for communication and collaboration.

Engaging Students in an Animated Literature Trip in Google Earth

noreply@blogger.com (Ammar Merhbi) — Mon, 11 Jul 2011 13:54:00 +0000

Innovative educators are trying to engage students in their literature classes in books and literature works by using multimedia to address the students needs in the 21 century. One innovative technique is using the power of Google Earth and multimedia to take students in a 3D animated tour of one or more characters in the book that they are currently reading. Students would navigate the guided tour, already designed by the teacher and interact with the spatial environment of the characters. This post will give a glimpse of what Google Lit Trips is, why is it useful, and some useful links if you want to delve deeper Please refer to the list of links at the end of the post for everything you need to learn about Google Earth and doing Guided tours.

Scenario

Students are reading “Johnny Appleseed”. They are engaged in some kind of literature circles to discuss chapters, characters, and analysis of salient elements in the book. Teacher realizes that the plot includes many places where events occur. This, the teacher believes, gives some geographical aspect of the book that students need to explore to make more sense out of the book. So, the teacher decides to combine the power of technology , pedagogy, and content to engage students in a Google Lit Trips.

1- The teacher first makes a story Board to locate the places where the character has been, the information about the events that occur in that place, an image that might convey more on that place, some links perhaps, and reference to the pages or chapter in the book where these occur. To know more on how to make a story board for a Google Lit Trip please watch the video below.

How to Make a Storyboard for Google Lit Trip

2- The teacher goes to Google Earth and searches for the first location from the storyboard. The teacher places a place mark and adds more information on this place including page reference and selections from the book, image, and perhaps some links for the students to explore the place where the event has happened.

Watch the two tutorial videos below on how to design a Google Lit Trip and record a tour.

How to Create Google Lit Trip–Part I

How to Creat Google Lit trip- Part 2

3- The teacher then saves the KML file and shares it with the students to view the tour. Students would view the tour, referring to the book too, and explore the geographical locations. They would be engaged with the associated vocabulary for each place, the questions in query, etc.… and discuss with their peers.

Students from grade 2 till higher education can be engaged in Google Lit Trips based on the books they read. Take a look at an overview of “Grape of Wrath” Google Lit Trip.

Google Lit Trips are especially useful in exploring books that contain many geographical settings. Students would explore places in the book that were previously foreign to them. They would align the verbal and visual channels to be engaged in a memorable exploration of a literary work.

Tips and Links

One of the challenges that newcomers to Google Earth and Google Maps often encounter is how to decide to use the application and when to use it. This Google presentation summarizes the main features of each App.
Google has produced an interactive game to help beginners quickly understand how to use Earth. It’s the most interactive way to become familiar with Earth. Click here to go to Google Earth: Learn.
For beginning users of Google Earth, as well as advanced, Google Earth lessons is an outstanding resource.
The Google Lit Trip Website the most comprehensive Google Earth-based lessons resource. It cotains galleries and downloadable Google Lit Trip files from grades 5 to Higher education. Make sure you check it out and download some of those .kml files
GoogleEarthGoods is a great collection of resources for Google Earth and Maps.
Geo Education Classroom ideas
Google KML Gallery of tours

Ah, and don’t forget that Google Earth is not confined to the surface of our planet. You can make a tour guide on other planets of even on the sea surface !!!

Last Comment

I believe that educators should take it to the next step and make students themselves produce Google Lit Trips based on their explorations of the book. This, of course, depends of the students' prerequisites, age, and the aim of the lesson/course. If students collaboratively construct their own interpretation of the literary work with the aid of technology then I believe that this is the highest layer of interactivity and engagement, let alone the high order of thinking and collaborative skills that are honed by this approach.

Visualizing an LMs Discussion Forum: an insight into Student/teacher behavior

noreply@blogger.com (Ammar Merhbi) — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 17:20:00 +0000

I’ve lately come across SNAPP (Social Networks Adapting Pedagogical Practice). SNAPP

is a software tool that allows users to visualize the network of interactions resulting from discussion forum posts and replies. The network visualisations of forum interactions provide an opportunity for teachers to rapidly identify patterns of user behaviour – at any stage of course progression. SNAPP has been developed to extract all user interactions from various commercial and open source learning management systems (LMS) such as BlackBoard (including the former WebCT), and Moodle. SNAPP is compatible for both Mac and PC users and operates in Internet Explorer, Firefox and Safari.

Developed by the University of Wollongong, this sociogram can

visualize the discussion forum in an LMS (Blackboard, WEBCT, MOODLE, SAKAI..) and displays the student-student, teacher-student interaction in mind map. Names of students/teacher can be displayed. Also, each node size and link thickness refer to the frequency of the posts.

I gave it a try on one of discussion forum on one of my Moodle Websites with my students. I chose a a discussion forum at the beginning of the year where students had to post their first Hellos using Voki as their voice avatar, and they had to comment on each other’s post.

1. First, I Downloaded SNAPP

You have to fill in the required information before your submit for download. Then you need to choose the LMS type you work on from the drop down menu.

2. This took me to a new page where I dragged a bookmarklet onto my browser’s bookmark tool. I followed the steps depending on my internet browser(Firefox in this case). And yes, SNAPP resides on your internet browser and not a stand alone desktop application

3. Then, I went to the discussion forum of my Moodle Website. I made sure that the discussion forum is in the nested view so that SNAPP can read the posts.

4. I clicked the Bookmarklet

5. I scrolled down till the end of the nested discussion forum. I waited for a while. This might take longer time depending on internet connection and pc speed. Also, make sure that Java is installed on your browser. The visualization of the discussion forum will soon appear with contributor names, the connection of posts, the size of nodes and link connection depending on post frequency , and a menu of filtering options on the right.

You can also view the statistics and export it as GraphML format or VNA File format.

