Laine's Wave
Laine's Wave
Online Professional Development for Language Educators and Language Teacher Educators
Station feed:  Created by: Helaine Marshall |
Created on: 10 Feb 2007 Language: English |
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Hit the Mark With Student Podcasts (6.30MB; download) -- Want to try your hand at producing podcasts for or and with your students
Here are some thoughts related to how best to go about this with & for students Selected by: Helaine Marshall [ stations ], Sun, 11 Feb 2007 21:57:52 UTC
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Using recorded Skype conversations as assessment tools (8.41MB; download) -- I was asked today by Barbara Sawhill to briefly take part in a presentation she's giving with Barbara Ganley on 'Using Skype, Podcasting and Blogging in Foreign Language Teaching'
Sitting here waiting for their Skype call, I decided to prepare myself a little bit and refresh my memory about their work.
As soon as I start looking I'm struck by what I've been missing out on by not blogging much, or taking much notice of the 'edublogosphere' recently. I can't let this happen again, no matter how busy I get.
First, I found a description of the workshop they are giving today:
"Recently, new technologies have distinguished themselves as credible tools that increase students' production and competence in a target language. With this change, a new conversation has begun about the structure of a language class, thinking about moving from a traditional teacher-and-text-centered classroom to a student-centered and possibly even a totally un-centered, textbook-less learning environment. In this workshop, we will explore several new "disruptive technologies" -- blogs, wikis, podcasts, rss feeds and Skype (http://www.skype.com)-- and explore ways these tools can support the objectives of a language curriculum."
This year I've been witness to the efforts that Barbara Sawhill has been making with her Spanish students, as we've been involved in podcast exchanges. Tonight, following links, I've just come across one of the most interesting reflections I've ever seen about using recorded Skype conversations.
Barbara Sawhill talks here, on the Language Lab Unleashed blog, about using recorded Skype calls as assessment tools for language learning.
In particular, she reflects upon students conducting Skype interviews as part of their final projects, and mentions the great value of doing this when students really use these conversations as a form of self-evaluation. She found that many students approached the task trying to produce something they thought Barbara wanted, rather than really reflect upon the conversations they had had. When her students approached the task as more than "just a list of questions that need to be answered", however, as one of Barbara's students (Gigi) did, then something special took place. In the recording, Gig talks to Rita, an EFL teacher in Argentina. She reflects upon the conversation in her blog.
Barbara also mentions the idea of students using these conversations as "snapshots" of what they were able to do at a particular moment, and she hopes some of them at least will be able to listen again in the future, and to be able to assess their progress. This is surely an area that has great potential in language learning. Selected by: Helaine Marshall [ stations ], Sat, 10 Feb 2007 05:09:36 UTC
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E-Society Classification (1.54MB; download) -- Spatial-Literacy.org have devised an e-society classification system for the UK, which caught my eye recently, based on a report of the E-Society (PDF).
Now, UK residents can check to see which of the 23 classifications they are in. The classifications are based on "based on levels of awareness of different ICTs; levels of use of ICTs; and their perceived impacts upon human capital formation and the quality of life."
The report makes highly interesting reading and some of the classification defy belief, but are based on real types.
The actual classification terms (below, with notes) are as follows:
GROUP A: THE E-UNENGAGED
The E ? unengaged are people who "do not have access to electronic communications or technologies". Included here are people who are "too old, too poor or too poorly educated to be able to access them."
This group is broken down by the report into:
Low technologists are people who mainly view the Internet as "an electronic version of a mail order catalogue, and not something that you learn from."
Cable suffices represents a group of people with limited interest in electronic technologies but "without the education nor income to become heavily engaged in using them." Many have access to cable television.
The Technology as fantasy group are
mainly "old males, some of whom have an interest in electronic technology and like to read about it, but few of whom use it."
Mobile?s the limit have low level computers and Internet usage, but use mobiles a lot. Apparently, this group is mainly female and elderly.
The Too old to be bothered "feel that they predate anything to do with electronic technologies."
The Elderly marginalised are mainly older people who feel that technology is "moving on at a rate faster than they can keep up with."
GROUP B: THE ?E ? MARGINALISED? represents those people who either "lack the disposable income to equip themselves with" new technologies them, or who don't have "the training and education needed to understand how to make effective use of them."
Here are the sub-categories:
The Net ; What?s that?. This group "are not engaged have very little interest" in most technologies, but are probably interested in owning a mobile phone.
Mobile Explorers :- are mainly young people who "have a high level of access to the Internet both at home at work. They enjoy using computers to play games and to watch videos", but not to acquire information.
The Cable TV heartland group represents people "for whom technology is an important lifestyle statement..." who "...read a lot about technology in magazines and spend a lot of time on the Internet."
GROUP C: BECOMING ENGAGED are those who generally acquire their ICT experience at work. They include:
E-bookers and communicators, who are active users of email and mobile phones, and who download a lot of music, but who do "not make use of the latest technical features of information technology."
Peer group adopters are "even more reliant upon email, text messaging and the use of mobiles to participate in peer group activities" and are generally young people with low incomes who live with their parents.
GROUP D: E FOR ENTERTAINMENT AND SHOPPING are interested in the Internet for providing "access to music, games and general entertainment".
Small time net shoppers are those people who generally "rely upon the Internet to buy music, books and videos"
E for entertainment. This group "access the Internet using broadband" and buy computer games, but they are not very interested in Internet shopping.
GROUP E: E-INDEPENDENTS are those who "take a rational and considered view of electronic communications and technologies"
Rational utilitarians use the Internet for shopping and usually are not interested in its use for games or leisure.
Committed learners "consists of well educated, urban professionals with a high proportion of middle aged females" who "consider information technology as a natural met Selected by: Helaine Marshall [ stations ], Sat, 10 Feb 2007 05:09:17 UTC
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Blogs, wikis & podcasts (& Second Life) (10.62MB; download) -- I've just finished a video presentation that I was asked to make for a publisher's in-house conference in Mexico next week. It's not great, but I found making it a lot of fun. I must do more of this!
Here is a better quality version (requires Quicktime 7.0): Web 2.0 & Language Learning Selected by: Helaine Marshall [ stations ], Sat, 10 Feb 2007 05:08:38 UTC
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