It’s good to know we got to the end of another subject, a subject which I dare to mention that will help all of us to increase our GPA and knowledge :) ; regarding knowledge, I will like to add that the tools that we studied were all meaningful. I learned which of them I can use in my future teaching experiences and which of them I shouldn’t even think of, so I got something from each; for example: I learned that hot potatoes6 is a program that can help me to design creative activities to be developed by my future students, and voxopop is a tool that causes to much trouble to be used on the other hand, so I will never use it again. Besides, I also learned that there are many ways to engage students with learning through the use of internet, among the tools I would like to use again are: voicethread, slidely, themeefy, InFocus, delicious, and obviously hot potatoes6.
All these tools can be used not only to teach
English, but also subjects like science, social studies, and even math, among
others. I will provide an example with science: you could ask your students to
develop a science project and to publish
its results as a magazine in theemefy. Another subject with wich you can have
fun using these tools is Literature. If you don’t believe me check the following
link.lite Now, don’t forget that you should do it with
the right attitude, working with all these tools can be a headache (as I
published in one of my previous entries), but if you arise your curiosity and
try the different features, you will find the interesting and appealing working
with technology in the EFL classroom can be.
If I could take this course again I wish I didn’t
have to work with voxopop nor with Quandary, I would like to spend time
learning how to manage well the multimedia projector and maybe learn how to
make the presentation appear normal for my audience and still get to read the
notes that you can add in power point since that is something that I consider
more relevant for Ss of fifth year; moreover, if I was the teacher I would
teach my Ss how to control the presentation from their android, and in order to
improve the course, I also suggest to have just one class a week and leave the
time for Ss to work at home by establishing communication via internet. There’s
a lot of ideas on that in this pdf document use of technology I like the way they
address technology with the CALL theory.
As a conclusion I would just like to say that I
enjoyed taking this subject, and that I
wish the best for the future Ss of it. I believe it is just necessary to keep
in mind that the complex stuff should be always analyzed regarding
applicability before using it in our context, and the basic stuff should never
be forgotten, especially when it is part of everyday teaching.
