Collaborative online writing

Wikis are a very good resource to work collaborative writing, it provides a lot of advantages to the students and the teacher. In the wikis students can develop a writing and have other classmates to edit or correct what they have written. A peer correction would help students realizae their mistakes, accepts classmate's opinion, argue and defend their own point of view, and the best advantage of all is that with this continue process of editing the writing would be improving more each time someone checks it out. Besides it helps students to be critic (in a good way) a writing and realize the mistakes that they make sometimes. However as we are working with an online resource we need to be aware of the comments or editions students make on each wiki, and that they do not have any disturbing content that might distract or offend other people.

Using learning technologies for school links projects

In this module I really learned something that never thought we could do in our country, though it is normal for us to speak with people from other countries I never thought of working with another school abroad. Such interaction with other school or country could help approach the unit being studied in a more real way, we can focus on the mail objective without explaining too much of something they students might not need to focus on at the moment (depending on the program something focusing on vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation etc might be not really the main goal of our class). So I think this link project can help us have our students more motivated, make them actually produce the content of the object they are working on, be critical, acquire responsibility since they will be working with someone abroad, and have an interaction with a foreigner.

To carry this in my school I think the best technology to be used with links projects is facebook, email, and depending on the ability and interest of students use skype. And I would probably try it first with the older kids, that’s 6^th grade.

Cyber well-being

This was a very important topic we talked about, though we have seen how amazing the use of technology in the classroom can be, we need to pay close attention to some of the things that can wrong when using it, and by that I mean how dangerous or appropriate it can or can’t be for our students.  I have always looked at technology as an easier way to find information, resources, audios, discussion forum but never really pay much attention to those advertisements or pop windows that might be disturbing (probably because I am already an adult and know what to exclude or not). The idea that might be cyber-bullying makes me a bit nervous, and to be honest I had never heard about it. When working with any of the technologies we need to prepare our students in advance to be careful when looking for information, to know the source of the information, the author, of valid it is, its update, and be a bit critical when choosing a web site. To help with this, I think the best is to notify the parents about the activities that are being carried out so they might have a little control on them at home and also provide help to their children if they need it when they are working on this.

Evaluating and Selecting Websites

Evaluating and selecting material is one of the teacher’s tasks because we are constantly looking for new material to be used with our students, each year searching for a book that is more updated and appropriate for our group, for information that might expand their knowledge and are more attractive, for new activities to make them practice, for new lectures, etc. And in order to do that we need to carefully look and study those materials and make sure that they will be accurate for the lesson that we’ll teach.

When using the web we need continue doing this job of evaluating and selecting, the only difference will be the kind of resource being studied, because now this material or resource will be from the WEB. So don’t think that because it is on the web it is totally reliable and that there is no need to carefully study and it will just take a few minutes to select anything from the web and give it to our students.

When teachers select a website they need to be aware if it is accurate for the lesson that will be taught, if the content (language, images) is appropriate for the students, if it is relevant, if it has any distracters, if it works some of the skills or components, if it is a reliable source, if it is easy to handle for students, etc. However, please do not be scared and do not think it this will bring you a bigger job, I am sure that with the use of the web classes will turn out to be more effective and nicer.

Integrating the Web

Our teaching can become more effective if we integrate it with the technology since it provides us  a wide variety of resources that we can use to improve our classes, make the lessons we are teaching more interesting, more accurate, and depending on the case simpler. But of course to be able to make this integration possible we need to be aware of certain aspects: the cost of the resources and licenses, the way students will access to the technology, the teacher’s skills on handling such technology, and the updating of the resource being used with students.

And never forget that the main thing that you should consider is to conscious of the lesson you are teaching because depending on that you will determine if it appropriate to integrate it with any learning technology, which one suits better and the way in which it will be used, and this indeed leads us to the planning part where we need to think and establish which are the activities that students will carry out along the lesson and how.

Use of technology in my class...

I think we all agree that the main reason that we need to use technology in our classroom is because as teacher we need to be updated with the use of new tools that our students handle and engage them more, it is a way to encourage them and to make the classes more attractive to them, and those resources might help us improve our classes in different ways.
In my class I am not sure yet how to use some of the technologies, since definitely the use of computer and internet is not an option in my school, what I can relay on is the use of office applications, DVD players and mobile phones. Since I am working with young learners I think I can create activities to be worked with power point and of course children love stories which might be seen on video :D. I think those are my two best options so far (I haven't really planned an activity yet, I need some time and work on it). However I have seen that my students use a lot their BB most of the time to get into facebook. I guess we could work with it by creating a group and working on a specific topic (probably only with the oldest students)

Netiquettes

I’ve always thought that when communicating on the internet we have to be very specific and clear, because it has happened to me that because we don’t have a way to see the facial expressions or to listen to the tone of voice, some misunderstandings arise. So every time I communicate on the internet I try to be very careful with the words I use and if it possible try to make them sound softer in case they might be interpreted as something else. Of course, now that I have read more on netiquettes I am much clearer, I have learned a lot of things that we can use or that we shouldn’t use when writing on the internet, and it has been very helpful, but of course everything improves with the practice.  :D

In the society there are always rules to follow for everything, to make a registration, to drive, to behave in a public place, and even to communicate, therefore we have the speaker and listener rules which helps move along a conversation in a good way. Just as we have rules when talking face to face with a person, we have some sort of rules or guidelines that we should follow to keep a good and nice communication on the internet. Some are not aware of this, but yes, even on the internet we need to follow certain rules so we can keep a good communication without offending, attacking, or causing any misunderstanding. 

So when writing on internet be aware of:

Capital letters are used for shouting
Try to make messages short, you can use abbreviations to do that.
Make use of the emoticons to add personality to the messages.
Be conscious on what you are posting.
Don't respond to flames.
Do not send spam (it is very disturbing to be receiving unwanted emails)
Forgive bad spelling
Do not use images or content without permission
Remember that what you post can be seen by any public.





 

Technology in the Classroom

Currently it is very strange not to find someone who is not engage (at least in a way) to technology therefore it has now become part of people’s life, either it is daily or sporadically, people are on a web page, on a blog, on a social network,  messenger, etc handling these new tools.

Nowadays that technology has progressed at a really quick pace it is important for us teachers to be updated in these advances and of course be able to manage it. On the web we can find a lot of resources that can help us improve our classes, at this time it is very rare to find someone, I mean a teacher, who has not used the web to look for some material, listening or just ideas to plan a class. And we can also integrate or encourage our students to make use of this resource not only for social purposes but for learning too.  A more advance and modern teaching model may be more attractive for students and might help motivate them. 

I think we can use technology in classroom in two ways:

-By having a lab in the school and controlling directly the assignments

-By sending assignments to be done on line (just like we are right now)

Of course in our country it is not very likely to find institutions with these accommodations, therefore for us it results more beneficial the second one, to work online, which by the way might bring more benefits to the students. They would be able to work on the assignment wherever and whenever it is possible for them to (of course with a due date), they are able to learn not only the subject that is being studied but the use of the computer too, they feel more motivated with a new and interactive teaching model, they learn to administrate their time (depending on the group you are working with), all these among others.

However to be honest I think the use of technology in the classroom can make things easier or more difficult depending on how well one manages it.