Thursday 23 July 2015

Entry for the 22nd July

Entry for 22nd July
We spent most of the morning preparing our projects. In the afternoon, we enjoyed a very interesting talk given by Gillie Cunningham, about the role errors and mistakes play in language learning.

ERRORS ARE OK ARE THEY?

The purpose of this talk is to analyze the attitude we have to correcting learners’ process of learning through error correction and mistakes.
Firs of all we have to look at the difference between an error and a mistake.

An error is when the learner doesn’t know the rule and  says something wrong, but through lack of previous knowledge of that rule. Once the learner knows an aspect of the language and  says it wrong, we can consider it a mistake. 

So what attitude do we take to errors, then?
WE are to hold a mirror to our teaching, and ask ourselves what is right?

We start off with a worksheet with a few sentences produced by native speakers, which are either correct, acceptable with minor mistakes or wrong. WE are asked to go through them and check our result s i pairs. The interesting thing is that native speakers make mistakes without realizing it.
 Eg. I already did it.


WMS Cunningham first made an overview of the different methods over the years in the 1950’s and 198’s
The traditional method was to listen and repeat.
To learn though drills, and listening and repeating “Set pieces”
Ms Cunningham gave the example of a role play in which a woman would ask for tissues and the seller would tell her the price. The suggestion is that there is little “real” communication taking place.

Other examples of this type of learning are grammar and vocabulary drills, gap-fills, and a great emphasis on pronunciation. 

She then introduced four different theorists who have been very influential through the years.

These were:
Caleb Cattegno (the Silent way)
Charles Curran (CLL)
George Lozanov (Suggestopedia)
James Asher (Total PHysical response)


The Silent way
THe teacher would conduct the lesson without ver speaking. This method consisted in displaying coded sound charts across the classroom and students would have to produce the sound themselves, but students would have to look at the teacher mimicking the sound with the mouth (without actually saying it).
This way, the learner would acquire the sounds himself without having to rely on the teacher as a model. Teaching was subservient to learning. The idea was to avoid “spoon-feeding”.

The second method was Community Language Learning,developed by Charles Curran, who had trained as a counselor.
Here the importance lies in s the sense of community in the learning group, it encourages interaction as a vehicle of learning, and it considers as a priority the students' feelings.This method refers to two roles: that of the know-er (teacher) and student (learner). 

The third method was Suggestopedia
 The idea is to “de-stress” students, so ideally, students will be sat on armchairs, with classical music playing in the background and with their books. Student would then close their eyes and the teacher reads to them. Error correction is absolutely “banned” as it will stress the students, and the idea is for the students to enjoy themselves. A technique used is to activate fun and games at the beginning of a class after something has been learnt in the previous one. Never tell students that something is difficult. The teachers of this method never corrected students.

The fourth method is Total Physical Response
It is based on “Trace” theory.

The more intense the emotion the language is associated with, the more it will be remembered.

 An example would be of a class where students are asked to throw their coats and umbrellas to the floor, stand in a circle, and pretend ethic are going to different places in a city (which would be decorated with posters indicating these places eg. bus station, ticket office), then asked to go to these places: put on your coat, go to the bus station, get on the bus. A lot of vocabulary can be learned through the principle of tracing- emotion commits learning to memory.

First we have to consider how a child learns a language.
A child would say something and the parent would check the content, not the grammar. The grammar would be the second stage.
Eg. I ha 

The next part of the session takes us to whether the purpose of language is to achieve communication between the speaker and listener or by the writer and reader. irrespective of  the mistakes produced.
A good idea according to Ms Cunningham is to correct vowel sounds silently
The fear os speaking can appear for fear of making a mistake

Attitudes to correction
Self-correction is ideal
Teacher to student correction is acceptable to a certain extent, although not according to certain authors like Penny Ur.
Student to student correction is desirable, even though they don’t like it when they are corrected by peers.

Another idea is to use gestures to indicate different tenses. Eg. Present Perfect - now, past simple, past perfect. etc. You can indicate the different tenses by shifting your position. Very close by indicates present- perfect, a bit further away past simple and so on. Other gestures to mark the continuos and simple aspect
Recap
What is acceptable English? Who decides this?
Do I have a principled and constant approach to error and correction?
Have I tested enjoyed correction techniques
Would I benefit from doing some classroom research on them?

