Material Development : Digital Language Learning Material

Examples of Digital Language Learning

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Criteria for evaluating digital learning material

Errors

Less serious errors that disturb the work of the user  serious errors that, example, endanger the preservability of the users’ outputs

Efficiency

refer to the experience of the users while operating the application or material after they manage to master using it in term of how well the experience goes.

Learnability

 the time taken for the user to use the system before they carry on to learn essential skills necessary to perform the tasks.

Memorability

the ability of an occasional user who has previously used the system to remember its operational principles. 

Criteria of pedagogical usability

    

     Feedback

        Student should be provided with encouraging and immediate feedback by the learning material will increases learning motivation and helps students to know their strength and weakness

Learning progress cannot be happened without immediate correction

Motivation

        Affects learning and makes people behave the way they do

        Motivation is the way to do things by reference to instincts, desires and reinforcement; support the direction on one’s general behavior. Motivation affects alertness and vigor

     Goal orientation

         When the goals of teacher, students and learning materials are closely aligned, the best results can be obtained. Goals should be clear cut and able to motivate the students to achieve the goals. When the students themselves do not set their goals, their meaningfulness should be justified from the point of view of motivation. Students should pursue their own interests in relation with learning goals

Learner control

        Learner’s memory should be pushed to the limit when learning a new topic. Materials should be broken down to be learned into small meaningful units

     Applicability

        The approach taken in learning material should correspond to the skills that the learner will later need in everyday and working life.The learners should be able to transfer the skills or knowledge to other contexts. Learning something new can be accomplished effectively by relating it to practical tasks. Learning materials should be at appropriate level from the point of view of learner’s learning process

     Added value

        To increase creativity in learners when using digital language learning material. Other kind of added value: adaptability to individual needs, number of flexible options, learning is controlled and initiated by learners, interesting contents, development of communication, active participation of students.

SLA theories and principles :

Theories :

• Behaviourist
• Innatist
• Interactionist

Principles :

• Materials should achieve impact
• Materials should help learners to feel at ease
• Materials should help learners to develop confidence
• What is being taught should be perceived by learners as relevant and useful
• Materials should require and facilitate learner self-investment
• Learners must be ready to acquire the points being taught
• Materials should expose the learners to language in authentic use
• The learners’ attention should be drawn to linguistic features of the input.
• Materials should provide the learners with opportunities to use the target language to achieve communicative purposes.
• Materials should take into account that the positive effects of instruction are usually delayed
• Materials should take into account that learners differ in affective attitudes
• Materials should permit a silent period at the beginning of instruction.
• Materials should not rely too much on controlled practice
• Materials should provide opportunities for outcome and feedback
• Materials should help the learner to develop cultural awareness and sensitivity.
• Materials should reflect the reality of language use.
• Materials should help learners to learn in ways similar to the circumstances in which they will have to use the language.
• Materials should help to create readiness to learn.

Songs and movies..

I'm looking at my lecturer's blog, Now Educate and saw the lists of things that we should have and post in our blog. Oh ya! I forgot about the videos, movies, and songs that can be used to students for teaching writing! And this was too late, but I hope what I post here are usable for me and others one fine day. Better late than never.~

1. Monsters, Inc.

Mike and Sulley as they attempt to protect a little girl from the clutches of an evil fellow monster named Randall Boggs, with the very real bond between the two buddies ensuring that we can’t help but root for them to succeed in their efforts. (The fact that they’re both monsters becomes irrelevant almost immediately.)

2. Au Revoir Les Enfants

An autobiographical account of a boy's first friendship - and his discovery of the real world. Set in a Catholic boarding school during the German occupation of France, this is the powerful story of Julien Quentin, a sensitive, headstrong 12-year-old boy who befriends the new student in his class. The boy sees differently than the others. But Julien is intrigued and the two begin a shaky friendship. One day, by accident, Julien learns of a secret that will change the young boys' lives forever

3. Toy Story

Woody is Andy's favourite toy, an old cowboy doll with a head full of stuffing and a heart of gold. But one fateful birthday sees the arrival of Buzz Lightyear, Space Ranger and potential rival for the hallowed position of Favourite Toy. Both movies tell simple, yet powerfully real tales. Expressed with extraordinary care and skill in animation, the films capture the importance and fragility of true friendship with eye-popping visuals, spirited laughs and lovable characters.

4. Up

Carl Fredricksen is concerned only with transporting his rickety old house to the edge of a cliff in South America. His solitary plans are foiled after an eager Wilderness Explorer named Russell stows away on his journey, and it’s not long before Carl becomes a reluctant father figure to the exuberant little boy. This is despite the fact that Carl initially wants nothing to do with Russell, although, as the movie unfolds, it becomes clear that Carl needs Russell just as much as Russell needs Carl – as the chubby adolescent teaches Asner’s prickly character that experiences and adventures are much more gratifying when you have someone to share them with.

