Final Exam

When "Dok Jan" in front of the Humanities and Social Sciences faculty blossoms, that means it is going to become a dry season and the Loei Rajabhat University final exam is coming. This year it is from February 21 to March 4, 2011 and it is expected that all the students could pass the exam moving to another step of their academic journey...

In the exam rooms I proctor, I have found out a few students should have acted more politely than they did. In Thai culture, the younger pay respect and be polite to the elderly. It would be impressive when the former say "Thank you" or others together with doing "Wai" to the latter... You can learn what "Wai" means in the following short clip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrQOXLm9CRM&feature=related

Work hard for your exam.

Best,

Aj. Moo

East meets West

On this coming Wednesday 9, February, 2011, English students from the three programs will participate in an activity. The theme of it is 'East meets West'. The purpose is to encourage the students to use English  through activities, and to learn cultures of other countries rather than Thailand. This is for sustainably happy living. The activities include plays, blog competition, King and Queen of the East and the West contest and activity reflection.

Even though, they will take the final exam in the next two weeks, they have rehearsed for their performance and looked forward to attending the activity.

This week, I would like to share 'how to say thank you' with you through the following website:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vzX3bKgx_IU&feature=player_embedded#

Enjoy practicing,

Aj. Moo

Coming back!

I'm happy with my students' blog ability. In my writing class, I suggested the 3rd year students to create their own blogs and write about what they have learned in each week. Hopefully, blog writing can encourage their writing habit.

For freshmen, they are practicing pronunciation through this web: http://www.youtube.com/voalearningenglish 

It is very useful because the English used in the clips is quite slow. That is read one-third slower than regular English. It's quite exciting to see how the students can read the report script. 

All the best,

Ajarn Moo

Week 10: Farewell ...

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year,

Finally, we are at the end of our online thread. This great experience is impressively sealed in my memory. This course convinces me that the Internet accessing definitely motivates our students to be autonomous learners. However, this should be under teacher guides.   From the starting point to the end of this course, I have learned many things useful for my educational career and I’m ready to transfer them to students and teachers.

I consider all of what I have learned from this course meaningful source for teachers of English. Therefore, if teachers applied the source to their teaching, I believe, students would pay more attention to language learning.

By the way, can I leave some suggestion for newcomers? Firstly, you have to be determined or set your goal and try to be there. You might encounter difficult issues which you have to spend more time on reading or difficult technical problems. Ask for helps from your instructor or classmates.  Don’t be hesitated because they will obstruct you to move on other steps. Secondly, you have to manage your time. Don’t forget that you not only have the online course but also regular work. We have to balance both of the things so you need to prioritize your tasks. Definitely, you have to increase your working time at home and take less sleeping time. Lastly, tell people around you what you are doing. This is for better understanding between you and them. Sometimes, you need private corner to study and cannot socialize with your colleague.

Without Oregon university support, I would have been a teacher with traditional teaching and would not have realized how technology encourages language teaching. I would like to thank Robert, our supervisor for your understanding various distant learners and hard work; Jeff Magoto and Deborah, our guest moderators, for sharing ideas and encouraging comments on our posts; and my classmates for great sharing and accompanying me to stand at this point. If possible, I would like all of teachers of English in my country experience such valuable experience.  

All of my best to you all,

Moo

Week 9: Multiple Intelligences, Learning Styles and learning Strategies

All of us might have similar feeling as I do that it seems incredible that we are at this time: week 9 of my great experience of online course, nearly the end of our online thread… Unlike the assignment from previous weeks, this week assignment focuses on the educational psychology. Not only did I spend time over reading the articles assigned, for more understanding I have watched video clips concerning the topics of multiple intelligences, learning styles, and learning strategies.

The articles we have read do not directly deal with technologies but what we have learned this week i.e. multiple intelligences, learning styles, learning strategies, and 5Cs learning strategies are indispensible components affecting effective language learning. This inspires me to give more attention to each individual student.  Montgomery and Groat (Student learning styles and their implications for learnings) told many reasons of using learning styles for their teaching. One of them is that they might get equal satisfaction from attempting to consider student learning styles as researchers take great pride from launching substantive innovations in their fields. I do agree that pride is a valuable reward and I would like to touch such a pride.  

Many learning strategies are provided in the Sailing the 5 Cs with Learning Strategies by National Capital Language Resource Center:  Center for Applied Linguistics of The George Washington University and Georgetown University. Even though the strategies are provided for secondary school students but I think teachers at other levels can exploit them. Unfortunately, I cannot remember all but it is there and I regard it as a great source for implementing the strategies for our teaching.