Finally Ms Cunningham ended  her talk with two very interesting ideas. 
The first was the idea that there is no known "perfect" method that will ensure that a learner of a language will learn, or in other words, the process of acquisition of a language is not scientific, it depends on many different factors.
This made me think about scientists today trying to solve the mystery of how the brain works, as it 
still remains unsolved.
And finally, a photo of Einstein and the caption
"Learning is experience, the rest is information"

  

Tuesday 21 July 2015



                                                                                                                          Tuesday 21st July 2015


SESSION WITH DAVID FARMER

WARM UP GAME.

-Circle with the right finger
-Cross with the left finger
-Circle and cross, then the other way.

GROUPING ACTIVITIES.

-Family portrait of a Victorian family.
-Family portrait of an sporty family.
- Of a group of   witches
- Of ships
- Students take a card with different types of families ( superhero, spy, robot,etc..) and represent them.

-Stop -go-jump-clap.- students walk  around the class and the teacher says the actions that the students must  do. They will do them at the same time . You can change the symbols or  the meaning of the verbs for characters of Shakespeare, so Juliet could mean  ... jump!!

-Create a sign
-Fight gangs.
-Spooky forest.
-Wall with a hole with lovers .
-Magician in a ship in a storm.
In this activity the teacher can choose interesting moments in Shakespeare plays and dramatize them
connecting Shakespeare through the characters , not through the story.

-Whoosh!!!

Story telling- The teacher tells a story and the students standing on a circle  will represent  the different characters as the story goes on. This method was used by the Royal Shakespeare Company and it was used in  British Pantomimes  ( Where is.....? ,  Behind you !!!!!   ).


-Playing around with phrases by Shakespeare -

Students will say some different famous  phrases  by Shakespeare.( Much ado about nothing- To be or not to be , that is the question- All's well that ends well - A horse a horse my kingdom for a horse)
The teacher will choose the lines according to the students and students will get familiar with them. Lines can be said with different intonation in order to enjoy the language.

-Hot seating-

The student that is on the hot seat will be asked questions about the character he is dramatizing.
Students can work in groups  choosing a character from Fairy tales or from any play they have read.


To extend ideas see more in    http://dramaresource.com/




SESSION WITH CAROL ROBINSON


In this session we have worked on how language change, how English is changing and how young people uses language.

Language is simplifying and there is a new develop in language , expressions like YOLO - you only live once , CHILLAX- chill and relax, BROMANCE- very good friends but no more , or UPCYCLE - convert old material into something useful and beautiful    are emerging in languages.

In this session we also had the opportunity of listening to Sara , a seventeen years old girl that told us how to use a real British teenager slang.( Bae, Piff, Basic. Turnt .Swerve .Innit. Bruv...)


Language is changing

,Language is changing and we are breaking the rules of Past Continuous (Eg. I'm really liking this room ) People are using past continuous in a passionate way and it is easier to use one word instead of two .We are changing usage and there are common errors and mistakes ( CD's, I'm good,  I get a coffee, there are less cars, I went there by foot, different to ).

Use a word in a sentence
     
       
The teacher gives the students a word and the students will use it in a sentence, then they will walk around the classroom comparing the different meanings they have given to that word ( Eg. Literally)


We read an interesting text for discussion- Why we need to invent new words- by Andrew Kaufman in The Guardian, Monday 11 March 2013.



Haga clic en Opciones

Haga clic en Opciones
Haga clic en Opciones
Haga clic en Opciones


Haga clic en Opciones
Haga clic en Opciones





14th of July

Morning classes
Educational Visits

During the morning lessons, as the previous Tuesday.  the class was divided into two groups,

One of the groups went to visit a school, an Academy, and the other one went to visit the Castle.

-Visiting the Castle

The visit to the castle was divided into three periods.

1.- An individual visit to the museum with Art and  History  worksheets.
2.- A guided tour  to the Dungeons
2.-  A creative writing period


Objectives:

1.- learning Art and  History from objects.
2.- Listening to a guided tour
3.- Using the visit as an inspiration for creative writing.

Materials:
-      A spider diagram .
-      A Castle Museum Art Worksheet
-      A Castle Museum History Worksheet
-      A prisoner´s diary sheet.

Procedure:

-The ss. are given  one hour and a half to walk around the museum . They are asked to choose a meaningful object for them
The mind map and the worksheet should be used as guidelines to think about the  Historical or artistic value of the chosen object.

-      General meeting at the hall for a guided visit to the Dungeons of the prison. The ss. have to listen to the guide and be sensitive and attentive so that they can understand what it was like to be a prisoner in the Middle Ages.
-      The ss. are given time to write a diary entry. They are
-      They are asked to write a diary entry.
A piece of creative writing using their imagination, what they have learnt about history and what they have felt in the dungeons to make it more vivid.


