Wise Decision Making

Salam..

oppss...singgah jap 

heheh. sungguh lama xupdate pape..I even forgot the password! lol.

Well, life's getting tougher..since dah abes study, there's so many things to consider..susah! sesah! sesak jugak kepala..no wonder they say being in school or being a kid is the bestest part! no need to worry and think of so many things..Talkin about life, i remember this one story of Adam and Eve..Most of us are familiar with the story of “original sin.”  Adam and Eve in the perfect Garden of Eden…the serpent-tempter shows up…Eve caves to the temptation and eats a piece of fruit…then, bammo!  Condemnation to eternal death!

Sounds a little harsh, doesn’t it? 

What would make Adam and Eve’s rule-breaking so egregious that it warranted capital punishment, not only for them, but for all their descendents?

so,..see how a certain decision made life a total lotsa different???

Scary? yes it is..

Task 3 : WWW Lesson Plan

TEXT & TASKS

WWW Lesson Plan :(10% + 5%)

Form : 2 Perdana

Level: Beginner

Time: Double-period class (90 minutes)

Theme: People

Topic: 'Capoeira Dance'.

Educational Emphases:

1. Learning How to Learn.

2.Thinking Skills

3. Knowledge Acquisition.

Aims: At the end of the class, students should be able to:
1. Find the information on the World Wide Web reagrding the topic; 'Capoeira Dance'.
2. Pronoun the word; 'Capoeira' in the right way.
3. Identify Verbs and Nouns based on the text.
4. Answer 7 open-ended questions.

Technical Requirements:
1. Fully functioning computers with internet access to the World Wide Web and the web browser.
2. Projector.

References:

1. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FtmM4iTALE

2. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/capoeira

Preparation:

1. Teacher makes sure that all the computers are switched on with an internet connection.
2. Teacher saved the prepared task sheets in every computer. (onto the desktop)

Procedures:

Pre-Activity Stage (10 minutes)

1. Students greet the teacher.
2. Each computers are shared in pairs.
3. Teacher makes sure students are ready and settled down before starting the lesson.
4. Teacher asks the students to go to the web browser on their computer, and search for youtube links. Teacher shows a video clip regarding the topic of the day from the youtube and provides the link of the video clip to the students . Address: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FtmM4iTALE

5. Teacher cultivates responds from the students, asking them on their schemata about the dance in the video clip.

6. Teacher tells the class that it is called 'Capoeira Dance'.

Activity 1 (10 minutes)

1. Teacher asks the students whether they know how to pronoun 'Capoeira', and asks few volunteers to give it a try.
2. Teacher introduces the web browser of Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary to find the right pronunciation as well as basic meaning of the any word.
3.Teacher asks students to go to this address: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/capoeira to get to know the right pronunciation of the word 'Capoeira'.
4. Students make themselves familiar and used to the application, teacher allows them to explore other links regarding the functions of the online dictionary/ websites provided.

Activity 2 (15 minutes)

1. Then, using the web browser, teacher asks students to find some information about the dance. A possible websites about the dance could be reached at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/capoeira
2. Teacher provides the students 10 minutes to do the internet searching and find the information.
3. Then, an open discussion will be held by which students are requested to present the information and knowledge they found with the class.
4. Based on the same topic, teacher incorporates the lesson on parts of speech; Noun and Verb. Students are required to go to this websites:

Noun : http://www.thefreedictionary.com/noun

Verb : http://www.answers.com/topic/verb

5.Teacher and students discuss on both parts of speech,students are required to promt any questions that they did not understand before the teacher asks them to proceed with the tasks. (have been placed on the desktop of each computers)
6. Students work in pairs, dragging all the right answers to be put under the right category. (15 minutes time allocated for this task)

7. Class discussion of the answers.

Activity 3 ( 15 minutes: Crossword Puzzles)

1. Then, based on the same text given students are assigned the second task on a Crossword Puzzles based on the topic and regarding the parts of speech they have just learnt.
2. The students are given clues of pictures and categories of part of speech (either noun or verb).
3. The task is to be done in pairs and can be derived from the desktop of each computers.
4. Discussion of the findings.