As you can see in the above discussion forum visualization, I, the teacher is in the middle of the web with the most posts and most interactions are between students and me, with some posts among students themselves.

This is a typical view of a discussion forum at the beginning of a course where students get to know each other and are reluctant to comment on each others’ post. This stage is where the teacher posts a lot. However, as the course goes along this discussion forum should change to reflect a different type of student behavior with a more student-student behavior, unless it is teacher-centered.

What this software can do is to reflect the student-student teacher-student interaction behavior in terms of links and frequency.

However, the software does not ensure that the discussion forum is engaging and fulfills the course requirements. A content analysis is needed for this.

SNAPP can be used as an insight into interaction behavior. For example, if one wants to explore teacher presence and social presence this might be useful. The teacher would for instance base some informed decision on how the behavior of interaction is shaping, is it teacher-centered? Is there a student who lurks and does not participate? Is there a pattern of discussion in particular stages in the course that should have been patterned otherwise?

What do you think? What other insights can we get from SNAPP?

The 4 E model for Pedagogical Technology

noreply@blogger.com (Ammar Merhbi) — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 23:38:00 +0000

If you look at the image on the left, you will notice the four key components of technology integration, what Collis & moonen (2002) refer to as key components of “flexible learning in a digital world”.

The components ( institution, implementation, pedagogy, and technology) are nested in each other, which means that each depends on and feeds from the other. The approach for the flexible learning can be seen in a top-down, that institution-wide to technological aspect, or in a bottom-up, that is from the technological aspect all the way up to the institution.

The 4 E Model as a Guide:

Collis & Moonen suggest a 4 E model that will guide anyone who wants to integrate flexible learning in each and all key components

Ease of use

Environment

Personal Engagement

Educational Effectiveness

Now, I will not go into details of the activity-flexibility abstract framework and its U pedagogical approach. All I want to focus on here is how the 4 E model would guide the teachers in adopting/adapting and using technology in their teaching contexts, be it a complex, core technology such as a CMS ( content-management system) or a complementary technology tool such as PowerPoint, word processor, or a web2.0 tool.

E for Ease of Use:

The ease of use of the technology tool can be viewed from the teacher’s and student’s perspective. Is the teacher capable to use the tool with relative ease and exploit it for the students’ benefits? Is the student able to use the tool easily so as to focus on the intended task and not on the tool features?

Are the activities associated with the tool easy to accomplish? Will the students easily work through the activities supported by the tool?

When a teacher decides to use this tool or that (X or Y) he/she should ask the question of : Is the tool easy to use? if not should there be an introductory activity to help students get the hang of it before using it for the subject or course?

E for Environment

Environment is a broad topic and it encompasses the educational institution or organization, the culture or socio-cultural aspect, and everything ( politics…) that affects holistically the adoption and adaption of the pedagogy and technology and the process of implementation.

Key questions such as : How does the educational institution, policy makers, or others in the position of power affect the implementation and use of technology and the associated pedagogy? Does the educational institution the teacher works in support the use of technology to enhance learning? or is he/she a pioneer?

In either case, the teacher who wishes to implement technology to enhance learning should not disregard the effect of the environment on the implementation process and should be keen on what is the best approach to use technology ( in-class access, home access, guided access, self-access…. )

E for personal Engagement

This E is tightly related to the teacher’s personal and professional engagement with the issue of technology in education and flexible learning as a whole. What drives some teachers to be engaged in technology to enhance learning? Is there any teaching beliefs behind that engagement? One should better gauge his or her beliefs on teaching with technology.

E for Educational Effectiveness

If a teacher decides to use a particular tool for learning and teaching, what is its educational effectiveness? The more the teacher sees that there is educational effectiveness, the more likely the teachers uses that tool. So, the underlying question here is: What is the pedagogical implication of this technological tool when exploited properly? How can technology enhance the learning process that was impossible or improbable before?

I believe that every teacher, administrator, or educational policy maker should be guided by the 4 E model not only in flexible learning but also in all technological pedagogies.

Now all you need to do is to select one tool that you used before with your students and compare it against the 4 E model. Do you think it was worth it using that tool? Do you think it added anything worthwhile to the learning process and outcome?

Reference: Collis & Moonen (2002). Flexible Learning in a Digital World. Routledge

Professional Learning Networks for Teachers

noreply@blogger.com (Ammar Merhbi) — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 11:12:00 +0000

Many language teachers are more and more comfortable with technology in their daily mundane life though most do not infuse their technology into the classroom context. This is probably due to the fear of taking risks and experimenting in the classroom. Those same teachers log on everyday online and socialize with friends and colleagues. But that’s just about it. With the increase use of web2.0 technology in all aspects of communications, educators around the world can link with each other to share beliefs, ideas, resources, and innovations in education.

In my teaching context teachers log online everyday, for hours, to socialize and check on other people’s news and updates. Social networking has been largely adopted, often with ease, by all educators, whether tech comfy/savvy or not ( e.g. Facebook, MySpace, Hi5, twitter, and others…). If a teacher logs online for educational purposes, he/she acts as a passive participant. Common behaviors include downloading resources such as worksheets, videos, etc…

From social networking software appeared the professional learning network. It is a network of educators who share knowledge together, sometimes in a collaborative mode. The teacher is now able to open up to the wider international educators to enrich his/her and benefit other teachers with this socio-cultural approach.

Professional/Personal Learning Networks

The best professional learning networks are usually social networking environments and micro blogging.

Social networking environments

To me Ning is at the top of the list here ( though others like Facebook has potentials). Ning is a social environment where like-minded people can share ideas and discuss on what interests them.

Classroom20 is one great PLN ( professional/personal learning network) where educators all around the globe join in for one reason “How to improve education, especially with the use of web2.0.”

