Week 4: Tough but productive week

This week is really tough but very challenging and amazingly advantageous. The main topic for this week is using technology to enhance reading, writing and vocabulary skills. We did two main things: reading articles about using technology to enhance reading, writing and vacabulary skills and writing a technology-enhanced l
lesson plan.

I read some articles on the related topic.  Krajka’s article ‘Using the Internet in ESL Writing Instruction' shows that  web is the invaluable source of information, both for teachers and the learners. It informs that 'the advent of the internet and the wide spread of technology create new opportunities for language learning'. Meanwhile Andrea's article  ‘Using Technology to Assist in Vocabulary Acquisition and Reading Comprehension   describes several possibilities to enhance vocabulary acquisition and reading comprehension with the help of technology. This can be used for students of different levels of English background. I will use for my students as well.

I also checked several multi-skills websites that would work for my class but i liked http://www.manythings.org/ at he most as it contains various skills with very interesting materials and has easy-to-follow instructions. Http://www.microsoft.com/education/en-us/teachers/plans/pages/index.aspx is very informative web-skills. It provides daily learning targets for common core state standards, including instructional notes, activity ideas, assessment ideas as well as links to open educational resources aligned to the standards. However, it might be problematic for some who do not yet use Word 2013 as it operates from within Word 2013. I had added my favorite link to RWG links webskills fall 2013 and my delicious.com. And writing an ABCD objective that I could create to go with the web-skills I used is very challenging. The practice helps me more familiar with the ABCD method.

This week   is invaluable as  we are asked to write a  lesson plan with technology . Tips and advice from Sean’s webskills team about “How to Write A Technology Enhanced Lesson Plan" (https://sites.google.com/site/webskillsuo/lesson-plan) and Margo Dill’s article “How to Write an Integrated Lesson Plan”
(http://www.ehow.com/how_2324320_write-integrated-lesson-plan.html) are very informative and useful as it provides a comprehensive information and tips on writing an integrated lesson plan. Using the template prepared by Deborah Healey , from Oregon University, I make a lesson with technology. What is interesting is that making the lesson plan on https://docs.google.com. Here,  the lesson plan can be shared with other people who can give their feedback as “comments”. I was so happy when I finished writing my lesson plan and shared it in the link. You can leave your comment on my lesson plan by checking https://docs.google.com/document/d/1mhqma7ltavik7y8jbtjvq2sxtzzoltrhxk0-lysnvos/edit?usp=sharing.