Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

…For Teaching ELL, ESL, & EFL

May 22, 2007
by Larry Ferlazzo
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Visuwords

Visuwords is a combination dictionary and thesaurus that gives you a visual “cluster” of meanings and synonyms for a word. It’s similar to the well-known Visual Thesaurus, but one major difference is that Visuwords is free.

It doesn’t provide the words in the context of a sentence, but it can nevertheless be a helpful tool to English Language Learners. Plus, it looks cool!

I’ve placed the link in both the Dictionaries and Thesaurus categories on the English Themes For Beginners and Early Intermediate page of my website.

I should point out that I recently read a critique from a teacher saying that some synonyms Visuwords came up with were inappropriate for students. I’ve tried it quite a bit, as have my students, and haven’t experienced that problem at all. But you might just want to be aware of that concern.

May 22, 2007
by Larry Ferlazzo
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BBC Reading and Writing

BBC RaW (Reading and Writing) is an effort to encourage adults to further their education. Their site has a number of audio/visual and text activities that would be accessible for English Language Learners of all levels. However, there’s quite a bit to choose from and the menu is a little confusing, so I’ve placed the link on my English Themes for Intermediate and Advanced under the Practice Writing section.

“Storytelling Activities” would be a good place to start on the site.

May 21, 2007
by Larry Ferlazzo
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Making Faces

Making Faces is an excellent game to teach vocabulary related to feelings and emotions. You’re given the word for a particular emotion and then have to create a face accurately demonstrating it.

It’s from BT Education. Be sure to have students click on the “Full Screen” mode.

You can find the link to this activity in the Feelings section of the English Themes for Beginners and Early Intermediate page.

May 21, 2007
by Larry Ferlazzo
1 Comment

Checking for Dead Links

I mentioned in a previous post that I verify links on my website each month. Since some readers of this blog might have their own sites, I thought it might be helpful to share the free online “link-checkers” I use.

I generally alternate between using two different applications. The one I think probably does a better job is the Anybrowser Link Checker. The other is called Dead-Links. You can find both on my Teacher’s Page under Verifying Website Links.

Both can verify links pretty quickly. However, both also have a lot of “false negatives.” In other words, they will identify a lot of links that just load a little slowly as dead. So it takes some time for me to double check them. It usually takes me an hour or two each month to both have the links automatically verified and to double-check on the supposed dead ones.

The link checkers tend to always identify the same false negatives each month. So once I know that those links are okay, I can just ignore them in other months when they’re flagged by the link checkers.

Of course, that leaves the problem of links that aren’t dead, but the content and owner of the linked site has changed. Students and other teachers in my school alert me of those situations, as do other users of the site.

Of course, nothing beats the accuracy of a person checking the links. Sometimes during the summer months I’m able to bribe one of my daughters to do it.

May 20, 2007
by Larry Ferlazzo
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Another Online Flash Card Application

Earlier this month I wrote a post about creating online flash cards (Create Online Flash Cards). I just learned, through reading Jane’s E-Learning Pick of the Day, about another one called Quigli. It looks interesting and user-friendly, though I haven’t gotten a chance to test it out yet.

I’ve placed it on my Examples of Student Work page with the rest of the online flash card applications under Student Flash Cards.

May 20, 2007
by Larry Ferlazzo
1 Comment

Create Video Quizzes

ESL Video is a new site (to me, at least) that allows teachers and others to easily place videos from other sites there and create a quiz related to the video.

It seems to me like an ingenius idea and, as technologically illiterate as I am, this Web 2.0 stuff always seems like magic. Teachers can do this, but, of course, students can as well. Registration is free.

This site is so good, and its uses are so varied, that I’ve placed the link to it in many areas on my website. You can find it under Videos on my English For Beginners page. It’s also on the Examples of Student Work page under Student Videos. You’ll also see it on the Teacher’s Page under Video.

May 19, 2007
by Larry Ferlazzo
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Articles

I’ve just created a section on my blog titled “Articles.” It has links to several articles I’ve written (or co-written) that have particular relevance to teaching English Language Learners. It’s right below “Categories” and above “Blogroll.”

I also have additional articles on my website page called Published Articles.

May 19, 2007
by Larry Ferlazzo
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Create Your Own Art Museum

There are several museums that allow you to virtually look at their art and then students can pick and choose which paintings or art objects they like. On some of the sites students can just email their collections to their teacher who can then post them online. Students can also post the url’s on their own blog or online journal and explain why they picked the art they included. On some of the sites students are not given direct url’s and, instead, have to register to access “their” collections. In those situations, I just create one account I use for the whole class, and they make individual collections within that account.

I’d suggest teacher’s do a “practice run” on these sites first, though, since sometimes the museums’ email functions haven’t worked real well (or my email provider marks it as really bad spam and doesn’t allow it through) and the student collections disappear into the bowels of the Web. In fact, it’s probably a good idea for teachers to do that on all the links on my Examples of Student Work page (where these museum links are also located).

One link I just posted is to the Whitney Museum. An excellent one is to the Virtual Musem of Canada, which allows students to comment on their objects within the collection. You do the same at the Art Explorer Scrapbook at the Art Museum of Chicago.

The Tate in Britain clearly has the easiest and best one of these sites. I’ve, on occasion, though, have had problems with receiving student collections via email from their site. That’s why doing a teacher practice run is important.

The Seattle Art Museum is the other link I have in this category. All of them can be found under Student Art Collections.

