Podcastin'

The Podcast that I chose to listen to is named “The Teachers Podcast” and can be accessed at http://www.teacherspodcast.org/#. The blog deals with educational issues, with a particular concentration on the use of technology in the classroom. The site features commentary from Dr. Kathleen King, who is a Professor and Director of Fordham University's Regional Educational Technology Center (www.wikipedia.org, 2008) and Mark Garu, an experienced teacher and author who now serves as Director of the Office of Instructional Technology of the NYC Board of Education, in addition to his duties as co-host of “The Teacher’s Podcast”.

In a broad sense a Podcast such as “The Teachers Podcast” is a valuable tool for those who wish to remain plugged in to the ever changing world of education. Being able to listen to two such obviously experienced and educated individuals discussing pedagogical issues offers the extraordinary advantage of being able to benefit from the knowledge of experts on a daily basis. Before the information revolution such a benefit could only be gained by physically attending lectures or listening to cumbersome tapes. Simply exposing oneself to the ideas presented here can act as a springboard for future research and ideas of ones own. For example, in the first Podcast that I listened to Dr. King and Mr. Garu were discussing proposals for providing computers to students. Dr. King relates an anecdote regarding here amazement at the ability of a three year old to use a computer. I would have never imagined that this would be possible. Perhaps, if I were involved in a head-start like program, obtaining this knowledge from a regular regime of listening to teacher oriented Podcasts such as this will lead to new and innovative ways to teach pre-kindergarten students.

The second manner in which such a Podcast can be used in teaching is as research tool. Their 10th episode deals with ways to teach African-American history in school during national black history Month. One could certainly imagine a teacher who was investigating manners of educating their students in this or other matter and using this Podcast as both a font for ideas and as a research tool for supporting their lesson plan.

Reference


1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathleen_P._King, (2008). www.wikipedia.org. Obtained 05 DEC 2008


http://www.newmediaexpo.com/SpeakerBios/MarkGura.htm (2006). www.newmediaexpo.com. Obtained 05 DEC 2008.

Mod 8 Part 2

I think that Shelfari would be a great resource for global cooperation project. What appealed to me most about this site was the ability to leave comments and rate books. I think that students that were involved in some sort of cultural exchange could definitely use this site to compare and contrast opinions on books with their foreign coevals. For example, students could compile questions about a FL books and send them to their overseas partners, or visa-versa. Students could share not only vocabulary and language issues, but also understand cultural aspects of a reading directly from members of the target culture.

Mod 8

For Mod 8 I choose Global School Net and Epals. Global School Net (GSN) states as its purpose the
…meaningful project learning exchanges with people around the world to develop literacy and communication skills, foster teamwork and collaboration, encourage workforce preparedness and create multi-cultural understanding.

The site offers links to various projects that are being conducted in order to achieve these goals. This site has some nice links that could be useful in the class room. While I was impressed with the resources on the site, I got the generally impression that the projects and suggestions contained in the site were geared more toward the affluent spectrum of education. I do not mean this as a derogatory observation. I simply wish to point out that I always try and imagine the use of any new resource in a variety of settings, and find this site more advantages for use in classrooms where students are already incorporates into the power structures of our society. This being said I think that the links on this site offer great opportunity to schools with abundant resources. I was particularly impressed by the “Door to Door Diplomacy” project. I think this inclusion of this State Department Funded program demonstrates a positive way in which the internet can help bridge the bureaucratic gape between Washington initiatives and schoolroom practice. I could definitely envision using the previous projects detailed here as a model for classroom projects. As a language teacher I think there also could be a benefit in using the international project created here as not only a template for future projects, but also as a means of motivating FL students by reminding them of the reality of the non-Anglophone world. The main drawbacks that I found with this site are the lack of a convenient search engine and a lack of Spanish language resources.
I found E-pals a little easier to use, although I think that it is more geared toward teacher preparation than direct classroom application. My favorite part of this site was the forums. We have encountered other teacher forums in the course of our projects, but I found the ones contained here the most useful and accessible. By doing a quick search for the word “Spanish” I was able to find a large number of pen-pal requests. Additionally there are many forums which provide teaching suggestions from around the world. I would love to be in position where I could pair my students with correspondence from other parts of the world, and this seems to be a great resource for doing so.