The Arcal and Webhead Learning Hub is a network of teachers helping other teachers integrate ICT in their teaching. The eflclassroom is another edu ning network where ELTs collaborate and discuss issues that concerns them as English language teachers and educator. Eflclassoom is abundant with resources for the English teacher. However, that best resource is the discussion that goes on between teachers.

There are also special interest education networks like ning in education ( Best practices on using ning for educational purposes), Technology Integration in Education ( Sharing and discussing best ways on integrating technology in the classroom), The Future of Education ( charting the course of teaching an learning in a networked world)), learncentral ( asynchronous social networking and the ability to store, organize, and find educational resources with the live, online meeting and collaboration provided by Elluminate technology), Games in Education ( use of electronic games in pedagogical context), and IATEFL learning technologies to name a few …

Microblogging : Twitter

is considered by educators the best PLN as it enables educators to share resources and discuss issues in a 140 character message. When an educator first starts tweeting her/she does not fell the significance of twitter until he/she follow other educators’ updates and those in return follow his/hers.
I have seen educators who wanted to start tweeting but couldn’t find educators to follow . C4lpt provides a directory of learning professionals who have online presence and are active participants. Notice that most professionals have twitter accounts. So this is a place to start. Follow these professionals and read their updates, retweet them, reply to them, and update your status frequently ( at least for the first few months) and you can have a faithful PLN who are willing to answer any questions that concern you.
There are also discussions or chats that educators hold frequently like #edchat and #edtech where educators focus on one topic to explore.

caveat

As an educator, you should know that working in isolation does not benefit you, your students, or your educational institution. In addition, being a passive educator only observing educators sharing their ideas without stepping in does not help much in your professional development. One can be educated and trained but not developed by someone else. Development comes from within. That is why you as an educator, in order to actively build a community of practice, should be an active participant, whenever you can, in your PLN in order to maximize your benefit.

Technorati Tags: social networking,twitter,microblogging,PLN

A Presentation Tool that Might Just Put an End to Power Point

noreply@blogger.com (Ammar Merhbi) — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 11:21:00 +0000

Prezi is a new kind of presentation tool that might just put an end to power point presentations. Prezi simulates how the human mind works, that is, non-linearly, opposed to the power point linear presentation. The human brain thinks faster than the presenter talks and thus focuses the attention to one aspect of the presentation. In addition, our minds think in a web-like directions. This is where power point stifles our way of thinking. Power point presentations were attacked continuously as making the audience “stupid” especially with it famous bulleted points.

Prezi presentation rationale is simple. The ideas presented are laid out on a map and the presenter focuses on the idea he or she wants to present ( including media) by focusing on that idea non-linearly.

The presentation embedded below shows on sample I did on one course. The navigation can be set to my restricted navigation path or to your own preference. In this case, I set up the navigation path to my own preference, that is, the ideas I am focusing on.

The above is intended as an example and not by any means a clarifications of concepts.

Prezi is really easy to construct ( took me 1 hour to learn the navigation and construct the above presentation). For a free account you are able to construct your prezi presentation online and embed/share or download your presentation on you pc. If you upgrade to a pro account you will be able to download the prezi software to your pc to construct your presentation offline.

How to use it with our Language Learners

Well, you could do number of things:

You could present the ideas of a literary piece you’ve been discussing in class and how characters/actions/causes are related
You can have students present a certain problem with solution to.
You can have a group of students edit the same prezi presentation for a project.
You can present or have students present their understanding of a vocabulary word and its derivative/collocations/usage….

You can do numerous things with prezi as you already do with your power point presentations only that your presentation will be consistent with your students’ way of thinking.

So why not have a go for prezi and share your experience here! :)

Largest Web-based, Genre-balanced English Corpus (COCA): A Tutorial and Suggestions for Classroom Use

noreply@blogger.com (Ammar Merhbi) — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 15:14:00 +0000

Corpus of Contemporary American English was released on the web in 2008 with more than 400 million words of corpus, the largest free web-based corpus. However, what makes this corpus special is not its enormous size but its :

1- genre-balanced search ability , as you can look up the word or collocation in any genre available ( or in all) and compare between spoken, fiction, popular magazines, newspapers, and academic, or even between sub-genres (or domains), such as movie scripts, sports magazines, newspaper editorial, or scientific journals

2- over time search, as you can compare different years from 1990 to the present time

3- “.. semantically-based queries of the corpus. For example, you can contrast and compare the collocates of two related words (little/small, democrats/republicans, men/women), to determine the difference in meaning or use between these words [ also how each is used in different genres]”

4- interface, as you can easily conduct searches between all genres and years. You can have your search result listed as frequency or relevance or as a chart. All of this is made possible because of the window frames.

Frame 1 : Navigation

Frame2: Query Result (including frequency and word collocation)

Frame3: The query in context (Key Word in Context) and the source text extract.

5- Great tutorial that takes about 5 mins to complete. Help is always there if you need it.

The following video is a tutorial to show you how to use COCA and its great features.( Please use your headphones as the audio volume is low)

How to use it in the language classroom

1- You could do a vocabulary activity sheet same as the one embedded below. In such worksheet you turn the students’ attention to how words are used in authentic language and how each word behaves in a given sentence ( collocation with words but not with/more than others). You can also have students notice the nuance of difference between seemingly synonymous words and how each collocates with different words.

The worksheet below was constructed using COCA as a pre-reading vocabulary activity where students were introduced to new lexis in context and asked to use context clues to figure out the meaning and asked about the collocation of each as well as semantic and syntactic significance of each.
vocabulary activity sheetgrade 8 mokey;s paw

2- You could do word part analysis worksheet where students practice on prefix or root words of new vocabulary to result in noticing of how words are formed. The document below was also constructed using the COCA and the wildcard (*) as a query ( I searched for the the prefix*, e.g. circum* to result in all words that start with circum-). After students formed the words ( working in pairs) they filled in the blanks with the appropriate words in sentences cited from corpus. As such, students experimented with new vocabulary not in isolation but in authentic language.

prefix activity sheet

3- You could have students derive a certain grammatical rule for the word “any” for example and when it is used. The options for using it in the classroom are endless.

Preparing corpus and concordancing for classroom use takes time and effort, and training for teachers/students too. The result is definitely one of satisfaction and enhancement of language learning as it is now learned using authentic language. Not only it changes the role of the students to a language explorer but also it aids in understanding English language ( from teachers’ and students’ perspective) like never before.

I hope this post was helpful enough :)

Any comments, suggestions, or queries are welcome in the comment feature.

An Engaging Online Gradebook Suite

noreply@blogger.com (Ammar Merhbi) — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 13:59:00 +0000

I know this post is not relevant to computer-assisted language teaching, but I thought this will help educators like me to manage their gradebooks easily and in a secure environment.

I have heard of engrade a while before from many educators on my PLN like twitter, Classroom2.0 … . So now I decided to give it try as I was concerned about the continuity, sustainability, security, and privacy of engrade since it is free for educators ( we always have the feeling that free means insecure:)

The interface of engrade is great and it really engages the teacher, student, and parents in the ongoing student assessment. Teachers can have students and their parents see their grades on engrade by supplying them with student access only. In addition to its excellent computational assistance of grade averages, engrade enables teachers to :

upload files for students and parents
comment on a particular student’s academic progress for students and parents to see, as an ongoing evaluation. This makes parents more envolved in their children’s academic endeavours.
Construct classes as much as they need
send direct messages to parents/students

Engrade website has a great demo video for those who consider using their services, click to view the demo before you proceed reading:)

Here is another registration demo screen casted by an educator.

OK Then, What about Security, Sustainability, and Privacy?

Website says that thousands of teachers have used it and not a single breach was reported. They claim that their servers are secure and that website will continue to be free. The people behind the website also claim that teachers’ classes and grades are absolutely private. How about that :) . You can access their security policy here and their privacy policy here.

Teachers and administrators should be cautious though as to keep their passwords secure and change them once in a while.

I was informed by my educators on my PLN that they have used engrade for quite a time now and that it is secure, safe, and engages parents and students in students’ assessment.

Try it and tell me what you think! If you had the chance to try engrade before, please do share your experience to inform us.

I will definitely go paperless this year and use engrade for a change from Excel and Microsoft’s free Classroomgradebook.

A Great Tool to Improve Students' Vocabulary: An Alternative to Wordle

noreply@blogger.com (Ammar Merhbi) — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 22:07:00 +0000

I am sure all of you by now know Wordle and its great implications in ESL/EFL. Wordle- a word cloud that displays words of a text, website, or Delicious visually and according to a word's frequency- has become a favorite tool for English teachers to teach text genres, vocabulary building, and much more. Teachers all around the globe build activities around Wordle to result in enhanced language learning. If you would like to read more about Wordle and activities that can be built around it, I recommend you read Nik Peachey's Post. He also provides a tutorial on how to start with Wordle.

However, there is another web-based tool that is based on vocabulary acquisition theories rather than technical aspects. This web-based word cloud tool is

. Now, to be honest wordsift is not visually appealing as wordle is and it is not customizable with regard to 1- words displayed in word cloud, 2- word cloud appearance, and 3- options of text input. Yet, it does render a great way to enhance vocabulary learning based on methodological framewrok.

Getting Started with Wordsift

As with wordle, worsift does not need any registration. The video below demonstrates how to use Wordsift.

As you have noticed in the video above, wordsift renders excellent representation of a particular word in text.

1- Frequency of each word in text is represented by its size.

2- Marks the words present in frequent word lists of AWL, lang.arts, Science, math, social studies

3- Word associations and definition of the chosen word are displayed in the virtual thesaurus .

4- Still photos associated with the chosen word "freedom" are displayed.

5- Videos associated with the chosen word are hidden so as not to distract the student unless the student chooses to watch the videos to have a better understanding.

How to Use It with Your Students

You can have students look up a particular word from an article they've copied and see how this word is used in context or how the meaning of the word differs from one sentence to another by examining the occurrences of the word in context.

You can have students utilize the words associated with the chosen word in the virtual thesaurus ( synonyms, antonyms) by replacing the word in context to see if it makes sense or choose the best synonym to replace it.

You can, for example, have students analyze the genre ( speech, poem. academic article, scientific article..) of an unknown text by looking at the word frequency and examine whether this text contains words that are listed in the AWL or math word frequency lists.

You can get creative and have students explain a particular word using the the visual representations in wordsift and another design tool such as glogster to poster a representation of the word with media.

The activities that you can do with wordsift are endless. As I always stress, the teacher is a designer who can create various activities that target various linguistic skills utilizing a particular tool.

Theory Behind Wordsift
Wordsift was developed by Stanford University ELL Resources. The theory behind wordsift states that

“ Vocabulary is a central arena in which the discrete skills of reading (decoding, sight-word recognition, reading fluency and accuracy) come together with top-down cognitive processes involved in comprehension…
…deficits in vocabulary knowledge and the semantic knowledge that it represents may be the most widely shared problem among struggling adolescent readers…
WordSift thus attempts to address one of the greatest challenges facing educators of English Language Learners: how to grow and enrich the academic vocabulary of their students across the grade levels, and especially through academic content instruction. Educators specializing in English Language Learners are faced with a substantial group of students who are “stuck” at the intermediate level of English language proficiency, leading to labels such as long-term ELLs or “lifers”.
Language development needs to occur in context, and content area learning provides the best context for it to occur.
A key challenge is to help content teachers define a new identity for themselves -- as a language teacher of their discipline. “

You can access the full text of the theory here.
If you have any comments, inquiries or you want to share you experience on wordsift your comments are most welcome.