May 18, 2007
by Larry Ferlazzo
7 Comments

Temporary Student Email Addresses

In order to use a number of the activities on my Examples of Student Work page, students need to show that they have email addresses. Often times they can just use mine, but quite a few of the Web 2.0 activities require registration of a unique address. Usually a link will be sent to that address that you then have to click on in order to open a free account.

However, many of my students don’t have their own email addresses and, even if they do, may not want to give it out to these websites. What can they do?

Near the top of the Examples of Student Work page, I have two links where students can register for email addresses that exist for ten or fifteen minutes. Students can receive and send email from that address during that period of time.

These two links are 10 Minute Mail and Guerrilla Mail.

May 18, 2007
by Larry Ferlazzo
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Academic Reading and Writing

Academic Reading and Writing (ARW) is the name of the English class we teach many ninth-graders at the high school where I teach. Since the majority of our school is composed of English Language Learners, many take ARW. The curriculum is accessible to advanced English Language Learners and, with modifications, can be used with Intermediate level students, too.

You can go the the ARW Page on my website to see many links connected to the themes we teach in the class, including ones on Natural Disasters, New Orleans, Latino Studies, Mt. Everest, Jamaica, and Nelson Mandela.

May 17, 2007
by Larry Ferlazzo
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Create Your Own Creature

Create Your Own Creature is sponsored by the Indianapolis Museum of Art. You can see pieces of art that show various “creatures” and then get to create your own. You write a description and send it to the museum to hang in its creature gallery. Students can also copy and paste their creation and description into their online journal or blog.

I’ve placed the link on the Examples of Student Work page under Student Creatures.

May 16, 2007
by Larry Ferlazzo
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Make a Wish

I’ve had link to Wishood on my Examples of Student Work page for awhile. I thought I’d highlight it today because I have several student examples there, too.Students can “make a wish” — in other words, send a card via email sharing one or more of their hopes and dreams. It’s just a little activity to both teach the idea of a “wish” and also a way for students to see their classmates’ wishes. This, in turn, moves into a structured conversation.

Good teachers do this kind of thing all the time in the classroom, and I don’t think doing it online is any better. It’s just a short and easy activity that students can do in a few minutes with some extra time in the computer lab.

The link is under Student Wishes.

May 16, 2007
by Larry Ferlazzo
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Listening Quizzes

Net Grammar has a series of fifteen units with sections on grammar, reading, writing and more. The section that really stands out, at least to me, are the sections on Listening. Each unit has a Listening section where the student can clearly hear a person talking. While the student is listening they can answer a series of questions on the screen about what they are hearing.

I’ve placed this link at the bottom of the Audio Conversations category of the English For Beginners page on my website.

May 15, 2007
by Larry Ferlazzo
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Make a Virtual “You”

Oddcast is an extraordinarly creative company that develops interactive online activities for a variety of corporations. Many of the activities you’ll find on my Examples of Student Work page have been made by them.

I’m writing today about three specific activities they’ve created that allow you to create a “virtual” you online. They’re listed under Student Virtual Hosts on my Examples of Student Work page.

In all three of these links you can choose the physical characteristics of “you” and have “you” speak, using a text to speech feature. You can also email “you” and post “yourself” on the Web.

The first one, The V Host Workshop, is the one with the fewest features. The second one from Gamespot has several additional things you can do with it. But the final one, Voki, has just been released by Oddcast and is in an entirely different class from the other two. You have to register for Voki, unlike the first two, but registration just takes a few seconds.

There are several ways these activities can benefit English Language Learners. They can design themselves, post their url in an online journal or a blog, and describe what their “virtual” selves look like and why. They can use the text to speech feature to write what they want to say and then listen to it. They can comment (positively) about their “virtual” classmates.

May 15, 2007
by Larry Ferlazzo
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Lonely Planet Travel Videos

I’m a big fan of the Lonely Planet travel guides and their online forum for travelers. They’ve been very helpful to me on my personal vacations.

Now, they’ve started Lonely Planet TV to host videos uploaded by travelers around the world.

I’ve placed the link on my Geography page near the bottom of the Sites That Cover Many Areas. The Lonely Planet site has a world map that you can click on to see videos from different continents.

I didn’t see any inappropriate videos in my quick review of the site. I’m hopeful that the company will maintain its usual high standards and carefully moderate video contributions.

May 13, 2007
by Larry Ferlazzo
2 Comments

JumpKnowledge

Shortly after I posted about how I hoped to have my students use Social Bookmarks to share their favorite English-language links with one another, I discovered a much, much better way to do it.

JumpKnowledge is one of a number of newer applications that allow users to annotate websites. In other words, computer users can virtually “write” on webpages they see on their computer and save those pages, along with their notes. Then they can access them anytime they want, and also share the pages and their notes with others.

Most require that you add “buttons” to your web browser — some do not. JumpKnowledge does not, which makes it a whole lot easier to use on a school computer.

I’ve registered (which takes about ten seconds) and opened an account (it’s free). I can then write notes anywhere I want on any webpage, and access them through my account.

My students will be able to access my website through my JumpKnowledge account. I figure that I’ll have one “copy” each of my various webpages where all students can mark their favorite links and write why they like them right next to the specific links. This way everyone can see at a glance which ones are liked the most.

If that gets too unwieldy, each student can eventually have their “own” copies of my various webpages where they’ll mark and write about their favorite links. All of my students will be able access everyone’s pages.

This explanation might be a little (or a lot) confusing. You might just want to go check it out.

I’ll be exploring other web annotation applications in the future to see if there are ones that are even better.

You can find JumpKnowledge on my Examples of Student Work page under Student Bookmarks.

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