what i liked most

Hi Everyone,
I like everything i learned in this course but i like the wall wisher, Web Quest and blogging most as i am planning to use these techniques with my students later.
Regards
Mandi

my view

"All individual is different" but
Technology can address and help all different types of individuals".

week 8, reflection

Hi everyone,
this week i invested much time in revising my project plan. i would like to thank my friend Adesh  for providing his comments and found many things missing in my project which i have already fulfilled in another post. similarly, i got a lot of idea when i read my friends plan. thus, i knew that peer review was beneficial for the reviewer as well as the one whose project was reviewed. another 'discussion task' too was very interesting. i am working for finalizing my project. what about you?

Regards
Mandi

some changes

Hi everyone,
As i am revising the draft of my project plan, i have earlier stated my problem that students use technology for 'Fun'. along with it i am adding more information on it that is some of the teachers assigned some creative writing but they just download it from the internet and paste it whereas some of the students task is done by their parents doing the same . Similarly, they just spend time searching unnecessary things in internet even in their computer classes.
Mandi

Overall reflection, week 7

Hi everyone,
It was another interesting week that i gained a lot of ideas on learners' autonomy and got to learn different ways of autonomy. so far i tried to find useful article to post on the Wall wisher which was again a very interesting task for this week. i made few changes in my project draft and now working to prepare a final draft. I made a plan that i will be using Wall Wisher when i will start teaching.

Regards
Mandi

Reflection

This week i concentrated myself on teaching large classes with the help of power points and got a very good exposure on creating interactive power points.
Regards
Mandi

A bit confused

I am little bit unhappy this week that i am not teaching fr this term as if i was teaching, this was the time i would implement my project in my classroom but still i have a hope that whenever i will be teaching i will be implementing it.
Regarding the change in my project, as i have stated that my students are using internet for 'fun' rather than utilizing it, i thought to make them utilize their knowledge by assigning them a task in web-quest rather than Nice net and i have already designed a project of publishing a class magazine in my web-quest.
Your suggestions will help me to improve my plan further.

How is the solution?

Hi everyone,

As I have already mentioned earlier that ‘Fun is the problem’ with my students, nowadays I feel that I can utilize the idea by the same course I am doing. In other words, if I introduce Nice net to my students and assign some assignments as Robert does in our classes it will be very much effective. Similarly, I have found that Web quest; http://www.zunal.com/ too will be very much effective solution for my students as they will enjoy and learn varieties of language learning issue at the same time.

Regards

Mandi 

wonder week

Hi everyone,
This week i did two interesting task. one is to create a rubric in rubistar.com and another is i designed a project for my learners which you can find in http://zunal.com/webquest.php?w=182833 
Waiting for your comments
Regards
Mandi

PBL and alternative assessment ! amazing techniques

Hi everyone,

The readings on alternative assessment, rubrics and project based learning (PBL) reinforced me to think of the project I used to design for my students of class four and five in order to develop their language skills. Similarly, I REMEMBERED A POSTER PRESENTATION by one of the Japanese instructor in last years NELTA Conference which was based on PBL and how it helped the teacher to MOTIVATE HIS STUDENTS in collaborative learning and improved their learning.

Thus, I am here wanted to state how PBL can be used to help motivate students more. As PBL promotes student centered learning rather than traditional teacher centered learning, students are always motivated to involve themselves in interaction activity rather than monotonous lecture class.

Similarly, now I have realized that PBL can be incorporated with technology in my class. Just a simple example is as they are investing their time on playing games on computer and using internet to chat with the friends, I can assign them to choose a story (after providing the link related with the story) and interpret it in their own words. Moreover, I have found advantages rather than limitations of using PBL in my classes.

Rubrics plays significant role in any assignments we assign to our students as it sometimes helps students on the questions as how much to do and how to organize their writings which I have found even while doing the assignments of this course.    So far I found myself using analytic rubrics in my classes and in special cases multi trait rubrics especially for higher level students.  Similarly, PBL is not a traditional method. Thus, alternative assessment system should be applied so that the learners would get chance to evaluate themselves and progress in their own pace.