My Top 10 Learning Tools for 2009

noreply@blogger.com (Ammar Merhbi) — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 13:01:00 +0000

This post is a contribution to c4lpt’s call for learning professionals to contribute their Top 10 Tools for Learning. Well, here it goes, not in order of preference.

Mindomo is a an excellent online mind mapping software that supports critical thinking. It is highly customized for education. Educators can embed their own maps in any website or blog. Students can use it with ease due to its user-/student-friendly interface. Students and educators can share and organize researches in an “interrelated form”.
Etherpad is a great web-based word processor. The great thing about it is that you can edit the same document in real-time and you don’t need to register. Just invite and share the unique url. This is great with regard to teaching and learning in real-time. Teachers, colleagues, and students can collaborate on the same word processor in real-time. Another great feature of etherpad is that you can export or import to and form MS word, PDF, and Open Document. (scriblink is another real-time WP sharing but not as flexible as etherpad).
Twitter doesn’t need an introduction and is the most well known microblogging platform in the world. A lot of learning projects were based on twitter. The implications for learning in twitter are endless, both for the professional and student. Jane Hart has a list of 10 twitter resources for classroom use on her blog if you wish to explore the learning implications of twitter.
Wikispaces is still my preferred tool when it comes to collaborate on projects. This wiki platform makes it possible for the teacher to engage students on a wide range of projects. Wikis in general tend to be chaotic so the teacher should be a constant regulator of the wiki project.
Diigo is a web-based social annotation software that I have included in the top 10 tools instead of delicious due to its learning implications. Diigo users can annotate any piece of information in any website and share their notes and comments. This has great implications for online critical reading skills.
Simplybox is a relatively new tool where a user simply boxes an info. on the web he wants to share and add to his account to share and annotate with other users.
Hotpotatoes is a free authoring software that produces highly effective interactive exercises and quizzes, especially for language learners. It has been and still is my favorite authoring tool. It is also SCORM compliant.
Microsoft’s free Learning Content Development System is yet another great authoring tool that produces professional-looking courses online (SCORM compliant) or on CD’s.
Google Docs should not be excluded form this list. Google Docs makes it possible for users to create, share ( link or embed) , and edit documents, presentations, and spreadsheets with great easy. Google Docs is highly efficient with regard to teaching and learning. Google Docs also makes it possible to conduct an online form. Great tool!
Pageflakes is an RSS reader very similar to netvibes and igoogle. Some call them the PLE as they are customized to the preference of the learner following website and blogs. What I like about pageflakes is its great user-friendly interface, customizable pages, and pagecasts that you can share with anyone. You can see an example of one user’s pagecast here.

Well, that’s it. This is my top 10 learning tools list for 2009. Of course other tools are abundant and probably deliver the same learning outcomes as the ones mentioned above. The main notion is that what you, as an educator, can do with these tools to enhance learning.

What is Web2.0? How Are Web2.0 Technologies Used in Education and Language Learning?

noreply@blogger.com (Ammar Merhbi) — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 19:17:00 +0000

I was approached by many educators in my teaching context asking about web2.0. What is it? Why is it called web2.0? Intuitively because there was a web 1.0 :)
To explain what web2.0 is, I should show you what web1.0 is and how they differ and how web2.0 affords an innovative learning based on collaboration and sharing of knowledge.
The model below roughly shows how web1.0 differs from web2.0.

Web1.0 refers to :

slow connection (modem)
HTML websites
One to many communication
Static Websites

Web1.0 companies present on their websites and users read the information with little communication between the two.
Web1.0 was used in education and language learning for drills and practice. The “drill” and “practice” nouns lend themselves well to behaviorist theory of learning. It can be seen as the PP approach too where PP refers to Present then Practice. The website Presents and learners, especially language learner, Practice but with little or no third P (Produce).
Web2.0, however, has arrived due to technological advances.

Some of web2.0 features are:

fast internet connection (dsl, fiber optics, cables)
Websites based on Advanced coding and languages such as XHTMl , ajax, Ruby on the Rails
many to many users ( The website supplies the platform and users create content)
dynamic websites including comments features, sharing files and multimedia
rss aggregation
little knowledge of html on part of the users to be able to supply content

An impressive range of web2.0 collection of websites can be found at http://go2web20.net .
The most important feature of web2.0 is that users can collaborate and build on each others’ knowledge. If you access the internet now, you would find unlimited amount of information that would not be possible without users pouring their contents;Therefore the term, user-generated content!! Website companies then rely on the user for their success. The more users generate content, the more the website company is successful.
I am sure that all of you now generate content in the web2.0. Social networking websites such as facebook, myspace, and ning; photo sharing websites such as flickr; social bookmarking websites such as delicious and diigo; professional netoworking websites such as linkdein; video sharing websites such as youtube and vimeo and much more rely on the user, you, to ensure their success. In fact you can hardly now see any website that is static termed as web1.0.
The following collage shows some of the most famous web2.0 applications. The collage was created using Picasa, a free photo editing application owned by Google.

How Is Web2.0 Used in Education and Language Learning?
The increasing presence of the internet in schools and at home encouraged educators to harness the power of web2.0, which is web based and needs access to the internet. The good thing is that web2.0 applications are free!! At least most of them are:)
Students can collaborate on projects, create images, edit videos, write blogs, and share bookmarks using web2.0. Yet, web2.0 is a tool and teachers should know how to harness its power based on methodology and research and not on technological aspects. Moreover, like any tool, web2.0 tools are diverse and each tool lends itself to a language skill or, in case of overall education, lends itself to particular subjects.
The following table lists a sample of some of the most famous established and emergent web2.0 tools and what linguistic skills or any other skill each tool affords, under the guidance of the teacher.