Activity 4 ( 15 minutes: Comprehension Questions).

1. Teacher instructs the students to open the third file on their desktop as their 3rd task.
2. The students are required to answer all the questions with the same partners in which the questions have been placed similarly onto the desktop by the teachers.
3. Teacher monitors the students with their work and provide guidance when necessary.
4. 15 minutes time allocation will be given to complete this task.
5. Then, whole class discussion on the task.

Conclusion ( 5 minutes)

1. Teacher asks few volunteers to conclude the lesson.

2. Teacher then wraps the whole session and tells the students that they can utilize the use of internet either to find information or find meaning (using online dictionary) in their learning.

Follow- up Activity ( 3 minutes)
1. For the follow- up activity, teacher assigned the students to find more information from the internet on what have been learnt from the class to be used in the next writing class. ( blog writing)
*(Teacher suggests some links where students can get more information apart from their own searching)
http://www.capoeira.com/com/news.php
http://www.capoeira.co.za/
http://www.capoeira.com.au/capoeirabrasil

HYPERLINK HYPERMEDIA

Capoeira (Portuguese pronunciation: is an Afro- Brazilian art form that combines elements of martial arts, music, and dance. It was created in Brazil by slaves brought from Africa, especially from present day Angola, sometime after the sixteenth century. It was developed in the region of Quilombo dos Palmares, located in the Brazilian state of Alagoas, which was the state of Pernambuco before desmembrement and has great influence on the Afro-Brazilian generations, with strong presence in the states of Bahia, Pernambuco and Rio de Jeneiro. Participants form a roda, or circle, and take turns either playing musical instruments (such as the Berimbau), singing, or ritually sparring in pairs in the center of the circle. The sparring is marked by fluid acrobatic play, feints, takedowns, and extensive use of leg sweeps, kicks and headbutts. Less frequently used techniques include elbow strikes, legs and body throws. Its origins and purpose are a matter of debate, with theories ranging from views of Capoeira as a uniquely Brazilian folk dance with improvised fighting movements to claims that it is a battle-ready fighting form directly descended from ancient African techniques. Historians are divided between those who believe it is a direct descendant of African fighting styles and those who believe it is a uniquely Brazilian dance form distilled from various African and Brazilian influences. One popular explanation holds that it is an African fighting style that was developed in Brazil, as expressed by a proponent named Salvano who said, "Capoeira cannot exist without black men but its birthplace is Brazil. Capoeira as it was taught to me is the warrior’s dance that was done between slaves that escaped their masters outside the cities. I was taught Capoeira in Rio de Janeiro by mestre Morcego who had come from Bahia, where he said Capoeira was played in the streets since he was little.

Task 2 (10%) ARTICLE REVIEW

Title: Collaborative Learning Skills Used in Weblog
Address:http://www.tell.is.ritsumei.ac.jp/callejonline/journal/11-2/kanniah_krish.html
ISSN 1442-438X
CALL-EJ Online
Vol. 11, No. 2, February 2010
Retrieved on Tuesday, 16th February 2010, 1045pm
Researchers:
1. Pramela Krish : a lecturer with the School of Language Studies and Linguistics, Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia.
2. Anuratha Kanniah : a lecturer teaching English as foreign language to international students at University College of Innovation and Technology, Malaysia.
Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia
pramela@ukm.my


