Using Podcasting in the class

    When I first heard about podcasting, I wondered why it’s so popular since there’re so many audio files on the internet. After browsing some information about it, I found it is unique because people can not only find a huge variety of new and interesting content but also can listen to what you want, when you want, and how you want. In addition, the audio files can be automatically downloaded to your computer and synced to your MP3 play. You also can create your own “radio”-style show and broadcast it to the world. It is really interesting.

    I chose one episode of podcasting English Café 498  in ESL Pod  as my teaching material. This audio material contains three part: introducing a famous movie, sharing a popular website, and answer some questions. When listening to the introduction of the movie Mary Poppins, we can not only hear the content of the movie. We can also know about the background of the movie. For example, women had no right to vote until 1920. Moreover, some words are spelled slowly and explained in detail such as nanny, nursery and so on. When listening to the question what the meaning of “oblivion” and “overwhelm” are, we can hear that the words were repeated twice and explained by a lot of examples.

    This is an interesting listening material that are suitable for students whose listening ability is “L.3.4.c Listen and respond appropriately to presentations and performances of peer or published works such as original essays or narratives, interpretations of poetry, or individual or group performances of scripts” according to Michigan EnglishLanguage Proficiency Standards. 

    I don’t think I will use all of them since it is so long that students cannot finish the listening and understand the content of the audio in the class. I can choose part of them such as the movie as my teaching material to teach my students how to get the main idea, how to get details and how to take notes when listening. In the class, I can ask my students to listen to the material and take notes. Then, I can talk with them about the movie to assess whether they get the plot of the movie, that is, the main idea of the listening. In addition, I can check them the words that are mentioned in the listening to see whether they can get the detail of the listening. I can ask them to explain the meaning of the words or ask them to make sentences using these words. Finally, to know whether they can take notes when listening, I can ask them to hand in their notes and score them.

     As a matter of fact, I think podcasting is very useful for students to improve their listening after class. They can choose what they like and listen in their spare time.

My comic strips class

  My comic strips can follow my last photo class. After they have known the new vocabulary and what is the healthy food, they can make their own dialogue according to the example in the comic strips.

  My students are still the beginners and according to Michigan English Language Proficiency Standards, they should be:

S.2.2.a Participate in social conversations with peers and adults on familiar topics by asking and answering questions and requesting information

R.3.3.d Recognize simple idioms and figures of speech

  In the class, after the students watch the comic strips, I can ask work in pairs to make their own dialogue to talk about what they have for breakfast , whether the food are healthy or unhealthy, if not, what they should do, meanwhile, I can expand some new words and sentence structure. For example, chocolate contains a lot of energy and you will put on weight if you eat too much.

  To check whether they can achieve the goal, I will ask them to perform their dialogue in pairs. Also, I can ask them to bring their own comic strips about the healthy eating to school next time.

My photo class

    When I was a teacher, I found that many students developed unhealthy eating habits for different reasons. So I think maybe it is a good chance for me to teach my students to keep a healthy diet as well as learning some new words about food.

    In my video, I introduced some reasons why students think little of their breakfast and tell them to choose food that are good for their health. This class can teach my students some words about food and also we can talk about health.

 I choose many pictures and short phrases, so the class is suitable for beginners. Based on MichiganEnglish Language Proficiency Standards, my language learning objective is:

S.1.3.a Participate in conversations on social topics by asking and requesting information

R.3.2.b Use meaning clues and language structure to expand vocabulary (pictures, background knowledge, context clues).

    After showing them the video, I can ask them what they usually have for breakfast and talk with them why they choose them and whether they are healthy or not.

To assess whether they learned the goal we wanted them to achieve, I can utilize the following method:

1.    Give them a sheet and ask them to fill in the blanks ( they are required to write down the words about food)

2.    Show them more pictures and ask them whether they are healthy or not and what they will choose for breakfast in order to keep health.

My TED Class

    My topic in TED class is about the hidden power of smiling and I think it is an interested topic that students are familiar with and have a lot to say. My language learning objective is based on MichiganEnglish Language Proficiency Standards and they should be:

1.       L.3.2.e Listen attentively to stories/information and identify key details and concepts using both verbal and non-verbal responses

2.       S.2.2.a Participate in social conversations with peers and adults on familiar topics by asking and answering questions and requesting information

3.       R.4.4.a Apply knowledge of complex syntax (sentence structure) and advanced grammatical features to derive meaning from content area texts

4.       W.4.3.a Independently create cohesive paragraphs that develop a central idea with consistent use of standard English grammatical forms, including a variety of sentence types

To test whether each individual student really learned the goal we wanted them to achieve, my assessment can be  

1.       Since the topic can be seen from the title, the two multiple-choices focus on details of the video and they can check whether get key details.

2.       Ask students to read two related articles in the Dig Dipper part. In the class, I will ask some students to retell the key points of the reading part to make sure they understand the meaning of the articles.

3.       In the discussion part, I can walk through the groups to check whether their discussion are around the topic or based on the questions I come up with in the discussion part. At last, I will ask some students to share their opinions, representing their own group.

4.       Ask students write a composition about the functions of the smile with personal experience independently according to what they discussed previously.

The flipped classroom

    In our traditional classroom, teachers teach and interact with students and students do their homework after class. Here comes the problem: sometimes, we thought we understood the concept being thought; however, when doing our homework alone, we felt frustrated since what we had learned did not work at that time. Flipped classroom changes the model of traditional classroom and make it possible for students to do their homework in classroom.

