Task 3 - WWW Lesson Plan

Level: Form 1 (Intermediate)

Time: 80 minutes

Aims: At the end of the lesson, students should be able to:

a) identify and list out twenty adjectives words from the Garfield comic strips

b) use the adjectives listed out to create dialogues in a comic strip.

Technical Requirements:

Computer (two students per computer), Internet connection, internet browser (Mozilla Firefox, Internet Explorer etc), e-mail, Microsoft word.

Preparation:

1. Locate sites that related to comic strip.

2. Asks students to sign up an e-mail account (if they don’t have one) and asks them to give their e-mail address to the teacher a week before the class.

3. Teacher must post the electronic task sheets to their e-mails before the class.

Website: http://www.garfield.com/ , http://www.toondoo.com/createToon.jsp

Procedure:

Set induction (5 min)

1. Teacher shows a picture to the students and asks them to describe its appearance.
2. Teacher writes down the answers on the board and underlines adjective words.

Development (70 min)

3. Teacher explains the rules of adjectives to the students and gives examples.
4. Teacher asks the students to go to http://www.garfield.com/.
5. Teacher asks the students to read the comic strips and identify twenty different adjectives from the comic strips.
6. Teacher asks the students to list out the adjectives by copying and paste the words to the task sheet 1 that can be opened from their e-mail.
7. Once they have finished, teacher asks the students to go to website http://www.toondoo.com/createToon.jsp, sign up and create dialogues in a comic strip by using several adjectives that they have listed.
8. Teacher helps the students if they encounter any problem while making the comic strip.
9. After they have finished, they must save it and publish. They must share the comic strip with other friends by sending it to friend’ e-mails as well as teacher’s e-mail. .
10. Teacher selects a few of finished comic strips and discusses them in class with other students.

Conclusion (5 min)

11. Teacher recaps the lesson by emphasizing on how to use adjectives.

Follow up activity:

12. Teacher asks the students to complete the task sheet 2 (can be opened from their e-mail) by building up ten sentences using at least two adjectives for each sentence.
13. Once finished, they must send it via e-mail before the next class.

Hypertext

NELSON MANDELA


Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela was born in Transkei, South Africa on July 18, 1918. His father was Chief Henry Mandela of the Tembu Tribe. Mandela himself was educated at University College of Fort Hare and the University of Witwatersrand and qualified in law in 1942. He joined the African National Congress in 1944 and was engaged in resistance against the ruling National Party's apartheid policies after 1948. He went on trial for treason in 1956-1961 and was acquitted in 1961.

After the banning of the ANC in 1960, Nelson Mandela argued for the setting up of a military wing within the ANC. In June 1961, the ANC executive considered his proposal on the use of violent tactics and agreed that those members who wished to involve themselves in Mandela's campaign would not be stopped from doing so by the ANC. This led to the formation of Umkhonto we Sizwe. Mandela was arrested in 1962 and sentenced to five years' imprisonment with hard labour. In 1963, when many fellow leaders of the ANC and the Umkhonto we Sizwe were arrested, Mandela was brought to stand trial with them for plotting to overthrow the government by violence. His statement from the dock received considerable international publicity. On June 12, 1964, eight of the accused, including Mandela, were sentenced to life imprisonment. From 1964 to 1982, he was incarcerated at Robben Island Prison, off Cape Town; thereafter, he was at Pollsmoor Prison, nearby on the mainland.

During his years in prison, Nelson Mandela's reputation grew steadily. He was widely accepted as the most significant black leader in South Africa and became a potent symbol of resistance as the anti-apartheid movement gathered strength. He consistently refused to compromise his political position to obtain his freedom.


Nelson Mandela was released on February 11, 1990. After his release, he plunged himself wholeheartedly into his life's work, striving to attain the goals he and others had set out almost four decades earlier. In 1991, at the first national conference of the ANC held inside South Africa after the organization had been banned in 1960, Mandela was elected President of the ANC while his lifelong friend and colleague, Oliver Tambo, became the organisation's National Chairperson.

task 2 - article review

The title journal article is VOICE BLOG: AN EXPLORATORY STUDY OF LANGUAGE LEARNING. This journal is taken from Language Learning & Technology http://llt.msu.edu/vol13num2/sun.pdf June 2009, Volume 13, Number 2 pp. 88-103. The author of this journal article is Yu-Chih Sun from National Chiao Tung University.

