May 27, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
Lyrics On Call is a new site that makes it quite easy for teachers to find lyrics for songs used in class.
With this site, and with many others listed on my website under Movies & Music, the days of having to endure endless pop-up ads while searching for lyrics on the Internet are past.
I was able to find lyrics for many of the song I use with English Language Learners. Raffi is always my “test” on these sites, and this one came through with flying colors.
May 27, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
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This year I’ve been helping my my students learn academic vocabulary. One new word has been “interpretation” and its various forms.
I’ve shown students several optical illusions that can be found at this site or at this one. Then, they have short conversations with other students about what they see:
“What is your interpretation of what’s in the picture?”
“It seems to me that there’s a ……”
I’ve placed the link on my Teacher’s Page under ESL Hand-Outs and Lesson Plans.
May 26, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
I just saw the newest Indiana Jones movie, after having re-seen the first three last week. I’ve posted my thoughts on How A Good Teacher Is Not Like Indiana Jones at “In Practice,” our group blog that’s written by teachers who work in low-income communities.
You might want to check it out and add your own ways on why a teacher should not (or should) be like the famed action hero.
May 26, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
My next “The Best…” list will be The Best Listening Sites For English Language Learners.
I’ve got quite a big group I’m considering for inclusion, but I’m open to additional suggestions. Feel free to leave ideas in the comment section. I’m hoping to post it by this coming weekend.
As I’ve done in past, even if your recommendations don’t make my list, I’ll still include them in the post giving you credit.
May 26, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
Listen and Write is a new web tool that I think has a lot of potential for English Language Learners.
A user first chooses a text he/she wants to hear read to him/her. Many of the choices are from the Voice of America, and are both high-interest and accessible. Their levels of difficulty are also indicated.
Then the story is dictated to you, and you have to type it correctly. You can choose the speed of the reading and how often it’s repeated. When you type only the correct letters actually show-up on the screen, and you can ask for hints.
I’ve placed the link on my website under Listening.
May 26, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
It’s time for another addition to my ever-growing series on The Best Ways To Create Online Content Easily & Quickly.
As regular readers now, this “The Best…” list shares free online applications that are free, accessible to English Language Learners, do not require registration, and let users create online content easily and quickly that can be hosted by the site itself.
Here are the latest sites that fit this criteria (or, at least most of it):
CREATE 3-D ART WITH CUBES: Cubescape lets you use cubes to create artwork, which you can then save into a gallery. Demo Girl has a nice screencast giving details on how to use the site.
“MORPH” AN ANIMAL INTO A HUMAN: I learned about You Wild from the Langwitches blog. It is weird, but could be a fun way to reinforce animal vocabulary for English Language Learners. One thing about it is a little strange though — before you save your creation there’s a pop-up that says by saving it you’re committing to being over eighteen years of age. I really don’t understand why that caveat is needed, since you’re just making bizarre pictures.
MAKE AN EASY SLIDESHOW WITH CAPTIONS & MUSIC: I posted about Moblyng a few days ago. Even though I’ve included slideshow applications in previous editions of this list, Moblyng clearly is the most sophisticated, yet accessible, one that doesn’t require registration.
POST AN IMAGE OR DOCUMENT & GET FEEDBACK ON IT: Last week I also wrote a post about a new tool called Backboard that lets you post something you write, or an image, and then lets people write comments on it.
CREATE YOUR OWN ZOO: ROAR is another site I’ve recently posted about. It doesn’t quite fit my criteria since you have to register to use it, but it’s so easy to do so I decided to include it on this list. Users can create their own zoo and mail the url address to a friend for posting on a blog or online journal.
RECORD THE LOG OF A CONVERSATION YOU HAVE WITH A “CHATBOT”: I posted earlier today about George, a “chatbot” recommended by Alicia Rey. One feature that I neglected to mention in that post is that you can email a record of your conversation with the “bot.” It doesn’t actually have its own url (you’d have to copy and paste it on a blog or online journal from the body of the email), but it could be a very useful asset for English Language Learners and their teacher.
MIX AND MATCH A STRANGE MUSIC VIDEO: You can easily create a strange music video with the Coke Videomixer. The site is in Dutch, but it’s easy enough to figure out by anybody. Students can make a video and then email it to a teacher or friend to post the url on a blog or online journal. English Language Learners can then describe what they’ve created.
Links to all these sites will also eventually be included on my website under Examples Of Student Work.
May 26, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
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Jackanory is a BBC site where beginning English Language Learners can create their own stories with audio, text, and image support.
I’ve placed the link on my English For Beginners page under Stories.
May 25, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
1 Comment
There’s a lot of debate about how much to use an English Language Learner’s native language in studying English. Certainly, a straight translation methodology all of the time is not the way to go.
However, I’ve found that, particularly with newcomers, providing them with access to an Internet resource that provides some native-language support can be a real confidence-booster. Pretty quickly, though, they often move away from those sites of their own accord.
There are quite a few newer “learn-a-language” sites that provide multilingual support from a social network. There are others that offer translation help for a smaller number of languages.
