If the class has no connection on the Internet, the teacher can still use the page in a LAN (local area network) or on a single computer for free access in class and outside class (e.g. in library or self-access center).
Other ideas for using the Web to teach language skills include:
- Vocabulary building
- word games with flash cards and link to answers (especially suitable for elementary level) - Grammar
- with terms underlined & and link to grammar rules; buttons to access on-line exercises and answers, explanation or notes. - Reading skills
- reading passages with vocabulary underlined and links to a glossary (meanings/ definitions), sound file (pronunciation of words), map and/or photos (for illustration), authorÕs biography, context of the passage or the culture, customs of the society, etc.; reading comprehension exercises with link to answer keys & optional further exercises... - Listening skills
- buttons to provide choices to play speech, do comprehension exercises (fill-in-blanks, Multiple Choice or open-ended questions), look up the glossary, answer keys, etc. - Writing skills
- picture composition, with choices to see suggested vocabulary, plan of essay, sample essays, etc.
Warschauer (in press) assembles a collection of online activities and projects for foreign language teaching. They include how to make use of the online news to create a televised newsroom with online news from a variety of countries, students' reports (both verbal and written) that cover headlines, sports, local culture, etc. (by Larren Rosen). There is also an entry on how to develop on-line tests and exercises, the answers of which can be imported into a spreadsheet program in which marking and grading will be done automatically (Mak & Mak).
Standalone Instructional Package:
(One example:
http://www.cuhk.hk/eltu/business.homepg.htm)Writing application letters and curriculum vitae is an essential part of training for any undergraduate students, school leavers (secondary/ university/ Technical And Further Education colleges) and education institutions. Samples and update information on the change in writing styles will still be useful when graduates seek new jobs, and for people who miss school.
| Job Application Letters | Resume/ Curriculum Vitae | Other related letters |
|---|---|---|
| instructions/ notes | format and styles | cover letter |
| checklists | notes | reference letter |
| samples - US, UK, Austalia, HK, etc.
- point out cultural differences or preferences. |
acceptance/ rejection letter, etc. |
|
- a list of questions to think about & prepare
- non-verbal behavior: posture, gesture, dress codes, etc.
- video-clips of sample interviews to demonstrate good and bad answers
Other resources, such as:
- companies information or link to WWW pages
- job advertisements (scan or type in, or link to Appointments services, electronic newspaper, etc.)
- training or retraining courses
A Word of caution:
The computer cannot react to learnersÕ verbal input. Also, it usually takes a long time to download video files and requires large disk space. Thus it is advisable to divide the video into short strips and to add the file size, a caption or a short description of each strip to assist learners to decide whether they really want it.
How to frame this in a research project?
There has been quite a number of studies of people's language needs at work. Just to name two: Hucking & Olsen (1991) conducted survey of language needs of technical professionals at work in the USA, Lai & Jor (1993) surveyed on graduates' language needs at work in Hong Kong. We can integrate this kind of language survey with a job search WWW document by interviewing employers and mailing out or posting online questionnaires to graduates to find out their language standard, difficulties at work as well as the kind of help they need. The survey result will provide input for further developing the page, or as a basis for writing up proposals to apply for funding to set up networks to support graduates.Another direction may be researching on learners' learning strategies and preferences to find out (i) whether they prefer learning with and on the WWW; (ii) what are the advantages and disadvantages, problems and help needed; (iii) what online resources they are most interested in reading and find most useful (for what purposes); (iv) what is more important - ideas or graphics, text (fast speed) or multimedia (nice format): (v) are the learners' needs same as the teachers? etc.
Publishing Students' Works on the WWW:
|  |
Publishing on the Web is not the monopoly of teachers. Putting students'
work on
the Web is highly motivating. It also gives students a real audience to
write for,
an international audience to interact with. It will compel the students
to work
collaboratively, and professionally - to scrutinize the clarity,
accuracy and
style of their writing. The web has made it possible and easy for
students to
publish their coursework or projects. It is not uncommon for teachers to
publish
class newsletters, or schools to publish magazines. How can we put these
on the
Web? Let us look at some technical
communication
magazines
The editorial board may consist of:
Schedule
Assessment
Students are graded by both the oral presentation and the written
product
contributed to the class magazine. The editorial board has to write the
editorial,
foreword, table of content, acknowledgment, etc. Their grade will be
based on the
skills of chairing meetings, the written minutes (focusing on the
decisions and
the working schedule), the coordination and compiling of the whole
magazine.
Advice
Class Newsletters are similar to magazines in that both of them are a
collection
of students' course assignments including project works. However, they
differ in
terms of length, variety in styles and selection of articles. The former
can be
more causal and include as many individual articles as possible.
