italki was reviewed by Turkan, Quanya and Randy.
italki is a language learning social network site. One of the distinguishing features of this site is how it links professional teachers or informal tutors with learners of a particular language. Professional teachers are expected to conduct courses similar to classroom-based language classes and are paid for their service. The method of payment is through the italki credits. It is worth pointing out that iTalki takes 15% commission on the money earned by teachers. The classes are offered online through Skype and must be arranged to fit to the instructor's schedule. Informal tutors are "near-native speakers" in the target language. Both of these teaching roles require an online application.
There is also a language partners section of the site where you can link up with speakers of the language and practice the language. You can view the participants levels in the language, which helps you make decisions about your choice in language partner. Once your are language partners, then you follow one another to respond to messages.
In addition to Skype, site participants also interact through the "notebook," "answers," and "discussions" tabs where you can read posts by users from a specific language group. This way you can see the types of questions and comments that have been posted by users. This seems to be the asynchronous section of the site.
In general there seems to be a lack of professional teachers featured on the site. We looked at Turkish teachers and found only one professional teacher. What is nice about the message boards is that it seems users are fairly responsive in making corrections to postings in a timely manner.
Monday, April 29, 2013
Monday, April 22, 2013
WK 13: Computer Based Testing
This past week we covered the topic of computers and language testing. There were a number of benefits and drawbacks that we discussed. In this blog post I highlight some of those.
An advantage for using computer based testing relates to practicality. It is saves on time and resources when a computer delivers the directions for the exam and the questions. Scoring is also a much more efficient process on the computer. Another advantage mentioned in the DuBravac (2013) chapter was that test items can be enhanced in online formats.Animation, video, audio, and pull-down menus can all be used to enhance more traditional types of testing items.It was also been discussed that computer rating systems are more reliable than human raters because the issue of rater bias is not a factor.
Despite these advantages, there are a number of unresolved aspects of computer based testing that make implementation questionable. For starters, automated scoring programs such as ETS Criterion can only assess certain aspects of production. In writing, for example, it is difficult to assess more discourse-level organization features than grammatical features using automated scoring. This is one area where I believe using a computer is still not as effective as a human rater. Doug Hesse has recently made a similar argument in an article written for the Washington Post.
Another issue with computer based testing has to do with fairness. A test should be fair and equally accessible to all learners. However, as was brought up in class, even in such a technology savvy age there are still some learners that have little to no experience using computers. So designing tests that rely upon computers could be unfair to these learners. Some learners also have anxiety using technology, so using a computer based test could raise the level of anxiety, which in a high stakes testing situation, is likely to already be at a high level to begin with.
An advantage for using computer based testing relates to practicality. It is saves on time and resources when a computer delivers the directions for the exam and the questions. Scoring is also a much more efficient process on the computer. Another advantage mentioned in the DuBravac (2013) chapter was that test items can be enhanced in online formats.Animation, video, audio, and pull-down menus can all be used to enhance more traditional types of testing items.It was also been discussed that computer rating systems are more reliable than human raters because the issue of rater bias is not a factor.
Despite these advantages, there are a number of unresolved aspects of computer based testing that make implementation questionable. For starters, automated scoring programs such as ETS Criterion can only assess certain aspects of production. In writing, for example, it is difficult to assess more discourse-level organization features than grammatical features using automated scoring. This is one area where I believe using a computer is still not as effective as a human rater. Doug Hesse has recently made a similar argument in an article written for the Washington Post.
Another issue with computer based testing has to do with fairness. A test should be fair and equally accessible to all learners. However, as was brought up in class, even in such a technology savvy age there are still some learners that have little to no experience using computers. So designing tests that rely upon computers could be unfair to these learners. Some learners also have anxiety using technology, so using a computer based test could raise the level of anxiety, which in a high stakes testing situation, is likely to already be at a high level to begin with.
