Teaching Idea: Have an authentic communication all over the world using Interpals

Have you ever heard about interpals? I my self is newbie on the site. I made the account about three weeks ago and discover many things. It's is the premiere online community for meeting penpals, language partners, travel buddies or just plain old fashioned friends. What is penpals? A penpal is a new friend from another corner of the earth whom you get to know through letters, online messages and chat.
Since it member is people from all over the world, it would be really useful site to practice talking in english. You can even choose with whom you wanna be friends by giving checklist on the area. Sometimes there are people using fake profile, but some others are there for decent friendship. It is an excellent site for practice language as there is session called language exchange. You can have a chat directly with native and any other english speaker all over the world in real time. Be wary of scammers, perverted, or spammers. I have experience finding some of them on the site, but you can block them right away. Report them and their account will be deleted in an instant.
Somehow, through this experience I want to apply this site to my teaching practice. I just hope students will have an authentic communication and enhance their speaking and writing ability. Beside, it will broaden their horizon by understanding other countries culture or the people different mindset. Wanna have penpal? make your account at http://www.interpals.net/.  

Teaching Idea: Teaching vocabulary using Word cloud

Word cloud or word mapping consist series of words that are related to a topic. It is really useful way to conduct vocabulary learning. There are two web based application provide free word cloud: Wordle and WordSift.

Wordle. The picture above is a word cloud made using wordle. Wordle is a toy for generating “word clouds” from text that you provide. The clouds give greater prominence to words that appear more frequently in the source text. You can tweak your clouds with different fonts, layouts, and color schemes. The images you create with Wordle are yours to use however you like. You can print them out, or save them to the Wordle gallery to share with your friends.

 WordSift. It is almost the same with Wordle. The steps to make are easy. First, make your own text. Then go to http://www.wordsift.com/. Please copy and paste your text in box displayed in Wordsift homepage. Once you click the 'Sift' button. the picture would appear as shown above. Sorry for its bad quality. I made my own WordSift as purpose of teaching vocabulary. For example, it was about the theme 'what activity you and family do during holiday break?'. Based on the text I submitted in the box, I got those point. WordSift will selectively choose the most appropriate words in related to the topic. So, we can be concise of what suitable words would be best describe the topic. 

Teaching Speaking Using Skype

 

Probably, you are already familiar with the logo. Yep, it is skype! this is a free downloadable software application that allows use of instant messaging, audio and video chatting. At first, I'm a bit startled when the group assignment to make skype was given. It is pretty easy to make. But we need a good internet connection. Wifi is preferable with condition you know how to adjust the proxy setting which was also my group's problem at first. Fortunately, we made it in time. 

Skype is very useful for teaching both speaking and listening. Learners can get actual conversation face to face in real time. To make your own skype account, all you have to do is register through the site http://www.skype.com/en/. Download the app to your mobile or PC for free, and log in using the username and password registered. Remember, maintain a good internet connection! If you want to record the video conversation, simply go to the link, http://www.dvdvideosoft.com/free-dvd-video-software-download.htm and figure it out!

Classroom Management

Classroom management is a term used by teachers to describe the process of ensuring that classroom lesson run well despite the problem occur during the process. It includes the learning process up to the assessment. There are several tools to help teachers, such as: lesson plan, worksheet, quiz, etc. Internet as source of learn provide allow teachers to make them online with so many web-based tools. Here are some that I think would work best in my class in the future. 

In managing a classroom,  a lesson plan is definitely a must. Be it online or physical. By lesson plan, teachers manage what material is going to be taught, how to conduct the activity, and the way to assess students understanding. It doesn’t necessarily for teacher to give the copies of lesson plan for students. Just for an anticipation if the plan wont work as it is expected to be. But, for an alternative teachers hand over the copies for SAP (Satuan Acara Perkuliahan). So, students will know whole materials for the course and get to study before class to give them a brief overview of what would be taught. Another significant tool is gradebook. As for the application, engrade.com is best. It allows teachers to record grades and attendance , schedule assignments and build classroom materials like : lessons , quizzes , and flashcards. It also allows teacher to create and share wikis , lessons , flashcards , and online quizzes. With this function, teacher can create online quiz and let them know their grade at the same time. Quiz is usually given in some occasion like twice per semester, etc. Using this application, Students can know their grade in which they are good or bad at certain materials and let them estimate the grade needed to pass the course. 