Lists of the songs

a) Count On Me

The singer for this song is Bruno Mars and it talks about friendship.

b) Country Road

The singer for this song is John Denver.

c) Number One for Me

By Maher Zain, it is talking about our mother. Students will learn how to appreciate their mother and things that they should and should not do to their parents.

d)The Climb

A song that teach students to never give up in their life and to be a patient person in this world because people around will always jealous and want to make you down when you want to be a successful person. The singer for this song is Miley Cyrus.

Integrating Technology in Teaching Writing

What is the educational technology? Educational technology is the study and ethical practice of facilitating learning and improving performance by creating, using and managing appropriate technological processes and resources. The term educational technology is often associated with, and encompasses, instructional theory and learning theory. While instructional technology is "the theory and practice of design, development, utilization, management, and evaluation of processes and resources for learning," according to the Association for Educational Communications and Technology (AECT) Definitions and Terminology Committee, educational technology includes other systems used in the process of developing human capability. Educational technology includes, but is not limited to, software, hardware, as well as Internet applications, such as wikis and blogs, and activities. Educational technology has their own advantages, and of course, the disadvantages too.

The advantages are:

a) Better Engagement and Motivation

The use of technology in an elementary school classroom enhances both student engagement and motivation. Student engagement and motivation are closely related during the learning process because the more students are motivated, the more likely they will be successful and engaged in their learning. Students who are often uninterested in learning become more motivated by technology. This motivation and engagement can be related to a specific content area in the classroom or new skills gained by incorporating technology. If teachers can see the power that technology has in motivating students, they can use it to their advantage

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b) Better Instructional Materials

Technology has the opportunity to expand instructional materials beyond a teacher’s wildest dreams. The possibilities are endless for the types of materials made available by technology today. Whether it be technologies available via the internet or software that can be purchased by a district, these resources are expanding and are becoming better and better with each passing moment due to people who are passionate about incorporating technology into the magical process we call learning.

c)Better Communication and Interaction

Technology has become a major foundation for communication and interaction between the classroom and the student’s home life. At the elementary level, some students often forget what their homework is, when it is due, or sometimes forget papers at school that need parent signatures. In addition to having technology provide these things to students, it also makes them available to parents. With technology being involved, students are able to access classroom websites from home, which may contain their homework or other materials from their classroom. With this tool, parents are able to communicate with their child’s teacher as well. This type of communication allows parents to know what is going on in their child’s classroom. When it comes to communication, as stated on http://www.rememberanything.com/benefits-of-technology-in-the-classroom/, “technology is an excellent tool for assessment purposes as well as advocacy issues between the students and the teachers”. Students are able to do homework or activities online where their teachers can assess them to see if they understand the information taught in class. This is a great foundation that is making it easier for teachers to assess the information that their students actually know.

d) Increased Family Involvement

As teachers and school districts look at technology, many view technology as an avenue to increase parent and family involvement in the students’ education. Parental involvement is something that is desired by many teachers, but some do not know how to increase the involvement from students’ parents and families. Technology is an appropriate answer to this serious and difficult dilemma that teachers face year after year when trying to get parents involved. If teachers can see the advantages to using technology to communicate with families and use technology correctly to do this, they will also see improvement within their students. This involvement through technology can manifest itself in many forms: classroom websites, emails, grades posted online, etc. With these tools incorporated into the classroom, families are now more than ever before becoming involved in the education of the student by being aware of what is going on in the classroom.

e)Information

A major advantage of the Internet is the ability to access all types of information from library resources all over the world, including magazines, books, newspapers and journal publications, instantaneously. This information increases the learning potential by providing students with the latest information. It also expands the resources of a smaller library tremendously. Students using search engines can find information quicker and more tailored to their specific needs.

The disadvantages are:

a) Inaccurate or out-dated information

As the disadvantage, educators may consider this information overload. With all of the information available to students, they may find it difficult to choose which information is most important to a topic and also when to stop looking. In addition, the validity of Internet sources varies considerably from website to website, which means students can very easily acquire inaccurate or out-dated information online.

b) Online Education

An online education provides students with the convenience of going to class and completing assignments on their own timetable. Students can take classes from a college or university nowhere near their home and get an education experience not available to them locally. Students who travel with a job can take a class in a house, hotel room or coffee shop. Students save on housing, gas money and travel expenses. 

However, an online education means face-to-face instruction does not exist, nor does the ability to get instant feedback on class assignments in many situations. They also can't hear questions from other students (or ask questions themselves), which often can give clarification to a student struggling with the concepts of the material.

c) Virtual Field Trips

An advantage of a classroom Internet connection allows students to take a virtual field trip without ever leaving their school building. Students studying the animals of Africa, the Great Wall of China or the Egyptian pyramids, for example, never have to get on a plane. For schools struggling with budgets and for schools in rural locations, going to an online museum or virtual zoo gives them a unique opportunity they might not otherwise have without Internet access.