I. Summary of the Article

The aim of this study was to find out the learners’ collaborative learning skills and sub skills that enhance interaction in the CSCL context. Basically, collaborative learning is the combination of two or more learners working together in a learning environment. Roberts (2004) has defined collaborative learning as the interdependence of the individuals as they share ideas and reach a conclusion or product. Computer Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL) is an educational learning setting that applies the idea of group- based learning with the communication technology to support learning. It allows learners to work in a group independently as in the sense that they are both the recipient and the sender of knowledge. The data gathering and analysis were guided by qualitative theory techniques. The researcher listened to the participants and constructs a picture based on their ideas. (Creswell, 1994) There were fundamentally two research questions addressed in this study. The first research questions was basically to identify the preferred collaborative learning skills and subskills by calculating the frequency of the number of attributes representing the skills and subskills in each weblog posting. Then, the second research question seeks to understand the process that takes place in a real academic setting. The nature of this study is to investigate deep understanding of group actions and interactions that involves an evitable interpretation of meanings based on the theoretical perspectives. All the respondents possess a basic degree. A total of 11 postgraduate are students pursuing Masters Degree (from literature based course) participated in this research. The participants were given a literary text (The White Heron, a short story) to analyze via a weblog. All the students in the course who participated in the weblog are taken as the sample for the research. There were 5 procedures stages conducted in this study; Stage 1: collecting data from the weblog, Stage 2: data reduction stage, Stage 3: coding phase, Stage 4: compressing the data collected, and Stage 5: making logical assumptions by correlating the contents (data).
The findings of this study were analyzed in two sections. The first section identifies on the skills and subskills used by the participants based on the Collaborative Learning Skills Taxonomy. There were 3 main skills identified; the active learning, conversation and creative conflict; by which the active learning skill represents 59.82% of the overall interaction as compared to the others. There were 3 subskills each identified under the skills in the CSCL Taxonomy. The active learning conforms to the subskills of informing, requesting and motivating, conversation- acknowledgement, task and maintenance, while creative conflict revolves around arguing and mediating skills. The participants demonstrated high preferences in providing information as they actively exchange ideas with each other and fewer requests to their peers as the form of request made in interaction is unlike the typical way of students requesting information. For the motivate subskill, there were only two students used this attribute out of 39 attributes, while the maintenance subskill which functions to request confirmation in order to validate information constitutes only 12 attributes. Furthermore, the findings also shown that the creative conflict skill that encompasses Mediate and Argue subskills delineates no attributes for Mediate subskill and 64 attributes for Argue subskill.

II. Personal Reactions to the Study

Honestly, this study is interesting. It attracted me to sit and read more about it because the term CSCL itself is something that I have been doing so far in this course. Piaget (1977) explained that individual thought is a necessary condition in the creation of constructive learning. What a person thinks over the same matter can be deliberated and brought in to be discussed with other and this is where the magical of sharing and extending the knowledge slips in. The ideas of learners are negotiated and develop virtually through active discussion and conversation.

I believe that this research is well conducted due to the fact that the researchers managed to bring deeper understanding on how the skills and subskills in the Collaborative Learning Conversation placed their impacts among the learners especially in the context of social and cognitive constructions when it is implemented in the weblog.
I believe that the findings are also had been well-presented by the researchers when they are located using both explanation and figures (or structures). For example, the coded circles in explains the interaction patterns among the participants in the subgroup.

Despite that it is a good study of the skills and subskills in the CSCL among the participants, perhaps the researcher could also focus on the effectiveness of weblogs in an online environment with a particular focus on technology students.

These days, students are interacting more via yahoo Messenger, Myspace, Facebook, Skype and other social networks to get across their ideas, share information, discuss over things and others. Blogging is a user- friendly way that it has become one of the medium in which virtual educational setting applies the collaborative learning among the students. However, in the teaching and learning of ESL in the Malaysian context, the implications of CSCL can not really be traced especially among the school students. No doubt that independent collaborative learning exists among the students, but that can only be seen in chunks and not in the whole piece. Only the urban areas or in the boarding schools. Personally, I doubt that students coming from the rural school, (sometimes, only God knows whereJ ) do blogging due to the fact that there is no internet connection even though the schools are equipped with sophisticated gadgets in the lab with the intention to support the learning activity. How can we expect the students to interact and discuss ideas or issues among them virtually if the networks are not provided? But, with the missions of having more SBT (Sekolah Berprestasi Tinggi ) towards 2012, hopefully the Ministry could provide the internet connection to the schools systematically so that the CSCL could be implemented among the students. I believe that this study could be an eye-opener to the other researchers or policy makers to bring about the CSCL to the school students, not only among the higher learning institutions like university students.
(1011 words)

Task 1: Website Evaluation

Address: http://www.eslcafe.com/

1. What does the application attempt to “teach”?

Upon browsing websites after another, I finally decided to evaluate http://www.eslcafe.com for my website evaluation’s task. Before exploring further on this website and what it has got to offer everyone in the language learning context, I think its better and appropriate for me to brief you on who is the moderator and the basic specialties this website has got to offer! Dave’s ESL Café is moderated and maintained by the one and only Dave Sperling. He creates this website with the idea that it could be the internet’s meeting place for ESL (English as a Second Language) and EFL (English as a Foreign Language) teachers and students from all over the globe.