    Even though there is no single model for the flipped classroom, it leaves us an impression that Flipped classroom means that teacher asks the students to watch some short video lectures at home before the class session, so they can focus on exercises, projects, or discussion in the class. In the article three reasons to flip your class, Marshall mentioned that the flipped classroom can increases comprehension of the material since students can learn at their own pace with the help of video. Secondly, it can increases interaction with teacher and peers when they discuss in groups or teacher offers help in the class. Thirdly, it can increases critical thinking in the process of learning because it gives the students more opportunity to participate at their cognitive level rather than comprehending the content of the class. It seems that it is necessary for teachers to flip their class to improve the class efficiency.

    In my opinion, the first problem is what if students don’t watch the videos at home? I think it is the biggest problem that every teacher may face in their classroom. Fortunately, I got some useful ideas on the internet. Such as Gimbar thought that ask students to take notes, copy down the definitions, and copy down the examples when they are watching the videos. I think another way to encourage our students to watch videos at home is to teach them the importance of interaction in the class and to help them establish the sense of group honor. 

    Another problem for me is that since students are required to watch videos at home, it means that every students have access to computer. As a matter of fact, most students live in the dormitory where computers are not provided. In addition, parents and head teachers forbid students to use computer after school for fear that they are addicted to computer games. In my class, I think I may rarely use this teaching method unless they have a two-day or longer break to ensure all of them can watch the video after class.

A serious game----The Third World Farmer

  http://3rdworldfarmer.com/
  I chose the game called 3^rd World Farmer which can guide us to experience the real life of the peasant in the third world. At first, I treated it as a game and I thought the more crops (corn, wheat, cotton, peanut) I planted, the more money I would get. Unfortunately, I met with many hardships, and the whole family were died in the end. The second time I played the game, I paid attention to some other details, and I found that so many hardships that the peasant had to suffer, such as the corrupt officials, the weather disasters, the unstable market, and other unexceptional problems. I played this game for four times and only one time the whole family were alive and two children had access to school. In other three times, they could not go to school and hospital for lack of money. What’s worse, their farm would be occupied by the chemistry factory. I was totally shocked when I finished the game. This game provoke people to think about the tough life of people in the third world and the real topics happened in the game, thus, taking action to help people there. The reason why I chose this game is that I hope more people can realize this situation and more people can join in.

  The game is not precise in all details, but shows us a lot of topics I mentioned above. The students should be at Level 4 speaking skills in the class. Michigan English Language Proficiency Standards describes their ability like this: "S.4.4.a Exchange, support and discuss opinions and individual opinions and individual perspectives with peers on a variety of topics dealing with content area information or issues". The objective of the class is to teach students express opinions on certain topics. When they play the game, ask them pay attention to the topics that affect the income of the farmers. After they finish the game, we can hold the activities to access students by asking them describe their personal opinions of the topics and the consequence of the game (e.g.: what do you think of the Farming License? Is it fair for government to charge extra money?). Moreover, we can discuss the topics and find the solution to this situation (e.g.: which one do you think is more important, education or health insurance? How can we help more people go to school?). In addition , we can give students a certain and ask them to write a composition to express their opinions.

Polleke’s Blue Room

http://www.freakinrooms.com/games/pollekesblueroom/

    Since I like to play escape game when I was a student, so I chose Polleke’s Blue Room. It is a house with four rooms (four images), and you have to escape the house according to the clues you get. Maybe there is something wrong with my mouse, or maybe I am not familiar with this game, it took me nearly an hour to play this game.

 

    Even though the image is simple, the game is complex since not only should you be careful about every detail but also you should think about the relationship among the clues. I think it is a good game that can be used to teach students who are at early intermediate level. According to Michigan English Language Proficiency Standards,students who are at this level can start short conversations on simple topics,can understand basic narrative text and authentic materials,and can write simple notes and write short reports using basic vocabulary,and common language structures.I can make use of this game to teach them some vocabulary, try describe the procedure of a task (learn to use imperatives to give instructions and learn to express order such as first, next, then, finally…), and follow the instructions to complete a task.

     In the class, the teacher can be an instructor and assistor, and the students can be the game player and center of the class. My class can be divided into three stages. First, I will introduce the game to the students and ask them to play the games without the walk through in a limited time (about 40 minutes). Meanwhile, I will ask the students pay attention to the vocabulary on the top left corner. Students can memorize some words when they click on the objects in the game.

 

    It is impossible for all students to finish the game in the limited time. At this time, ask two or three students who perform better in the game to describe how they play the game to other students who fall behind. At this time, students must make use of the images of the game to explain the procedures of the game and use the word that appeared in the game. If students have difficulty in explaining, teacher and other student can give them a hand. 

 

    Finally, show students the walk through and ask them to finish the task according to the walk through. I don’t think all students can finish the game in the class because it requires extreme carefulness and patient. So they can play the game after class and discuss how they play it in the next class. Meanwhile, I can check whether they master the vocabulary, the imperatives by describing part of the procedure of the game.
    I think that assessment can be informal and formal in many different ways.  I can check their words according to their description of how to finish the game as well as giving them a quiz such as fill in the blanks or multiple-choice. When checking whether they can describe the procedure of the task, I can ask the students discuss the game strategies in the class or write short notes when they play the game.

    It is really an interesting game. It can help students learn something new as well as having the sense of achievement. I can still remember the great joy when I put the numbers I collected together.