( Click each logo to link to its website).

*Web2.0 Tool*	*Features*	*Implications for Language Learning*
Wikis	A wiki is a website where it is possible for members to modify content easily. Members can edit and modify each others’ input. Wikis usually are chaotic so it is advised that the teacher moderate it and modify what is not relevant or inappropriate.	Students can use it to collaborate on projects. For instance, they can start a book project where they initiate the idea of the book and edit for each other, add content, correct, and collaborate. Wikis lend themselves specifically for writing skills. The final product can be made public for the world to see. This gives motivation for students in learning.
Podcasts	A website where users create and upload podcasts. Podcasts are audio recorded by any digital recorder or using a pc and a mic. Major universities and educational institutions have podcasts ready to download.	Language teachers can use it with their students to enhance pronunciation, communication, and motivation. Students can, for instance, interview any of their classmates, teachers, staff, or any other person on a certain issue. They can even start a school radio station as some schools have lately done. The audio input on the pc can be edited using an audio editing software such as audacity, an open source free audio editing tool that rivals commercial editing software. Podcast can be shared on the internet and downloaded to PCs or mobile devices such as iphone. Teachers can also podcast whole lessons and lectures for their students to listen on-the-move http://www.podcastdirectory.com/ is a directory for most podcasts (also called internet radio)
Blogging	A blog is the blending of two word web and log.Posts by users appear in a reverse chronological order .Blogging needs no html knowledge and some of its features are the ability of commenting on posts, installing plugins and widgets, embedding videos… Websites can install a blog onto their servers now to make them dynamic and interact with users. The best known blogging software is the free wordpres.	Language teachers can have students start their own blogs. Each blog should discuss a certain issue ,e.g. hiking, music, tv shows, technology, and much more. Teachers can also set up a class blog and make students members so they can post and comment on each others’ posts. Students can share learning resources, aid each other, and share links to websites. Blogging helps students with writing and reading skills. It , as well, provides students with real international audience who can comment on their posts.
Microblogging	Microblogging is blogging with a limited number of characters. The best know microbloggin platform is twitter where any user can tweet a 140 characters. The simple question of twitter is “What are you doing now?” Tweeting can ranger from silly updates such as “ I am sleepy now” to significant tweets such as “ US Department of Edu. research finds that online learning beats f2f (link to website)”. In twitter, the user can follow the updates of whoever he or she wants. Twitter has become so famous that even Oprah, President Obahama, and Queen Rania tweet.	Students can tweet on their current status and can share what they discovered on the WWW using the link feature or even reflect on their own learning. They can be given the choice to follow their favorite singers’ updates for example then create a report on their current lives. Microblogging has been proven by research that it enhances writing, and cognition. Edmodo is a microblogging platform designed specifically for education. If you wan to know more on edmodo read my earlier post.
Social Networking	These are websites that provide platform for users to create their own network of friends and other users of mutual interest. Users range from professionals to primary school students. Each user can share, discuss, and comment on their connection’s activities, updates, blogs, videos, or photos. Users can share files and multimedia form all over the globe. one example of a ning professional network is classroom20 where 25000+ teachers share and collaborate on issues related on using technology in education.	Students can create their own social network in facebook and myspace. They can interact with other users using features such as commenting, updating, tagging photos and videos. Ning is a social network that lends itself to education more than the above ones. Teachers can setup private networks or public where students meet and collaborate on learning issues. Social networking not only enhances learners’ writing and reading skills but also it motivates them and increases their interculturality.

The above table lists only a slim portion of the available web2.0 tools. I shall list a more comprehensive web2.0 tools in a later post. Teachers should be aware that students should be trained on the above tools before including them in education and the language curriculum. Web2.0 technology has been proven to increase learner autonomy, creativity , and interactivity.
I hope this post was useful to language teachers and educators who are novice at implementing technology in their teaching contexts.
Your comments are always welcome. If you want to share your own experience of any web2.0 tool in your teaching context please do share !!!

Edmodo: A Microblogging Educational Platform

noreply@blogger.com (Ammar Merhbi) — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 06:45:00 +0000

I’ve been aware of edmodo for quite a time now though I have never had the chance to use it with my students yet, as the scholastic year did not start yet.
What is Edmodo?
We all know twitter as a social networking platform and a microblogging platform for language learners right!!! The thing is that twitter does not have the security that our students need for safe microblogging. This is where edmodo comes in with its enhanced new features.

Simply put, Edmodo is a microblogging platform for education. You notice this on the home page of edmodo where there you can sign up as a teacher or a student.

Once you enter as a teacher you have to create an account to use edmodo. Your pesonal page contains all the features you need to connect with your students. You can upload assignments with files, link to urls, embed videos, or post a note.
The security in edmodo is that you have to create a group to connect to. Once this is done, you are given a code which in turn you give to your students. So, when your students enter edmodo as “student” they will be asked about the code which they should insert.
The following video is a tutorial to introduce you to the features of Edmodo.

How Can You Use It with Your Students?

You can make it as means to deliver assignments and notes
Students can use it as a microblogging platform. The same as twitter. As a result, you can build a task around it. For example, you can assign a task for students to accomplish such as researching on the internet and share what they found out using the link , embed, and file sharing features.
It is great especially for absent students. You can share the worksheet done in class and deliver the assignment at the student’s fingertips so her or she would’nt fall behind.

Try Edmodo now and share you ideas if you have an other creative use for it with you students.
Your comments, as always, are welcome.