Sunday, April 14, 2013
Culture and CALL
This week we focused on the topic of teaching culture with CALL tools. We read Guth & Helm's (2012) chapter, which gave a nice framework for explaining culture and how hard to pin down this concept is. In our class discussions we also talked about the essentialist and non-essentialist approaches to culture.
I am quite critical of the way in which culture is sometimes taught and thought of in connection with language learning. Dan mentions in his blog post about some of the problems that arise when teachers think they should be teaching culture along with language. My experience is similar to Dan's, as my Chinese language learning experiences often involved learning meaningless dialogues about some aspect of Chinese culture. It seems that teachers feel they can easily teach some traditional practice of their culture as a way to embed culture within language learning. However, I think these approaches often do little to address students' pressing communicative language needs. If I am learning Chinese, for example, how beneficial will learning about Chinese tea serving customs really help me? In general, I think for some teachers sharing something about their own culture is rather self-serving.
Despite of my critical view on teaching culture, I do believe there is a place for some aspects of culture and language learning and the connection to CALL. Kerry Pusey has been looking into teaching different speech acts through the use of sitcom segments via youtube. In discussing aspects of American culture as they relate to the completion or failure of different speech acts, I feel the connection between culture and language is very apparent. To me, this is perhaps one of the most applicable ways to use CALL to teach culture, especially if the speech acts have been identified as ones the learners will need to know to function in the target culture.
I am quite critical of the way in which culture is sometimes taught and thought of in connection with language learning. Dan mentions in his blog post about some of the problems that arise when teachers think they should be teaching culture along with language. My experience is similar to Dan's, as my Chinese language learning experiences often involved learning meaningless dialogues about some aspect of Chinese culture. It seems that teachers feel they can easily teach some traditional practice of their culture as a way to embed culture within language learning. However, I think these approaches often do little to address students' pressing communicative language needs. If I am learning Chinese, for example, how beneficial will learning about Chinese tea serving customs really help me? In general, I think for some teachers sharing something about their own culture is rather self-serving.
Despite of my critical view on teaching culture, I do believe there is a place for some aspects of culture and language learning and the connection to CALL. Kerry Pusey has been looking into teaching different speech acts through the use of sitcom segments via youtube. In discussing aspects of American culture as they relate to the completion or failure of different speech acts, I feel the connection between culture and language is very apparent. To me, this is perhaps one of the most applicable ways to use CALL to teach culture, especially if the speech acts have been identified as ones the learners will need to know to function in the target culture.
Wednesday, April 10, 2013
Culture Learning Activity (with K. Pusey)
Student level: upper intermediate
L1: mixed
Target culture: American culture
Main features: use Web 2.0 tools to promote culture
learn/break essentialist views
Breaking essentialist views of culture
1.
Ask students to write down 1 or 2 stereotypes/images/things
they think about when they think of “American culture”
a.
Give examples: guns, fast food, obesity, military, pop
music, hamburgers, Budweiser, white people
2.
Have Ss research the topic to break their essentialist
view: search for counter-examples of the vie the initially express (fast-food
vs. slow food; guns vs. anti-gun control; hamburger vs. vegetarian/vegan; gangs
vs. youth advocacy groups; Budweiser vs. non-alcoholic party drinks)
a.
Use 2 different Web 2.0 sources (ex. blogs, podcasts,
social media sites, Twitter, search hashtags)
b.
Search the hashtag #gangs on Twitter as an example
c.
Go to Google blogs and search for “_____ blog” as
another example
3.
Write a summary of findings and post images from Tumblr
or other site
a.
Summary/writing topic: Have Ss write a summary that
answers the following questions:
i. What
aspect of American culture did you select?
ii. Why
did you choose this topic?
iii. What
did you find out from reading the blogs and/or listening to the podcasts that
was new to you and/or different from what you thought before reading/listening?
4.
Post their findings on course wiki
5.
Report findings in class (next class)
Sunday, April 7, 2013
Reflection on Writing and Grammar: Blogs
In the discussions about using CALL applications to focus on writing and grammar, one of the more interesting topics for me was Katie's presentation about using blogs for responding to readings in a writing course. I think the idea of using blogs to encourage response to readings is appealing, but there are a number of problematic aspects about implementing them that Katie discussed. Some of these relate to motivation, commenting on others blogs and grading responses.
