What Does It Take What does it take to get people geared towards teaching English with less use of the massive photo copies so prevalent in most programs? Most Program Managers believe that the more photo copies you make the better teacher you are. Enlighten Program Managers are hard to come by.
The place where I am currently employed has gotten us this great copy machine to use for our needs. This is wonderful when we have paper and something that actually needs to be copied. It does, however encourage people to make good use of the machine so they can walk around with those copies to indicate what a great teacher they are. the good thing about copies is you get to give them to the students to fill in the blanks or whatever while you rest and don't actually have to teach. Talk about cruise along.
We have in a location somewhere over 300 iPads sitting there screaming to be used. They were given out to one class with instructions to use them to help with the teaching. That's it. No program, no plan, nothing.
I came up with a plan that was cost effective (Free) and would give the teachers the needed knowledge to effectively use the iPads with the classes. You go to a site Sophia.org and there they have three courses in professional Development which would fit the bill and solve the problem we have. Three courses specifically would be
iPads in Teaching
Virtual Classrooms
Using Google Docs
You do the four modules and then show mastery by putting up a tutorial for the class; using the information learned. After you show mastery then you get the Certificate. It's all free. You can't get more cost effective than that.
That's only part of the problem solved. The way they have the pacing schedule the teachers don't have time to do anymore in the class than what has been prescribed. It seems the only option is to put something up that the students have to do outside of school. It doesn't take place during the learning day so it has to be completely voluntary. VOLUNTARY.... there goes that idea. some will and some won't but at least the iPads will be getting used and their purchase will not have gone in vain.
Saturday, June 14, 2014
I have been away from the blog for a few years and I think it's high time to get back into the realities of the Environment and how it relates to English. I originally started the blog to engage teachers with the kinds of activities they could use in class that would eliminate the use of massive mindless photocopies. What I found out was that most teachers just don't give a shit. Or at least they don't profess to use online teaching as a way to avoid killing trees.
Most are forced into online teaching. They receive their certificate or whatever the receive that allows them to call themselves ESL teachers and they basically make no effort at keeping up with the rest of the world that is passing them by.
How do teachers get to the point that they can get excited about e-Learning or M-Learning without being pushed into it.
In my opinion, and they are like noses....everybody has one, We can get to that point by looking at Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. If they excited about their work, teachers can progress up the scale and eventually they will get to the point where they can get really excited about using teaching techniques that don't require loads of paper.
Getting there is a very long uphill battle if the employer is not tuned in to helping their teachers develop and progress not only as teachers but humans also.
You just don’t have to Kill Trees to get your point across.
What’s on the Agenda for this week?
·Coursebook Footprint
·First Advertisment……
_______________________
Summer is here and some are gone and some are staying around for a while. That’s always the way it is. Some leave happy and some leave sad. Whatever situation you are in, go with peace and love in your hearts and love your students unconditionally. Oh yeah, My Mantra (one of many), try not to kill too many trees.
____________
Coursebook Footprint
What footprint does our coursebook leave? I am printing with permission of a posting by Robert Haines.
"How big do I want my coursebook footprint to be?"
Let's run with the analogy, shall we...
The extent to which a language learning course is comprised of a linear syllabus, interspersed by easily quantifiable tests, all based on the contents of coursebook pages, in whatever order, determines the coursebook footprint we leave behind as we move through our educational ecosphere.
Grammar McNuggets, traditionally extracted from published coursebooks, leave a deep footprint (not to mention their *carbon footprint*), less desirable to sustainable learning communities that thrive on conversation-driven, emergent grammar, an organic compound with a substantially lower coursebook footprint (and considerably less CO2 output). We can reduce the risk of severe failure in the cycle of 'agricultural' (i.e., organic) learning that has sustained communities for centuries when we decrease our reliance on the industrial model of education so prevalent among current 'best' practices.
While technology has a role to play in safeguarding our learning environment for future for language learners, it will ultimately come down to the grassroots efforts of teachers and students, individually and collectively, drawing upon naturally occurring resources such as conversation stemming from curiosity about ourselves and the world around us.
We can reduce our dependency on 'foreign' resources by keeping language learning local as we consider the global implications of our actions.
______________________________
Wanna FREE Cat…..
