Mail VU -Connected Classroom

Greetings to all!

Have you heard the term of 'connected classroom'? I believed all of us know what is classroom, but connected classroom? Well, it actually a way of connecting or extending the activities in the classroom to the outside world by doing another tasks at home. One of a great tool for this purpose is MailVU, a video mail that others can view! It is a pretty simple tool to use, even people who are not familiar with technology can use this easily! What you need are a microphone and a webcam to record a video and send it as an email.

The video can be recorded for the maximum of 10 minutes and if you are not satisfied with the recording, you can always record again and again because it is free! There is no need for you to sign in for you to use this tool, which is absolutely great!

Teaching recommendations:

I will absolutely use this tool for my future teaching context if there are enough equipments at my schools. MailVU is good because it can help teachers to create a new speaking task and make it as a homework! Students may be asked to record their own video at home and send them to teachers for evaluation. In fact, teachers can reply those emails with the similar video which will make the feedback process is much exciting.

So, how does the connected classroom will work? I give an example where teachers can ask students to work in pairs in the classroom and conduct an interview about their family members. The questions can be about their parents' occupations, or the background of their siblings. As homework, they are required to record a video using MailVU and introduce their family members and tell a brief story about thier family (based on the interview in the classroom). Once finished, they should send the video to the teacher for evaluation and further feedback.

MailVU is very suitable to encourage students to practice their speaking fluency because the video is recorded without others are watching it live. It reduces students' affective filter and makes them confident to speak, especially for those who are quiet in the classroom. Teachers however should provide some key vocabulary or language structures in the classroom before students can do the recording at home.

Why I like this website:
1. It is a new tool that can be used to set up speaking activity as homework now! The form of homework is not only in the books or papers.

2. Very easy to use by all level of students. There is no need for you to sign in or register in order to use the tool. and It's free!

3. A great way to practice speaking and fluency. And it is a fun way to use the language!

4. The file can be sent and share with your friends via email.

Some considerations:
1. Teachers need to consider problems such as computers equipment and background noise if they want to do the recordings in the classroom because the quality of videos may be affected.

2. The videos that you have recorded cannot be downloaded into computers and can only be viewed online.

Click and Learn

Hello everyone!

For today's entry, I will introduce a language website that can be used in the classroom by English language teachers. It is Click and Learn! This website is developed by Spanish Government to support English language learners in their county. But since it is FREE and appears in English, so we still can use it as one of our teaching resources. There are a lot of language activities that can be found in this website, accompanied by visuals and audio texts. Teachers and students may find a series of activities for each given topic that can cater all different levels.

Once you enter the site, please choose English (see the above image) so that the main page will appear in English language. 

Teaching suggestions:
Since this website has various activities that suit all levels from beginner to advance students, teachers can use it as one of the sources for their lessons. It can be used to introduce new sets of vocabulary to beginners, teaching new structure of grammar, functions and even use the topic of culture and issues for class discussion.

Moreover, teachers may suggest their students to use this website at home as their homework. It encourages students to be autonomous because they can try any activity that suits their own level. It is also an advantage to use this programme because they can always try something which is below or above their level. In every activity for each topic, students will be introduced to a new set of vocabulary to help their understanding and familiarity with the topic. So, I believed it won't be a problem for students to handle the difficult terms or jargon while doing the activities.

What I like about this website:
1. It provides printed version of activities as their handouts for the lessons in classroom. This is great because even if there is no computers facilities at schools, teachers can use and adapt this materials for teaching purposes.

2. There are a lot of activities and games that available for all levels of students, suitable to be used in a mixed- ability classrooms.

3. The activities involve various language skills: reading, listening, spelling, writing, pronunciation. Good for all- rounded skills building.

4. It encourages autonomous learning as students can use it on their own since the website is user-friendly.

5. There are certain activities that are great for vocabulary drilling which is good for teaching beginner students.

6. The activities accompany by some interactive visuals and audio that can help students to keep focusing on the tasks given. And all these you can get for FREE!

Some considerations:
1. The teachers' and students' guide are in Spanish, hence it is difficult to be understood if you don't know the language!

2. Some activities do not have 'previous' and 'skip' button, so when students stuck and cannot do a task, they cannot do the following task sequence. It is lacked of control.

3. Some activities do not have clear instructions. (I even didn't understand what am I supposed to do when doing one of the activity in the website!)

Well, that's all about it. Just Click and Learn and give yourself a try now!

Concordance- Just the Word

Hello all.

As a second language user and learner in English, I always find difficulties in using the correct and suitable collocations for my writing and speaking. So, today I will introduce two websites that easily can help us especially second language learners to check the use of collocations and concordance. The first programme is the British National Corpus. BNC has 100 million word collection of samples of written and spoken language from a wide range of sources. It gives you the examples of concordance that can be used together with your target words from the real life.

Just enter your word in the look up box (as shown in the circle above) such as 'flower', and click 'go' for the results.

The results of your search will appear as in the image above. On the right, which is shown in the red circle, you will get the source of the sentence that appear on the screen and on the left which is in the blue circle, you can see the example of how your word is used in a sentence.

The second website which is similar to BNC is Just The Word. The function of this programme is just like BNC, as it searches for you the combination of your chosen words from different sources. The most interesting part of this website is that it helps you to find the function of your chosen words in different word class. It is not only that, JTW also provides the examples of the use of your chosen words.

Once you enter your words or phrases in the search box, the result will appear as in the image above. In the right-hand frame (orange circle) you will find the part(s) of speech and the types of relation that the word is found in. For instance, if you want to find the word in the adjective class, just click on the Adj link and it will bring you to the related clusters on the right of the page. The green bar indicates the frequency of the word use in the given combination.

If you want to look how the combination is used in a sentence, you can just click on one of the combination result and it will appear as above. You will get to see a few sentences that show how your chosen word can go together with the suggested result. Amazing isn't it?

Teaching suggestion:
Both suggested websites BNC and JTW are very useful for students' vocabulary enrichment. I would say they are suitable to be used in both primary and secondary school students (if teachers plan to use) and it is a great source for second language learners.

What I like about these websites:
1. Helps users and students to identify the correct use of words' combination and the results come from different written and spoken resources.


2. The examples come from the real source and authentic, which means they are frequently use in the world.


3. JTW also provides the examples of common errors made by second language learners and it is very beneficial for their language performance.


4. JTW gives the structure of the word combination and how they can function in different parts of speech.


5. Both are suitable resources for autonomous learning because learners can look for word concordance on their own and improve their writing skill.


6. They are FREE to use and FREE is good for me!

Thing to consider:
1. You really need internet connection and computer facilities to get into these websites. Or if students are not available for them, teachers can just print them out and make them as handouts in the classroom.