Week 4 - reading, writing, issues - interrelated

New week, new sites, new thoughts…reading comprehension is actually a problem in our country. Our students do not perform well in surveys, what is more, they are deteriorating. So it is even more challenging for language teachers to make Ss read texts carefully and be able to talk about what they read. As students are used to reading and writing short messages on the net, they find it hard to concentrate on longer texts, and to understand the main ideas without knowing all the words in the text. I constantly try to train my students to overcome these difficulties, and to make them enjoy reading by choosing graded readers and magazines but I haven’t applied the net. Reading and writing are intertwined. Students who do not read, of course find it hard to write.

As for writing, I had very bad experiences when learning English because years passed and didn’t have to write anything, just translate sentences, and when I had to write, I was very bad at it, and was given bad marks. When I decided to become an English teacher I knew I would like to do it in a different way. In the first few years, I do not even give any bad marks, just written feedback and pluses for good work. My students tend to appreciate it, and they usually like writing and are not stressed when given such an assignment. I’m glad I got to know about useful websites this week which I can use in my practice.

As for the project, I haven’t decided what to do in my group, and I wonder what will come out of this. Still, I like writing about that problem. At school I have discussed it a lot of times to Englsih teacher colleagues but we have not agreed on or tried anything systematic. (I’m not the only one with this problem.)

week 3 - sites are delicious :)

Delicious.com? what is it? Now I know. Hmmm, delicious J I must let my colleagues know about it, and not only the English teachers, it is useful for anyone who uses the net a lot, but I’m sure the English teachers will love it.

Authentic material…listening…pronunciation…speaking…from where? Although the listening exercises of course books have developed a lot, they are not so useful. Many times unnatural, even the weaker students can’t help smiling when they are listening to them and they love making fun of the intonation and reactions they hear in those dialogues. And last year when we had the Italian assistant, some of my students struggled to understand her because of her accent. To tell the truth, listening is really hard in the classroom because some students find the same exercise hard, whereas the others can hardly understand it even after second hearing. The gap is much bigger than in the case of reading, writing or even speaking skills. Why? Because some students watch films only in English, or have travelled widely and heard and spoken ‘real’ English, while the others lack all these experiences. 

The websites I’ve got to know are so useful not only because they provide videos, and related exercises but also because there are some really short texts which can easily be applied in 45-minute lessons, and also because eager Ss can practise at home.

The main problem with these sites is actually a general problem: time. On the one hand, they can save a lot of time for me, on the other hand it really is time-consuming to find The Right task for a certain group and lesson...but hopefully, after a while, I’ll only enjoy the benefits

Week 2 made me think...

Week 2 is coming to an end. It has  been extremely busy for me but still enjoyed all the new things I have met. Beginning with the various search engines. I need more practice to become more familiar with them and benefit from them.
The ABCD learning objectives made me stop and analyse if I'm doing it well in my groups. I need this stop every now and again, I think it is an essential part of being a responsible teacher, to stop and ponder whether I'm doing it right, what I can improve, whether I know the needs of my students and the process that is going on in their minds. Reading all the messages about ABCD and writing mine made me do this important step.
Writing about my school and one of my groups also made me more conscious of certain facts. One thing that I promise to myself is that I will not complain when one of the gadgets fail to work at school and I will think of my colleagues who work in much harder conditions. I'm going to focus on how to solve the problem instead of blaming the maintenance men. :)

I have started to think about my group I described in Project step 1, and what I can do next with them. It requires constant concentration and empathy to make them work. Perhaps I drew quite a dark picture of them, I'm not sure. They are loveable people, but I would love to overcome the obstacle that they have because they are not open to the world. Last year when we had a language assistant from Italy helped to broaden their minds but the assistantship lasted for 10 weeks, which was not long enough. OK, now I'll continue thinking...

Week 1 reflections

I am really enthusiastic about learning online and have discussions.I've never tried it before. The most I worked online was when I had a project with a Turkish school and we had to make the application together but neither of us could visit the other. We worked a lot till we put together everything and it was great fun when finally we were granted the money and were able to meet and visit each other's country with a group of students.
To tell the truth, I've often had problems with technology and then refused to get on with it in my teaching practice but I know it's essential to be up-to-date and it is a good way of motivating students.
I hope that my students will be able to benefit more from sitting in front of their computer if I give them more computer-connected assignments.
I'm looking forward to this course!