This comes to us from Sarah who has this wonderful cat to give away for free. Her words, exactly…
"No cat is ordinary". Boots is simply sweet for a wild wadi boy cat. Boots is also,regal and gentle and loves to play chase the mouse...LOL! Surprise, surprise.
He is spayed, dewormed, shot and clean...a perfect Tom now! more LOL. (My comment: Guys don’t do that to other Guys. It’s always the women that spay males. It’s the Guys code.” Leave each other alone)
If you have any other questions, please e-mail Sara- his kind and very generous keeper.
You don’t have to kill the trees to see the Forest.
Environmental English #9-English Attack/E-Mail English Classes
You just don’t have to Kill Trees to get your point across.
First thing to do…. is immediately forward this e-mail to your personal e-mail. It seems in their infinite wisdom… the IT department has decided to block all blogs, wikis, videos, audio and a whole host of other educational material from the school Internet connection. Well, some can be accessed after 5pm so I guess the only option is for you to stay past 5pm to get a look at the material. I’m sure they have their reasons.
Remember…. Environmental English can also be seen in a blog form at www.environmentalenglish.blogspot.com
What’s on the Agenda for this week?
·English Attack
·E-Mail English Classes
·Communicative Language Teaching Lesson
·How much do you really teach?
·Noodler’s Delight
·Free 10 Day Online Workshop
__________________________________
English Attack
I know you are wondering, “Gee Thelma Liz. What’s all this English Attack about?”
This is a great website for the students.What makes this site so great is the creator/owner of the site came from the Gaming Industry to create the site.What does this mean to the students and teacher? It means that it’s going to be a lot cooler and more visually pleasing than most sites. Plus, he takes a different approach to learning.
You do have to join the site to participate but once you do get on the site, it is really cool to surf around and see what’s there. If you’re expecting 2500 downloads of Grammar exercises that you can print out for your students 20 at a time, well, you will be severely disappointed.
Stuff like Video Boosters, Games and Photo Vocabs should keep students busy for a long time to come.
There is a great interview with the co-founder, Frédéric Tibout on a great site, Edukwest
English Attack is a French site (in English). Edikwest comes out of Germany and it has lots more interesting interviews with different people to go along with this one. It’s a site well worth a visit.
Here is a site that offers FREE E-Mail English classes. It offers a lot of other stuff but we will get to that a little later.
Think if you could get all your student’s e-mails and send out a bi-weekly English class. They could do the lesson or view the material at home. Well, here is a site that offers just that. The link is at the top of the page and says, “Start your FREE email English course now!” Sign up for the e-mail course and see what they have to offer. Obviously, it is not for lower level students who struggle just to bring their books to class.
Now for the other cool stuff on this site. Of course these cost about $9.95 each. “Oh No…. I have to spend money. You mean everybody doesn’t work for free. Geeze Louise. I thought everybody liked to eat noodles.”
·TOEFL Test Package-220 different tests
·English Test Package-2031 Tests
·Listening exercises
·Grammar through Stories
·More than you could use in a year or so
____________________________________
Communicative Approach
Everyone thinks they know what the Communicative Approach is all about. Do we really? Most people think (with a Cheech and Chong accent),”Cool Man. We just kind of like you know sit around and rap about stuff, Man.”
I remember our Leader saying at the end of the first meeting that he favored the Communicative Teaching Approach. That’s what The Man wants and that’s what The Man should get. Ask and you shall receive, You’re driving the bus, It’s your gig, You’re the Head Dude In Charge (HDIC) and all the other clichés I can’t come up with at the moment.
You are either working for The Man or you are working against The Man. If you are working for The Man, Great. If you are working against The Man, well, that’s just not nice. When we were little and playing in the Sand Box we were told to play nicewith the other kids. If you don’t play nice with the other kids it goes from being a Sand Box to being a Cat Box. I really don’t want to play in a Cat Box. Do you? Speaking of Boxes, enough of the Soap Box and let’s get on to a Communicative Approach lesson plan.
Here is a lesson plan outline from this Doctor Mora from San Diego State University.She can’t put stitches on a cut but she is a Doctor all the same.
A LESSON OUTLINE FOR THE COMMUNICATIVE APPROACH
Jill Kerper Mora, Ed.D.
