August 18, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
4 Comments
Copyright And Fair Use: Guidelines For Teachers is a very simple, and very good, one page PDF document.
I’m adding it to The Best Resources To Learn About Copyright Issues.
Thanks to patpack on Twitter for the tip.
August 18, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
With the Afghanistan Presidential elections happening, the Wall Street Journal has published an excellent interactive timeline reviewing important events in that country since the 9/11 attacks.
I’ve added it to The Best Sites For Learning About The Afghanistan War.
August 18, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
2 Comments
The National Journal ran a piece last week on paying students for increased test scores.
I was pleased to see a number of thoughtful responses criticizing the idea, and disappointed to see what people said in support.
I couldn’t say it any better than Bob Peterson (from one of my favorite magazines, Rethinking Schools) did:
Yes, motivation is a key to learning. I see that every day with my fifth graders, but motivation should flow from the quality of curriculum, the nature of the learning activities, the connectedness of the curriculum to the lives of the students, and the overall school experience.
I suggest that districts that have so much money that they can have programs to pay students for higher test scores, instead spend the money on making sure that all students have a full complement of physical education, visual arts, music, drama, dance, and library instruction as well as classroom teachers who are skilled at creating engaging learning activities.
August 18, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
4 Comments
There are a number of excellent sites that English Language Learners can use to practice their English, and you can find many of them at The Best Sites To Practice Speaking English.
Most of them, however, require using a microphone, which is fine for when we’re in the computer lab at school, and fine for the minority of my students who have Internet access at home, but not very helpful for those without that kind of access. That makes using the computer for speaking homework not really an option.
There are other apps, like Google Voice, that allow people to record audio by phone, but require some work by the teacher to post the audio on the web (admittedly, not much work, but I’m always looking for ways to reduce my workload, not increase it 
)
So I decided to create another “The Best…” list, and this time focus on free applications that would allow students to use a phone to record audio directly to the web — without me having to be an intermediary. I was looking for sites that would allow me to just listen and leave comments, but not require me to actually post it. It would serve as an “audio journal” for students.
Here are my choices for The Best Sites For Students To Record Audio By Phone:
(Several that I had listed when I originally posted have gone out of business)
I just learned about ipadio from Cliff Mims today.
Both Alice Mercer and ELL Classroom have written about Dropio, though it appears to me that it doesn’t quite have the journal-life function that I’m looking for.(UPDATE: Drop.io has been purchased by Facebook and is phasing out its service)
Listen Voice appears to be sort of an audio blog that can be recorded by phone. It’s free if you limit each call to five minutes or less. However, the number is in Boston, so the calls are long-distance. They do have an option, though, of you leaving your number and then they will call you. I haven’t tried it yet, so don’t know how well that works.
I talk about a new, simple and great way to use a smartphone to record students at This Seems Like A Pretty Easy Way To Practice Speaking…..
Please let me know if you have other suggestions.
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.
August 18, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
As I’ve explained in earlier pieces, I periodically post “most popular” lists of websites (and books) that I think educators might find useful. Of course, there are a number of ways to gauge “popularity.” I just view these lists as opportunities to check-out some new sites, and find it interesting to see which ones might be particularly “popular.”
Today, I’d like to share two tools to use if you want to know which website links are the most popular on Twitter — in other words, what links to sites are being “retweeted” (or forwarded) most often.
There are other similar applications, but these two seem to me to be the best. I’d be happy to hear if I’m missing something.
One is TweetMeme. It’ll show you lists of the most popular links being retweeted over three periods: “most recent,” 24 hours, and 7 days. You can also view the links by category.
Twitturly is a much more simple application that has fewer categories and only tracks popularly over a 24 hour period of time.
Topsy lets you identify the top 100, top 1000 and the top 5000 links to sites that are being retweeted. Thanks to TechCrunch for the tip.
The other is more expansive than just Twitter but, for lack of a better place to put it, in adding it to the “retweets” list. It’s called Splurb, and it ranks links based on their popularity among several social networks — including Twitter. Thanks to Mashable for the tip.