In general, I think using blogs to respond to course readings can be difficult to get going. I think at the beginning of a course where a teacher plans to implement blogs it would be helpful to orient learners to this medium and the genre of a reading response. Perhaps the first week could be spent on having learners pick out features of a blog posting they feel is thoughtful and shows someone has read the materials well. This would help build the context some before diving into writing them.
It would also be helpful for the teacher to work with the students to create a rubric for grading the blogs. In the process of analyzing other reading response blogs, the students and the teacher could co-create a checklist or rubric of features of a good blog post and good comment. They could also agree on how many comments they feel would be appropriate each week.
Katie mentioned that it is important to assign student blog groups, so that that students are responsible for checking a few student's blogs and exchanging comments on them each week. To keep the blogging from become stale, it might also be helpful to switch the blog groups every 2-3 weeks so that students could be assigned a different classmates' blog to read.
While blogging has been around for a while and is widely used in writing courses, this presentation gave me some new ideas to consider if I decide implement a blog in a writing/reading course in the future. The last idea I think would be fun to try would be to have L2 learners blog about the graded readers they are reading as part of an extensive reading program.
In general, I think using blogs to respond to course readings can be difficult to get going. I think at the beginning of a course where a teacher plans to implement blogs it would be helpful to orient learners to this medium and the genre of a reading response. Perhaps the first week could be spent on having learners pick out features of a blog posting they feel is thoughtful and shows someone has read the materials well. This would help build the context some before diving into writing them.
It would also be helpful for the teacher to work with the students to create a rubric for grading the blogs. In the process of analyzing other reading response blogs, the students and the teacher could co-create a checklist or rubric of features of a good blog post and good comment. They could also agree on how many comments they feel would be appropriate each week.
Katie mentioned that it is important to assign student blog groups, so that that students are responsible for checking a few student's blogs and exchanging comments on them each week. To keep the blogging from become stale, it might also be helpful to switch the blog groups every 2-3 weeks so that students could be assigned a different classmates' blog to read.
While blogging has been around for a while and is widely used in writing courses, this presentation gave me some new ideas to consider if I decide implement a blog in a writing/reading course in the future. The last idea I think would be fun to try would be to have L2 learners blog about the graded readers they are reading as part of an extensive reading program.
Reflection on Listening and Speaking with CALL: Podcasts
There are many ways to integrate the language skills of listening and speaking with CALL tools. In this blog post I will restrict my reflection to the use of podcasts and its teaching and learning potential.
We discussed the use of podcasts for teaching pronunciation in class. It seems that the researchers who conducted this study were hoping that repeated recordings with the podcasts would draw learners attention to pronunciation in order to get them to improve it while presenting on a study abroad theme.
I'm not so sure having learners create podcasts in order to evaluate aspects of their language production is the best use of the technology. Rather, I see it more applicable to task-based approaches where learners podcast is used to create a desired outcome. Through the process of creating the podcasts there will be an opportunity to focus on form, but it is not likely that learners will improve their pronunciation or lexical/grammatical accuracy through such a project alone.
Paul Nation has discussed how language teaching should include four different strands: language-focused input, language-focused output, fluency, and language-focused learning. I feel like podcasts are more appropriate for the language-focused output. If I were to have learners engage in language-focused learning, on say, pronunciation features of language, I would consider using a type of pronunciation software instead.
We discussed the use of podcasts for teaching pronunciation in class. It seems that the researchers who conducted this study were hoping that repeated recordings with the podcasts would draw learners attention to pronunciation in order to get them to improve it while presenting on a study abroad theme.
I'm not so sure having learners create podcasts in order to evaluate aspects of their language production is the best use of the technology. Rather, I see it more applicable to task-based approaches where learners podcast is used to create a desired outcome. Through the process of creating the podcasts there will be an opportunity to focus on form, but it is not likely that learners will improve their pronunciation or lexical/grammatical accuracy through such a project alone.
