My 9th Week Blog

I likely sent my final project!! I´m so happy about that. :) :)

It´s been hard work, but I feel really satisfied after having successfully finished it.

The topic for us to discuss this week  has to do with Incorporating Learning Styles to Technology. In my opinion, to properly use web technologies in academic settings, it is vital to understand the learners characteristics and their perceptions about technology use.

It is therefore necessary to understand the relationship between students´ learning styles and their preferences for instructional strategies, since learning styles provide information about individual differences in learning preferences,  they can suggest how instruction can be best designed to support such learning preferences.

I personally consider that personality has a strong influence on preferences to acquiring and integrating information.

Using an on-line questionnaire to discover students dominant intelligence, seems to be the best way of getting aware of important information about our students intelligences, so that teachers could use appropriate and different teaching techniques in the process.

Since in every class we can find diverse kinds of learning styles, I consider pertinent to apply various types of exercises in every lesson. That way, every student can use his specific intelligence, verbal, logical, visual, bodily, naturalistic, musical, interpersonal, or intrapersonal; and benefit from the class. Exercises such as projects, jigsaws, group and pair work, among others, can be certainly beneficial.

My Week 8 Reflection!

I posted my Project Draft! :)  I´m planning to go on polishing it during this coming week, and I´ll hopefully be finishing it before the deadline. 

The most remarkable thing that has happened to me this week, is to have been able to create a reading exercise posted in http://poster.4teachers.org/worksheet/view.php?id=156159. I also found a page for making instant puzzles. I´m so happy about that! I´m really fond of using puzzles to reinforce my students learning. Besides, the main part of my project includes learning by doing by means of building-up puzzles. Now, I can go on,  asking my students to easily, quickly, and with the help of the computer, illustrate their work. After every two units finished, they will be in charge of working in groups, making puzzles with the vocabulary and grammar learned. This way, they will be applying their knowledge and having the basic material to go on putting their speaking abilities into practice. Because nothing can be expressed without vocabulary, and nothing can be built, or properly said, without grammar.

Another important web page shared by Jeff Magotto from Oregon University, is ANVILL, whose use constitutes an enormous value for us teachers to apply in our classes.

My Week 7 Blog 

Dear Robert and friends,

Time really flies! I can´t believe myself we are just finishing the seventh week of our productive course. It has certainly  been a  hard working time. I´m impressed to see how knowledgeable and professional colleagues there are around the world. It´s being a great experience to share opinions, to exchange important tasks, to learn a lot  from them all.

During this last week, we have discussed real facts such as: one computer classroom, learner autonomy, and one computer class lesson. A great variety of tasks have been posted by colleagues who have shared their own experiences  and  their  particular ways of exploiting the resources they have at hand.

I´ll be definitively starting my final project tomorrow. I have already made up my mind about it. I´ll be working with young adult students of 4^th level, who will be in charge of organizing themselves in groups to build-up puzzles including the structures and vocabulary periodically learned. Every two units finished, they will be writing instructions and illustrating a puzzle to be completed by their other groups in a kind of a contest. These puzzles will be set in Power Point and posted in their own blogs which have to be likely created.

This productive task has as a main objective to review the  previous knowledge, to  learn by doing, and to reinforce the new knowledge. Students will have the opportunity to  think critically, solve the problem of finding the right words , given a clue, a definition or instruction; and struggle trying to be the winners of a smart competition.   

This task would be kind of a demonstration of autonomous learning. Students will be working with motivation, will be taking active and reflective approach to the language, will be making decisions, acting independently, assuming responsibility, planning, deducting, inferring; and even getting assessment after finishing their tasks and contests.

Warm regards,

Dolores

My Week 6 Blog

Another important technological tool has been implemented this week. I´ve had the chance of creating a Power Point interactive activity: “Building-up puzzles”.

By means of this tool, students will be able to:

·         Use an interactive activity created by themselves.

·         Include specific  vocabulary and grammar learned in the process.

