Story Time

Video Fun

Animoto.com - is a great video maker that can be another great tool for teachers to use with their ESL students.
  I really think that this could be a great extra project for students to expand their understanding of any subject.  Through the use of pictures and text ESL student can really get a better understanding of nearly any topic they are studying.  From history to pop-culture students can make videos that can help them practice what they are learning in class.
Depending on the topic given to the students the performance indicators would be how well they stay on topic.  Also how well they link the pictures to the text meaning they provide.   The task could be very specific, such as make a video of five national parks and describe the pictures you choice to represent each park using the vocabulary words of the week.  To assess I could see how well they use the words.  At the end of the project I could do a quick word matching quiz.

Example Video -

Picture Video

TedEd Lesson on English Language Secrets

In this Ted lesson I am looking at the topic of secrets tips of learning the English language.  The three tips that the speaker talks about are where the stress of the word is placed, linking and collocation.  The three tips can helps a non-native speaker sound more natural.  The lesson can help students concentrate on certain aspects of their oral language practice.  These tips on how to sound and link words together can help one become more natural sounding to a native English speaker.   I think that by practicing these tips one can build confidence in speaking English.  In this the student will become more comfortable in their practice of the learning the English language.

After a lesson on common collocations I could assess the students on recognizing collocations.  We could also continue practicing them along side vocabulary lessons. 

ESL 1.1

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TedEd Lesson  -  Secrets of the English Language

The Flipped Class

In the articles, Why it’s time to Rethink (and Question)Homework by Katie Lepi and 7 Things You Should Know about …Flipped Classrooms, the concept of a typical classroom work and homework are flipped on their head.

            I really like the idea of having kids come prepared with the knowledge they need for the class rather than having to lecture about the information.  Then all class activity is about reinforcing the concepts, answering question, and filling in the gaps that pre-class work was not able to fill.  Though as a teacher one would really have to know the capabilities of the class and the commitment of the students to truly make this flipped classroom work.  Without that commitment the students may fall behind. If the students are not prepared for class with the material and knowledge they need to be in class and really take advantage of that time the flipped classroom idea becomes harder to control.

            Homework plays several different roles and depending on the students level of development with the topic at hand it really could  help or disenfranchise the student.  Too hard and the student may give up, to easy and the student get bored.  A teacher may want to reinforce a concept or show it in a different way with different assignments but with each student and class different materials can be provided.  Having students do different assignments could become confusing but it could be very helpful to the student and possible the class.  If students are doing different assignments they could present what they learned to the class.  Even if it’s a quick five minute presentation they can share the learned knowledge with the whole class.  

Chop Chop

TubeChop - Funny English Words (01:14)

     In a classroom the video can be used to prompt a lesson.  The whole video is a lesson in itself but in this instance I would want it shorter so it prompts a class discussion.

  

     In this lesson the objective would be to learn and expand the student’s vocabulary.  Not only are they learning funny words which are not used as much as high frequency words they are learning the meanings of the words by using synonyms of the words.  The synonyms are often the more high frequently words.  This is a fun way to introduce new words expanding the vocabulary of the students.

      To extend the lesson from the video I would have each student pick one other word off the list from the video to describe and to pick one other word that they find funny in the English language to discuss.  By having each student talk about their words the other students will also learn from each other.  They can also write the words up on the board.  From this I could even create another assignment that would use these words to create a funny story.  Farther reinforcing all the new vocabulary.   After practicing the words I can then assess the students with a quick matching of the funny words to the high frequency words that we were practicing.