I would like to reflect on my learning experience on E-portfolio. In my opinion, E-portfolio is without a doubt the new and contemporary method of creating one’s portfolio in cyber space. It provides users the freedom to create, store, copy and paste, embed hyper links and record their learning or self-reflecting progress and also to share with people wherever they are in the world through the Internet. It can also act as a proof of computer literacy to potential employers when one applies for jobs. One point that I would like to point out is that the Mahara E-portfolio website will be excluded from my recommendation list for any first time user. I found the applications and features on Mahara are so confusing and rigid to use and I had to almost jump through hoops to simply embed a hyperlink on my view; I do not consider that very user-friendly at all hence the reason why I chose another digital asset – Blogger.com to develop this assessment on or to quote an old English saying: “Better the devil you know”. I had used Blogger.com before for assessments from other papers in the past semester so I do have the ability to find my way around and use the applications without any difficulties.
This is just my humble opinion on Mahara, I’m sure they will improve and be more user-friendly in the near future.
This week About.com is discussing some of the important concerns about teaching writing skills to ESL/EFL students. I can really relate back to my own learning experience when it comes to writing in English. When I attended the IELTS course for academic purposes, I had no idea how different academic writing is comparing to high school composition writing! I felt like I was writing in a whole new foreign language even though all the words were in English. The structure, the usage of tenses (preferably passive voice) and a whole new set of vocabulary; I never thought I would pass the writing section in the IELTS exams…
Although I have only received four emails from About.com for their online learning – Teaching English as a S2, I have gained some very valuable foundation knowledge in this particular area. When I first enrolled in the Teach English papers for next semester, I had absolutely no idea what would I be taught or what kind of difficulties that I would encounter. But after 4 weeks of reading the About.com emails and reflecting on what they had introduced to me, I’m now more confident and I can say that at least I have some clues of what is to come in the next semester.
About.com is giving an introduction to some of the vital issues related to writing skills for ESL/EFL teachers. A number of examples are included in this week’s introduction demonstrating how to build up writing skills from the sentence level to the paragraph and also a series of examples of teaching essay writing skills.
In order to make the learning experience a long lasting and valuable, students are required to be involved personally in writing exercises. The teacher should be certain and clear on what writing skills they are attempting for the students to develop and learn. Next step is for the teacher to decide on which means, type or exercise can facilitate learning of the target area. Upon defining the target skill area and means of implementation, then the teacher can proceed to focus on the topic s which students can participate in. Both enthusiasm and effective learning from students can be expected when the teacher combines these objectives pragmatically.
A number of factors should be taken into consideration when choosing the target area, for example, the students’ level of English; the average age of the students and any specific goals or aims for students to learn how to write in English. Other important factors in this process are: What outcome is expected from the students to produce at the end of the writing exercise? Will it be a well written letter or basic communication of ideas? What is the focus of the writing exercise? Is it the structure of an essay, tense usage or creative writing? The teacher can then start to focus on strategies to involve the students in the writing exercise in order to build a long lasting and valuable learning experience.
After talking to Darryl this week, he made me realized that we shouldn’t rely solely on the grammar rules set out in the text books when giving lessons on English grammar. We should be more flexible and practical with grammar use especially in our daily life. Nobody speaks like what they read in a textbook and we definitely do not wish our students to be like robots, which are programmed with a rigid set of grammar rules.
Nonetheless, the “grammar banging” (intensive grammar review sheets) method mentioned in this week’s About.com email is both beneficial to the ESL teachers and the students.
Students will become more confident and competent with the use of the passive voice in daily conversations when it is repeated frequently. Bear in mind that the subject area that the students discuss should be limited to a targeted area as not to confuse or make it too difficult for them to comprehend. Students are more likely to produce the targeted outcome when their oral production task is clearly defined for they do not have to concern with the creation of a self-chosen subject.
The Induction Method: Quiz Maze
ESL Inductive Learning and Grammar Review Maze
This learning game helps students to inductively review previously studied grammar.
Instructions
• To correctly move through this maze, students must choose if the sentence is correct or incorrect.
• Black arrows are for correct answers, red arrows for incorrect answers.
• Two numbers are left out of the correct path of the maze.
• If students can't find their way out they know that they have made a mistake along the way and need to check through the sentences again!
Here are the sentence links divided into levels. The final link gives the key to the maze, which is the same for each level. Feel free to print the image out and use the sentences for the appropriate level, or, make up your own sentences - just be sure that the correct and incorrect sentences correspond to the key. :-)
Learning Grammar through Conversation
The aim of this class exercise is to use past forms of modal verbs of probability and advice to reason and discuss difficult issues. The teacher will present a difficult problem and students are asked to use the past forms of modal verbs, for example, must have been, should have done, etc. to discuss the problem and offer suggestions for a possible solution.
• Once the students have discussed the presented difficult problem, divide them into small groups.
• Students then are asked to fill out the sheet including Facts, Conclusions and Judgment and remember to remind them that modal verbs of probability should be used when appropriate.
• Once decisions are reached among the groups, have a class debate and ask each group to share and debate their opinions.
• Keep the conversations going by asking students to think of similar situations that they have heard or been involved with?
The Old School: Grammar Banging
About.com points out:
…“grammar banging” (intensive grammar review sheets) is useful at the end or beginning of the year. The end of year calls for exam preparation and the beginning calls for some review to raise awareness of what has already been learnt and where problems still lies. The sheets provide in these “grammar banging” reviews are very effective because each question focuses on one important, specific area.
The ESL Class Objectives part this week in the About.com email, points out the significance of setting out a clear and concise class plan for both the teacher and the students. From my own experience of attending an English course when I first arrived in NZ was to pass the IELTS exams in order for me to gain access to tertiary education, though I did not end up going to university back then. And because of my specified reason, I worked out a learning plan right at the start of my course; I also had a discussion with my tutor at the time and he provided me with a lot of valuable advices on how to pursue my goal.
My learning experience of the IELTS course was immensely beneficial for my exams and my today’s study at university, especially on the Academic Writing part. I used to write English composition o a secondary school level but never had I imagined learning the knowledge of academic writing, it was so new and exciting to me. Our tutor was so focused on planning an appropriate class for us because our common goal was identified in the beginning of the course.
In this week email, About.com points out that the common purpose of most adult learners is to be able to communicate in English. As a result of this, emphasis is often placed on communicative approaches in the most widespread teaching materials, namely the Oxford and Cambridge University Press Series. It is also beneficial for an ESL teacher to possess the knowledge of a number of teaching techniques and theories in which will assist you to smooth the progress of your students’ learning experience.
Setting ESL Class Objectives
In order to provide your students with a successful learning experience, various reasons as well as language acquisition needs, require to be taken into consideration in the process of planning a class as this is equally significant for both the students and the ESL teacher. Students can only work out a better learning plan when they clearly understand their reasons for learning English. Moreover, once the students have set up their learning plans, it will also assist the teacher to identify their learning needs and desires. As adult learners do not usually have state imposed goals, pragmatic method to English learning is most likely to be the most effective.