 The last thing best use for classroom is worksheet creature. Teacher can make dozen of tasks for the material given. Worksheet is very useful for daily assignment or material. It is very common task to give in the classroom. After having to answer the worksheet, teacher can ask them to have peer feedback to correct the answer. The least, teacher also can create a group to facilitate sharing between students and teachers for some problems about the material. So far, I’ve experienced with facebook and twitter group. After having a discussion in group, we can brought up the topic in the classroom if it’s necessary. At last, to sum it up, my choice are lesson plan, gradebook, and miscellaneous.

Lesson Plan

Lesson plan is very important in teaching process. For teacher, it takes role as manual guide to conduct a successful learning. By making a lesson plan, it means a teacher is well prepare and is aware of what to do in the classroom including the activity, the way to conduct the activity, the material, the goal, and the assessment. 

As we are now in Computer Assisted Language Learning course, we are asked to integrate the use of lesson plan in teaching technology for language learning.  Here is the result of lesson plan my group made to complete the assignment of the course.

Screenshot

Teaching Listening Using Podcast

One of few things that works well with listening course is podcast. My lecture used this tool during listening course 1 in the first semester and I feel this way is quite successful to enhance student's listening comprehension. The podcast was taken from http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts. As for the assignment in CALL course, we record our own podcast by using Audacity. First, download the application and follow the steps given.

This is a podcast made by my group http://www.4shared.com/mp3/tXYzEcVFce/CALL_USB.html

And here is the transcript 

Ajeng: Good morning friends, I have an interesting story about cultural shock. Well, it was happened when I had a vacation to Jogja. When I ordered a food and I did not know well about Javanese language, unfortunately the seller didn’t know Indonesian well. I was in difficult situation ordering food. What was shocking again was when the food arrived. The taste was truly not my style. It was too sweet to be a food like I used to eat when I’m in Surabaya. Well guys anyone of you have similar situation about cultural shock story?

Harum: Yes I have. My cultural shock experience is about my penpal friend, her name is Isabella. She lives in Lawrence, Kansas. She is still 21 years old just like me, but what makes me shock is that she has lived together with her boyfriend in their apartment for three years. It’s my very first time to have native friend so I’m very surprised. You know in West Country it is legal to live together without marriage, but here in Indonesia it is considered to be illegal. Mmm, does anyone have the same experience as mine?

Elok: Ah! I remember has the similar experience as yours. It was from my Canadian virtual friend. He is a man, 27 and is single. However, he has a son outside marriage. Don’t you think that’s very shocking? I mean, it’s taboo here. But he told me it is legal there. Well, that reminds me a lot of how the famous unmarried couple, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, have their three biologist children. Maybe I’m just a bit startled to find such person myself. Endang take your turn.

Endang: It was happen when I visited my uncle’s home. Something that made me shock was, there are many women did susuran. Susuran is chewing tobacco. In my environment, susuran is done by men only as the supplementary if they won’t to smoke. But, in my uncle’s environment,susuran is done by women to avoid the belief that they will not get a soul mate before they do susuran.

Burhan: In another country, people who enter the home usually wear their shoes or sandal but in Indonesia it is the opposite of that culture. Indonesian people usually put off their shoes or sandal in front of their house. When the foreigners visit Indonesia, they don’t put off their shoes or sandal and in Indonesia the owner of the house asked the foreigner “please put off your shoes or sandal in front of the house”.

Collaborative Writing Using Google Drive

Another new thing for me: Google drive. Therefore it is fun. Since the task was for collaborative writing, we were asked to make a text in any topic by using document in google drive. The advantage of using google drive is that everyone on the group can correct the text. Be it for grammatical error or spelling. This tool is included in google, so we only need a gmail account to gain an access.

Here is my group work:

The paragraph

Korean Learning Website

I often visits talk to me in korean site. It’s one of websites that provide korean learning. The website is run by korean and all of the navigation is available in english, make it even easier to access. The administrator as well as the teachers are korean. But they often invite guests from all over the world to join them conducting the learning. 

The website provide skills need in language learning, including: grammar, listening, pronunciation drill, and vocabulary. The grammar lesson consist of 9 levels covering the language structure itself and word builder. While listening material, as well as the vocabulary and pronunciation drill,  is available in audio and video form. What I really like from the web is that they have the correcting session where the native teacher correct all the learner’s work. Besides, the session called ask hyojin is just really brilliant and interesting. Well, many things are not described yet and I have not had my words enough. If you are curious about the website, just visit the link www.talktomeinkorean.com.

The screenshot