Week 5: Alternative Assessment and PBL

Week 5 was very busy. I read about  Aiternative Assessment (checklist and different types of Rubrics). At the RubiStar I created my first rubric. Rubric is a wonderful way to clarify expectations for holistic grading. Students will be more motivated when they get rubrics before they begin the task. Having read articles about PBL and WebQuest, I decided to use them in my future work with my students. I start to create WebQuest to my students at Zunal.

Week 4. Reading/Writing Skills and Technology-enhanced Lesson Plan

It was another frutful week. I have read article  Jarek Krajka "Using the Internet in the ESL Writing Instruction". The author gives  us very easy to follow instructions how to teach writing genres with the help of the Internet. The next academic year I will use some of them with my students. But before that as Krajka said I need to answer the following questions : "Why I should incorporate on-line lessons into the curriculum? What are the benefits of such a method in comparison with traditional instruction? How is the Internet component fit into the syllabus?". The activities which present Mei-Ya Liang in "Three Extensive Reading Activities for ESL/EFL Students Using E-books" will improve reading, writing and thinking skills of the students.

We continue to explore websites. I like Breaking News English (http://www.breakingnewsenglish.com/). It has activities on the themes Technology and Business English which fit the objectives of my students. Lauri's ESL Website (http://fog.ccsf.edu/~lfried/) is also a great bank of activities and it is easy to navigate.

I think that many teachers do not like to write lesson plans because they have not appropriate template and do not understand how to write correctly. Basic Lesson Plan  model from the University of Tennessee will helps  both beginning teacher and experience once.

Skill-building Websites and Delicious

This week we explore different websites for oral/aural skills and read some articles. Lindsay Miller in her article "Developing Listening Skills with Authentic Material" suggest the format of pre-, while-, and post-listening activities for helping learners develop their listening skills. I agree that such type of activities very useful with authentic materials delivered through technological media. As for the sites , the http://esl.about.com/od/conversationlessonplans/  and http://www.esl-lab.com/  fit the objectives of my students.
After reading the instructions about using Delicious.com I create my own Delicious site and now may save bookmarks.

Week 2

Last week we analize the search engines in terms of use in our own class. This task was very interesting and informative. I want to thank all friends for so many useful links and ideas. I will use Noodletools with my students  and share the information with colleagues.
Another task was to learn how to write ABCD (audience, behavior,conditions, degree) objective.  We learned that "clear objectives can help the instructor design lessons that would be easier for the student to comprehend and the teacher to evaluate".(Jones,1997).