ePals - Collaborative Classrooms

Classrooms around the world can be collaborate easier thanks to ePals, a website devoted to learning through global collaboration. This website has eight projects already designed to promote cross-cultural learning through an exploration of weather, global warming, or habits. What I like most about these projects are the fact that each one is linked to national standards so that I can assure that my students are meeting certain objectives. I would probably use these projects in my ESL classroom because they allow students to explore not only U.S. customs but also their own native traditions and customs as well as other customs and traditions across the globe. The topics for these projects are very relevant to the lives and cultures of my ESL students. There is so much knowledge to be shared when using these projects with classrooms in other parts of the globe.

ePals also offers a forum where teachers can find other classrooms across the globe to work together on a lesson plan of their own design. I really liked reading about different teachers trying to find other classrooms to connect with on a similar topic, such as The Great Gatbsy or current events in the news. This offers me the ability to find other teachers to work with if I ever have a great project that I want to share with the another classroom. I see myself using these forums to connect with teachers from across the globe to share ideas and get feedback.
I also like the fact that this forum also has sub-forums for technology, special education, and other resources. Special education is an area that I have already noticed that my pedagogical knowledge is lacking; therefore, this forum can be very valuable to me as a teacher.

A great synchronous tool to use while completing an ePals project with another classroom would be Skype. Skype provides another manner of communication for both teachers and students. Email is the method of communication while using ePals but students and classrooms can also be connected virtually through this program. Teachers can use Skype to work on the project together in real time, instead of waiting for emails. Skype allows students to see the other students that they are working with and communicate face-to-face. Therefore, when using Skype in my ESL classroom, my students will be using English in authentic and meaningful ways.

Videos in the Classroom

I'm sure most of us have heard of YouTube, the online collection of videos. How many of us have heard of TeacherTube, the online collection of educational and instructional videos for the classroom? While browsing this site, I found a cooperative learning strategy for the language classroom called Inside and Outside Circles. "In this video, the teacher uses this learning strategy to review vocabulary. He gives index cards with a vocabulary word related to the metric systrem on it to the students in the inside circle, and the students on the outside have to figure out it's corresponding vocabulary word in the American measurement system. The students on the outside rotate around the inside circle and then they switch circles so that all students can equally participate in the activity.

This activity promotes interaction and communicaion in the target language. This activity could not only be used for vocabulary development, but also for key figures or concepts in a thematic unit. For example, a unit on the Civil War could contain the important battles, people, and concepts. Not only does this review the content material, but it also build communicative competence. Students have to use the language in order to be successful.

Bookr - create a book from pictures

My cooperating teacher has suggested that I plan some activities that revolve around holidays and customs for my English language learners. The next major holiday is Thanksgiving so I used Bookr to make a short virtual book about Thanksgiving.

This book would serve as an introduction to the holiday and also a way to preview the key vocabulary, such as gratitude, thankful, cornucopia, Pilgrim, Native American, and all the food relating to the holiday meal. I would use this book in whole class instruction first, going over the new words, and then let students explore the book either individually or in small groups/partners.

Some of my students have just arrived to the U.S. so this would be their first experience with Thanksgiving, others have been living here for four or more years. This book would be a good way to capitalize on the knowledge that students already know about the holiday by letting them explain and describe how they celebrate the holiday. After Thanksgiving, I could have my students make a book, using Bookr, that narrates how they celebrated that holiday.

Flickr - encourage creativity

Flickr is not just a website for the storage of photos online. Flickr is a wonderful web tool for teachers to locate pictures for instructional purposes. In the ESL classroom, visual aides play a large role in building students' comprehension and activating background knowledge. Through the search engine, teachers can browse pictures that other people have taken and decided to share pubically. Pictures that are licensed through Creative Commons can be used by teachers (and students) without being in violation of copyright.

Through the use of different perspectives and topics, a slide show of various pictures on a single topic can encourage creative thinking, which can be displayed orally or in writing. A slide show of pictures related to the season of fall can provoke different thoughts and ideas in each student.

Flickr is also applicable student use. As a class, students can take pictures related to a topic that they are learning about and create a visual representation of their knowledge as a whole. Similarly, students can also search for their own pictures to be include in various online projects.