Integrating a Web-based Concordance in Word Processor as Part of Teacher Feedback on Students’ Writing

noreply@blogger.com (Ammar Merhbi) — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 08:13:00 +0000

IN an earlier post I mentioned the positive effects the generic tool- the word processor- has in improving language learners’ writing skills. I also described how to use the ‘comment’ feature in MS Word as a teacher feedback (or peer response) on a language learner writing piece.
This post will take it a step further by exploiting the ‘comment’ feature, hyperlink, and a web-based concordance as an innovative writing and linguistic feedback. The web-based concordance that I chose is http://www.lextutor.ca/concordancers/concord_e.html. The reason for that is the simplicity and flexibility of such a concordance that gives the language learner, or researcher the ease to analyze a certain collocation or language use. One can choose from drop down menus the kind of corpus included ( Brow, BNC written or spoken or both depending on the query or correction context). One can choose the number of lines that the concordance turns out since so many lines might confuse the language learner/researcher. The concordance can also be used by a teacher with “Gapped” option for learners to practice gap filling.
How to integrate the web-based concordance in MS word?
1. First, highlight the linguistic or writing error and use the “comment “ feature to insert a comment.

2. Go to http://www.lextutor.ca/concordancers/concord_e.html. Now you need to prepare the concordance to target the writing error above ( verb-noun collocation ). To get the best results you should enter “the lights” in the “keywords” box and not the word “lights”. The reason for that is you are searching for the right collocation of the verb and noun, in this case “lights”, but if you enter “lights” without the article “the” the concordance will search for instance of “lights” as a verb too and not as noun as you intend. Now you should choose in which corpus you should search the instances of the collocation. Since this is a writing assignment, I chose the “Brown Corpus”. You can choose another corpus that fits in the targeted linguistic error, but make sure it does result in useful pattern that the language learner can notice the correction.

Make sure also that you set the output lines to “20” because you do not want you student to get lost with all these line if it should result in “100” patterns of the collocation.
3. Now click the “Get concordance” button.A new page will open with the pattern of the word in question. Click here if you want to see .

The patterns show that “the lights” collocates with : switch on, light all, refocusing of, went out, are switched by, have failed, seeing the lights still on, go on, came up. So “the lights” does not collocate with “open”.

4. If you think that this pattern output is adequate, click back to the main page where you inserted the keyword with the corpus that you selected, then click at the bottom of the page”show full URL”. A link should appear in the box. You can then click “test URL” just to make sure that this is the right one. After that you can click “Select URL” then “Ctrl+C” to copy URL.

5. Now go back to your student’s document where you already inserted the comment. Highlight “click here to find out”, then right click and scroll to “hyperlink”.
Click “hyperlink”. A new window will appear. You should then “paste” the URL that you copied from the website ( click in the address bar then “Ctrl+v”) to paste. Then click “ok”. Now your comment links to the concordance that you prepared.

So why do we use it with our students instead of correcting the error?

Students will notice their errors by involving them in their correction instead of doing the correction for them. In most cases, in my experience, students will disregard the teacher’s comments or corrections.
Students are exposed to authentic language exemplars.
Students will become more autonomous, relying on themselves to do the correction instead of the teacher. The presence and the role of the teacher is not at all diminished.
The role of the students changes from that of receptive individuals to that of inquiring individuals, researchers of language.

Some words of caution:

Teacher should at all times monitor students’ self-corrections as some students could not find out what to correct and what to look for.
Training on corpus linguistics/concordancing in the classroom is extremely important before implementing it in writing assignments. Students should know what to look for in patterns to derive the rule/correction.
It takes time on behalf of the teacher to prepare the concordance, but it is worthwhile.

That’s it!! If you need any assistance or would like to comment on this post please do so in the comment box. Your comments are highly appreciated.
Ammar

Corpus Linguistics, Concordance and Data-Driven Learning: An innovative Language Teaching Approach!

noreply@blogger.com (Ammar Merhbi) — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 21:23:00 +0000

Technorati Tags: concordance,data-driven learning,corpus linguistics

The Corpus linguistics refers to a body of text. This text can be written or spoken or a combination of both. Corpora ( plural of corpus) can be based on brief text on a narrow topic or can run into millions of words such as BNC ( British National Corpus, a 100- million words of British English) or Cobuild Corpus.
To access, or make use of a corpus one should use a concordancer to look at linguistic patterns. A concordancer is a software that show instances of words in a body of text. In addition, it allows to show collocations and frequencies of words. This approach can be called Key word in context ( KWIK). Now web-based concordancers are being increasingly available, such as Cobuild and lextutor.
The following screenshots are from the Cobuild web-based Corpus
1. Write the word you want to query in the box, then click “show conc”

2. A pop-up window will appear with the instances of the word
Click here to view it ( better than providing a screenshot :)
3. To use in the classroom, teacher should turn students’ attention to the collocations and usage of the word in authentic language ( since the word is retained from authentic text and not text made specifically for esl/efl). Students then can derive grammatical rules (eg. modal verbs, indefinite pronouns..) and notice how certain vocabulary is used in authentic context. They can deduce what a certain vocabulary collocates with.

4. The teacher can also use a fill-in-the-blank activity where the word in query is omitted. If internet connection is not available or there are no computers in the classroom, the teacher can distribute them as printout. Note that the teacher should spend time preparing this concordance before presenting it in the classroom to ensure that it targets the intended language use.