San Diego State University
These are the steps to follow in planning a lesson using the communicative or natural approach to second-language teaching:
1. Presentation of a situation or context through a brief dialogue or several mini-dialogues, preceded by a motivational activity relating the dialogue to learners’ experiences and interest. This includes a discussion of the function and situation: People, roles, setting, topic and the level of formality or informality the function and situation demand.
2. Brainstorming or discussion to establish the vocabulary and expressions to be used to accomplish the communicative intent. Includes a framework or means of structuring a conversation or exchange to achieve the purpose of the speakers.
3. Questions and answers based on the dialogue topic and situation: Inverted, wh- questions, yes/no, either/or and open-ended questions.
4. Study of the basic communicative expressions in the dialogue or one of the structures that exemplifies the function, using pictures, real objects, or dramatization to clarify the meaning.
5. Learner discovery of generalizations or rules underlying the functional expression or structure, with model examples on the chalkboard, underlining the important features, using arrows or referents where feasible.
6. Oral recognition and interpretative activities including oral production proceeding from guided to freer communication activities.
7. Reading and/or copying of the dialogues with variations for reading/writing practice.
8. Oral evaluation of learning with guided use of language and questions/answers, e.g. "How would you ask your friend to ________________? And how would you ask me to _______________?"
9. Homework and extension activities such as learners’ creation of new dialogues around the same situation.
10. To complete the lesson cycle, provide opportunities to apply the language learned the day before in novel situations for the same or a related purpose.
There you have it. In a nutshell…. Do we do this with our lessons as requested? We can try to follow this example. I’m sure it’s much easier if your students are at least motivated enough to even bring their books to class.
______________________________
How much do we really teach?
How long is our teaching day? I feel it is from the time we get out of our car or off the bus until we get back in our car or back on the bus.“Blootty Ale!” Students want to speak English with you. They are begging (longing) for every opportunity to do so.We are in a position to give them practice in authentic language usage, which goes a long way toward their overall improvement. That is why we are here, isn’t it? This extra oomph can only help. Some students will do nothing in class but open up outside the class. This does not mean you corner them and tell them, “Be my friend and I will teach you English.”You just can’t chase students around the campus and do grammar exercises with them when they have run out of breath. But, it IS Ok to talk to the students. There is no need to tell them, “Don’t talk to me outside of class. This is MY time.” That’s not why they come to the School.
______________________
Noodler’s Delight
Sausage Noodle One-Dish Meal Recipe
Sausage Noodle One-Dish Meal is a delicious side dish recipe that you would love to prepare on every party. Try this sausage dish; I am sure you will have a huge fan following for this Sausage Noodle One-Dish Meal recipe!
1 pound bulk beef sausage
1 cup (or more) milk
1 pound American cheese, chopped
Salt and pepper to taste
16 ounces egg noodles, cooked, drained
How to make Sausage Noodle One-Dish Meal
Brown the sausage in a skillet, stirring until crumbly; drain.
Return the sausage to the skillet over low heat.
Add the milk and American cheese and heat until cheese melts, stirring frequently.
Stir in the salt, pepper and noodles.
Yummy yummy yummy.
_________________________________
Free Online Training from WikiEducator
From eL4C38
Open Education Resources (OER) is becoming much more pervasive in tertiary education. Developing content which can be shared within one institution, or across continents represents a powerful paradigm shiftin the distribution methods of learning content and courseware from traditional publishing models to those which are open and collaborative in nature. Major initiatives from leading institutions to provide open courseware further support the growth of this segment of online learning.
WE extend an open invitation to all educators around the world to join us on WikiEducator
to receive a free basic Wiki editing skills online training in exchange for one Open Education Resource (free lesson plan, student guide, teacher handout or other lesson) developed on the Wiki.
Join the upcoming L4C38 free 10-day online workshop scheduled to begin on May 26, 2010.
Thank you.
You don’t have to kill the trees to see the Forest.
“A WebQuest is an inquiry-oriented lesson format in which most or all the information that learners work with comes from the web. The model was developed by Bernie Dodge at San Diego State University in February, 1995 with early input from SDSU/Pacific Bell Fellow Tom March, the Educational Technology staff at San Diego Unified School District, and waves of participants each summer at the Teach the Teachers Consortium.