Afternoon classes

-Feedback on the visits
-Project work

-Back at Nile the whole group, we are divided in groups to be able to share the impressions we have of the school visit.

All have visited the same school but on different days and we are asked to compare and contrast the two visits, first in small groups and then with the whole class.

The facilities and the library were real impressive .

The discipline wasn't optima but considering these are the last two weeks , we didn't think it was relevant.

-The Project
We are given time to work in small groups for the final project of this course.




-Remember!!!!


Liberté, Fraternité et  Egualité 

Monday 20 July 2015

Monday July 20th Maite Zumalde




Monday    July  20th    by   Maite Zumalde


9.15-10.45       Making Trailers           Claudia Rey 


We learned how to use 


imovies     for ipads and Macs


11.15-12.45

Some teachers continued working on their projects and others went to the classroom to work with stories.


14.00-16.00   Language: Clothes and Fashion   Johanna Stirling

1st Activity

We stood up in a circle looking at what people were wearing. We could ask questions about pieces of clothing difficult to describe.
Then we turned round and one person started describing somebody in the circle. The person guessing the name went on again standing up in the middle.


2nd Activity

We had a discussion at our tables following these instructions:



After that the whole class had a feedback.

3rd Activity

In pairs we identified and crossed out the odd one of group of words and added two more.
We chose four of the words and drew them.
The class was divided in two groups and went around talking to each other and trying to guess what we drew.





4th Activity


We watched this video and revised some of the vocabulary.


5th Activity

We listened to a pod cast and took notes. We could learn how clothes tell us about the characters in a novel.













Sunday 19 July 2015


FRIDAY 17th JULY 2015
SESSION 1. CRITICAL THINKING. (CLAUDIA REY).

Activity 1.  Inferring: solving out Holmes´ mystery.
-In groups, we continued discussing the mystery with the information gathered the day before. Eventually we were given the final clue.
-Bringing up the topic to modern times. Discussion about modern burglars and what they usually pick.  

Activity 2.  Creating:
-Individually, students are asked to write a letter in reply to Holmes´ explanation of the facts.
-Dramatize the dialogue between Sherlock and the Inspector at the police station.

Activity 3. Divergent Thinking.
We discussed in groups the difference between thinking in and outside the box. Then we came together as a whole group. We reached to the conclusion that thinking outside the box is:

                  -more creative
                  -a process to come up with different ideas
                  -less constrained.

Activity 4. Poems on Paintings.                                    

We were shown a painting by Picasso.          
           

Step 1:  Remembering, recalling knowledge from our painting experience. We identified Picasso

Step 2: Understanding. What does the picture depict?
Step 3: Applying. We recognized the Cubist period of Picasso. Through breaking symmetry, we are given different approaches to the painting.

Step 4: Analyzing. We identified possible situations, finding evidence that it is a mother supporting her toddler. At this step we had found out the name of the painting:” First Steps”.
Step 5: Evaluating. Picasso might not have had in mind a toddler, so a different perspective must be seen. Through several interpretations from the whole class, it became evident that he was depicting someone going through a new experience in his life, provided with some support.

Step 6: Creating. Individually, students are asked to write a poem about a new experience they have coped with lately.

  Literary devices used: metaphors, similes, alliteration, personification.

At this stage we review the writing process: pre-writing, drafting, revision and editing

Students work in pairs or threes about the poem they have created to get their feedback. Each student must :a) pay a compliment. b) ask a question. c) make a suggestion. After collecting your group´s ideas, you go back to your own poem, and eventually you read it to the class. After listening, students are supposed to guess their partner´s experiences. This is still “ Divergent Thinking”.


SESSION 2. CREATIVE WRITING. USING COMICS AND CARTOONS. (CLAUDIA REY)
We were given different ideas for exploitating comics and cartoons.

Step 1: Collecting materials.
Step 2: Comics samples. You are not creating new ones, you must state what you must do with them.

Step 3: Creating comics.
Step 4:  Photocopies of comics.

Step 5:  Q R code readers.

Activity 1: Fill in the bubbles.
 
We were given different panels with comic strips, with one sentence for each frame. In the first example, all the six vignettes ended with a prepositional verb in “up”. Then we were given a second strip with one caption in the first bubble. We had to write sentences in the other three, following the same pattern, and getting to an ending in the last closing one.

The best ones from each group were brought up to the class.
Activity 2: Q R. code readers       This is task based learning.   