Now, let us first have a look at all the special features that this websites brings out to the people. This website is primarily consisted of 5 different sections; the home, jobs, stuffs for teachers, stuffs for students, and stuffs for everyone. From learning or improving English language for quite illiterate user/ speaker to the advanced one, or even to the graduates students who is seeking for job recruitment, (especially in Korea or other International Job Board), this website covers it all! The information on teaching English abroad with TESOL / TESL/ TEFL Certification can be read under the job section. The Oxford seminars have provided students with the most professional, recognized, and certification courses available.

This website grabs my attention in a sense that the stuffs for teachers provided- teacher discussion forums benefits this group very much. Why do I think so? Well, it aids to improve their teaching through online shared/ joint sharing. This is more likely to be an interactive virtual discussion among teachers where they share what works best for their students in the class, what does not work, what are other easier/ simple ideas to improve the language learning among students. Mutual exchanges of views on the teaching techniques open to new learning opportunities and skills that can later be applied in the classroom. For example, Trebor, a teacher who joined the website in December 2004 shares a list of websites activities & ESL activities games sites in assistance to others a lot! ( www.english-to-go.com , www.english-at-home.com, www.englishzone.com, and others.)

This application is actually focusing more on reading, speaking and listening skills while does not focus on the writing skills. The learners acquire the knowledge by exploring and reading the notes given for the topics, uttered the correct words by listening to the Pronunciation Power application.

Another fascination I have discovered about this website is that, despite of its greatest student discussions forums, the topics provided by the website are also broad. The wide range of activity allows freedom and flexibility in learning grammar, for example. A boring, dull style of learning English language in the classroom can really be switched off with the varieties grammar lesson provided here. Through idioms, phrasal verbs, pronunciation power, more than 100 quizzes, slang and not forgetting the students discussions forums guarantee absolute improvements in student’s language proficiency. What’s more, the topics provided as in History, People, Grammar, Geography and others could broaden the student’s general knowledge that they are not aware of, not particularly restricting their knowledge on the English language learning per se.

Indirectly, this website is teaching the students to be self-driven about their learning. The students manage their time and use the application provided independently without being force to do so. (In class, frequently teachers ask you to fulfill the box in a piece of paper, and you dragged yourself to do it, right?) Students are more powerful and in control of their own learning strategies at this pace. The answers are strictly provided, and if they answer wrongly, the students are informed straight away rather than waiting the teacher’s feedback for at least 2-3 days after.


2. What sorts of things is the application used expected to do with regards to the learning content?

I believe that before looking at the expected things to do with regards to any learning content, the students/ users need to have very clear goals to be attained at the end of the day. Let say, for example, if the users want to learn on adjectives clause, they need to click the links on grammar lessons’ page. Then, they will have to proceed with the exercises provided by the website. As this application provides practices and questions through flash quizzes, the students need to read thoroughly the questions and directions given. This is when their reading skills is adhered to.

3. What sorts of computer skills is the application users expected to have in order to operate /access/use the application?

Well, to operate the application in this website, the users must at least posses the basic computer skills. I mean both computer hardware and software knowledge. In this application the computer hardware knowledge would be, switching on/ off the computer, how to navigate a mouse, and others. It is not a surprised that even though we are living in the world of ICT, there is still some learners who does not know these skills.

In order to operate the application of quizzes, the learners/ users need to have the basic knowledge of typing. When they know how to type the word, they will be able to key in their answers. Then, after answering all the questions, they have to press the submit button, and the answers will be automatically checked in seconds. What’s more, the learners will need to know how to use online quiz generator if they want to submit their own quizzes to share with other users. The students will be having fun doing so as they get immediate feedback and it is so practical to be done.

