Archive for How to…
There are a number of ways you can bring your ESL, EFL, ESOL lesson into the real world of native English speakers. One way is by using social media as content.
What do I mean by content?
Content is the actual linguistic material that we present to our students. Many language institutes use language textbooks that present the target language in a systemic manner. However, it could be that these texts do not incorporate examples from the internet, i.e., new media or social media. So when possible it is a good idea to bring in social media to supplement the textbook.
(It is important for non-native ESL/EFL/ESOL teachers to be aware of the fact that a high percentage of native English speakers use the internet and social media daily in their lives – and this use also has significant influence in their use of language – therefore, the need to expose our students to this use of English by mother tongue English users.)
In choosing real content from the internet, including that of social media, in goes without saying that we need to be aware of the ESL/EFL level of linguisitic development that our students have obtained – and then s-t-r-e-t-c-h them a bit to the next level in each lesson.
10 Steps to Using Social Media or New Media in an ESL/EFL lesson
Here are 10 steps that will help us in using social media, such as blogs, podcast, websites, videos, etc. in our lessons:
- We need to go over the internet material first.
- We need to choose topics that are of interest, professionally or personally, to our students.
- We need to check the material we have chosen for level of grammar, new lexical items that our students could have difficult with, e.g., phrasal verbs, idiomatic and/or colloquial expressions, puns, etc.
- We need to look at what background information we may need to provide, such as explaining particular cultural modes of behaviour, history, etc.
- If it’s an audio or video we have selected, in addition to the above, we need to assess the speaker’s speed, clarity of pronunciation, as well as clarity in the audio reproduction. (What might seem like clear audio to native speakers can be full of distracting noise for ESL/EFL/ESOL learners.)
- We need to organize our ESL/EFL lesson plan so that we have an introduction that prepares the student for the topic and linguistic input they will receive and connect it to their own work or lives so that it is meaningful for them.
- We need to prepare them for the new lexical and/or grammatical input with pertinent exercises.
- We need to monitor input, adjusting the material depending on the students’ reaction as they read, listen and/or view.
- We need to follow up the use of social media with exercises that will help them apply the language that they have learned to to their own situation.
- We need to incorporate the new lexical and grammatical material in the following lessons to help the students remember it and use it.
Using social media or new media in the ESL/EFL classroom makes the lesson more real and interesting for students, but it will only help their progress in learning English if we take the necessary time to prepare its use in our lesson plans.
How do you use social media in your classroom or lives? Post a comment and let me know. Or if you are not an ESL/EFL/ESOL teacher but you produce material on the internet – how can you make your material more ESL/EFL/ESOL-friendly?
ESL/EFL/ESOL Social Media Learning Tool: How to Set Up E-Notebooks
Posted by: Eileen | Comments (22)Learning ESL/EFL/ESOL with an E-Notebook helps students actually work with new media. While younger students take to the social media like bees to a flower, older people in the business and professional world can seem a bit mystified by all and overwhelmed by social media.
As I mentioned in an earlier post, E-Notebooks are a a joint electronic website where students can keep and monitor their English language learning efforts: written work, as well as audio and video recordings.
So how can you go about creating these e-notebooks?
It is not that difficult a process. This is how I did it. There are various other possibilities as well which we will discuss in later posts.
- I purchased a domain name.
- I got a web hosting provider.
- I installed the free WordPress.org onto my main site.
- I created a sub-domain for each student and installed the free WordPress.org onto each sub-domain.
The e-notebook is basically a WordPress.org blogging platform. I chose WordPress.org because I am familiar with the platform, and it gives me and my students the control that we need to use it as a learning tool.
Some of the strengths in WordPress.org that I found particular useful for creating e-notebooks are:
- it has a WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) word processor;
- it has both blog and static pages (which are website-style pages);
- it can be adapted and expanded with widgets as and if needed;
- each student can decide if they want to publish, password protect or keep private for themselves and their teacher whatever they post in their e-notebook. I found that giving students the power to keep their language learning efforts private gave many a sense of ease with this new form of communication.
In setting up their sites, I asked each student to focus on something they enjoyed talking and writing about: hobby, interest, passion. Then, I walked each student through the basic steps of setting up their site, answering any questions or concerns as we went along: username, passwords, personalizing their site with a free WP theme, giving it their own title and tag line, and writing a post.
Most chose to keep their first posts private, which was fine. I fully respect my students’ feelings and needs. This is, after all, an ESOL language course, not a website/blog creation course. However, I found that before the next class a number of students had gone home, signed into their dashboard, explored the site, played around with the name of their site, categories and tags; some even chose a different theme. I saw this as a good sign as they were becoming comfortable with this new medium on their own turf.