August 17, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
1 Comment
Audio Pal is a new tool that lets you easily record a message — either by using a phone, computer mike, or text-to-speech — and then add the embed code to your blog or website. Students can update it as often as they want, and get as many different ones that they want. It’s pretty neat. No registration is necessary, and it’s free.
I’m adding it to The Best Sites To Practice Speaking English.
August 17, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
Simple K-12 Virtual Field Trips has a nice collection of links to…virtual field trips.
I’m adding it to The Best Resources For Finding And Creating Virtual Field Trips.
Thanks to Crista Anderson for the tip.
August 17, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
DE Tools Of The Trade is another good collection of Web 2.0 tools to use in education.
I’m adding it to The Best Collections Of Web 2.0 Tools For Education.
Thanks to Anne Mckague for the tip.
August 17, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
Buzz Feed is another place to find what are supposedly the most popular videos on the Web. The selection appears to include some “raunchier” ones than the other sites I have listed in my post on the best places to find the Most Popular Online Videos, but it does seem to have some other useful funny ones that could be used for activities with English Language Learners. I don’t know how they determine their selection — it’s obviously using a different methodology than the others.
I’m adding the link to that “most popular” post.
August 17, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
Developing Questions For Critical Thinking is an interactive site using a revised version of Bloom’s Taxonomy that was developing in the 1990′s. It seems like it has some very useful resources.
I’m adding it to The Best Resources For Helping Teachers Use Bloom’s Taxonomy In The Classroom.
Thanks to Far Out Links for the tip.
August 17, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
INSITE is a very nice collection of Web 2.0 tools for education. David Eisert, who was kind enough to leave a comment about it, describes it this way:”Students have actually reviewed all of these technologies and created lesson plans to go along with each tool. We are in the process of creating a searchable user interface and allowing outside contributors.”
I’m adding it to The Best Collections Of Web 2.0 Tools For Education.
August 17, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
2 Comments
One way to encourage our ESL/EFL students and others to become active citizens in the world is to help them become aware of important news events. Current news can also be a source of high-interest reading, speaking, listening, and writing material, and provide opportunities to stimulate higher-order thinking.
A first step in this process is to provide them with accessible information. This list offers my choices for the top ten News/Current Events Websites for English Language Learners in 2009. It updates The Best News/Current Events Websites For English Language Learners — 2007. There are a lot of similarities between the two editions, but also a few important changes.
This list is different in one way from all my other “The Best…” lists. The first group of sites highlight my choices in order of preference. Then, later in the post, I list the choices made by my students. I was surprised to find that they liked some of the sites I list in The Best Visually Engaging News Sites, which are ones I thought were fun to look at but were not really that informative or accessible. One of the other issues was that a few of my choices were blocked by our school district’s content filter, so students weren’t able to try-out all of them, including my top-ranked pick.
Here are my choices:
Number twelve is the English Club. It provides a monthly text and audio summary of four news stories, including online cloze (fill-in-the-gap) exercises.
Number eleven is Voice of America’s Special English TV. The vocabulary used is great, the speed is perfect, the information is often (though not always) interesting. But can’t they liven it up a little bit and not just have a “talking head?” How about a few pictures related to the subject?
Number ten is Voice of America’s Special English TV. The vocabulary used is great, the speed is perfect, the information is often (though not always) interesting. But can’t they liven it up a little bit and not just have a “talking head?” How about a few pictures related to the subject?
Breaking News English is number nine. It’s been providing text and audio of the top news stories a few times each week for quite awhile. In addition, it has excellent lesson plans and follow-up activities that can be printed-out.
Number eight is News English Lessons, a sister site of of Breaking News English that appears to have even more accessible resources for ELL’s.