My intent behind creating this latest “The Best…” list was to identify sites that provide teacher-created content; do not require any registration; are free; and, except in one instance (where I identify what my students and I are think is the best bilingual English/Spanish site), provide resources in many languages, including ones that are not widely-used.
You can also find links to the sites on this list, as well as to many others, on the Bilingual Exercises page on my website.
Unlike some of my other lists, I am not identifying them in order of preference. I think they’re all pretty equal.
Here are my choices for The Best Multilingual & Bilingual Sites For Learning English:
Bilingual Quizzes From Activities For ESL Students is a project of the Internet TESL Journal. You can find a ton of quizzes using multiple multiple languages here.
Foreign Languages For Travelers has a narrower set of quizzes, but a wider selection of languages.
Goethe Tests covers vocabulary and language tests in twenty-five different languages.
For an English/Spanish site, there’s no question that Pumarosa, created by teacher Paul Rogers, is by far the best resource for Spanish speakers.
The Cultural Orientation Resource Center has put their extraordinary collection of refugee phrasebooks online and free for download.
Here’s how they describe this incredibly useful resource:
These phrasebooks are designed to supply refugees with the appropriate English phrases and supplementary vocabulary for use in the daily activities of American life (rather than simply word-to-word translations, as in a dictionary). Phrases contained in the books have been selected for their directness, brevity and relevance to the needs of newly arrived residents of the United States. Among the nineteen units included are sections on “Giving Information About Yourself,” “Recognizing Signs,” “Dealing With Money,” “Health,” “Food,” “Clothing,” “Housing,” and “Jobs.”
Each phrasebook is approximately 140 pages and can be downloaded for free.
They are available in these languages: Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian, Cantonese, Czech, Farsi, Haitian Creole, Hmong, Hungarian, Khmer, Lao, Polish, Russian, Somali, Spanish, and Vietnamese.
The St. Paul’s Public Schools produces some great bilingual materials in English and in Khmer (Cambodia), Hmong, Oromo, Somali, Spanish and Vietnamese. They’re not online, and you have to purchase them, but the prices are very reasonable. I’ve used their materials for years.
GCF Learn Free’s reading site has been on several “The Best..” lists for its simple reading instruction, which is excellent for English Language Learners and new readers. They’ve kept that site, and have also added several multilingual features to specifically help ELL’s. You can visit their Learn English site here. They plan on adding many new activities there in the coming months.
As always, please feel free to provide feedback in the comments section.
You might want to consider subscribing to this blog for free if you’ve found the post useful.
May 25, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
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In response to my last post, readers sent in suggestions for other “chatbots” — artificially intelligent avatars.
David Deubelbeiss, the founder of EFL Classroom 2.0, recommended Dave. He also wrote:
“I’m working with another person to develop a bot for students where you don’t have to type! This is a significant drawback for ELLs. The model is to have a menu of selected questions/replies which the students click . This is converted into speech and then Dave replies. ”
By the way, there have been a lot of recent upgrades to EFL Classroom 2.0, so if you haven’t gone there recently I’d encourage you to make a visit.
Alicia Rey, an EFL teacher in Argentina, also sent in a link to George.
English Language Learners would find both useful.
Thanks to David & Alicia for sharing the links!
May 25, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
2 Comments
Students can communicate with an artificially intelligent avatar.
It’s really quite impressive — type in a question and it will vocalize a pretty reasonable response.
I’ll probably put it on my website under Listening.
May 25, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
1 Comment
Since I posted my list of The Best Ways To Create Online Tests, a couple of readers have asked me if I knew of a good site for math tests.
It seems to me that the website “That Quiz” is the place to go for math quizzes. The site also has some non-math tests, but those weren’t flexible enough in my eyes to be included in my original list since that was focused on non-math assessment.
The link can also be found on my Teacher’s Page under Math, along with other useful resources.
May 25, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
1 Comment
Thanks to a comment from Elke, I realized that I made an error in my original post on The Best Ways To Create Online Tests.
I had meant to include Classmarker as the third site listed as the best place to just have simple, no-frills, tests made where students could take them online.
And I meant to say that Easy Testmaker was an extra site I was including on the list because it was an easy way to make tests you could print out and have students take on paper.
This will teach me not to post too late at night!
The original list has also been corrected.
May 25, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
Poptropica is an online video game from Pearson Education which, according to the Poptropica webpage, is developing additional games, too.
There are some English language development opportunities in the game, primarily when the player has to interact with different characters and choose which questions to ask. However, I would have expected more educational value in a game from Pearson.
I’ve placed the link on my Intermediate English page under Word and Video Games.
May 24, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
I included Fliptrack in my post on The Best Ways To Create Online Slideshows. They’ve just changed their name to Moblyng, appear to have kept all their attractive features, and have made it even more accessible to English Language Learners (and others).
It seems even easier to make a slideshow and it continues to allow you to invite others to collaborate on your creation. Plus, and this is the best addition, you don’t have to register on the site to create slideshows anymore.
The only negative with that last change is that, if students are using a public or school computer, they need to click “Clear Your Personal Info” so that others don’t have access to it. The other alternative is to register with the site, which is easy to do.