Disadvantages of this experience mean students can't ask questions of the zookeeper or touch a snake at a zoo. They can't take pictures or create memories with their classmates. For younger children, a field trip can teach them how to behave in public and respect adults; since virtual field trips don't leave the classroom, they only learn to respect their teacher.

d) Social Skills

The Internet allows students to meet people from all over the world at the click of a button. Suddenly doing a tenth grade literature project on Irish literature with the help of students in Ireland makes the project more interesting and thus a huge advantage. Artists studying Italian architecture can email experts in Italy about the vast amount of artwork.

While these opportunities provide great details and resources, they also can damage social skills. Students who reply primarily on the Internet for information and interaction don't talk to people in person as much; rather they just email back and forth. This can make it hard to develop listening skills, especially when interviewing someone, or to acquire appropriate social skills for face-to-face interactions.

Mini Test! ~5 Dis 2012~

Question 2.

You are teaching the theme ‘Environment’ to a form three class with intermediate level of proficiency. Describe one activity on how to integrate the following thinking skills into your lesson.

1. Analysis
2. Application

For this question, I will give the students a picture about recycling so they can analysis and apply it. Based on the picture given, students will analysis and write an essay how to apply it in their daily life.

Based on the picture given, write an essay about the cycle of paper recycling in correct order. Your essay must be included all the process shown and not more than 250 words.

Mini Test! ~5 Dis 2012~

Question 1.

For this question, I did not remember or jot down the question, but it asked me to write two instructions for the students. So, this is my answers.

1. You are the CBS Gaya Centre. Suddenly, a woman came to you and asked the way to go to Wisma Merdeka. By referring to the map below, write the direction that you will give to that woman clearly so she can arrived Wisma Merdeka from CBS Gaya Centre. You direction must be not more than 100 words.

2. Your best friend from London is coming to Sabah and he asked you to bring him go around Sabah but, you are not free on that day. So, he asked you to tell him about the place that he should visit. Based on the map below, write an informal letter to your best friend to tell him about the interesting places to visit, the directions to go the places, the accommodation provided, and anything that you feels are important. Your letter must not more than 250 words.

Responding to Student's Writing

   After I read the essay handed up by the students, I will read and mark it. To comment the essay, I will use different ways for different students based on different condition. For the example, if the level of students that I teach is high proficiency, I encourage students to peer-editing before the submission. By this way, students not only will edit their friends work but also can make it as an example to write on their own if they feel their friends work is good.

   If majority of the students make same mistakes and repeated, I will talk about that in front the class and write some example of mistakes and the correction. By this way, I think students will be able to ask directly anything that they don't understand and not feel so embarrassing because almost everyone in the class make the same mistakes.

   However, I will use written comments and talk to the writer personally if the mistakes made are so terrible, and just a few students have that kind of problems. By this way, I think I will not make the students feel shame rather than I talk to them in front of the class. At least, when I talk personally with them, I can ask them what actually they don't understand and find some ways to help them out.

Mark An Essay

This is the picture of the essay that I have to mark.My phone camera is not so clear, so I typed the essay here.

A Scary Experience

The last year. I with my friends snow and Elva went to theme park. We was a very nice and scary day.

This theme park is very big. One eye can’t saw the end. There were a many entertainmer facilities. We played a lot of fun things. We played the merry-go-round, advance through the rapids, the roller coaster…….

we saw the haunted house really went to played. But when we walked to the door, snow said to us that doesn’t went to go in. we asked her why, she said the terrible. We encouraged her, said we could always with her. She agreed to went to in with us.

First, we just walked in, feeled a very black. But we were a little bit into the inside. We heard some sounds. Snow tinghtly caughted our hands. After that we continue went to inside. We feels a hand caught our feet. We were very scared. More and more went to inside, terribled thing more and more. We saw a vampire in the corner tongue out. Scared we closed the eyes. emit cold sweat. We had been closed eyes out of the haunted house.

Finished, we all went home. This was really beautiful and ‘scary’ experience day.

Overall, the essay is understandable. I can understand what the student trying to say in her essay even though the sentences is not in correct way. For this essay, I give 10/20 marks to her. This student has some ideas to write, but maybe she did not know how to express it in writing or problem with English. She shows some understanding in writing and topic development.

Actually, she did not make a lot of mistakes in her essay. But she has problems with punctuation, spelling, and capital letter for people’s name. For example, ‘The last year. I with my friends snow and Elva went to theme park’. I know that Snow is her friend, just like Elva but she did not use capital letter for the pronoun. After the sentence ‘The last year .’, she put period (.) instead of comma (,).

Besides punctuation, spelling, and capital letter, this student has a problem with using past tense. She knew that the sentence has to use past tense, but she do not know what is the past tense for certain words. For example, she wrote ‘feeled’ instead of felt and ‘caughted’ instead of caught.

As the conclusion, this student is able to manage her essay well, the introductory paragraph, the body, and the conclusion. This means she has some ideas to write but has some problem in certain parts.