Week 10: My Reflection

Time flies when you have fun. You may get surprised when you hear this for the first time, but that was a real thing. To be honest, I did not expect to learn a lot from a virtual class; I thought that face to face is more affective way for the students. Now, I believe that this kind of class can go one better than the traditional method used nowadays. Therefore, awareness should be raised among schools, universities and other organizations. 

Week 1:

I started using (nicenet.org) for the first time. I thought that forums are the only way of sharing discussions. I also created my own blog where I post my reflection at the end of the week. 

Week 2:

Discussion- Web Searching: We analyzed different kinds of search engines. I thought that Google and Yahoo is the only search engines that can we use. As for me, it was very difficult as I needed to go over each one and give it a try to see which result I came up with.

Task - ABCD Model for Behavioral Objectives: before the teacher starts his lesson, he needs to draw his objectives. As a result, he will be able to achieve what he wants his students to learn in the class. That what was Sean used to do with us every week.

Week 3:

Discussion - Aural/Oral Skill-Building Websites: We read an article on listening-speaking website. Unlike speaking, it was easy to find listening lessons for beginners and advanced students.

Task - Using Delicious.com to Store Useful Links:  when we search for different website, we  used delicious.com to save some helpful ones. This was used in order not lose good links. Here is my link (https://delicious.com/aaldosar ). to be honest, I am not satisfied with mine. I am going to add more in the future. 

Week 4:

Discussion - Reading/Writing Skill-Building Websites: I visited two multi-skill websites. One of them was easy for my students. You can see it at (http://www.moma.org/interactives/artsafari/shegoat.html)

An ABCD Objective has been given on this post.

Task - Preparing a Technology-Enhanced Lesson Plan: I read an article about “Tips and Advice from the Webskills Team” and I learned how to write a technology enhanced lesson plan. It was easy for me to do it. I taught me how to organize myself with new technology and how to anticipate the problems.

(https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BxCALs5cKjqYbkM0TUgwOFdKRVU/edit?usp=sharing)

Week 5:

Discussion - Project-Based Learning and WebQuests: There was a reading about After reading about project-based learning (PBL)and WebQuests.  In brief, we can say that Students can interact and have the ability of evaluation.

Task - Rubrics and Alternative Assessment: In this part, I made a mistake when I shed the light on some points related to technology and neglected the language skill in my rubric. I thought that rubric is for language skill and technology usage.

I made an extra credit task on my blog:

http://aaldosar.blogspot.com/

Week 6:

Discussion - Technology Tools: There were topics about how to create student-centered classes. I read about Interactive Lecture and ◦Tips and Strategies for Effective Teamwork on:

http://serc.carleton.edu/NAGTWorkshops/earlycareer/teaching/LargeClasses.html

Task: it was not my first time using power point. However, I did something different. I created an interactive one using hyperlinks. That took me a long time to prepare one lesson. Participant in this course should be designers as well. It has been uploaded on https://docs.google.com/file/d/0BxCALs5cKjqYN3g3UzVCeVA5MjQ/edit?usp=sharing

Week 7:

`Students can post a document, link, or type on a wall using padlet.com.  we also talked about different tools we have not used in class. That was like creative since we need to see which one fits the class according to the ABCD objectives and students’ needs. I created my own class on nicenet.org. what was funny that I thought this websites is for Oregon University.

Week 8:

I used different tools with my student from the ones I learn last weeks. Students have fun because they tried various things together such as twitter, powerpoint and padlet.

Week 9 :

There was an article about “Technology and Multiple Intelligences”.  I know that students have individual differences but I didn’t know that they have characters that may affect them  psychologically. I believe that the teacher should study carefully all these characters before he starts teaching at school. 

Week 10:

It was the saddest week ever since we pack our bags and leave the course. But, we were not allowed to carry all our luggage with us. We had to leave some pieces of advice to the new participants in the future. In another hand we were asked to read about technology integration. I talked about the best technology the I used to achieve my main goal based on the Tiers shown on the table.
http://www.k12.wa.us/edtech/techliteracy/techinttiers.aspx


At the end, I post a comment on Eda's blog 

(http://academiaeda.blogspot.com/2013/12/week-10-reflections-on-what-i-did-what.html?showComment=1387142826609#c8423299184829340322)

Week 9: My Reflection

This week task was very interesting. It was about individual differences. We were asked to read about learning styles and strategies. Since our course is about web skills, I tried to think of a tool fits with students’ characteristics. So, I read an article about that written by Richard M. Felder and Barbara A. Soloman. Another article that I enjoyed was Technology and Multiple Intelligences. It showed many kinds of characteristics. They are:

■ Verbal-Linguistic

■ Logical/Mathematical

■ Visual/Spatial

■ Bodily/Kinesthetic

■ Musical/Rhythmic

■ Intrapersonal

■ Naturalist

■ Existentialist

I believed that students are different, although they are in the same age. Knowing these characteristics helps the teacher to understand his students and use the proper technique in the class. The teacher can make a questionnaire to analyze the students’ abilities. As for me, I learned many tools in this course, so I can provide each student with the tools that meet his interest. Some students do not know how to study English. This helps me guide the students to the best way of studying using technology (not only in my class, but also with any teacher in future).