One of the groups was given a handout with four different pictures on Ancient Artifacts and Ruins. According to the drawing the students must guess what the different pictures represent. Each of the four Stations or drawings has a Q.R. code. Using the Q.R. code mobile app, it is given the explanation of the picture as well as the location where they come from.
Based on the book, “History Alive” by Jane Willis

Activity 3: Digital tools.

Some groups worked on the web, making comics with digital tools.
Most of these activities are meant for eleven year old native speakers, thus they should be adequate for 13-14 year old non native speakers.

SESSION 3: LANGUAGE THROUGH LITERATURE. EXPLOITING A NOVEL.(JOHANNA STERLING)
We were making comments on Anthony McGowan. We highlighted two of his opinions:

“We are the Baddies”.
Question: ”What do you do if you get author´s block?”

Answer: “I get drunk”.

Activity 1: Letters. (Based on the book: “The Queen of the Tambourine” Abacus)
The topic was started by being given two letters from the book. The first of them was about a lady who sent a letter to a friend, criticizing her unbearable behaviour from her point of view. We ignored the true reason for the letter. Then came a second letter apologizing for the former one.

-We should discuss about the letters and what they mean
-Your reaction to the letters.
-Appearances and personalities.
-What the relationship between these two people is.

Linguistic approach: a) Words that are stressed for emphasis purposes. b) Terms for apologizing.
 
Activity 2: Communication.
-Make a list of different ways you communicate with people.
 
Activity 3: Emphasising.
-Emphasizing by stressing the verb “be”, or adding stressing “do”,”does”, “did”. We did some practice on this.
 


Activity 4: Letter Response.
-Asking people around the class how they feel when receiving a letter.

                              -POSITIVE: from………../it says…………

YOU HOPE           -NEGATIVE: not from…………/it doesn´t say………….

Activity 5: Rereading the letters.
-Analyze the two letters. Which one is less tentative and more polite.

Activity 6: Transforming phrases into more polite terms.
-Handout containing words or phrases to make sentences more polite. Students make sentences sound less direct and more polite, by using other expressions.

Activity 6: Euphemisms.
This activity teaches students other ways to say things without being too rude or cruel.                             
 

Thursday 16 July 2015

Activities on the 16th July



1st sessionFLY Festival at UEA: Talk- Anthony McGowan

We were taken to the Festival of Literature for Young People. As we waited to go inside the theatre for the talk, we looked at the books display.
Once inside the theatre, they announced the winners of the FLY writing contest.
Anthony McGowan talked about what writing is about and the relationship between writing and “the truth”. He told a story about his own childhood at school in Leeds related to the topic of bullying, which inspired him to write stories of the kind, so many of his books are a reflection of his days at school. Then, quite enthusiastically, he read one of his stories and asked the audience about the importance of writing stories from real life or made up ones. Finally he gave the audience the opportunity to ask some questions and there were some teenagers interested in knowing about the topics he chooses, tips for writing, age when he started writing or books to recommend. He gave them a few tips, mainly:
-          To be a good and constant writer, always carry a notebook with you and write about anything surrounding you.
-          Finish everything you start.
-          Try to see things with a novelist eye (lots of stories moving around school).
-          Try to be constant and write every day (he tries to type at least 1000 words a day).
-          For teenagers, begin by being a good reader.
-          Every word counts (he started with poetry at 15 just to flirt with girls, but it didn’t work, though it was a good way to start!).

  An anecdote: as a civil servant (before being a writer), he used to daydream and write a lot at his boring office work, and that’s when he realised he would become a writer.





 2nd session:  Visit to Sainsbury Centre
We were taken to the Sainsbury Centre for a guided tour on representations of art in different ages.
-          Greek figurines, around 6000 years old, possibly dolls, many found in tombs, so probably religious meanings. No written records yet.
-         Hippopotamus from Egypt, around 2000 years old. Although they used writing, there is no written evidence of this piece. Found in a sarcophagus, likely to have been placed there to protect the dead body for a further life.
-         Indian bronze figures with religious meanings, from the 11th century, hindu in inspiration. One of them was Shiva, the destroyer god who made recreation possible through destruction. There was a strong cultural transmission through art, as well as an oral transmission. Vedas were the first written evidence.
-         Raven stealing the sun, northamerican (Canada) art which represents a rattle from a shaman in the form of a raven. There is a nice legend on this on how Raven started life by stealing the sun, moon, stars, water and fire.
-          The 14-year-old ballet dancer, by Degas. Connected to the naturalistic movement and the french writer E.Zola, and his novel “Nana”, 1880.
-           Antonio Saura´s “Hiroshima mon amour” painting, a desintegrating figure which represents a memorial to the dead people from Hiroshima.