Using corpora in the classroom involves making use of concordance software to analyze a corpora ( or web-based concordance such as the above example) and spot patterns and differences in language usage. For instance, students can use corpus linguistics with the aid of a concordance to make error corrections to their writing, or the teacher can show students a certain syntactical or lexical usage for students to induce the rule ( inductive learning), called data-driven learning since it is based on a data analysis that results in linguistic learning. ( check out the father of data-driven learning website, Tim Jones). For more on the idea of data-driven learning click here. Of course, using a concordance and corpora is not easy for students to handle so it is imperative that students practice extensively on deriving or inducing rules from linguistic patterns, or even correct their linguistic and writing error based on a written corpus.
Again, it is important to note that data-drive learning demands extensive practice before employing it as an approach. The role of the teacher becomes that of a manager, orienteer, and observer and the role of the student changes to a researcher of language.
Why use this approach instead of traditional grammar and lexical instruction?

It exposes the language learner to authentic language instead of rather fabricated ESL text
It changes the role of the language learner from a mere receptive individual into a language researcher ( note that this approach might not work as expected especially with young learners).
It ensures a learner-centered classroom without diminishing the role of the teacher
It encourages learner autonomy with regard to errors correction ( will be discussed in my next post)

More posts will also discuss more on concordancing, data-driven learning, and corpora. How a teacher can collect a certain corpus for a certain learning context, how a teacher can analyze his/her learners’ linguistic output, such as writing, called learner error analysis,and how to use corpora in more activities in the classroom.
Now, I leave you with some links to concordance software, including web-based, that you can use and play around:

antconc Lawrence Anthony’s free concordance software that you can download
monoconc pro commercial concordance
concordance commercial concordance software that I use
lextutor a free web-based concordance
Cobuild free web-based concordance and corpus

Next post will discuss how to integrate a concordance in word processor to result in error noticing and learner autonomy.
If you have an queries , need more info, or just want to post feedback please post a comment. Your comments are highly welcome :)
Ammar

Introduction to Word Processing: Enhancing Language Learners’ Writing by Means of Comment Feature in Word Processor

noreply@blogger.com (Ammar Merhbi) — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 21:35:00 +0000

Word Processing has been proven by many researches in CALL that it enhances language learners’ writing skills. Though the word processor is not intended for language learning it affords itself into aiding learners to enhance their writing and linguistic skills. As with all tools, word processor cannot teach learners writing skills unless the teacher is there to act as a moderator, manager, orienteer, and observer.

According to many researchers and studies on the nature of word processor to enhance language learning, the following are evident:

Word processing

mitigates learners’ apprehension of revising and editing since they do not need to rewrite everything. All they need to do is to cut, paste, move blocks with a click of a button
strengthens learners’ confidence that words are not permanent and that they can be changed
gives learners better visibility of the whole writing process
the public nature of the computer encourages class collaboration as opposed to the private nature of the paper
encourages creativity with its inclusion of graphs, photos, videos to illustrate learners’ writing
organizes teacher feedback which is systematic and organized as opposed to the red pen comments on paper
results in longer writing, therefore, better writing

It is the last bullet that I address in this post : Teacher feedback in word processer

Actually, teacher feedback is not that much of innovative but it does lend itself into organized and systematic feedback that rather makes the writing leaner notice the comments. ( Next post will discuss a rather innovative way for teacher feedback in word processer).

Most teachers use the MS Word Processor, though WordPerfect is also adopted by many, so for this and forthcoming posts the examples and tutorials will be based on MS WORD 2007.

In the student’s Word document click the ‘Review’ button in the toolbar

2. Highlight the section or word in your student’s writing document then click ‘New Comment” in the toolbar.

3. If you want you comments to appear in a balloon, then click “balloon”, then “show revisions in balloons” or else you can show revisions “inline by clicking again “Balloons” in the toolbar then “ show revisions inline”

Students will appreciate and notice the comments in the word processor as they are well structured and target specific writing errors rather than holistic.

You can, as well, insert a link to a website for you students to follow that addresses their linguistic/writing error. In this way, you are changing the role of you student from a mere receptive individual who might discard you comments to a language researcher. My next post discussed how you can insert a link to a web-based concordance ( definition and introduction will be provided) and how this will change the role of the language learner improving learner autonomy.

If you need any more assistance or clarification please post a comment.

Ammar

On CALL (Computer Assisted Language Learning)

noreply@blogger.com (Ammar Merhbi) — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 21:08:00 +0000

This is the first post on this blog, so I would like to maintain it as an introduction to Computer assisted language learning (CALL) and how language teachers and practitioners can harness the power of CALL to enhance language learning.
Most if not all teachers now are called “technology immigrants” since technology was not around in their time when they were learners. Our students, in contrast, are called “technology natives” as they experience technology on a daily basis whether in an educational setting or for personal use. Two things are obvious with regard to our students:

They will know about technology more than we will ever know
They expect their teachers to be knowledgeable in technology

CALL is a part of applied linguistics that is gaining momentum so rapidly as technology changes. Researchers on CALL are increasing as technology is becoming attainable to all ( open source software, internet, web 2.o). Still, many teachers are technophobic since they did not experiment with technology long enough to integrate it into their teaching contexts. Technology can be seen as a tool to enhance learning. So, like any tool, it relies on how a teacher uses this tool to enhance learning. The affordance of technology varies from teaching context to another so teachers should not be afraid to experiment with it. As with course design, teachers can integrate technology successfully based on their creativity.

Language Teachers should exploit technology

based on methodological frameworks and theories of language learning
based on their specific learning context
to enhance language learning
to enhance peripheral learning to language learning , such as autonomy, collaboration, social networking
to enhance their pupils’ critical thinking

The disposition of the teacher to experiment with technology and try it with his/her students to result in innovative language learning setting is worthwhile and the rewards are substantial.
The following posts will discuss CALL and the integration of technology, with its subcategories, multimedia, web 2.0, e-learning, successfully in the language classroom based on methodology and theories of language learning, and especially on reflection on practice.
I hope you find the forthcoming posts valuable and worth reflecting on. More importantly, worth experimenting implementing in your language classroom.
Moreward
Ammar