Summary
This article is a study which uses voice blogs as a platform for an extensive study of language learners’ speaking skills. The aims of this study is to provide a theoretical and a pedagogical foundation for the premise that extensive practice on blogs can constitute an integral part of instruction, and that blogs enable students to structure their thoughts and to make them publicly available in a way that is rarely possible in other media. The data was collected through two procedures which are survey and retrospective interviews. The participants of this study were 46 college students in Taiwan in two oral communication classes taught by the teacher-researcher with 24 and 22 students respectively. They were majoring in a variety of technical disciplines and tended to have relatively little exposure to English in their content-based classes. For this study purpose, the teacher-researcher chose to set up one blog for each course and developed a voice blog that served as a platform to which students could upload their posts. Each student was required to upload 15 voice-blog entries and 5 voice responses to classmates’ blog entries by the mid-term week and by the final-exam week. The blog activity was mainly an out-of-class opportunity for additional, extensive speaking practice. Students must try to make the blog experience informal, personal, and exploratory according to their preference of how, what and when to say it. From the survey done, it is found that most of the students spent 15-30 minutes creating a voice blog entry. As for stages in creating the entry, 71% says that it is difficult to come up with an appropriate voice-blog topic however 49% says gradually it become easier. 47% of the students did brainstorm before they create an entry. 55% rehearsed several time before recording. 56% always listened to the recorded file before uploading to enhance the quality of their blog entries and most of them often edit or redo the blog after uploading. From the interview done, it is found that most students have positive attitude toward blog activities. Participants’ perceptions of usefulness of blogs were positive as most of them feel that the voice blog can help them improve their English. For time management, most students say that it was hard at the beginning than by the end of the semester due to unevenly spreading out of their blog. As for concern about popularity, some students do feel concern and some are not even bothered.

My Reaction
This study really interest me as it has been done on the current and popular CMC –blog -- that has becoming part of medium of learning English as second/foreign language. In my opinion, this study has been well conducted but still there is room of improvement could be made perhaps by expanding the research to wider context. Maybe what can be done is to have more participants from multi disciplines in that university so that the results will be more accurate. The method of research could be improvised too. Perhaps besides having survey and interview, the researcher could do pre and post test of the participants’ English speaking skills in order to have more accurate results on how effective the voice blog is in term of improving the students’ English speaking skills. This research has brought some implications too in the teaching and learning of ESL. Generally, the use of blog as CMC can provide positive learning environment for the students especially for those who have low self esteem in learning second/foreign language. This is because self esteem is one of vital aspect in learning second/foreign language. Another implication would be students can facilitate their own learning. Meaning that, the use of voice blog is actually promoting learner-centred approach. As for Malaysian context, I think that voice blog could be an interesting medium of teaching because it can attract students to explore and practice the language as well as understand the relevance of learning and using the language.

Website Evaluation....

Well, for my website evaluation I've chosen this website to be evaluated -- http://towerofenglish.com/

So, the questions are:-

1. What does the application attempt to "teach"?
Basically, this website is "teaching" the application user English in a very fun and interactive ways. There are various activities that can be chose and they are all integrated with other subjects which attract the user to try and explore them more.I must say that this website is not only meant for the students but also for the teachers (not only English teachers) as they can make use of the links provided to create interesting lesson plan to be taught in classroom.For example, under Business category there's a link called Lemonade Stand in which it teaches the user maths and the marketing strategies as user need to determine the product (eg how much sugar and lemon to be used,how many cups to be sold) that they are selling based on various factor involved.Thus, maths teacher can probably use this as a material for teaching students the quantity of things.

Since this website is integrated with other subjects, it has exposed the user to the real English. Students may see how the language is being used in other area or subjects and probably this will create awareness among them (especially for those who doesn't like English) to the relevance of learning English. Consequently, it will motivate the students to explore more of its content and practice the language through the activities that are provided. Some of the activities too are enabling the user to make decision and see the result of what they have decided.In that sense, they become very much autonomous as learning would be on their part -- they don't really need others to tell them what to do.

2. What sorts of things is the application user expected to do with regards to learning the content?
Apparently, there is no specific level or stages that the user have to go through. All they need to do is to select from the categories provided on the left side of the page and links related to that particular category will be displayed. Users can choose any links that they feel is suitable and interesting for them to try. There is short description on what to expect from the link and suggestions of related activities of what can users do. Each link clicked will be opened in a new tab. So it is easy for users who wish to do more than one activities at a time.

3. What sorts of computer skills is the application users expected to have in order to operate/access/use the application?
Only basic skills are needed in order to access the website -- mostly typing and clicking only. Users might have to know how to download and install certain software as some activities might required software like Real Player in order for the user to listen and watch videos. Thus, it is very convenient for all range of ages to access this website.

4. While you are “playing” / “accessing” / “assessing” the application, does it remind you of anything you do in a classroom, or with a teacher, or with a fellow classmate, or in self-study?
Yep.It reminded me of my practical teaching in which I was always referring to websites such this in order to make an interesting lesson plan for my students. I have tried to exposed my students to real English as I want them to see the relevance of learning English. Moreover I want to attract their attention especially students from the last class to see English as useful and fun rather than intimidating language that have no use for them.

Some of the websites has some generators in which it has made teachers' life a lot easier. For example, Puzzle Maker-Lesson Corner website. It has generator that can actually make puzzles -- crossword, word search, word scramble -- so teachers just only have to type the words and the web will generate the puzzles for us -- complete with the answer or clues. Another good thing is this generator allowed us to created puzzles in which they have interesting shapes rather than the normal one (the plain box). I did that for my students and being normal kids, they were all easily attracted to the puzzles up to the extent I manage to make them sit and do the puzzles quietly and attentively (normally they were all very hyper and can't really settle down for even 5 minutes). So basically this web has saved me lots of time in making interesting material for my students. And I'm really feel grateful for that. =D

5. Can you pinpoint some theories of language learning and/or teaching underlying the application?
I think the most significant theory that I noticed underlying in this application is Communicative Language Teaching (CLT). This is because this website introduce the users to the real English practice in which most of the activities engage users in the meaningful, authentic and pragmatic use of language. Students will be able to see the authentic context of using the language and practice it. Students also become autonomous learner when they access this website because they have the opportunities to focus on their won learning rather than being tell what to learn by teachers. Indirectly, it promotes intrinsic motivation among the students too in learning English .