However, web
readers may prefer the latter, which tend to be shorter, more condensed
and
contains a greater variety articles (editorial, reviews, reports, new
product show
case, etc.)
Train students not only to write html codes, but also to think in a new
presentation paradigm - hypertext (nonlinear, multidimensional,
hypermedia). Think
of the readersÕ interest/ needs and preferred paths of reading. Keep a
good
balance between text and pictures/ graphics. Try to have variety and
consistency
in both the content (types of articles) and the style. Students tend to
include a
lot of graphics, but overlook that this is at the expense of file-size
and thus
download time. What attracts people to visit a page again is not the
beautiful
graphics or video, but the content and ideas.
Sometimes, students like to use desktop publishing software to give the
hard copy
of the magazine a professional look. However, the formatting will
complicate the
html conversion for the WWW. Thus it is more efficient to develop the
html version
right from the start, or in parallel to the hard copy.
Second, what looks good in print copy is not equal to what looks good
on computer
screen, and vice versa. Some readers of the Web magazine like to read
on-line
while others may prefer to print and read off-line. Thus one has to
consider how a
web page look both on the screen and in print form.
User rate of CUHK architecture web page tells us that students are most
interested
in browsing peer projects (building models), instead of course handouts.
To
increase interactivity, it is advisable to add email addresses of the
authors and
cross links to related Web pages, especially page of similar subjects/
areas.
However, initial survey of existing student Web pages seems to reflect
students do
not care much about the channels of feedback and interactivity. More
research on
students' feedback is needed to decide whether the students' interest
match with
what teachers think they need. Also, students should be reminded of this
important
aspect in Web page production.
Last but not least, be ware of copyright, citation and
plagiarism. It is too easy
for students to copy
a text file, or even an image on the WWW into their paper or Web page.
Remind them
to obtain copyright from the author or the publisher beforehand. Teach
them how
to state the source and make reference in the main text as well as the
bibliography. Expose them to the WWW pages on intellectual property,
government
policies, etc.
The newsgroup, hut.writing-project is a special newsgroup created at HUT
CC. The
articles are sent as e-mail messages to a mailing list at HUT. From
there they are
sorted and go to local newsgroups (most universities in the project),
Gopher
(Cairo) or the Web (ENST in spring 95 and HUT in autumn 95).
The WWW page
According to the project's WWW page, , 'The Individual Writing Exchange
is a
system which encourages writers from differing "rhetorical backgrounds"
to
consider ways to make their writing more effective on the international
stage.Õ To
put it simple, each semester consists of three to four 3-week cycles. In
Week 1
students write and post articles. In weeks 2 and 3 the students comment
on/
discuss the articles written in week 1, and revise their own articles
(written in
week 1). In week 4, a new cycle begins - new article, comment, revise,
etc.
Essay topics included both technical (e.g. role of technology at work,
controlling
city pollution, etc.) and general/ business (e.g. utopia - an ideal
world,
multinational companies, racial and ethnic diversity, etc.)
In addition, HUT students worked in groups to create a class glossary
and glossary
tests. The HUT plans to make a glossary program for the Web, and then it
will
become an international project, with each participating university with
Internet
access creating its own WWW Culture Page.
There are several advantages of using the hut.writing-project newsgroup
and the
WWW. First, it is very flexible. Teams or universities may join at
different times
without affecting other schools. This solves a common problem of
international
email projects: different school schedules leading to late starts and a
long
warm-up period until member lists are finalized. This also saves a lot
of time in
amending the members and addresses of email lists, resulting in more
efficient
time management. Moreover, it is easy to keeps track of and record
students' work.
Also, without the newsgroup (which the organizer controls) there would
be no way
of controlling who joined the project. The WWW has offered an
environment in which
email, newsgroup, gopher, etc. could be integrated. Furthermore, the Web
encourages and supports certain standard format of graphics, audio and
video
files, which is missing and may cause problems in email.
To join the project and for technical information, URL
http://www.hut.fi/~rvilmi/help/techtips/jointips.html
Students work on activities such as:
Positive elements of this course include:
This project may be adopted in LOTE (Language Other Than English)
classes or TAFE
colleges easily. These classes are usually made up of learners from
several
cultures or the latter immigrants from various countries. Thus it is
easy to
divide learners into teams and ask them either to report on the city
they come
from, or to browse the Web pages of their target languages and
develop a
country profile.