Number seven is iCue. It’s a collaboration between NBC and MIT. There’s a lot to the site. It’s basically an extremely interactive way to learn about the news (and has a U.S. History component), but that’s an understatement. It’s designed for students thirteen years-old and above. You can play games, watch videos (which all have very easy and simultaneous access to its transcript at the same time — great for English Language Learners and, in my experience, unusual on the web), save student work, and a ton of other activities. You have to register, but it’s free and easy to do so.
Number six is the CBBC Newsround. This is sort of a version of BBC News designed for younger people. The lay-out, writing, and choice of stories is very inviting. They now have a separate Accessible Newsreader for much of their content that is attractively designed and provides audio support for the text.
The News Challenge game is number five. Two different short news clips (with different perspectives) about the same event are shown, and then questions are asked about them. It’s an excellent way to promote critical, and higher-order, thinking skills.
I’ve put the Audio Slideshow Gallery at Reuters at number four. The photos are excellent, they have very short captions, and the narration, though it isn’t an exact recitation of the text, is accessible. They do an audio slideshow each week summarizing key news events. (NOTE: Reuters seems to have discontinued this feature)
Number three is the LIFE site sharing millions of photos from the LIFE Magazine archives and Getty Images. What’s great about this new site is that, unlike Google’s previous hosting of many of the same photos (which are just listed by decades), LIFE’s site shows them in thematic slideshows with accessible captions. Plus, they include daily updates of slideshows about current events. You can also subscribe to a weekly email newsletter that gives you updates on new content. Both the historical and current slideshows are fabulous.
Number two is the Voice of America Special English News. These short articles, with audio, are accessible, timely, and numerous.
And now, for the number one News/Current Events Website For English Language Learners, I’m picking… :
The BBC Learning English site is attractively designed and has images and audio support for text.
Here are my students’ choices:
Number seven — LIFE
Number six — Discovery Earth Live
Number five — News Map
Number four — Voice of America’s Special English TV
Number three — World News Map
Number two — World News Today
Number one — Audio Slideshow Gallery at Reuters (Now Discontinued)
Newscred looks like a great way students (and
anyone else) can create their own personalized online newspaper. Of course, it’ll even be greater when their site is consistently up. They were written up in the TechCrunch blog today, and I suspect they’re being overwhelmed with traffic.
I’ve been looking for a good site performing this kind of service for awhile, and have written about my frustrations. I was finally able to get through to Newscred and was impressed. Once they work out their technical issues, it should be an ideal place for students to identify topics that they’re interested in and have an attractively designed and accessible source to read about it.
The site has 2500 news feeds. It’s simple as pie to set-up your paper, and you can create multiple papers on different topics.
Obviously, a fair amount of the information that shows-up in these feeds is going to be quite challenging for English Language Learners to understand. However, since it’s on the topics they choose, and shown in an attractive form, it will certainly provide high-interest reading material that one can hope they’d want to ‘fight-through” a bit to comprehend.
I’m tentatively adding Newscred to this list — assuming they fix their technical issues.
(speaking of Newscred, Demo Girl has just created a screencast on how to use that web application).
Mapeas provides news videos from around the world. Of course, lots of sites do this. Mapeas is different, though, because the video links are located on a Google Map — you go to the geographical area of the world you want, and you click on the links located there.
The Voice of America has a new Articles section, which has lots of interactive exercises related to engaging news articles.
The Daily What: News For Schools In Scotland provides very well-written and accessible articles about world-wide events, and, in addition, provides interactives (such as quizzes) for each one (look for the red question mark on the right column to find the interactives). The articles have both shorter and longer versions available. The site has a lot of other features, but those are only accessible to Scottish teachers and students.
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.
August 16, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
Looking For Mr. Wright is an interactive slideshow from the Wall Street Journal that takes you a tour of buildings designed by famed architect Frank Lloyd Wright.
I’m adding it to a number of other Frank Lloyd Wright resources on The Best Images Of Weird, Cool & Neat-Looking Buildings (& Ways To Design Your Own).
August 16, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
Barry Fun English is a teacher-developed site with a lot of free and accessible activities. I especially like Fun Vocabulary, which provides great images and audio support for the text.