Furthermore, to improve the learning and speaking skills, the users need to have the computer software knowledge of downloading software. For this website, the learners will have to install the FLV player or Adobe Shockwave Player to enable them to use interactive demos such as 8 in 1 English Dictionary Demo and other pronunciation demos.

On the other hand, if the users are teachers who have it in mind to bring the materials available in this website to the school, they need to possess the printing skills so that they can print the activities from the html links.
As in conclusion, the basic computer skills are required by this application in order to operate it. It is not a big matter whether the user is not a ‘computer geek’ or he or she is someone illiterate. The application is very easy, simple and fun to be done!

4. While you are “playing”/ “accessing”/ “assessing” the application, does it remind you of anything you do in a classroom, or with a teacher, or with fellow classmate, or in self- study?

Quite a lot, I guess! While assessing this website, it brings me back to those bittersweet teaching-learning processes during my previous semester. Teaching practicum! During the practicum, I managed to come up with crosswords and ‘wonder-word’ game to introduce my students with new or unfamiliar terms. There was one of my mentor, Pn. Uthaya Mary who introduced me one a website, (sorry, I tried hard to remember the address, by I can’t. )

While “accessing” the application, I found out that the flash quizzes had just reminded me of the enjoyable quizzes I always had during my leisure time on friendster and facebook application. They are very easy to handle, and time effective! It moves us from one question to another and thus making it very practical to be done.


5. Can you pinpoint some theories of language learning and/ or teaching underlying the application?

First and foremost, it is obvious that this website underlies the ‘Silent Way’ theory as proposed by Richards and Rodgers (1986: 99) The application is fully utilized when the users discovers or creates rather than remembers and repeats what is to be learned. In this sense, the learners discover for themselves various facts and principles. Via this way, the students constructed conceptual hierarchies of their own that were a product of the time and effort they have invested. Injecting a healthy dose of discovery learning can somehow lead students to understand more of the subject matter where they work things out on their own and thus surely made them understand and remember better what has been discovered.

Furthermore, I believe this website is closely related with ‘The Audiolingual Method’ of language learning especially in the speaking and listening page. For the listening and speaking skills, great emphasize is attached to pronunciation in which it is a great effort to get students to produce error-free utterances. Even though there is little or no grammatical explanation given, it is taught inductively rather than deductive explanation.
In this application, the Pronunciation Power teachers learners to use the 52 sounds necessary to say all 540 000 English words. The learners also can choose their native language for easier comprehension of the pronunciation.

6. How well is the constructivist theory of learning applied to the chosen website (s)?

Obviously, the constructivist theory of learning applied to this website is the theory of Zone of Proximal Development or often abbreviated as ZPD. It is originally developed by Lev Vygotsky, explaining the difference between what a learner can do without help and what she can do with help. The ideas of scaffolding could be made clear here when the learners are given assistance by peers, teachers or guardians, hints provided regarding the learning contents or even the process of applying the contents. For example, if the learners are not clear with a certain grammar concept, the examples are set to make it possible to understand for the students. Furthermore, if the instructions are too complicated for them, teachers can facilitate their learning at any time.

This website does encourage independent learning. But it does not mean that independent learners do not have to be observed and monitored. Teachers or parents can go through the flash quizzes done by the learners to ensure that the input is really worth exploring for.

The constructivism does also emphasize on learning through mistakes. In this sense, if the learners did not produce correct answers, they could likely re-do the quizzes and do more and more exercises so that they could really grasp the input from this website.

7. In 1980s and early 1990s, there was a major debate on ‘whether the computer was ‘master’ of or ‘slave’ to the learning process (Higgins and Johns, 1984). In relation to your evaluation- was the computer a replacement for teachers, or merely an obedient servant to students?

Honestly, I would say that computer is neither a ‘master’ nor a ‘slave’ to the learning process. Both words do not suit the functions and impacts the computer placed in the learning process if the users know how to utilize its advantages effectively.
For me, having a computer as assistant to the learning process is great. Computer or the internet is the place where we can get all sorts of knowledge, references, language content and exercises. The contents are just the same. What makes a difference is the process of getting information.