3rd session:  Reading and writing activities/ Using mystery stories (2)
Claudia handed out templates for reading/writing activities based on literature circles, a collaborative and student-centered reading strategy. After selecting a book, students are given a different role to work on it: artist, head honcho, connector or analyser. The teacher must decide carefully on the different roles assigned depending on the type of learner. Students work on this strategy after having worked on different activities (poetry, journals, mind maps, etc.) throughout a long period of time.
Collaborative work is important in the previous stage to discuss about the process and to learn from each other before completing their tasks on their own. Students rotate the roles as they read the books.
Students, by using this technique, can learn to take responsibility for their own learning and become stronger readers.





The last activity we did today was another Sherlock Holmes story in which we had to read, take notes and share ideas with our group trying to formulate hypothesis to solve the mystery. Each group had a different part of the story and by mixing the groups and reporting our part to the rest, we had to try to complete the puzzle and solve the mystery.



By  Araceli Valero


Wednesday 15 July 2015

Friday, 10th July 2015

NOTES FOR ICT FOR LITERATURE SESSION
We explore some websites where we can find activities to be done with students.
*Akinator: There is a genie to whom you can answer questions. After these questions, the genie is supposed to guess who the character is.
* Wordle:  It is an application used to create “word clouds”. It is a good application for mapping, guessing or revision exercises. Or we can use it simply for “nice” things, for example, with the names of our students.
Some teachers mention some other similar programs, such as WordItOut or Tagxedo.
* Poster Maker: We can create a personalized poster. We include a photograph. Then we can choose the type and colour of the font. We can add a tittle, taglines, credits,…
* Fakebook: We can create a “fake” page for Facebook.
*Teachertube: We can share instructional videos.
* Into the book: It is a page mainly for primary, but it can be used with the youngest ones in Secondary. It is a pedagogical site with great ideas we can use in class.

After exploring all the pages, we write in the blog some ideas we think of to use in our classes.

LEARNING MATERIAL
1. In groups, we discuss about what makes learning good and effective to work with.
- The layout: attractive, visuals, design,…
- Topics connected to the interests and needs of our student. They should be up to date. We agree that the appearance of “celebrities” in books is not very convenient, as there may be changes in their lives at the moment of using the books..
- It should cater for differentiation: we should try to pay attention to the paces of our students.
- The use of multi media resources is important, too.
- It must the adapted to the ages of the students.
- It should have a clear font, sometimes it is too small and difficult to read.
- There must be a variety of activities.
- They must include activities permitting students to be creative and collaborative, i. e. projects.
2. Individual quiz : statements about reading activities. Sharing of ideas. Everybody agrees in including prediction activities, allow students space to react to the text, don’t get students too hung up to understanding all the details, and try to relate the text to learners’ lives.  We totally disagree about some points, for example, start the lesson getting students to look for difficult words.

Introduction to Poetry, by Billy Collins
Activities on the poem:
1.  Read the poem
2. Read the poem a second time, and mark J if you like, L if you dislike or ? if you do not understand something.
3. In groups, share your ideas and see if any of your partners can explain the meaning of what you did not understand.

HOW TO EXPLOIT A TEXT
We are given two different texts. In groups, we design some activities to exploit it. Sharing of ideas.

DIFFERENT TOOLS FOR “CHARACTERISATION”
Teachers have to teach “contents”, but to evaluate comprehension of any content, we can use different tools. A skillful teacher has to have a lot of tools so that he/she can match the best tool to the best subject, that is, the “optimal match”.
We have a look at three different tools and refer to three different texts we have seen in the course to discuss which would be the optimal match to each of the texts. These tools are:
-          Character map, concentrating in the features of one character (appearance, behaviour, personality;…)
-          Table with literal, inferential and evaluative comprehension questions on several characters.
-          “Changes” table, focused on the changes of one character along the story.
GRAPHIC NOVELS
Activities on graphic novels were suggested:
-          Prediction activities.
-          Description of the characters, scenes, …
-          Representation of a scene.


Finally, we were invited to make comments to any of the activities in the blog.

