Reading Prompt 5 reply

I don’t have an iPod or any other type of .mp3 player. My only experience with an iPod was borrowing a friend’s when I went on vacation. I ended up only listening to songs 3 times over a 3 week period. Checking out this ‘gadget’ gave me the opportunity to see if I would want one. I just didn’t get the fever. Knowing myself, I don’t have a need for gadgets. However, after reading Richardson’s chapter and the two articles, I do see value in using them for language learning/acquisition purposes.
McQuillan gives us several instances of podcasting in L2 classes. That iPods can offer students contextual support in the TL is amazing. In contrast with ESL textbook series, iPod downloads are always going to be current. The various features of an iPod make it a flexible resource for teachers. If listening is the lesson objective, the audio-only input can be utilized. For a reading lesson, iPod with text can be used, with the added support of audio and video.
Across the readings several ideas grabbed my attention. If I and my adult ESL students had iPods, accessing ‘ESL Podcast’ McQuillan mentions, along with ‘VOA Special English’ podcasts would be attempted. Both are current and relevant English programs the ESL learners would enjoy socially and academically. In Stansbury’s article, Poli’s use of the iPod for English music listening activities is a great idea. Be it grammar, spelling, and/or progressive verbs activities, it’s a fun and engaging way for students to practice and further English language acquisition. For individual student projects McQuillan discusses keeping an ‘audio diary’. This would be a great way for learners to speak and hear their voices, and in turn improve their English language speaking ability. Add to all the iPod English language uses, its portability allows students to practice beyond the classroom, easily and repetitively. The museum field trip illustrated a great way to record the experience with an iPod. Together the readings showed iPod usage yielded better success with language acquisition than the more traditional methods. Who knew an iPod could be a language learning tool!

Reading Prompt 4 reply

The integration aspect involved in the design of CALL products is an important issue to consider. Design of CALL products is a complex, evolving process that requires integration of ideas and elements for success. Levy discusses three perspectives designers need to understand in CALL development. The language teacher’s perspective requires considering how to integrate classroom traditional learning with computer learning—in or outside of the classroom. If able to, designing a curriculum as a guide or template seems to be the best route to allow flexibility in using CALL. The idea of horizontal integration from the language learners’ perspective is essential to CALL design also. Knowing learners’ technical backgrounds, experience, and predispositions is necessary to determine the amount of learner training required when designing CALL activities. An institution-wide perspective is the third one that involves what can be referred to as vertical integration—the policies, technical support, and learning environment of institutions. These areas are necessary considerations in designing university LMS’, for example. Together these three perspectives emphasize the need to integrate various components in designing CALL products.
Richardson’s chapter on RSS feeds was very informative and useful! With my adult ESL students I would be interested in using a couple RSS feeds. One might be on the topic of the recently devastating Haiti earthquake. It’s a relevant current event item that stirs thoughts, emotions, and ideas for many people. Using the various articles from newspapers, blogs, and/or volunteer organizations could be CALL tools to improve/practice critical reading and thinking, collaboration skills, and vocabulary growth. Another RSS feed might be on American culture. Again, a relevant topic of interest with the same language learning applications as the first RSS feed idea. As for myself, there are endless topics that interest me. Word of the Day feeds, news feeds, travel feeds, Texas Hill Country feeds, to name a few. I definitely see the power in RSS feeds!

Reading Prompt 3 reply

Soares discovered several challenges with her classroom blog. Students were motivated to read it in class but not outside the classroom. She questioned if they perceived it as a learning tool and if this was true of other students. Through Exploratory Practice and two PEPAs she was able to analyze issues and learn. Her first PEPA was a class discussion about the purpose and need of the blog. Answers indicated her students understood the blog was a learning tool to practice English and interact with other speakers. The motivation, however, was still not there and she found this to be true with other class blogs she visited. From her online survey with other teachers she was able to learn that levels of cognitive development and linguistic proficiency seem to be a factor, along with degree of student input. Student self-expression and interaction with real readers seem to trump linguistic accuracy. Reading posts versus commenting on them were preferred by most students. From her second PEPA of two tasks, Task 1 was a blogging activity involving the class blog and another random blog site. This task was teacher monitored, with some guidance and degree of student autonomy. A reflection activity of Task 1, Task 2 revealed the students were more apt to interact with their own blog vice an outside ‘stranger’ blog. Through these two activities motivation in blogging increased. Lessons learned for future use included trial blogs and understanding the technology involved before introducing one into the classroom, a tutorial and some hands-on demos’ of activities, recognizing there is diverse student blogging experience, and more in-class blogging to spur motivation beyond the classroom.
Without any expertise in this area, after reviewing all the technologies Levy describes, Nagata’s BONZAI is an ILTS I would want to explore for possible use. This AI seems to contain a multitude of language learning tools—lexicon, morphological generator, and a syntactic parser to name a few. Providing detailed feedback of errors made and that it contains a listening component are a couple features that make it holistic learning in a sense. I would use this program to compliment language learning in the classroom, perhaps as a progress check over the course duration. A major consideration would have to be the linguistic proficiency level of the learners, ideally intermediate to advanced learners. Also, their technology expertise level would play a role. Regarding the program itself, a consideration would have to be the cost balanced against its need in achieving learning objectives. Interesting reading for sure.