Tracing back on my practicum day in school, I would really thank the computer for all the applications offered due to the fact that it makes my teaching contents and process lively and well presented. I used the computer in my class very often via presentations and discussions. The students even made their own PowerPoint slides and video clips based on what have been learnt in the class because they possess both the computer hardware and software knowledge. However, I never let my students depend solely on the computer. The computer is just used to trigger their interest on the subject matter and to aid them, but still I would guide and facilitate the students in the learning process. I would make sure that I will be around the students in the computer lab rather than letting them interacting with the computer alone because the tendency that students will resort to facebooking or myspacing very huge!

Despite having computer to assist me producing good lesson plans, I also utilize other authentic materials such as textbook, magazines, news papers and others. The computer does not take over the entire teacher’s works in preparing good lesson plans for the students. Thus, the idea of the computer is a replacement for teachers or merely an obedient servant to students should not have appeared wholly. The computer cannot do everything a learner wishes, what he or she wants to achieve at the end of the lesson even though it aids a lot. Therefore, both teachers and students should not take advantage and depend solely on the magical computer can do.

8. Would you like to use the application yourself in your future work?
Yes? Give reasons:
No? Give reasons:

Certainly yes! I would exploit this application in my future work. Even though the website does not put the focus solely on the stuffs for students, it may also open new doors to other people in the educational field. Focusing on the stuffs for students, I am really impressed by the wide range of quizzes applied here. The links are very easy to be located as there are different topics covered. Plus, the wide ranging of topics under the quizzes will indirectly enlarge the student’s worldview and cultures as this website can be assessed by users all over the world. When teachers and students from different places share their views and ideas, this actually benefited everyone to try new strategies to learn/ teach/ improve their language proficiency to a higher level.

Personally, I love the website for its practicality. The links from one page to another is very easy to handle. Furthermore, the wide ranging topics such as History, Geography, Science and others indirectly acknowledge the learners not only with the contents for English language. The explanation given for the grammar, idioms, slang lessons are very clear, making it easier for the learners to comprehend the knowledge.

Not forgetting, kudos to Dave and his team for having the Podcasts for this application. Teachers, students or even parents can just download the lessons via videos and this does not require a complicated and fussy effort.


9. Suggestions/ Recommendations:

I believe that, there is always a door for improvement in anything. The same thing goes with this website. Despite its advantages for the teachers, students and everyone, it also has some points to be amended for the betterment of all its users. From my evaluation, this website could be quite frustrating for the learners who belong to different levels of English language proficiency. There are learners who are advanced, intermediate and beginner. However, the stuffs for students do not cater or specify the level of proficiency in the quizzes or even the explanations for the wide ranging topics. At first, for the grammar lesson, I thought the Adjective Clause #1 is meant for the beginner learners while the Adjective Clause #13 is meant for the advanced learners. To my surprised, they are not! I would suggest that there must be different levels of quizzes/ explanation/ exercises so that the benefits would cater all users. Neither the advanced learners would not feel frustrated and boring if they find the quizzes or exercises too easy and simple nor the beginner learners would not find it too challenging or intimidated if they questions are too difficult.

In my observation and exploration of this application, I found out that it does not cover all the four language skills- reading, listening, speaking and writing as a whole. The emphasized is put more on the reading and the listening part, neglecting the other two.

Despite that this application is practical in use; it does not tackle the idea of authenticity. The moderator should incorporate colors and pictures perhaps rather than just words for the grammar lessons. Maybe, if adult learners like me could stay awake with this application for 30 minutes, it never goes the same as with the young learners. A seemingly dull and boring page will quickly turn off their attention as children normally do have very short attention span especially over educational things.

I would suggest that the complementary/ congratulatory salutations are implied for all the flash quizzes. No doubt that the learners will be attended with either correct or incorrect results of their answers once they are done with the questions, but in natures, human just love rewards! Perhaps the words such as ‘Good’, ‘Well done’, ‘Great Job’ for the correct answers or even ‘Try Again’ could boost the student’s motivation to do more and more exercises. B.F Skinner and other researchers have clearly demonstrated the strength of rewards in both animal and human behavior. (Brown, 2001). So, why neglect the rewards here?

Hopefully, my suggestions/ recommendations here will help to cater the application for everyone in the English language learning context.

In Class Task 3.: Blog Entry:.

