Busy, Busy week! This was one of my favorite weeks. Being able to make my own game, puzzle and online test was incredible. I made a Body Parts Board Game with many pictures in under three minutes! 

       While writing my Project plan I learn a lot more about my place of work. I also realized that my way of teaching goes along with my organization's mission and vision. It was great to discover that our lesson planning style came from a person called Pamela Shea. I made her my Facebook friend and chat with her about lesson planning, I learned a lot! 

       As you can see, busy always means good for a teacher.

Thanks for reading,

Rosmery from Bolivia.

Good morning,

We are about to begin the 8^th week!

       This week I really enjoyed Padlet, didn’t you? I think it is a great way to start a debate in our classrooms. Students could find articles and pictures, even cartoons and videos or just post their own opinions about certain issue. All the class could read it, and then, come to classes and debate! 

       My project Plan is going very well. I am now writing my first draft and how lucky I am, I have two partners ready to review it and give me their feedback. While building my Google Site I experienced some difficulties, even though I followed the instructions our professor kindly gave me. I failed to give my site a cool look, I really hope that I can change that later on… Nevertheless, as I built each page, I got to remember how I have taught that particular point and words just poured out. To my mind, my colleagues will find not only lesson plans but inspiration when they access the CBA’s Lesson Plan Pool. I need it to be that way because this endeavour  would mean nothing without the collaboration of my peers.

       Reading Tuula’s project was a great pleasure. I think she followed the assessment rubric word by word. Her paper sets the bar quite high. Well done, Tuula!

Rosmery from Bolivia.

Hello,

       I am working on a Project Plan to build a Lesson Plan Pool for the Centro Cultural Boliviano Americano in Santa Cruz, Bolivia. I thought about using a Wiki, but I now realized that using Google Sites is my best option since I can easily emulate our course site and add text, images, links, pages, sub-pages, documents, attachments, comments and files. 

I am collecting references from:  

https://support.google.com/sites/?hl=en

https://sites.google.com/site/teachmeaboutsites/

http://www.dosomething.org/u/how-to/how-to-use-google-sites

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OwboHfaecbo

https://sites.google.com/a/godfrey-lee.org/google-sites/why-use-google-sites

       With all these elements, my lesson plan sharing page will become a successes among my colleagues or anyone that could benefit with the plans posted there. My primary target is the teachers at my Bi-National institution my own. Nonetheless, any educator teaching Top Notch, Summit, Postcards and On your Marks may benefit from the use of the site as well.

       This week I plan to build my site and add the very first lessons plans. By the middle of the week I will be able to publish the link to the brand new site.

I hope you have a great week. 

Rosmery from Bolivia.

When was the last time you did something for the first time?

This week I had two of those exciting moments when I got to create my very first Assessment Rubric and when I got to learn about WebQuests!

      I am pretty sure that almost every teacher has used check lists, at least mentally. On the other hand, the use of other alternative assessment like Rubrics is quite new to me. Considering that I crave knowledge, new means motivating in my dictionary.

After reading about Holistic Rubrics, which score student’ performance as a whole, and analytical Rubrics, where scales are divided into separate categories representing different dimensions of performance, I find them as very useful tools in order to evaluate in a more subjective way. Nonetheless, since I had never used them I imagined them difficult to create. Little I knew about rubistar.com. This website made my job so easy that I intent to use rubrics in the future. Other kind of rubrics is Primary Trait Rubrics. They allow teachers and students to focus on one aspect of language performance. This is why the author considers them as a relatively quick and easy way to score writing or speaking. The last alternative assessment tool is Multitrait Rubrics. They allow to rate performance on three or four dimensions and several aspects are scored individually.

      Susan Gaer’s "Less Teaching and More Learning" got my complete attention from the very beginning. I especially enjoyed the Folktales project. Project Based Instruction works because it appeals to students’ feelings. To my mind, learners will be motivated if we plan projects that are meaningful for them. Gare’s examples of PBL were very carefully planned and, as she points out, there are three crucial elements to design successful PBLs: the project must be geared to the population, the students must see value in a project and flexible timelines are necessary.

       Another first for me: WebQuests. It turns out that they are inquiry-oriented activities that use resources on the World Wide Web. As mentioned at zuna.com, these web based projects help students to develop critical thinking skills and they often include a cooperative learning component. As I read different WebQuests at questsgarden.com, I became more familiar with this interesting concept, I might as well go ahead and create one just for the fun of it…and it wouldn't hurt to get the extra points, don't you think?

Sources:

 http://www.nclrc.org/essentials/assessing/alternative.htm

http://rubistar.4teachers.org/

http://www.ncsall.net/index.html@id=385.html

http://zunal.com/zunal-help/help-about-whatiswebquest.php

http://www.ncsall.net/index.html@id=385.html

http://questgarden.com/

Thanks for reading!

Using the Internet in ESL Writing Instruction and Three Extensive Reading Activities for ESL/EFL Students Using E-books.

            This week’s readings and activities made my inspiration grow bigger.

