October 15, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
David Deubelbeiss has been refining the EFL Classroom 2.0 Bot, an avatar who will respond to your written questions both in writing and by speaking.
I’ve written several posts about using something like this in the language-learning classroom.
It’s worth a visit…
October 15, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
12 Comments
I’ve used music a lot with English Language Learners. Singing feels much less threatening to many who are learning a new language.
Karaoke is a good language-development activity, and there are quite a few karaoke sites on the Internet. I thought it would be a good topic for a short “The Best…” list.
In order to make it on this list, a site has to be available free-of-charge (or at least some of its resources have to be free), easy-to-use, require no download, and allow students — either alone or in a group — to record themselves singing. A link to their performance can then be posted on a student or teacher website.
There are only a few sites that meet that criteria. Here are my choices for The Best Online Karaoke Sites For English Language Learners:
The Karaoke Channel Online has an extraordinary collection of songs available…for a price. However, if you choose the free option you have access to two hundred songs, though none of them are particularly up-to-date. But it’s a very easy process to record and save.
SMS Tunes is another similar site.
Sing Snap is the newest addition to this list. It has all the best qualities of the other sites here — easy to use, free-of-charge, and, if you don’t want to record, you can just listen to others sing while the screen shows the lyrics. Using a webcam is an option, but unlike many Web 2.0 sites, you can still use it if you just have a computer microphone.
Karaoke Party is the newest free online karaoke site. Though I haven’t spent a lot of time checking it out, it seems very comparable to the others on this list.
MikeStar appears to be a new and accessible karaoke site that I’ve learned about from Nik Peachey.
You still need to get an invitation to use Songboard, but it seems to have a pretty clean interface to show music videos with highlighted words as they are sung. It doesn’t have a way to record your singing, and you have to sign in using Facebook (though you can get access to a number of them without signing-in), but it still might be worth checking-out.
You might also be interested in The Best Music Websites For Learning English and The Best Sites To Practice Speaking English.
I’d certainly be interested in hearing suggestions, so please feel free to leave them in the comments section.
If you found this post useful, you might want to look at previous “The Best…” lists and also consider subscribing to this blog for free.
October 15, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
1 Comment
Here’s another installment in my series of The Best Ways To Create Online Content Easily & Quickly. As you may remember, in order to make it on this list, the web tool has to:
* be easily accessible to English Language Learners and/or non-tech savvy computer users.
* allow people to create engaging content within minutes.
* host the user’s creation on the site itself indefinitely, and allow a direct link to be able to be posted on a student or teacher’s website/blog to it (or let it be embedded).
* provide some language-learning opportunity.
* does require any registration.
You can find previous installments of this series with the rest of my “The Best…” lists at Websites Of The Year.
Here are my latest picks:
SEND AN E-CARD FROM THE GUGGENHEIM: I’ve posted about a lot of places where people can send attractive and innovative E-Cards, and then post a link to them on a student/teacher website. However, at the Guggenheim Museum E-Card page, not only can you pick from some extraordinary art work, but it’s the only E-Card site I’ve ever seen that also has a spell-check. That feature really makes it helpful to English Language Learners.
MAKE A QUILT ONLINE: The International Quilt Study Center & Museum lets users create their own quilt. They can then email the link to a friend and/or post the link on a teacher or student website or blog.
SEND A NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC E-CARD: National Geographic lets you send a strange, but engaging, E-Card of what appears to be its mascot, Zipper. Students can “drag-and-drop” various objects into the picture, including speech bubbles where they can write text. They can then send it as an email, and post the link on a teacher or student blog/website.
WRITE AN AZTEC E-CARD: At The Field Museum site, you can write E-Cards that can be emailed and have examples of Aztec sculpture. A link to the image and what the student writes can then be posted on a teacher website or blog.
BECOME A TALKING POTATO: With Spud Yourself! you can turn your image into a talking potato (or use one of the site’s pictures). By using the text-to-speech feature, English Language Learners can develop their language skills in a fun way through writing and listening. You can post the link to your talking potato on a teacher or student blog/website.
SEND A SALVADOR DALI E-Card: Here’s another resource from an art museum, and this time you can send artwork or a quote from Salvador Dali. If you’re interested, you can also find a lot of other E-Card sites on my website under Student E-Cards.
MAKE A STORY WITH BAND-AIDS: A manufacturer of band-aids in the United Kingdom (I guess they call them “plasters” over there) lets you create an animated story, with text, on their site. All the characters in the story are made of band-aids. It’s a bit strange, but cute. The only negative is that you don’t get an immediate url address of your creation — they review it first and then send you an email before it’s posted. I don’t know how long it takes.
You might also want to check out The Best Ways To Create Online Content Easily & Quickly — 2008.
If you found this post useful, you might want to look at previous “The Best…” lists and also consider subscribing to this blog for free.
October 15, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
The Washington Post has a great Interactive Timeline on The Lives and Careers of Obama and McCain.
I’ve just added it to The Best Sites To Learn About U.S. Presidential Elections.
October 15, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
1 Comment
Slide Six is a new online slideshow tool that I learned about from Free Technology For Teachers.
It doesn’t actually let you make slideshows online, but you can upload PowerPoint presentations. The real “kicker,” though, is that you can then add audio narration to the sldieshow and post it all online.
As far as I can tell, there are only two other slideshow web tools that also provide this audio option –VoiceThread and Show Beyond. Of course, Flowgram, the top-ranking site in The Best Web 2.0 Applications For Education — 2008, also provides an audio narration feature, but it’s much, much more than a slideshow creator (but can certainly function as one).
I still want to try-out Slide Six a little more, but it’s certainly a candidate to be added to The Best Ways To Create Online Slideshows. I’m also very impressed with its customer service.
October 15, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
2 Comments
Thanks to Kevin Jarrett, I just learned that the popular educational diagramming and design software Inspiration is now trying out a free web-based version called Webspiration. I’ve got to say, though, that I’m less than inspired by it.
You should read Kevin’s post about it, though. I’ve only used Inspiration software once several years ago, but Kevin is obviously very experienced with it and has more positive feelings.
It just seems overly complicated to me. Plus, only people who are logged-on can view your finished work — you can’t just get a public link to it. It does have a nice collaborative feature, though.
For English Language Learners, at least, there are plenty other Web 2.0 applications that are much more accessible.
As Kevin says, though, it’s a brand new application and might very well improve with age.
What do the rest of you think? Am I missing something?
October 15, 2008
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
I’ve placed two links about the crisis in Darfur on my World History page.
One is a surprisingly accessible interactive from the U.S. Council on Foreign Relations called Crisis Guide: Darfur. The first chapter is particularly good for English Language Learners since it has captions for the audio.
In addition, I’ve added a link to the relatively well-known “serious” game called Darfur Is Dying. You “play” a refugee foraging for water and trying to avoid being killed.