Despite the hypermedia potentials of WWW, Laurillard (1993) reminds us
that
'hypertext, accessing a text database, is not interactive, because there
is no
intrinsic feedback on the user's actions: the information does not
change as a
consequence of the users' actions on it; it only changes if you change
the system
itself, by changing the information or the links directly.' So far the
computer
cannot react to learnersÕ verbal input. Nor can it check written answers
on-line
and provide instant feedback to learners. Also, unless the teacher has
some
control over the web server, the use of evaluation form is limited. A
teacher
needs more than a departmental or personal account and password to put
files. It
is preferable to have the right to create student accounts if student
publishing
is involved. The use of evaluation forms, tests & exercises, statistics
require
programming knowledge, and support from the computer center/
professionals.
Moreover, the multi-media output on the WWW is still unable to compete
with that
on CD-ROM. Unless the bandwidth is high and the computer is of a
high-end model
(at least 8 Mb RAM) , the download time can take over ten minutes or
even hours
and thus is unbearable and discouraging.
Last but not least, Maimone (1995) points out some technical, social and
pedagogical
issues unresolved:
How much computer knowledge is basically required?
Training on how to produce:
How much does it cost?
Project Design of Technical Express
The main objective is to train students to present technical information
to
non-technical readers in clear English, supported by audio-visual aids.
The
project requires the whole class to work collaboratively on a magazine,
about
computer hardware/ software, Internet (email, newsgroup, gopher and/ or
WWW),
etc., for other staff/ students or the general public (non-computer
professionals).
Students may write instructions or guides on email, describe/ evaluate/
promote a
new software, tips on how to navigate the Internet, etc.
Non-engineering students
may collect information to compile a list of common Q & A. To collect
information
for writing up the articles, each team may conduct surveys, interviews,
case
studies, site visits, etc. Each team is responsible for the
word-processing,
proofreading and graphics within its section. Thus it is best for each
team to
have at least one student with computer knowledge. At the end of the
term, each
group is to present the result of the study orally in class.
Week Topic/ contents
1 WWW Workshop : What's out there? (in Computer Lab)
2 1st editorial meeting on the Internet
magazine
Aims: Brainstorm & set up the editorial board; contents, layout &
standards, etc.
Task: Each team has to provide a 1 - 2 page proposal outlining
the articles
&
writers in that section, and methodology (Interview? Survey?)
3 Essentials of written communication -
how to write plain English, reports, etc.4 HTML Workshop (in Computer Lab)
How to produce html files, scan pictures, digitize audio and video
components,
etc.
5 2nd Class editorial meeting
Each student has to produce the first draft of article s/he write for
peer
comments & editing.
6 Group Oral Presentations
7 Revise magazine articles; compile the first draft of
the whole
magazine
8 Last editorial meeting to finalize the magazine;
project review
Collaborative projects on the WWW
The WWW is a network of networks. This makes international and
intercultural
communication feasible and convenient. How can we use the web for joint
projects
across institutions? Let us look at two examples of how teachers in USA
and Europe
make use of the Web for international collaborative projects.
Global Communication Through Email
Ruth Vilmi of the Helsinki University of Technology, Finland, has been
organizing
international email projects for foreign language writing students since
Autumn
1993. In 1995 Laurent Gaillard (of ENST) put the newsgroup onto the Web,
which was
a big step forward. Via the newsgroup, the messages are sorted by
country (at HUT)
and subject (at ENST).
The Cities
Project
(The above description is extracted from the Cities Project's WWW
page)
Conclusion
In this paper, I have briefly outlined what and how you can start
teaching,
publishing and collaborating in projects on the WWW. Though the above
examples
are mainly drawn from tertiary English language classrooms, the
experience can be
easily applied to any languages, any disciplines and secondary levels.
He even predicts that the WWW will not survive the decade owing to three
reasons:
These questions require contemplation, discussion and research. It is
hoped that increased use of the WWW will encourage the development and
use of higher-bandwidth networks, and replacements for both HTML and URLs
are being designed.
References:
Appendix: Frequently Asked Questions
How may staff is needed & what each is responsible
for?
Minimally, one. Simple html files are easy to create, and ordinary
teachers should
be capable of handling it. If the Web 'page' involves a lot of graphics,
audio and
video components, and for best effects, student helpers or technical
staff may be
helpful.
How long does it take?
minimally one week from nothing
to
something
update html files: an hour or two
Design and collection of materials (text, pictures, etc.):
2 - 4 weeks if the materials are ready-made.
HTML file production
depends on how sophisticated your page is;
a page with only hyperlinks or text can be created within a few
hours.
What future commitment is required after the first version is
completed?
What is the most difficult part/ potential problem?
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