After reading Jarek Krajka’s article about using the Internet in ESL writing, my mind was filled with new and exciting ideas for my lesson plans to come when my vacation finishes in two weeks. I couldn't agree more with the author when he says that one of the benefits of incorporating on-line lessons to the curriculum is that the Internet gives students variety and choice (as opposed to using the course book only). Even though I am very much into using the Internet with my ESL students, I used to assign the same text or exercise. Now I learned that asking and encouraging learners to do something different will end up in a more productive outcome. Krajka also mentions that the use of the Internet will increase student’s cultural awareness and provide completely authentic materials. The author makes a call for attention at the end of his article when he points out that the teacher's wide computer expertise and his active role both before and during the on-line lesson are the most crucial keys to the success of such a lesson. I am sure that nobody can argue that statement since we should use the Internet as a useful teaching aid and we, teachers, have to be savvy when it comes to use online materials.

Mei-Ya Liang’s article about E-books was an extensive source of both, really useful websites and really useful guidelines on how to use the materials we would get from these websites. Her questions about skimming, getting main ideas and details from E-books are a real treasure that I intent to use. Her evaluation criterion is decidedly accurate and useful as well. I have already chosen a book to work with my advanced students next term: The Art of War by Sun Tzu. I have chosen this book inspired by John Hunter’s TESOL 2013 opening speech.

Sources:

https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#inbox/13e2f80dfb591367

http://iteslj.org/Lessons/Liang-ExtensiveReading.html

http://www.bygosh.com/index.html            http://www.bygosh.com/artofwar/index.htm

Aural and Oral Skills Teaching

       This week's readings have been both, enlightening and entertaining.

       It is really necessary that teachers provide tasks that integrate all the skills in order to benefit our students, as mentioned by Julia Gong (The employment of CALL in teaching second/foreign language speaking skills). Here I would like to add the need to chunk materials and activities. For example if you are planning for a receptive skill like Listening, make sure that you include a meaningful productive Post-Listening task like writing about the student's own opinion or experience. I agree when Ms. Gong says that using computers provide a safe environment for our students, but I have to say that my students still need the teacher's reassurance and feedback when we go to our CALL classroom. It is true that their enthusiasm increases whenever I use any technological approach during class or when I assign homework, so Julia Gong is right about the motivating factor of technology.

       While reading Developing Listening Skills with Authentic Materials by Lindsay Miller I was greatly surprised to hear that the use of the Radio was still on! I pretend to include it on my teaching. I just have some questions...Are these Radios online? Can we have their broadcasting schedules and topics in advance? Is it legal to record their programs in order to use them in class? The Pre-During-Post is a must when it comes to lesson planning for a receptive skill in my institution. Therefore, I use it almost every day. For authentic aural material I tend to use Randall's ESL Lab and Breaking News English. I also ask my students to record themselves using my Ipad and then I used the recorded conversations with other classes. I am also very much into making my students produce videos, first they need to write their own material (after researching the net), then they need to look for pictures that illustrate what they are talking about, finally they need to put all together with their voices in the background. I also use their videos as authentic material!

Speaking lesson plans

       I would like to talk about a lesson plan that I found at esl.about. It really got my attention since it deals with the grammar usage of Modals of deduction, something my intermediate students find challenging, which are so well addressed. The name of the lesson plan is Teenage Problems-Giving advice. Esl.about is one of the many destinations to get lesson plans, and it is definitely a really good one. 

esl.about

       I have to say that meeting Lindsay Clandfield in person at an ABLA Convention in Santo Domingo, which was an inspiring moment, made me read ALL his recommended lesson plans. I especially enjoyed his First Day plans since we all know that it is in that important day that we set the tone for the rest of the course (you never have a second chance to give a great first impression!). I would love to use his Out of the Classrooms plans but that is not allowed where I work. One Stop English is an ideal site to find fun and innovative plans for all English levels!

onestopenglish

Delicious Social Bookmarking

       Creating my Delicious account was quite easy since I signed in using my Facebook account. I find it so simple to use, just click on Add to Delicious on your bookmarks bar and add a short accurate description about your link. You should also add tags to group your links under different categories. Here you have a link to my Delicious account so you can follow me!

rosmerycba

Rosmery from Bolivia

       All the readings about Web Searching were really useful. Nevertheless I learned a lot from two of them. 

       First, Technology Tip of the Month. I was amazed by how much better you can use Google by adding Boolean searches. It got my attention that Google does not read AND nor NOT, so you need to use a + sign in front of a required word AND
before but not after the hyphen NOT. If you are searching for a phrase then you need to put " " around the phrase.

      The second reading that taught me a lot was "Choose the Best Search for Your Information Need". I discovered new search engines like

iSeekEducation
which works very well when I need to refine and narrow my search.

IDEA 
A Portal where you can Browse or search a debate topic database with pro/con arguments 

Merriam-Webster Dictionary and Thesaurus
Use this one when you need definitions, etymology, pronunciation, synonyms.

        I loved iSeekEducation. I made a search for Essay Writing and the first results were really accurate!

Which readings you enjoyed? Did you learn any other tips?

Thanks for reading,

Rosmery from Bolivia.



Sources 
http://pages.uoregon.edu/dhealey/techtips/june2009.html

http://www.noodletools.com/debbie/literacies/information/5locate/adviceengine.html

Some humor...