Tag Archives: app

Freedom for students to choose their own materials Part 3

Continuing with the theme of freedom for students to choose their own materials, here is another insight into one of my students.

I asked an advanced general English teacher that is a web designer and coder what he would like to learn. Much to my delight, like me, he is keen on technology and science fiction. So, in addition to the deep conversations and debates we have had about AI and ethics and the possibility of sustaining life on Mars we have shared YouTube clips, films and series that we both find fascinating.

This student is keen to widen his lexical range and to know if his colleagues are speaking correctly when they converse in English (because he works in a Danish company in Barcelona, so the “lingua franca” is English). To help him broaden his lexicon, I have suggested that once a week when he is reading journals and literature for work, that he focuses on the language, and pays special attention to the lexical items he understands from context, but that he wouldn’t be able to define in English or in Spanish. I steered him towards a free Spanish English dictionary app that stores the words looked up in “recientes” an option at the bottom of the screen. This is a great way to revise lexis which has been consulted in the dictionary and can be used to review and retrieve to ensure lexical items become a part of personal lexicon. The student has started to do this and is so far sticking to it! Bearing in mind that lexical items need to be used no less than twelve times it will take time to see drastic changes however gradually he will be able to build up his working vocabulary.

Another useful tool that we discussed doing was writing notes on his smartphone while talking to his colleagues (it is now considered professional etiquette here in Spain to use your phone while engaging in conversation with somebody) to help him remember what his colleagues have said. The idea is that he will then have more time to reflect after the conversation to ensure what was said was correct. This may seem an odd strategy, but the student is worried that his English is being “dumbed down” by less proficient colleagues. Recording progress on this is understandably more difficult.

WeChat, do you?

These past few weeks I’ve been teaching a pre-sessional course at a UK university and have heavily experimented with using the instant messaging app WeChat in class. The predominant L1 is Mandarin, but with Thai and Arabic speakers too, it has been the perfect context for testing. The outcome has been surprisingly positive and a great learning curve for both the students and me.

 

Here are some activities I trialed:

 

Free chat WeChat

As a warmer at the beginning of class after a free study period and lunch break, I asked the students to chat about anything they liked. They chose food, the trip they went on at the weekend, and I spurred them on with questions. Admittedly the answers were very short, but it helped them feel comfortable with chatting open class and with the teacher.

 

Synonym race

This activity worked really well. I selected academic lexis the students had learnt during the course to date, and it was a novel and quick way to refresh the lexis and push the learners for more than one alternative way to say something. On other occasions I have made it a group activity where one phone in a group of four students is used, and a point is awarded for the first answer with an additional point if the synonym is spelt correctly.

 

Lecture summary and peer correction

I asked the students to consolidate their notes in groups of four, for a lecture they had attended that morning. The task was to compile a 100 word succinct summary of the lecture covering the main points. Once this was uploaded, the groups peer corrected the texts for content, language and grammar mistakes. Each text was read aloud open-class, and peers shouted stop at any point to correct the mistakes. The students enjoyed reading and correcting each other’s work.

 

Free writing assignment – out of class

I wanted to see if the quality of writing changed if the task was to be completed in students’ own time. I gave the students some questions to introduce them to the topic, then asked them to write a 100 word summary using information from their answers to help them. Some wrote as they would speak in chat style, but others continued to write in a clear and convincing academic style. When I asked the students how they felt about completing a writing task like this, they all agreed they enjoyed it because it gave them the freedom to manage their own time and complete the task when it was convenient for them.

 

If you try any of the activities above, I’d love to hear about it!

An app a day! Day 24 – Voice recording apps – Vocaroo & iTalk Recorder

9Jmpf5TVtYmN0Buq5tY7GoXXXL4j3HpexhjNOf_P3YmryPKwJ94QGRtDb3Sbc6KYVocaroo is the easiest voice recording tool that the internet offers and what’s more it is free, but it is only available for Android phones, laptops/Macbooks and desktop computers. Vocaroo is not the only easy voice recording app available, apple users have iTalk Recorder which is not free, but is extremely easy to use and guarantees quality recordings and easy sharing which appears to be a problem with Vocaroo. Press the big red button to record and press it again to stop. Recordings can also be appended to existing recordings.

I have used voice recordings in class to create short role-plays, adverts, audio guides for museums, monuments, cities and countries, and creating narratives. The recording is a personal record for the learners of their proficiency and can later be evaluated for pronunciation and the paralinguistic features of speech.

An app a day! Day 20 – Goodreads Social: Network and Reading

Goodreads is a social network app for iOS (iPhone + iPad), Mac OSX, Windows, Windows Phone, Android & Kindle.  Goodreads encourages users to rate books, read recommendations from other users, and catalogue books into read, currently reading and to be read. Goodreads helps learners to find new and interesting book titles by browsing personalised recommendations based on books they have already read, their tastes or a particular genre.

Goodreads is also a great way to encourage learners to write in English and comment on other users’ comments and be exposed to a wide audience that they can interact with about books and suggestions.

An app a day! Day 19 – Mindmeister for vocabulary brainstorming and essay plans

I have used Mindmeister in class with low-level learners to create mind maps of lexis on their iPads, iPhones, and Android Phones, when brainstorming ideas for a new topic. Mindmeister creates a tidy mind map that can be saved and referred to out of class, enabling students to review new vocabulary. Learners can personalise their mind maps or create collaborative maps that they share.

With Cambridge exam classes I have encouraged students to use Mindmeister to organise their ideas when writing plans for their essays, reports, proposals, articles, and letters. We have also created a model mind map for the plans as a collaborative task using an iPad which was later shared amongst all the learners.

An app a day! Day 13 – Evernote

The Evernote app enables the user to store handwritten notes, clips of web articles photos and images on iPads, iPhones, Android Phones, and Windows phones with the objective of creating a digital workspace that can be accessed from the device you own by syncing between. This way information can be stored and used on iPads, iPhones, Android Phones and Windows phones for use while on the move or in the study space. It also allows learners to make presentations using by selecting the presentation option, which will transform the notes into a presentation automatically.

Available for iPad, iPhone, Windows Phones, Android Phones

 

An app a day! Day 12 – Adobe Reader

indexAdobe Reader makes reading fun and colourful.

Functions include highlighting text, striking through, underlining, adding typed text, writing or drawing anywhere on the document, and adding a personlised signature.

I use this app regularly on my iPad to make notes and highlight key points in articles, and I have used it for writing notes on scanned student assignments, so it is as equally useful for learners and teachers.

Available for Mac, Android and Windows portable devices, and desktop computers.

 

 

An app a day! Day 11 – Learn English Verbs – Pronunciation by a Native Speaker!

Screen shot 2015-03-11 at 22.43.07Learn English Verbs – Pronunciation by a Native Speaker! has a lot to live up to as an “Award Winning memory App” that promises to “show you how to learn the verbs and their key conjugations 7 times faster than any other traditional method”.

Available for iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch

 

An app a day! Day 10 – English Idioms Illustrated

Screen shot 2015-03-11 at 22.25.36English Idioms Illustrated are memorable comic images to learn and remember idioms, as the proverb goes, “a picture is worth a thousand words”…

Not only are the images that accompany the idioms laboriously created but they also appear with a detailed description about the history of the proverb. So while the pictures enable visual learners to store and retrieve the idioms, the text enables analytic learners to put logic to the origins and lexical meaning of the proverb.

Available for iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch.