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There are many published sources of good ideas of how to use technology in the classroom, and we don't intend to reproduce them all here. However, this is a quick starting point, to get you thinking on a few obvious areas - and with a bit of luck to get you creating your own ideas from these starting points!
1.
Word Processors
2. Use Blogs
3. Instant Messaging, or even better, Face Book or My
Space
1.
Word Processors
A program such as Microsoft Word makes drafting, editing and formatting
easy. This makes it an ideal tool for a collaborative writing project
with an end product in which students can take real pride.
Consider these outine stages for a project (and then adapt them to your
situation and the subject matter). (a) Groupwork discussion on the approach
to the topic and the allocation of responsibilities. (b) Writing (each
student might have to produce one A4 page on their topic. (c) Peer review.
(d) Discussion of comments and corrections, presentation issues, etc.
Redrafting and then collation by a volunteer member of the group. (e)
Delivery to the class. The technology enables easy redrafting (a lot of
re-writing by hand can kill any enthusiasm) and high quality presentation.
This type of collaborative writing activity, requiring fluency, accuracy,
creativity and teamwork, is transferrable to any level, with learners
as young as 6 able to wrok together to produce illustrated PowerPoint
presentations. The output can be published via the website.
2.
Use Blogs
A blog is a webpage to which an individual or a group periodically
posts thoughts, opinions, weblinks, even video and audio. Others are able
to comment, and these comments can be viewed by anyone visiting the site.
The best way to find out about blogs is to set one up yourself. It's astonishingly
easy!. Go to www.Blogger.com, follow the instructions to set up your owbn
blog, and make your first post within 5 minutes!
Teachers used to be preoccupied by the absence of real communication in
the writing tasks they set. Students would write a dialogue, a letter
or an essay, but ultimately the only person who would ever read it was
the teacher. It was never an authentic piece of communication. The Web
changes that dramatically. Students can now write for an audience which
potentially inscludes everyone in the world with acccess to the Internet.
A good way into posting to the Web is through blogs, and specifically
in commenting on blogs. By doing this, students can post as little as
a sentence or two, and can build up their input as they gain conficence.
This helps students to develop learner independence and enables them to
work in contexts that interest and motivate them (football, dance, beekeeping
- there are blogs on every topic underthe sun!).
Start by teaching the functional language of giving opinions. Print out
some blog posts and, in controlled activities, ask learners to comment
on them. For example, here is an extract from a post on a climate change
blog, www.climateark.org/blog:
"What is required is massive reductions in energy use, achievable
only by shrinking human populations…" Do you have anything
to say about that? Well, I think… It seems to me that… But
isn't that like saying…
Students then locate blogs that interest them by going to Google and searching
for, for example, 'climate change blogs'. The final stage of the activity
is for them to write their comments and click Post. This can be done as
an independent assignment, or students can send links to their teacher
(rather a cumbersome process, admittedly).
You can see more information on our website about blogs, including a few sample links to blogs created by students on our summer courses in Oxford, here.
3.
Instant Messaging, or even better, Face Book or My Space
Each teacher should set up a Face Book or My Space area for each of his
or her classes, and email the students in each class to invite them to
join. Then, any time that it is appropriate, the area can be used to paste
information about the activities in the class (which will allow any students
who were not able to attend to catch up with missed work), and also to
prompt discussion on any topic. This will often be very powerful for practice
of language of giving opinions, etc, but will also allow the quieter students
in the class to keep up with the discussion, and to come to the fore.
If there is any other material which you would like to see on these pages at any time, please don't hesitate to contact us.
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