Since those beginning days, tens of thousands of teachers have embraced WebQuests as a way to make good use of the Internet while engaging their students in the kinds of thinking that the 21st century requires. The model has spread around the world, with special enthusiasm in Brazil, Spain, China, Australia and Holland.”
Go to the website and check them out. They are pretty cool to set up. It’s not as much exotic fun and making photocopies out of Grammar books but fun all the same. Sometimes you just have to settle for second best.
I like them because they give the students something to actually do instead of regurgitating information that has been spoon fed to them. They have think for a change. Oh yeah! They have to be thinking English too.
The students have
oIntroduction
oTask
oProcess
oEvaluation
oConclusion
The teachers get to decide just what goes in each section. As I said before, it’s a lot less fun than making copies of a Grammar book and it’s a LOT MORE involved.
Here is one about proper eating called EatingUnder The Rainbow
Granted, it’s only for 3rd graders, but I think the language might be appropriate for lower level learners.
__________________________________
Speaking & Reading in One
I have put together a little lesson about Nasreddin (Johara) and added a Voxopop (Online recording tool) at the end for students to answer the questions. Check it out.
The students read the story and then make a recording with the answers.
Demo of Sixth Sense
This idea is really great. You can have an interactive teaching system that can be used on any surface as you walk around and it will cost about the same as a good mobile phone. Watch the video and you can see the possibilities. It will save all that lugging around of projectors and computers.
Do you ever get so bogged down with the realities of everyday life that you have lost your Groove and to paraphrase a former President of the US, Bill Clinoccio, “We’re in a kind of a Funk?” You can’t chalk it up to Culture Shock. You’re just having a real bad time of it all.
You have got to Get Your Groove On. Easier said than done. Remember a time when you were on a contract and you were having a really good time? You were doing all kinds of really cool stuff and both you and your students were having an excellent teaching and learning experience. Think back to that time. It was probably “Dam the torpedoes, Full Speed ahead.” That’s what you have to do now. Go for Broke and all the other motivational clichés you can dream up.Does it work? Of course it does. I’ll give you an example.
I previously worked in Kazakhstan for $300/Month for a Translators Institute (College). I got there and ask about a Curriculum-None… Syllabus-None… Books-None… I did have classes of young eager Russian and Kazak students who were raring to go. That was a Plus.Did I forget to mention that the chalkboard wouldn’t accept the chalk they provided? I did have a cool flat a couple of blocks from the school and another half block to my favorite adult beverage establishment. Oh yeah! Let’s not forget I had a final exam at 3pm and I needed copies of the test. Their answer, “You can get your copies at 5pm.” That was the best job I have ever had(next to my current job that is). I was completely FREE with no boundries on what I wanted to do with the classes. NONE.
While there I
oGot mugged and spent 8 days in the hospital (that is another story)
oSaw one of the muggers go to prison after a year dealing with Courts, DA’s and other strange stuff.
oI was constantly worried about getting killed by the muggers friends to shut me up.
oI did three Radio shows a week. Sat & Sun. morning and Tuesday night. I worked with three of my students. We had a great time. They chose the music and I did the rest. Two of them were on-air for the shows. I was a little weired out when they chose Tom Jones for the music on one of the shows but I would not interfere with their choice of music.
oRan an online newspaper about the city.It was nothing mind shaking. Just stuff I saw and what I thought about the whole experience.
oHad two girlfriends, Russian and Georgian. They kept me alive and out of trouble.
oPlayed Blues Harmonica in this club with this brilliant Russian Classical Pianist that liked Blues and Jazz. This guy went on tours and won competitions.
oNo AC in the summer and sometimes in winter the weather would get down to -35 Degrees C. No hot water for three winter months.
In short… I was vibrant, alive and always involved in something from the time I got up until I went to sleep. In the end, the remnant of the local KGB told the school not to renew my contract. Nothing Illegal. I was just having too much fun. So, you ask if I had my Groove On. Oh yea! It was definitely ON.
And, this is what you have to do where you are now. Get Your Groove On. You don’t have to be a squiggly little English teacher holed up waiting or the sun to come up so you can get your validation from your work. Yes, work is cool and you can definitely Groove while there but your total picture has to change. It’s a complete systems approach. Take care of the You in your life and the work will follow.