1. Why do you think evaluation of CALL websites, materials, etc important?

Honestly, I truly believe that the importance of having to evaluate any websites especially CALL webwites for the learning context,is crucially in need due to some factors. To ensure the quality of explicit contents/information/ knowledge is fully acquired or sent to the learner, the aspects of reliability, practicality, authenticity must be considered.
First of all, the reliability should be measured in a sense that the websites offers truthful contents from a wide range of reliable sources with the subject matter is seen as the central focus with lots of exercises in it. For an instance, if the websites is intended to give grammatical exercises on tenses, the right tense must be attended thoroughly by the moderator in charge of the websites.
Second of all, its important to evaluate CALL websites to ensure whether the site is practical to be utilized/ understood and on the learner’s part individually. The exercises offered must fit the learner’s needs and their level of proficiency. Neither in the category of beginner intermediate nor advanced learners. The learners would have the chance to choose which exercises to get it done on their own. If the exercises are too simple or easy, the students can move forward for the challenging one while if its too difficult, they can turn down to the intermediate them, thus making them not frustrated with the exercises.
Last but not least, the authenticity factor. I always believe that the learning process itself should be appealing, and grasp the student’s interest in regard of which levels of proficiency they belong to. The websites and its contents should lead them to think creatively, opens new opportunity to study on their own pace to produce the best impacts and not to become a frustrating one. It should trigger or stimulate the student’s mind at all cost. How the website is looked authentic to the learner? By its appearance, maybe. The colors, the animation plays their vital role too to boost the student’s motivation to learn and explore the language learning on the own sweet time and space rather than doing the traditional sheet of paper.
All in all, the evaluation of CALL websites, materials etc important so that the students could learn and produce the best impacts on their language learning. =)



2. How do you think Hot Potatoes JCloze may help your students learn English? Since the last semester, I have downloaded the Hot Potatoes applications from the internet. Why? Because my seniors asked me to do that as I will be using it in my final semester and another one, it’s free. Hehe. Nothing is free nowadays, right? *I can see you nod your head.Agreed,hehe*However, due to my own ignorance attitude in which I regret now,… I didn’t explore the benefits of this software. What a waste..

Well, shifting from a dull piece of paper to another medium which is interesting to both students and teachers is much fun, isn’t it? That is why I think Hot Potatoes JCloze may help my students to learn English faster and better. No doubt about that.
I believe that teacher knows best on what their students are capable and incapable of in the language learning process. Thus, the interactive short answer exercises application that is free can be fully utilized by the teacher. Creating the exercises based on their student’s needs, level of proficiency, interest and others could really assist to heighten the students’ interest to learn the language stress free. Teachers can use their own creativity by making the exercises very appealing to the students’ senses neither through the colors background, the pictures, the wording, the comments and others in it.
Besides the students having fun dragging and dropping the answers, it’s amazing knowing that this authoring tool is a perfect choice for the students as in the students would have fast feedback on the exercises done with just a click, rather than the teacher have to mark all the papers. Furthermore, this way would also increase the students motivation to do the exercise as in, when the students did scored on the questions, the comments they’ve got- ‘Good’, ‘Great’,’ Well done’, etc will make them eager t do more exercises while if they didn’t do right, the words such as ‘Try again’ will not make them very intimidated.

In conclusion, Hot Potatoes did really help students learn English more alive, fun and meaningful and all the above words are my own humble thoughts on why teachers should utilized the profits of using Hot Potatoes JCloze in their class.

WEEK 2 Tasks :)

Assalamualaikum..Hola,Ni hao, Namaste,Good Day,.

For this week's class,we've learnt on the basic things about CALL.How and when CALL is made popular since 1960s..the definition of CALL, the applications-authoring packages and others.From the lectures, I just found out that internet is started to spread with its function in Malaysia probably around 1996. Ha Ha Ha! I just knew it,..what a big shame,right?and one more thing, tracing back yearsteryears, a computer was as big a building!hehe.. Thanks to Prof. Izaham for letting me know about that..=)

Well, below are the works I've done for this week's lectures. Pls comments for suggestions/recommendations, and further improvements.hehe ;p