I cannot say more but would like to say in short that to meet the ultimate goal of language learning, teachers and students should cooperate in learning process, basically, with teacher understanding their students.

Best,

Moo

Week 8: Teacher Resources Online

This week, I extremely appreciate the overwhelming websites suggested.  I would like to express my great thank to our guest moderator this week, Jeff Magoto, director of the University of Oregon's Yamada Language Center who introduces ANVILL (https://anvill.uoregon.edu/anvill2/) which broadens my language perspectives including assessment tool, voiceboard. I have never experienced such the program. I spent many hours surveying and could not help comparing the centre to that at my university. ANVILL is indeed virtual language self-access center. Students there are very lucky having opportunities to use well-designed programs. Apart from the astonishment, I also gain much more benefits such as making exercises to use online or offline on a computer or to print out; making exercises online to use online; or how to create Nicenet and Blog class. Besides, I could make bingo and board games, matching from http://www.toolsforeducators.com/, the website we can make exercises online to print out.

This semester, I also teach the 5^th year student majoring English in Education faculty. They had a teaching apprenticeship last semester. When I asked them to access the site mentioned above, they said if possible they would like to come back to the schools they had been the apprentice.

http://www.easytestmaker.com/default.aspx is very useful and practical for teachers. I like the way I can make ‘filling blanks’ test without leaving space for filling. I just place [  ] around the words to be left. The result was found like we manually left the words ourselves. It is very convenient.

In relation to making exercises online to use online, I could make a poster from http://wizard.4teachers.org/ . I have learned this by trial and error. At last, I could do it. I have learned how to insert a picture in the poster. It will be found when you access http://poster.4teachers.org/view/poster.php?poster_id=399577.

With this regard, I have an idea to ask my students to produce posters on purpose. Moreover, their peers can give comments on the poster in Nicenet class.

Shortly, if websites suggested this week were disseminated to teachers of English, I believe, not only would students give more attention to language learning, teachers would be proud that they could produce their instructional material which serve lessons they teach and student needs.

Best,

Moo

Week 7: Learner Autonomy and the One-computer Classroom

This week our focal issues fall on ‘Learner Autonomy and the One-computer Classroom’  which have been discussed widely  among our group. The issues assigned every week are definitely valuable for us, teachers of English or those who teach other languages. Our students should be encouraged to be autonomous learners because our world has been changing with information technologies. They should be exposed to the information themselves under their teacher guidance.

Thanasoulas’ article provided me deliberated detailed information concerning ‘Learner Autonomy’ even though he states that there are some pieces involved missing.

With regard to the definition of ‘Learner Autonomy’, as Thanasoulas (http://iteslj.org/Articles/Thanasoulas-Autonomy.html) stated, the relevant literature is riddled with innumerable definitions of autonomy, I do agree with Holec’s definition (1981, 1983, cited in Thanasoulas) that 'the ability to take charge of one's learning' and ‘the learner's willingness and capacity to control or oversee her own learning’. If I were asked to define the term I might do it shortly as ‘learning to learn’. This is in line with Holec’ s suggestion in that autonomy is a process, not a product. Whit this regard, I think it should be ongoing or lifelong process.

Some part of the article provides me with new perspective ,that is, constructivism view positing that knowledge cannot be taught but only learned because knowledge is something 'built up by the learner' (Candy, 1991, cited in Thanasoulas) . Therefore, to encourage our students gain more knowledge or experience, learner autonomy must be promoted.

One-computer Classroom is the other interesting and practical issue. Strategies and applications for the One-computer Classroom are suggested. Tons of activities are demonstrated when I access the websites suggested by Robert. For instance, ESL Activities for the One Computer Classroom (S.Gaer): Word-Processing Ideas (http://www.susangaer.com/sgaer/onecomputer/wordprocessing.html ) and Internet ideas (http://www.susangaer.com/sgaer/onecomputer/internet.html)

The sites give me a thrill to see hundreds of activities which can be done via Word-Processor or adapted from accessing the Internet. Without any doubt, we can regard a computer as a great teacher assistant  in a classroom.

Apart from the two main issues I have learned this week, I also get the answer I have tried to find for a couple months since my computer was installed Office Word 2007. Where is the Auto Summarize tab on the menu bar? Technology Tip of the Month: Microsoft Word and PowerPoint in the Classroom by Deborah Healey reveals the answer to me. It is about ‘Auto Summarize’. If I had not downloaded PDF that explains how to have the tool available on the quick access toolbar, I would have been stuck on the question. Thank you Deborah for your tip making my job easier…

Best,

Moo