Of course you say, Students cheat on Tests yak yak yak, but consider this. At this place in Kazakhstan, the Vice Rector (Vice Chancellor) got up in front of the whole student body before the State Exams and told the students to get their cheat sheets made. They (Management) would get the examiners drunk and take care of the rest. How sweet is that?
If I can throw in one more Cliché. “Don’t sweat the small stuff. It’ all small stuff”
You don't have to Kill Trees to feel Macho or Feminine.
You just don’t have to Kill Trees to get your point across.
I have decided to enlarge Environmental English a little to get more bang for the buck. Wait… It’s Free. All you have to remember is do or investigate all the ideas and you can start loading up on Gold Stars.
In this edition:
oDoodle English
oBelieve It or Not (Writing Explanation)
oVoxopop.com
oNoodlers Delight- Aardvark Stroganoff
oTeachergary.com has hits from nine different countries
Here is a guy from China that gives online classes/sessions on using Doodles to teach English. It’s quite interesting how he does it. His students are a lower level than ours but the concept is still valid. Watch one of his session recordings.
I know you are asking yourself, “Gee whiz Betty Lou. How can we do this?” It’s very simple and here’s how.
oGet about 12 Erasers and cut them in half. Now you have 24. Fuzzy math
oHave the students draw a box around the best doodle on their desks
oThey then have to erase the rest of the desk
oHave each row pick out the best doodle on their row
oAnd so on and so on until you have the best one in the class
oEach time you go up a level the students have to erase the boxed doodle
oFinally you have the class winner of the best doodle in the class
oThe students then have to write a story about the best doodle
It’s too late. The desks are clean of all writing. Tom Sawyer strikes again.
Of course this may lower final exam grades by a few points but remember The Desks are Clean. I’m not sure why the desk on the Girls side of the class is not cleaner. I guess it’s their natural artistic nature.
_____________________________________
Believe It or Not (Writing Explanation)
This certainly explains a lot of things.
Try this. . .
Believe it or not you can read it.
I cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer inwaht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Amzanig huh? yaeh and I awlyas thought slpeling was ipmorantt..
__________________________________
Voxopop-Online Speaking Exercise
I know you are thinking, “Gee whiz, Bobby Joe. How am I going to get my students to talk online?”
Here is a site that allows you to make a recording and allow members to react or whatever to that recording by making a voice recording on the Internet. Yes, they do have to actually go to the website and do something in English. And no they, don’t get to get their friends to fill in the blanks on 23 pages of photocopies, do their part in killing Trees and releasing Bleach into the water table. They just have to plan their answer and make the recording.
Here is the page I have set up for www.teachergary.com for the 16 weekly lessons where the students have to make a recording for some conversation questions.
It does work better if your students have evolved beyond the photocopy and understand that simply having the right answers is not learning. The problem with the “Right Answer” method of learning is students Graduate and have no actual knowledge. But, they do have the right answers and that all that is important to them. This cannot be allowed to happen anywhere. It is our job as teachers to wean them off of antiquated and destructive learning methods.
____________________________________
Noodlers Delight-
Aardvark Stroganoff Recipe
Serve this tuna stroganoff recipe over rice or noodles.
Ingredients:
1/4 cup butter
1/4 cup chopped onion
1 can cream of mushroom soup
1/2 cup sour cream
dash pepper
1 can (7 ounces) Aardvark Meat, strained and fluffed
1 can (4 ounces) mushrooms, drained
Hot cooked noodles or rice
Preparation:
Melt butter in skillet; sauté onion until tender. Combine soup, sour cream and pepper; add to onion. Add Aardvark and mushrooms; heat through. Serve Aardvark stroganoff over hot cooked noodles or rice.
Makes 4 servings.
______________________________
Teachergary.com has hits from nine countries and some change (other)
oUS
oOman
oBrazil
oGermany
oItaly
oRussia
oMexico
oMaldives
oOthers
Go ahead. Get your site up. It’s not Rocket Science. Heck, it’s not even as complicated and complex as Long Division. Get involved with the rest of the world. They are out there waiting for you.