Mod 5 - Blog Comment

On the blog site “Don Quijote” (http://blog.donquijote.org/blogs/spanish/ ) I choose to comment on the blog entitled “Felipe's study abroad experience: 8 weeks of learning Spanish”. It is a short entry, and intended for to pique student interest in traveling to Spain as part of a travel group sponsored by this company. The commercial nature of the entry does not bother me, however. I myself have studied in Salamanca and found the ring of truth in this testimonial. While I intend to rarely use non-source language materials in my classroom I feel that providing students with real life examples of language use and introducing them to the opportunity to study abroad is a great way to motivate them. I think that such as site as this would be a great resource, especially for seniors who are preparing for college and may want to consider studying abroad.

Twitter Versus Spoink

I prefer Spoink to Twitter hands down. Spoink is infinitely more intuitive and easier to use. There is, in my opinion, no reason to even use Twitter, since both sites accomplish the same tasks, with Spoink being the easier of the two to use. For example you can send direct messages to follower / friends on both sites, however I could not figure out how to do so on Twitter. Spoink, on the other hand, is rather intuitive is this regard. You simply click on the link of the contact, then select “send direct message” and proceed from there. The same is true with regard to uploading videos and pictures. The creators of Spoink clearly recognize that this is a popular feature of such services and include a tool for doing so directly underneath the text entry box. I could not figure out how to do this on Twitter. I did a help search for “uploading pictures”, but was not presented with any helpful information. Another intuitive feature of Spoink is the posting of the organization’s contact information in the upper right-hand corner of the screen where it is easy to find. Twitter has a “contact” link, but this only leads you to a “snail-mail” address. I have very little tolerance for any organization which requires an extensive search for an e-mail address or phone number.

The only advantage that I found in Twitter is the bar on the top of the main page providing links to the top discussion issues of the day.

Mod 5

Here is the link: http://chronicle.com/wiredcampus/article/2825/more-on-academic-twittering-breaking-down-the-classroom-walls

I found this article by searching “using micro-blogging in the classroom” Yahoo. The article is fairly short, but it attaches to a video post by a college professor who shares some of the advantages of using Twitter in the classroom. The interviewee, one Mr. Parry, a professor of Media and Communications from UT Dallas, points to the breaking down of classroom walls as one of the chief advantages of this tool. I see particular advantages for this in the language learning classroom. I feel very strongly about the need to engage the students’ interests in order to achieve effective activation in the classroom. By communicating with our students outside the walls of the school we can increase our knowledge of their likes and dislikes and hopefully tailor our lessons appropriately.

Mr. Parry also mentions the brevity of the communications in micro-blogging versus those of a traditional blog. Again returning to the issue of our students’ interests, I feel that this offers another advantage. Students today, especially teens, are more accustomed to a world of abbreviated messages. Many are turned off by wordiness. The text message like nature of the micro-blogging system may seem more familiar and therefore more comfortable to the modern student, at both the high school and college level.

I can definitely see myself using micro-blogging as a means to discuss issues with lessons and homework, as well as practice writing the target language outside of the classroom.

Classroom2.0

I stumbled upon http://www.classroom20.com/ while looking for links to add to my blog for the first assignment. It is difficult to give a brief synopsis of the benefits of this site because; even after a solid hour of exploring, I feel that I had only viewed a small portion of what was being offered. Of course, one of the main benefits of this site, and others like it, is the ability to communicate with teachers from all over the world. You can also invite fellow teachers to join. Utilizing a free site, with a fairly simple interface, is a good way to overcome technologic short comings which some of use may unfortunately face in under-funded schools. For example, even if your school lacked a functioning or reliable website, the motivated teacher could use a site like Classroom2.0 to set up a forum through which he and his colleagues could compare notes from a distance.

Another feature of this site that I like is its simple and user friendly search engine. For example I typed in “Spanish verbs” and found a link to a forum asking how best to use technology to teach irregular preterit verbs. From there I was directed to a site entitled “Conjugamos” which offers various resource links and even a timed conjugation quiz. While the latter exercise is not wholly within my philosophy of teaching foreign language it is interesting to see how one simple search can branch out to encompass so many resources.
Another extremely useful aspect of this site is the section for forums. I was especially impressed by the “Success Stories” forum, where teachers share the pros and cons of implementing new techniques and technologies. Of course teaching will always be a game of trail and error; but we can greatly enhance our efficiency by not only learning from our successes and failures, but also by learning from the successes and failures of our colleagues worldwide.