·         Solve puzzles made by their partners.

·         Develop group-work abilities.

·         Reinforce previous knowledge.

·         Think critically.

·         Get self-assessment after solving their partners´ puzzles.

In my opinion, puzzles result to be a kind of a small quiz.

The interactive activities will be reflected after students post their puzzles in their own blogs, since my final project has to do with guiding them to create their own blogs where they will be periodically adding work made by themselves.

At the end of the period/level, the speaking abilities will be also developed when students are asked  to report to the class their experiences about having learned to create blogs,  build-up puzzles, and post them in their blogs.

As for reading skills, they will be also applied when students read the instructions for completing the puzzles.

Even critical thinking will be used while solving alternative words to complete the spaces provided, after   word definition analysis,  or oriented instructions given,  to fill out the illustration of the puzzle.

I added a motivational video taken from You tube, to catch  the participants´ attention and interest.

A final puzzle with all of the level contents would be ideally used for a contest

I´m posting my Power Point activity in the Wiki Power Point Files, with a topic example.

 

Warm regards,

 Loli Paredes

My Week 6 Blog

Another important technological tool has been implemented this week. I´ve had the chance of creating a Power Point interactive activity: “Building-up puzzles”.

By means of this tool, students will be able to:

·         Use an interactive activity created by themselves.

·         Include specific  vocabulary and grammar learned in the process.

·         Solve puzzles made by their partners.

·         Develop group-work abilities.

·         Reinforce previous knowledge.

·         Think critically.

·         Get self-assessment after solving their partners´ puzzles.

In my opinion, puzzles result to be a kind of a small quiz.

The interactive activities will be reflected after students post their puzzles in their own blogs, since my final project has to do with guiding them to create their own blogs where they will be periodically adding work made by themselves.

At the end of the period/level, the speaking abilities will be also developed when students are asked  to report to the class their experiences about having learned to create blogs,  build-up puzzles, and post them in their blogs.

As for reading skills, they will be also applied when students read the instructions for completing the puzzles.

Even critical thinking will be used while solving alternative words to complete the spaces provided, after   word definition analysis,  or oriented instructions given,  to fill out the illustration of the puzzle.

I added a motivational video taken from You tube, to catch  the participants´ attention and interest.

A final puzzle with all of the level contents would be ideally used for a contest

I´m posting my Power Point activity in the Wiki Power Point Files, with a topic example.

 

Warm regards,

 Loli Paredes

My blog Week 5

I´ve created my own rubrics supported by the general belief of my colleagues that creating our own rubrics is a very simple task. I encouraged myself and made it. Now, I can go on using my ID rubric to more easily assess my student´s tasks. This has undoubtedly been the most relevant point of my Week 5 tasks.

I´ve also shared my opinions about technology-related changes by describing one of the technology-related changes I would personally use,  by means of building up puzzles and solving them.

I´ve created a rubric/alternative assessment about writing. And most importantly, I feel a little bit more confident about including technology in my everyday teaching.

Warm regards,

Loli Paredes

My 4th week blog

During this week I´ve learned the way to set Technology Enhanced Lesson Plans, having as an example a lesson plan from the University of Tennessee where the guidelines to write a complete lesson plan, are included.  Important things such as: title, author, grade, level, time allotted, short description of lesson, NETS.S, instructional objectives, ABDC objectives, resource, materials, technology, instructional procedures, techniques and activities, supplemental activities, assessment.

Most of my partners have already decided what their final project will be about. As for me, since I teach different levels, I haven´t yet  made up my mind. I´m just thinking about what the best alternative could be. I´ll be likely deciding it.

Very practical exercises developed with the help of technology, have been exposed by my colleagues. Those exercises intended to enhance reading, writing and vocabulary skills. Important web pages have been shared by my colleagues, such  as: www.dfilm.com/live/moviemaker.html; http://www.fog.ccsf.edu/-lfriend/; http://a4esl.org; http:/www.manythings.org. I´ll keep on downloading info.