Paul Nation has discussed how language teaching should include four different strands: language-focused input, language-focused output, fluency, and language-focused learning. I feel like podcasts are more appropriate for the language-focused output. If I were to have learners engage in language-focused learning, on say, pronunciation features of language, I would consider using a type of pronunciation software instead.
Friday, April 5, 2013
Materials Development 2: CALLaborative Podcast Project
The activity discussed in this materials development blog entry is adapted from a project outlined by Arena and Cruvinel (2010). This project integrates task-based learning with Web 2.0 to encourage collaborative interaction among learners while they work on a podcast project. Arena and Cruvinel outline a number reasons for using a podcast project while adapting a task-based learning approach, which I believe would be appropriate for using with the high school student population I will be teaching this fall. Some of the benefits the authors discuss are that learners are able to see the outcomes of their language skills in a concrete outcome and they would engage in interaction with their peers while creating the podcast.The lesson plan demonstrates how throughout different steps of the podcast creation students focus on many different aspects of language, such as reading, writing, listening, speaking and pronunciation.
One of the difficulties I see in creating a task-based project like this one is that it requires the teacher to plan and coordinate steps of the project carefully. If care is not taken to approach such a project in a systematic manner, then the project is not likely to achieve its desired results. The steps outlined by Arena and Cruvinel (2010) address the need for a structured approach to designing the podcast project and are briefly outlined below to help frame how I would design a similar project.
Considering that my students would be located in Istanbul, I would focus on finding topics that relate to their immediate surroundings of the city and their lives. Ideas that students might come up with are things to do in Istanbul, including visiting mosques, restaurants, and the grand bizaar. Students could also discuss stereotypes about their culture, as mentioned by Arena and Cruvinel (2010). This could connect to reading or listening input given to learners prior to beginning the project. After the students have decided upon a topic, then the collaborative group work on the projects would begin. Students would use audacity to record and create their podcast. The podcast would be stored on the hosting site PodOmatic. The lesson planned below outlines this portion of the project.
References
Arena, C. & Cruvinel, E. (2010). Learning through CALLaborative projects using web 2.0 tools. In Shehadeh, A. & Coombe, C. (Eds.). Applications of task-based learning in TESOL. Alexandria, Virginia: TESOL.
One of the difficulties I see in creating a task-based project like this one is that it requires the teacher to plan and coordinate steps of the project carefully. If care is not taken to approach such a project in a systematic manner, then the project is not likely to achieve its desired results. The steps outlined by Arena and Cruvinel (2010) address the need for a structured approach to designing the podcast project and are briefly outlined below to help frame how I would design a similar project.
- Step1: Identify a need and a purpose
- Step 2: Negotiate meaningful topics and with learners
- Step 3: Define a concrete result
- Step 4: Choose the right tools
- Step 5: Find and invite partners
- Step 6: Prepare a schedule
- Step 7: Plan the tasks
- Step 8: Implement the project
- Step 9: Aggregate the artifacts
- Step 10: Evaluate the project
Considering that my students would be located in Istanbul, I would focus on finding topics that relate to their immediate surroundings of the city and their lives. Ideas that students might come up with are things to do in Istanbul, including visiting mosques, restaurants, and the grand bizaar. Students could also discuss stereotypes about their culture, as mentioned by Arena and Cruvinel (2010). This could connect to reading or listening input given to learners prior to beginning the project. After the students have decided upon a topic, then the collaborative group work on the projects would begin. Students would use audacity to record and create their podcast. The podcast would be stored on the hosting site PodOmatic. The lesson planned below outlines this portion of the project.
References
Arena, C. & Cruvinel, E. (2010). Learning through CALLaborative projects using web 2.0 tools. In Shehadeh, A. & Coombe, C. (Eds.). Applications of task-based learning in TESOL. Alexandria, Virginia: TESOL.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)