May 24, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
Just a final reminder that the deadline for the next edition of the ELL/ESL/EFL Blog Carnival is May 31st.
You can submit a blog post that you think is helpful to learning English, including examples of student work, by using this easy submission form.
Twelve excellent contributions have already been sent-in, but there’s room for more!
May 24, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
ROAR: The Game! is a neat game from the BBC. Players have to create their own zoo, including picking habitats, the animals, their food, and their feeding routines.
There is audio support for some text, and the English is simple. It would be accessible to Early Intermediate English Language Learners. It’s a fun way to to learn about animals and practice language skills.
One feature that I particularly like is that you can email a link of your creation to a teacher or friend for posting on a website or blog. Then, as an extension activity, students could write a little describing their zoo, as well as use it as an opportunity for oral practice.
Players do have to register for the game, but it’s free and easy to do so.
I’ve placed the link on my website under Word and Video Games.
May 24, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
It’s Greek To Me is an online game from Scholastic. You virtually compete in the ancient Greek games as an archer or discus thrower. You are asked multiple choice questions on Greek influence on the English Language and, depending upon the correctness of your answer, your virtual athlete is successful or not.
It’s a fun little game that teaches a little about English and the Olympics. The language is relatively simple, and is accessible to Intermediate English Language Learners.
I’ve placed the link on my World History page under Greece and Rome.
May 23, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
1 Comment
I learned about Planet Impact from TechLearning. It’s a series of engaging online activities where students can learn about comets and their affect on planets.
It’s presented in relatively simple English that’s accessible to Intermediate English Language Learners. There are several games students can plan, including ones where they calculate angles to determine if their comet will hit or miss planets.
I’ve placed the link both on my Science page and my English Themes For Beginners page under Planets and Space.
May 22, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
13 Comments
Before I share the links to test-creating sites here, I should also point out that there are also several excellent sites that let you create online learning games. These can also function as effective ways to assess understanding — by either having teachers or students create them (I have a strong preference towards the latter both in making games and tests). You can check-out The Best Websites For Creating Online Learning Games to learn my picks for that category.
I’m not listing these test-creation sites in any order of preference. They each offer very distinct features that could work in different situations. By the way, they’re all free.
So here are my picks for The Best Ways To Create Online Tests:
My Studiyo is now called Quiz Revolution. It’s easy to use, you can include multimedia, and others can add questions (that are moderated before they appear). It used to be completely free, but now it appears you can create a quiz for free and will stay up for 250 “plays.” After that, it is “subject to removal or modification and/or additional ads.” So, even though it’s a neat site, and is worth looking at, I can’t say that it’s best site any longer.
Here are two sites that are connected — SMILE and CLEAR. They’re both from Michigan State University, and allow teachers (and students) to easily create clozes, drag-and-drop exercises, and sequencing activities. They also allow you to use audio and video with the activities, and will host them as well. This is an excellent site for making a variety of ESL/EFL-related assessments.
Classmarker is a good to go to just create basic online tests. It’s simple, efficient and effective.
Just in case you want to make a number of different tests to just print out on paper — without the ability for students to take the test online — Easy Testmaker is the place to go.
ProProfs is a good site, and you can make great online flashcards there, too.
Thanks to a suggestion from Wayne Basinger, I’m adding Quiz Egg to this list.. As Wayne, who uses it with his students, wrote, ” It allows the students to take online quizzes and then puts their scores in an Excel Spreadsheet. Easy to grade and record.” I checked it out — it’s free, looks easy to use, and allows you to add images that you grab off the web.
I don’t know how new Zoho Challenge is, but it’s definitely new to me. It seems like a very good way to create online tests (and include multimedia in them).
Testmoz is an app that lets you create an online, self-correcting quiz without having to register.
FunnelBrain is primarily know as a site where you can create flashcards. It does an okay job at it, but I don’t think it warrants being on The Best Tools To Make Online Flashcards list. However, they just added a tool that allows you to create online tests. It’s not flashy, and doesn’t have as many features as some other sites on this list, but it’s ease of use made me decide to add it to this post.
educaplay looks like a great free (as far as I can tell, at least) tool where you can easily create a ton of different kinds of educational interactives that you can link to or embed in your site. These include:
•Riddles
•Crosswords
•Wordsearch Puzzle
•Fill in the texts
•Dialogues
•Dictations
•Jumbled Word
•Jumbled Sentence
•Matching
•Quizzes
•Maps
For at least some of the them, including dictation, it provides the ability to record audio.
gnowledge is a new site that lets teachers create tests, and tracks students taking them.
LearnClick lets you easily create interactive cloze (gap-fill) assessments. You can learn more about it at my post.
If you’ve found this post useful, you might want to consider subscribing to this blog for free.
May 22, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
One of the great things about Edublogs is that it’s always adding new features. They’ll be testing some upgrades starting Friday night, so everybody with an Edublog (including mine) might experience some downtime this weekend. So if you can’t access this blog, just try again a little later.
It’s a very, very minor inconvenience — a tiny one compared to the extraordinary product that James Farmer delivers!