As PBL, alternative assessment and web quest are based on self- directed learning, it helps learners to promote independent learning as they get opportunity to learn by doing as well as in their own pace and style. 

Your comments will help me to grow more on PBL AND DESIGN NEW TASKS FOR MY LEARNERS.

Regards

Mandi

Wow! A wonderful week

Hi everyone,
I enjoyed doing assignments of week 4 a lot. the first task i did was i read the articles provided in our class wiki and share my ideas in nice-net. in other words, i posted it in discussion. similarly, i found the real problem of my classroom for which i want to implement the project as my students are using computers just for fun. another interesting task i did was, i prepared technology enhanced lesson plan. it was my amazing experience as i felt very difficult to understand initially but now when the plan is ready, i am happy and satisfied as build up a confidence that i can prepare a technology enhanced lesson plan. the lesson plan i prepared  is presented below:

Class (name, type of student): Grade eleven students who have already studied English as a second language for thirteen years, aged 17-18 years.
Topic: The Boarded Window (story) by Ambrose Bierce

Duration: 45 minutes
A computer will be there for the whole class with Wi Fi connection from where students will listen the story retrieved from the following link.

Materials
Technology component downloaded from/accessed in class at: http://www.manythings.org/voa/stories/The_Boarded_Window_-_By_Ambrose_Bierce.html

Other material: Handouts of the story (if technology didn't function), whiteboard, marker and question cards

Introduction
Review of previous lesson: The teacher will ask one of the students to summarize the chapter within ten sentences before s/he starts the lesson


Objectives of this lesson (tell students about them): By the end of the class, students will have been able to;
a)   Write the meaning of the difficult words
b)   Find out the theme of the story
c)   Tell the suitability of the title



Procedure
Presentation (teacher or student), including key vocabulary
At first teacher will provide the audio of the story and divide them in pairs and provide them the activity as solving questions;
i. find out the difficult words from the story and discuss its meaning in your pairs.
ii. Discuss in pairs on the theme of the story and write it down within ten sentences
iii. Discuss in your pairs on the suitability of the title and share your answers with your class.

Activity (student) students will listen the story. After that they will list out the difficult words from the story and discuss the meaning of the words in their pair. They will take help from the teacher if required. After completing the task they will discuss on the second question and after that they will shift to the third question and finally share their answers with their class.


Learning styles addressed: Pre –reading activities (pre- teach vocabulary), while reading activities (discuss the theme of the story) and post- reading activities (share their ideas on suitability of the title with their class)



Technology alternative (in case things don't work as planned): If in case computer didn't work, the teacher will be ready with the handouts of the story so that the lesson would go smoothly without any disturbance.




Review before the end of the class session:
Ask one of the students to share his/her feelings after reading the story.



Homework:
Write the summary of the story 'The Boarded Window' in your own words.

ops! sad ghost story

Hi everyone,

I visited the site; http://www.manythings.org which was shared in our class wiki and reached to  http://www.manythings.org/voa/stories/The_Boarded_Window_-_By_Ambrose_Bierce.html and listened very much interesting thriller story entitled ‘The Boarded Window’ by Ambrose Bierce with audio that can be downloaded. This story is useful for the advanced level of students as it requires ‘critical thinking’ to understand the story.  

 

Your comments for my improvements are always welcome.

Regards

Mandi

A gift for the teachers!!!!!!

Hi everyone,
I just Read an article by Mei- Ya Liang entitled 'Three Extensive Reading Activities for ESL/EFL Students Using E- books.
i found this article very much useful for us those who are thinking to use technology and teach our students using internet. the following link given in this article are very much helpful for us and can be utilized in our classroom.

• A story map worksheet: http://www.education-world.com/a_tsl/TM/WS_storymapws.shtml
• An advanced story map worksheet: http://www.lefthandlogic.com/htmdocs/interventions/rdngcompr/storymap1.shtml
• Carnegie Medal criteria: http://www.carnegiegreenaway.org.uk/carnegie/crit.html
• Newbery Medal criteria: http://www.ala.org/ala/alsc/awardsscholarships/literaryawds/newberymedal/newberyterms/newberyterms.htm

The classic argument structure: http://www.winthrop.edu/wcenter/handoutsandlinks/classica.htm