English Cafe! using podcasts in the classroom

ESL podcast supports the English Cafe episode 270 which discussed Eleanor Roosevelt, the wife of Franklin D. Roosevelt; it is a continuation of a conversation on famous Americans which is guided by Dr. Jeff McQuillan.  This podcast discusses the history of Eleanor Roosevelt in an manner to educate English Language Learners about American culture and history.  I think this would be a great tool for students, not necessarily those students who are new to the country and do  not have any English experience.  The content is very cognitively demanding with little contextual support to help comprehension.  Ideally this podcast would be preferred for high intermediate or advanced ESL students.  This would be a fantastic tool for students who are preparing for the NYSESLAT and need to improve their listening comprehension skills.  Words are enunciated, difficult or new vocabulary words are explained in simplified terms to increase understanding of the content.  U.S. History teachers should implement this tool in their classrooms or should guide students toward this podcast as a reference for a research project.  Not only would the students be able to gain content knowledge but English comprehension would be augmented simultaneously! (I am a huge fan of content-based instruction and feel that students benefit tremendously from it!)  So to my fellow ESL teachers out there, use and share this tool with your peers! I have a strong feeling that your students will make great strides through the assistance provided in this podcast series.

e-teaching, e-learning, e-cultures through ePals!

I have just discovered ePals, and I must admit this seems like a fantastic tool for students to engage in multicultural activities.  Since I am in the English as a second language field I feel that many of these tools can be accessed through the proper use of my classroom. 

For the mainstream classroom, especially where students may not be able to interact with diverse populations I think this would be a phenominal tool! Students are able to interact frequently through the internet if desired or via postal mail if preferred.  The goal is for educators to provide meaningful opportunities for their students to engage in cultural discussions and realize that culture surrounds us always. 

With English Language Learners I feel that these tasks may prove to be slightly out of the range of the beginners, the intermediate level students would do much better.  This is a wonderful way for students to be able to express their experiences, holidays, beliefs, cultures and so much more.  I have discovered that there is a significant population of Hispanic students in my area which were born in the United States  yet they do not speak English at all.  I am sympathetic toward this group of students; it appears as though they feel that they are abandoning who they are if they learn English.  This tool would be a great way to validate their cultures, experiences, etc. and still encourage English use. 

Educators from all over the world have posted their desires, their class sizes, languages and experiences they may or may not have with ePals.  A world map is shown on the website that can be clicked upon; participants from all over the world are already establishing their accounts and are eager for people to participate with them.  What I have observed is that there literally are educators and students from MOST of the world's countries who want to e-learn about other cultures, communities, holidays, weather, natural disasters, how culture influences who people are etc.  The options for this ePals tool could be limitless; all we have to do is sign up and use our creativity to make learning meaningful for our students.  This is one great way!

New Teacher?! Read these articles for helpful hints!!

I recently read two articles:

"9 great reasons why teachers should use Twitter"
"Don't eat lunch alone"

they are so practical and useful for us teachers in training!

I thought 9 great reasons...was wonderful; each reason is explained in one or two paragraphs so its nice and concise yet very informative.  Not yet have I made connections that I feel comfortable using for my teaching benefit so I think that using Twitter to get honest feedback from collegues is amazing!!! I have not done student teaching yet although I am participating in a local high school several times a week, doing observations and helping out in the afterschool program, so I need all of the advice I can get.  Networking in this manner, where the character number is limited, provides honest (hopefully!) and direct feedback to whatever question I may pose.  I really look forward to using Twitter as an idea's workshop like Laura Walker suggested.  Having access to other teachers' ideas about lessons can only assist me to broaden how I perceive and present lessons once I have a classroom of my own.

While I enjoyed Laura Walker's blog, it did not provide information about how to go about finding teachers to follow; this is where Richard Byrne's article comes in.  He actually posted two power points to his blog which include practical advice, almost step by step, to follow teachers! This is the type of information I need since I for some reason am not very computer savvy.  (Although, I must say that I am beginning to feel like a pro with blogging!!)  The focus of this article was developing a personal learning network which I think is an amazing idea.  How better to settle into teaching than with support of people who are already doing it?! It takes me a bit to open up to people enough to ask for help with certain things, I feel that this tool would work amazingly well for me, especially while I am trying to gain some confidence in a school as a new teacher.