 

Note: This post has been transferred from my old blog at

http://challenges1-5.blogspot.com/2013/12/week-9-my-reflection.html

 

Week 8: My Reflection‏

This week, we were lucky to have the expert Jeff Magoto in our class. He introduced ANVILL to the class which is considered amazing to the students. It has a creative method of discussion that I really enjoyed. Although it is easy, I saw all the students were not able to record their voices. It was very helpful because it can overcome one of the most important students’ issue. It is large classes. As for me, I watched the youtube posted by Jeff (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BVg5rEFjeU4). He was very nice. He welcomed any questions presented by the students. I tried to sign up. I am still waiting because I was not able to access the internet due to technical problems.

I explored some tools in my class and shared my idea of how to use it on class.

On the task, I made my own powerpoint and asked them to read the rule of adding (-ing, -ed, -s) shown in the presentation. They should answer the questions and send it back to my email. All these was online and downloaded from (http://www.4shared.com/file/BTBakCHe/lesson_13_-_spelling.html). When they make sure they understand the lesson, they post more examples on (http://padlet.com/wall/60xetlsm5t). we are going to start our new virtual discussion on nicenet.org. Here is the link

http://nicenet.org/ICA/class/home.cfm

I am looking forward to finishing my first draft on my final project. I was late because I had a technical problem. So, I will work  on it and finish it soon.

Week 7: Project Task 5 - Continued

As I said on task 4, students were interested to use technology in their smart phones. I found they are interested in twitter and they all have accounts and use it daily to socialize with their friends. I created a course a count on twitter and ask all the students to follow it. I used the course acount to tweet some assignment questions and I asked my students to post the answers via tweeter. This time, they can discuss their project in the role-play and see how good each member does. The teacher can check their tweets and give them marks according to their tweets. The best tweets (answers) can be retweeted by the teacher to show how great they were.

Note: This post has been transferred from my old blog at

http://challenges1-5.blogspot.com/2013/11/week-7-project-task-5-continued.html

Week 7: My Reflection

This week is new challenge for me. It is difficult to ask students to practice English using their mobile phones. They were impressed by this idea. They have not used to hear something like that. They used to have their mobiles for fun and entertainment. Education became more interesting with this new technology. At the beginning, I asked a group of students teach their classmates how to create and use Google Documents. They have not used it before but they decided to search for it because they were curious about new experience they would practise. As for me, that was my first step to check how active they were to the next challenge. They use their mobile phones for chatting most of the time. So, I found it a good chance to kick off my new idea and start with this as introduction to my point. All class were active and interested. What was funny, they asked me about my phone number

Note: This post has been transferred from my old blog at:

http://challenges1-5.blogspot.com/2013/11/week-7-my-reflection_8289.html

week 6: My refelction

I have used power point many times, but I have learned something new this week. it seem like I had just worked on it. To be honest, I did not like that especially the hyperlink. It took long time. I was frustrated a little bit. it was hard for me to prepare a revision for the test on unit 3. But, when I presented it in the class I saw all the students active with me. They did not want to go for a break. The losers asked me to prepare another game and promised to win next time. I know it is difficult for me, but when I remember their performance, I feel excited again.

You can see my power powint on the following link:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BxCALs5cKjqYN3g3UzVCeVA5MjQ/edit?usp=sharing

This technique helped me to deal with large classes as well. One class before, they were working in groups of six. Each group has a leader. These groups were divided equally. I believed that these groups will be the same even in the next semester because they are almost in a good harmony. They were give one task to work on. The leader were asked to give a role for each member. I notice that students were doing very hard job. In this case they will not receive any new information. So, decided to have their emails and send them announcements and assignments via email.

Week 6: Project Task 5

My students are at an intermediate school. Their ages range from thirteen to fifteen years old. Their first language is Arabic. Those students study at public school. Unlike private schools, English ,in public schools,  is taught in grade seven around the age of twelve which seems a late age to teach a second language. In this case, students are weak in learning. This is a very quick information about my students.

I was thinking of a creative technique to review unit 3 with my students before the test. When I started to read the task for this week, I found that power point is a good I idea to present review the unit. It is not only because it is power point, but also it is prepared in a different technique. it guessed it would create a competition among them.  I prepared an interactive power point for my  class and took them to the learning Resources Center (LRC). I divided the into groups. I tried hard to make them at the same level. Each group has a leader who controls the his group. each students took at least one chance to answer with no help. The one who asked for help made his group lose a half of points. Students were enthusiastic. Even weak ones; they were very active. That was  an enjoybale class. I enjoyed it as well. My students asked me to review the next unit using the same way. I know it is hard to prepare that, but I have to do it.

