Week 4: Skill-building Websites for Reading and Writing and Technology-Enhanced Lesson Plans

My reflection on this fourth week, more than a job, is a pleasure. Although my jobs absorb me a lot and I generally have to post my assignments during the last days of the week, I try to do my best. I feel more than happy in this course. Undoubtedly, our instructor, Courtney, has been an excellent guide during the week sessions. On the other hand, my classmates are quite smart and improve week by week in their works. Definitively, I am learning from all of them and that satisfies me a lot.  This week, our job concentrated on three main topics: reading, writing and vocabulary skills; technology enhanced lesson plans and problematic issue related with technology.

The first of the class topics, reading, writing and vocabulary skills; implied reading specialized material on these skills and sub-skill. “Using Technology to Assist in Vocabulary Acquisition and Reading Comprehension”(http://iteslj.org/Articles/Constantinescu-Vocabulary.html) by A. Constantinescu was the first article that I read. It remarks the importance of integrating technology into the language classroom. Furthermore, it highlights the close relationship between reading and vocabulary. Constantinescu states that reading comprehension leads to vocabulary acquisition, while vocabulary knowledge benefits reading comprehension.  

Another good article about teaching the eading skill was “Three Extensive Reading Activities for ESL/EFL Students Using E-books”(http://iteslj.org/Lessons/Liang-ExtensiveReading.html) by Mei-Ya Liang.  It underlines the importance of using authentic material in the teaching setting. Liang, mainly, proposes using e-books in class to enhance extensive reading.

The last article that I read this week was “Using the Internet in ESL Writing Instruction” (http://iteslj.org/Techniques/Krajka-WritingUsingNet.html) written by Jarek Krajka.  It features the effect of CALL in teaching the writing skill through three technological activities: creating class websites, using web pages and making e-mail connections. Besides, Krajka enumerates a series of writing genres to work with like writing a letter to a friend; a formal letter; a personal opinion essay; a description of a festival or ceremony; a biography; a newspaper report; and such.

After reading these articles, I analyzed three suggested websites. One of those websites focused on the reading skill “Breaking News English ESL” (http://www.breakingnewsenglish.com/). Then, two multi-skill sites were reviewed, one focusing on vocabulary “Activities for ESL Students” (http://a4esl.org/) and the other focusing on writing "ESL Language Lab" (http://legacy.lclark.edu/~krauss/toppicks/writing.html).

The second class topic was about creating technology enhanced lesson plans. This plan integrated information about class material (online and traditional material), introduction that included review of previous lesson and objective of the class, procedure to be developed by the teacher and the students, learning styles addressed, type of assessment and homework.

Finally, the last class topic constituted the third work on our project task. This time, it referred about the problematic issue in our current course that could be solved by means of technological resources. In my case, I exposed two different types of issues, extrinsic and intrinsic ones, that I expect to solve with what I am learning in this web skill course.

I hope that everybody is enjoying this learning experience like I am doing now!

Regards!