A few brave souls decided to publish their posts for the world to see. I asked these students if they would mind if I showed their sites and posts to the other students and if these could write comments. All happily agreed – after all, they had made their posts public because they wanted others to read what they wrote.
As students have begun commenting on these public student e-notebook/websites, as the original writers have begun replying to their fellow students’ comments – I have seen a “green light” go on. They are getting it: these English language learners are experiencing what social media is all about – sharing ideas, stating opinions, creating relationships – and they are doing it in their target language!
As I mentioned above, this is one method to create an e-notebook. Can you think of others? What would fit with your students’ needs and the equipment you have available?
If you are interested, here is another example of a student’s e-notebook.
Enjoy using social media in ESL/EFL/ESOL lessons,
Eileen
“Tweeting?”, I asked.
“Yes! Yes!” Patrizia* responded. “She showed me how she has to type in… Oh, what is it? a 100 letters? Oh, I don’t remember, … and then the other person sends back a message… just like with the sms – only now she’s chatting with a girl in England! “
Patrizia, one of my business English clients, was keen to know about Twitter. Her 15 year-old daughter, who is studying English in an Italian school, was using it to “tweet” with others - in English!
Patrizia was delighted that her daughter felt confident enough in English to try to carry on a conversation with a native English speaker. Now Patrizia wanted to learn how to use social media, too.
The personal and professional world we live in is increasingly using the social media to network with people around the world. Nevertheless, some of my students were familiar with these new media, many had only heard of them, and most did not use them.
However, their children were using them – and these parents wanted to know more: they wanted to know what their children were getting into. Using social media became a hot topic for discussion. But to fully understand social media and to use the new CMC (computer-media-communications) lingo, there is nothing like actually rolling up your sleeves and getting your hands dirty….
So, I suggested that it might be a good exercise to use these new media as tools in learning English. For example, why not create a blog which we could use for their writing exercises? This idea went down like a cold shower on a cold morning.
My clients/students’ coolness towards these new means reflected a number of causes: some felt that their English language skills weren’t adequate enough to write comments on other people’s blog, let alone write a post themselves. Others had heard of local negative news coverage of Facebook which left them feeling very leery of getting involved. For others, Twitter was an unknown entity and its 140 character count too limiting for their vocabulary and grammar capabilities. A few had commented a few times on blogs in their own language but had been ignored by the blog writer and other readers. In general, they felt ill-at-ease with these new media and how to communicate with them.
So I came up with the idea of “E-notebooks” for each student.
An “E-notebook” is a joint electronic website where students can keep and monitor their English language learning efforts: written work, as well as audio and video recordings. It is a joint electronic website because both I, as their instructor, and they, as the learners, have full access to their individual sites. It is a site that they can access either in class or from their own computers.
Here is an “E-notebook” from one of my Giovanni students. He has given me permission to show it to you. Take a look at it. It is a tool where teacher and student can note areas to work on, as well as improvements. How do you think he handled his qualms about writing a post?
In another post, I’ll describe to you how I set up the E-notebooks for each student and how we use them in an ESL/EFL/ESOL lesson plan.
But for now: How do you feel about using social media, such as blogs, Facebook, Twitter, My Space, etc.? Do you think that it is important for parents to be familiar with exactly how the new social media function in order to be aware of what their children could be getting involved with? If you use social media, which ones do you use and how has they enriched your life?
Till the next post, enjoy using social media in ESL/EFL/ESOL lessons,
Eileen
*not her real name
Ebooks and ESL/EFL/ESOL – what do they have in common? A lot!
One of the wonders of the internet and social media is the amount of useful information that you come in contact with. From one site, I found this wonderful link on writing an ebook by Jonathan Kranz. He calls his book, “The eBook eBook: How to Turn Your Expertise Into Magnetic Marketing Material”. Jonathan is the principal of Kranz Communications and the author of “Writing Copy for Dummies”.
Even more interesting is the fact that Jonathan has published his “Ebook Ebook” under the Creative Commons License and gives away free downloads.
“Ebook Ebook…” covers such topics as:
- What Will You Write About?
- Why You Need Conflict and How To Create It
- Organizing Your eBook Piece by Piece
- Getting the Word Out: A few thoughts
on promoting your ebook - 10 Practical Tips for Successful eBooks
- Your eBook Checklist
His writing style is crisp and clear with nuggets of humor woven in.
So what do writing ebooks have to do with ESOL/EFL/ESL teaching?
I see ebooks as a great tool for a teacher to write for her/his students and as a possible course long project for students, naturally about topic areas they know and keeping in mind their language level.
Take a look at Kranz’s Ebook Ebook and let me know what you think. How can you use ebook writing in your ESOL course? Write your thoughts and comments in the box below.
You may download his ebook about ebooks (for free and without registration) from this link: The eBook eBook: How to Turn Your Expertise Into Magnetic Marketing Material.