Week 5: Extra Credit Task

Here is my Lesson plan. But, this time it is different. I tried to practice what I have learned this week. It ia about Project-Based Learning.

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0BxCALs5cKjqYWGYwMU9vTmhtb3M/edit?usp=sharing

Students will benefit from this lesson because it meets their interests. I am sure they will enjoy this new experience. When they enjoy it, they absolutely will not forget it. "education is what remains after one has forgotten everything one learned in school" - Albert Einstein

This Project-Based Learning will be outside of class.

Week 5: My Reflection

This week I have learned many things. What makes it more interesting is that I have not only learned from Mr. Sean, but also I learned from a colleague.  To be honest, I have just understood what rubric was this week. The more you get involved, the better get experienced. I knew a good website for uploading my rubric. I really thank Mounira Ben M'RAD for this nice website.

Nowadays, it is easy to find and use the internet everywhere. So my students can use the technology easily. Whenever they have a project or something they have to do, they can get the benefit of it. I asked them to download and application on their smart phones and have them listen to a very short audio clip. To have them do this at home has an advantage. They can listen to the audio at any time when they are comfortable. Besides, they can listen many times. You can download this application from the following site:

 

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=hk.hkbc.epodcast

Week 4: My Refelction

In this week, I learned new things. I was getting better and refreshing in teaching. I have gained the following expereince:

1- new and interesting websites for reading and writing. My students used to feel upset when I gave them an overload from the book, but I was surprised when I say them excited by the new links I added in the class.

2- I wrote about the difficulties I faced in teaching English. Sean told us not to write any solution to these problems. I am very excited to know what he will ask us to do next week.

3- It was the first time to me to write a lesson planned with technology integrated. I faced difficulty to so. I found it important. 

week 3: My Reflection

This week I faced new experience. I was asked to read to articles and write my opinion.  The first one was written by  Lindsay Miller. It was about  (Developing Listening Skills with Authentic Materials). The other article was about (The Employment of CALL in Teaching Second / Foreign  Language Speaking Skill) by Julia Gong.  I I agree with the fact that speaking skill has the less practice. Besides, computers play an important role in improving skills. The second one was about how to create a website in delicious.com. It is a good website where you can save your links and share yours with others. You can find mine at https://delicious.com/#aaldosar. To be honest, I am not satisfied enough on what i posted. I am going to add more helpful websites later. Thirdly, I explored new websites for practicing listening and speaking. They are easy and difficult ones.  That is to say, there are for beginners, good and advanced students.

Week 2: My Reflection

This week I have learned two significant skills:

1) ABCD Objectives:

I have graduated from teachers’ college which offers educational courses. However, I did not learn how to write objectives for my lesson as I did in this week. We used to write objectives on each lesson but we did not follow the ABCD procedures. I have recognized the importance of these objectives. With this, teacher will know how to be in the same level of students thought before class so that he will be able to understand his students’ needs.  When teacher define his goals, he will be able to choose:

- the proper teaching aids.

- the right method for the lesson you are presenting

- the right resources for your students for their ages

Moreover, the teacher will not get confused and become more trustful. Students like the who feel more confident because they know that he will help them overcome many problems they face during the class.

2) Search Engines:

Before I start introducing the search engine, I asked my students about the one they usually use.  They all know one search engine (Google). They know about (Yahoo) as an email, but they do not know that it has search engine as well. I was surprised because people in my generation knew it. I believe that video games, new technology and social networks dominate their thoughts. Besides,  Yahoo is not well-known as Google in our life. We have an LRC but it is hardly to be vacant. So, I asked the computer teacher to use his room for one class. I was lucky to find it free this week. I showed them the search engine, then I told them that each one has its own purpose. They found it hard to seal with it because of the language; it does not support Arabic.

Week1: My Reflection

I have heard about blogs long time ago but I have not thought of creating one day. It was kind of ambiguous. However, it was not difficult for me to do It because I like challenges I believe that learning through mistakes makes information lasts longer. So, I did some steps exploring and learning at the same time. For steps I got confused with I searched in the internet for other sources to overcome the problems I faced.

Now I found it easy to do it. I can share this experience with teachers I am visiting in school days.

I am glad to have you visiting mine and hopefully seeing you posting comments and sharing experience together.

Helpful Links: 

1) Blogger Getting Started Guide

https://support.google.com/blogger/answer/1623800?hl=en 

2) Create a New Blog on Google Blogger   

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hnIdotClgXY