It’s definitely worth a look throughout the site, though. I think it has the potential to become one of the best resources out there for ESL/EFL teachers.
I’ve placed the link on my website under Vocabulary.
August 15, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
The League of Scientists offers a number of science-related games whose difficulty level can be adjusted. In addition, you can start your own games and have up-to-eight people compete in “your” race. It’s not as simple as it is in other game sites to create games that only include your classmates, but if you set it up that the people you want to compete against all sign-in at the same time, it seems to me that you should be able to make that happen. Also, unlike in some of the sites, you have to log-in before you play (registration is simple, though).
Even with some of those drawbacks, I’m still adding The League of Scientists to The Best Online Games Students Can Play In Private Virtual “Rooms”.
August 15, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
There’s now an application that lets you watch all the great TED Talks from your desktop without having to be connected to the Internet. I’m adding it to The Best Teacher Resources For “TED Talks”. Thanks to Jeff Mummert for the tip.
Buchenwald: Horror and Liberation, 1945 is a slideshow from LIFE. I’m adding it to The Best Sites For Learning About The Holocaust.
August 15, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
Tom Barrett has created a bunch of great presentations on “Interesting Ways” to use various Web 2.0 applications with students. I’ve shared them in The Best places to learn Web 2.0 basics.
He’s developed two others that I’ve recently learned about, and which I’ve added to the same “The Best..” list. They are:
Twenty-Three Interesting Ways* to Use Search Engines in the Classroom
Twenty-Five Interesting Ways* to use Twitter in the Classroom
Check-out Tom’s blog and all his resources!
August 15, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
4 Comments
Our school year doesn’t begin until right after Labor Day, but since I identified Labor Day resources for lessons in my United States History class, I thought a “The Best…” list might be helpful.
During my nineteen year community organizing preceding my entry into the teaching profession, I worked very closely with organized labor and saw and experienced the huge positive difference its power made in people’s lives. Though I’m a member of my local teacher’s union, I haven’t been very active. However, I’m very aware of the benefits the union has won for my students and for me. No institution is perfect, but I would not want to live in a society where organized labor was not a vibrant force.
Here are my picks for The Best Websites For Learning About Labor Day (and are accessible to English Language Learners). They are not listed in any order of preference:
EL Civics has a Labor Day Lesson.
Glencoe has an online cloze (fill-in-the-gap) activity on the holiday.
The National Council On Economic Education has an excellent lesson on Labor Day, including a good visual representation on How Labor Got Its Day.
Read about the History of Labor Day.
The History Channel has a good a video about Labor Day and a photo slideshow.
The Library of Congress has online resources on The First Labor Day that can be adapted for English Language Learners.
Why Do We Celebrate Labor Day? comes from How Stuff Works.
Here’s another short history of Labor Day. This one is from PBS.
Meaning of Labor Day is a short video from CBS News.
President Obama talks about America’s workers at a Labor Day celebration is this ABC News video.
In Praise of the American Worker is a slideshow from LIFE.
CNN has an online quiz titled “Working in the U.S..”
Here’s a Labor Day infographic.
ESL Holiday Lessons has one on Labor Day.
Top 10 Things You Didn’t Know About Labor Day is a slideshow from TIME Magazine.
Please let me know if you have ideas for additional resources.
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.
August 14, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
It sounds bizarre, but Buildings That Look Like Food shows a series of photos of…buildings that look like food. I’m adding it to The Best Images Of Weird, Cool & Neat-Looking Buildings (& Ways To Design Your Own).
Thanks to The Interesting Pile blog for the tip.
August 14, 2009
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
Swine Flu: Fighting A Global Pandemic is an interactive from Agence France Presse. It’s an “Interactive graphic comparing swine flu to other global pandemics, AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis, in terms of the number of victims and the amount spent on prevention and treatment of the diseases.”
I’m adding it to The Best Sites For Learning About The Swine Flu Outbreak.