Wed 15th July: QR codes and creative writing

WEDNESDAY 15TH JULY SESSION

ACTIVITIES WITH QR CODES AND MOBILE PHONES

First we were told to install in our mobiles the App QR Code Reader
Some pictures with QR codes were hung on the walls so that we could walk around and guess what the pictures could represent

To do the activity we made a chart with three columns. In one of them we wrote “My guess” in the other “New idea” and in the third wrote the real information after reading the code

First we walked around and guessed what the pictures could represent
Then we discussed in groups of six the possible ideas
Finally with the help of our QR reader we really found out what the objects were and led us to further information of them. In this way you can be sent to a pdf or a video instead of giving the students any text.

We also analysed and discussed the relationship of the objects to categories such as writing, farming or Art and Music. We could also discuss as archeologists if the objects found belonged to the same civilization
When reading the code it gives key words and clues, so we use inferential language to understand then we search for more information.

Activities that can be done with mobile phones
They are Jigsaw activities

We worked with the passages called the “silent movies” and the “the perfect phone”
In the silent movies students have to make a silent movie of 2 minutes of their houses going around it and describing what they see.
Also the teacher makes a recording and prepares some questions so that students know what to do.For example, on your tour, what is the second room in the video? What is the last room?

Work in groups and answer the questions. Then make comments of the videos.
It is a kind of homework

With the perfect phone text students work in groups of four and discuss the best features a mobile should have. For example writing statements like saying It might be water resistant, It might do this or that

Students then discuss with new partners and decide which are the best features and discuss with the whole class things like the battery life or prize.
Finally create a poster of an advert to sell the phone. Students after watching all of them vote and decide which the best advert is.

We also worked with the “Time will Tell” text to show that it’s also interesting to make a collage with App. Students can create a collage of photos of objects for a time capsule. This idea can be motivating for students.

You can find more ideas in the book “Use of Technology in the classroom” by Gavin Dudney and Nicky Hockly

FROM READING TO CREATIVE WRITING
With our eyes closed we had to visualize ourselves when we were 6 years old at a festival and write down facts about the people we were with, the place we were and events that took place.

We then created a web with sensory images ( sight, hearing, smell, touch and taste) that came to our mind.

You can get into deeper visualizations by focusing and describing in detail your feelings by making a mind map

You tell to a partner your experiences who asks questions and in this way you get more ideas to start writing your piece of creative writing.

Some pieces of writing were read aloud about “a prisoner’s diary” which we wrote after our visit to the castle dungeons and also about the festival.


Group work used for creative writing
Students are told to read either a passage or part of a book. They are given roles and work as a team. There is an analyser, an artist, the connector and an organizer.

Working with the book “the Giver”
First we watched a trailer of the film based on the book and try to answer the who, where, when, what, why questions about the characters and plot.

Then we had to read the “Writing from imagination” extract from the book. Usually this type of texts such as “the hunger games” or “the maze runner” would encourage them to write a piece of creative writing.

To finish it is important to say that what we do in the classroom is wrong because writers spend a lot of time making graphic organizers, mind maps, brainstorming ideas, then they do drafts and get feedback. It has to be read by others before being sent to the editor.

WORKSHOP
Handheld devices in the classroom language by Thom Kidle
Nowadays Technology is part of us and part of our teaching. We have to use it.
Everyone has thousands of photos in their mobiles to show and talk about them. You can have a look at others contact list and talk about the people and share the information by asking and answering questions or show and talk about their favourite Apps.

He talked about a useful link “cessb2weebly.com” and about “ the value added teaching through technology”
Every smart phone has a camera to take pictures or record videos and have a sound recorder.

How to exploit images: PHOTOS
Students can talk about family photos or take photos of parts of their school or make pairs of pictures about a topic to do contrast and compare activities for official exams or work with linguistic landscapes (included in nile-elt blog).

Working with videos
To follow progress in speaking a language is difficult to see in short courses but it is possible to see it by recording them at the beginning and at the end.

You can also make a video walking around your home and describing what you see.
Doing short interviews using “vox pops” or watching videos to teach you different abilities like dancing or cooking with “ video jug”

There is another App to watch and show a picture instantly using your mobile and i-pad  called “chirp” because of the sound it makes
Another useful App is the QR codes that have already talked about and can be also used in treasure hunts instead of using paper

Apps for language learners
There are App to work with phrasal verbs, vocabulary, quizzes or speaking and intonation such as “ speaking pal”. Others based in literature activities like “Shakespeare in bits”

Apps for descriptions and directions
An App to do mind maps “popplet” and a translator that works with mobiles even without wifi to scan a sign called “wordlens”
Most of the links to pages about all the tools covered on this platform are found in Nile-elt blog.