Another theory that I found underlying this website would be The Silent Way in which again it believes that learners should develop independence, autonomy, and responsibility (Brown, 2001). Through this website, students are actually doing discovery learning as they are the one who discover what they want to learn. It is up to them to determine their own learning. So again, students become autonomous learner in which in this context, teachers don't really play any part in students' learning.

6. How well is the constructivist theory of learning applied to the chosen website(s)?
Judging from the theories that I found underlying this website, I couldn't agree more that the constructivist theory of learning is very well applied to this website. As stated in previous question, this website has enable the users to do discovery learning. Bruner said “Practice in discovering for oneself teaches one to acquire information in a way that makes that information more readily viable in problem solving" (Bruner, 1961, p.26). In other words, we learn by doing. This is what can be found when students access to this website -- solving problem according to their prior knowlege and experience. For example in Castaway (a game can be found in this site) students can actually apply their experience and knowledge in order to solve the problem they are facing (the need to escape and save themselves from danger). Another exaple would be the detective game in which students need to think and plan carefully of what they want to do in order to solve the mystery. All these are examples that proved this website reflected the constructivism theory very well. The decisions lies in the users' hand and therefore whatever outcome they received after making the decision -- good or bad -- they learn from it.

7. In 1980s and early 1990s, there was a major debate on ‘whether the computer was “master” of or “slave” to the learning process (Higgins and Johns, 1984). In relation to your evaluation – was the computer a replacement for teachers, or merely an obedient servant to students?
In relation to my evaluation, I don't think computer is either teachers' replacement or students' servant. The reason I said so is because I think computer is the only tool that is used to aid both the teachers and the students in teaching and learning process. The teacher use the computer to ease their burden in planning out the lesson whilst the students use the computer to enrich whatever knowledge that they already have.

Furthermore, computer is just a tool so it doesn't have the efficiency in teaching people to be a holistic individual. We need more than just information or activities in order to be a good human. We need affection too. . Computer can't give this because it is just a tool with no feeling included. So teachers are the one who played the role in giving the affection needed by the students.Thus, it can't replace the teachers at all. Plus,students can't really learn everything from computer, isn't it? For example, they can't learn values from the computer. What they need is real person to model the good values and to tell them what is wrong and right. Obviously computer can't do this (though it can provide information on it). So students still need the teachers to teach them about values. .

As for whether computer is an obedient servant to the students, I think that it is not a servant at all. As mentioned before, students use the computer to enrich whatever knowledge that they already have so it is an AID.A very useful aid I supposed in order to enrich students' learning and making them aware of the real life situation.

8. Would you like to use the application yourself in your future work?
Definitely! This is one of the most convenient website I found that is very user friendly.I don't encounter much problem while accessing it and I'm sure others too will find it's easy to be accessed. Furthermore, the instructions are all clear and use simple language. So it suitable for kids and beginner user. The links are all interactive and fun.Plus they are all neatly arranged.It also enables the users to do multiple activities at one time. And above all, it only requires basic skills to access the site so even if the user don't know much on operating a computer, he still can access this web. The materials are authentic so I guess it serve the purpose for those who wants to learn about real thing out there.

*Personally,it is quite an enjoyable and pleasant experience accessing this particular website. =D

9.Suggestion...
Despite its well arranged links and attractive activities, I think that the developer should update the website more frequently as there were some links have been moved. Therefore users can't access them. Another thing is, I think the developer should add more features at the home page so that the website become more lively and attractive =D

da very 1st entry of da very 1st blog...ngehehehe

Bonjour everyone and welcome to da very 1st blog of mine... =D

My full name is Nor Masheera Abdul Manaf but better of known as sheira/masheera. I was born in Negri Sembilan but spend my growing up years mostly in Selangor.Urm..this is my first time blogging so I'm still adjusting to the features (kinda having trouble figuring this and that huhu)

Okey now about the questions that need to be answered....Ummm..let see what are my skills and knowledge of computers..
Well...I've started using computer since I was in secondary school but at that moment computer was just thing that I used to play games hehehe But now...since it become a neccessity in my life as etudiante, I've developed certain skills+knowledge (definitely at beginner level) such as using word, power point and excel for the assignments, edit video+pictures using movie maker. I have NO idea at all how to format a lappy or change the the RAM whatsoever but I am very looking forward to learn how to (so that I won't have to spend money on doing these...anymore) About things that I often do when I'm online... Facebooking of course hehehe video+music +software downloading, finding info, reading newspaper etc...I did use computer for my practicum but it wasn't not really practical for me as too much trouble occured. Maybe school should provide more computer facilities for the sake of students' needs...

That's all from me...daaaaa for now.....=D