My End-of-course Reflection

I would describe this course as a really 'technical' course for preparing prospective English teachers in utilizing IT in their teaching, even more technical than the three English Language Teaching Techniques courses. Every time, we produced concrete, visible products for the attained learning objective(s).

Throughout the course, I have produced various teaching products, which definitely demonstrate the advantages of IT over the traditional teaching approach, some of which as summarized below:

1) Thesaurus - which definitely helps students improve their variety of vocabulary in writing without spending money purchasing a solid thesaurus

2) Quizlet - which helps students revisit and revise important concepts online, and students will then not have the excuse of not revising because of losing teachers' printed-out materials

3) Hotpotatoes - which undoubtedly saves teachers time in formatting in Microsoft Word in the process of designing matching, word puzzle exercises, etc.

4) Photo Story 3 & Adobe Spark - which positively encourage students to speak English (either narrate their own stories or recreate other stories), and this supplements the deficiencies of students not speaking English inside classrooms, although communicative language teaching approach is being implemented

5) Screencast-o-matic & ActivelyLearn - which facilitates the implementation of flipped classroom, something which lots of teacher find it hard and time-consuming to do

6) Powtoon and Prezi - which serve effectively as presentation tools to arouse students' interest (and thus lengthen their attention span) in the 'Motivation' stage of a lesson

7) Kahoot! & Google Response - which make instant response from students to teachers possible, and this defeat the blame from the English panel chair and/or principal that 'my teaching is one-way and too much teacher-talk'

I have seen lots of schools putting something very broad and vague like 'strengthen students' learning by utilizing multiple teaching approach' into their schools' Areas of Concern (sadly, including my alma-mater). IT in education should have fallen into the multiple teaching approach, but they still refuse to incorporate this into their school-based curriculum.

As a typical attitude in Hong Kong, 'People say a lot. Then I see what they will do', our education context falls into this cliché. I hope I will be the one who can initiate the change to IT in education within my school.

Once again, thanks Dr. Paul SZE Man Man for teaching this course wholeheartedly and sagaciously.

Session 11: Engaging Students using Kahoot!

Students treasure the chance that they can instantly interact with teachers in the classrooms and the teachers respond to their initation. Kahoot! then becomes the most popular interactive tool in Hong Kong classrooms.

In the following demonstration, a group of S6 students, who are very interested in the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK), are given a Kahoot! quiz to test on their general knowledge on CUHK. The Kahoot! quiz covers a wide range of areas and faculties, aiming at enhancing students' general knowledge on CUHK!

You can play the Kahoot! via the following link:
https://play.kahoot.it/#/k/bce1ba95-4b2a-481f-8381-f94485e98d07

Session 10 - Using Powtoon and Prezi to Impress Others in Presentations

Microsoft Powerpoint may not be, as the name goes, necessarily powerful. More often, it becomes a cliche that everyone 'abuses' Microsoft Powerpoint. In view of this, two new presentation applications which can be utilized to impress others are introduced here.

The scenario is set as follows: a group of Secondary 6 students listen to a JUPAS talk, which talks about 2 occupations, clinical psychologist and psychiatrist, in school hall. This talk serves the aim to spark their interest in entering the mental health helping profession.

 

The Powtoon Version:

https://www.powtoon.com/c/eTicxCsxLKl/1/p

 

The Prezi Version:

http://prezi.com/14xisy3___3n/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy

Session 9: Using Adobe Spark as a Substitution for Windows Photo Story 3

The Windows Photo Story 3 introduced before is actually quite an old-fashioned software, which may suddenly not be responding when you are spending your effort editing the video, and then you need to close the application forcefully and redo it.

In view of this, Adobe Spark is an updated software which serves similar functions with Windows Photo Story 3. In the following demonstration, I have recreated the Arsenal video with Adobe Spark.

You can access the Adobe Spark video via the following link:

https://spark.adobe.com/video/PO7aT9MrdBMRZ

One fun fact, while loading, the Adobe Spark will show you some re-made famous quotes, which, on one hand, flaunts its advantages, and on other other hand, allows me to rethink and be inspired.

(Actually I have used the above quote 'If you can dream it, you can do it' for printing on the totebag as souvenirs for Shaw College students for my Shawbeat society :D)

Session 8: Using IT to Facilitate Reading - JCloze and ActivelyLearn

Application 1: J-Cloze


C-cloze is another type of gap-filling exercise which provides students a cue 'the beginning letter of the word' and requests students to fill in the remaining letters of the word. Other than hand-writing the exercise, JCloze serves a very good function in realizing the production of C-cloze exercises.

In the following demonstration, a short email excerpt from my reputable professor, Dr. Eunice Tang, is adapted to form the short paragrah for a C-cloze gap filling exercise. You can access the link here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/dtgfq3hwhuihmkk/Transportation_to_CGP_from_Leeds.htm?dl=0

Application 2: Activelylearn.com

Activelylearn.com is such an interactive online tool for students to make good use of IT to facilitate their reading skills. It may be an even more useful too for teachers, since they can conveniently convert their favourite online articles (which they read secretly inside their staff rooms) to an inspirational learning tool!

In the following demonstration, an article from ESPN about my favourite football player, Lucas Perez, is converted into a learning tool by activelylearn.com, aiming at testing students' grasp on main theme gist and meanings of some specific words.

You can access the link here: https://read.activelylearn.com/#student/reader/339621/notes

However, once I have finished producing the exercise, I discovered that students have to complete the designated questions before proceeding to answering the latter questions. Inconveniently, teachers cannot produce questions which require cataphoric reference, which a word in a text refers to another later in the text and they need to look forward to understand. Be careful!



Session 7: Using Screencast-o-matic for Recording Computer Screen

The application Screencast-o-matic makes the implementation of flipped classroom a step closer to reality - Teachers can simply present their prepared Powerpoint on their computers at home and add an audio track to it. Then, a shareable link to students is generated. After students watch the video, other activities can be carried out using the class time for correction of students' misunderstanding (if any) and/or consolidation of the targeted language item.

In the following demonstration, part of my second supervisory lesson in my second teaching practicum is flipped using this useful application.  You can access the video via the following YouTube link:

https://youtu.be/hop2XyDEcw0

I also found that this application (only the FREE version) can act as a good tool for students to practise their oral skills by having a voice-over recording! In the following example, I voice-over the reputable ELED CUHK video (and it really looks hilarious for the voice-over for Ms. Sammi Chan - take a look!) and provide explanations for 2 of the respectable professors - Dr. SZE Man Man Paul and Dr. TANG Lai Yiu Eunice.

You can access the link via the following YouTube link:

http://youtu.be/P-fTifqaB20?hd=1

Session 6: Using Audacity and Photo Story 3 for Oral Activities

Session 6: Using Audacity and Photo Story 3 for Oral Activities

Some students may be too timid to 'show off' their beautiful and/or audacious voice inside their classrooms. Then, some voice recorders are needed to serve as platforms for their demonstration of their oral utterances. Audacity is a good replacement tool for the default Windows sound recorder. In this task, I have recorded the very famous, encouraging quote from Sylvester Stallone.

Feel free to listen to my voice via the following Dropbox link:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/uxgkaolywhcav0e/let%20me%20tell%20you%20something.mp3?dl=0

 

 

Having trained students' 'audacity' in spoken utterances, they can start producing 'photo stories' by the free Windows Photo Story 3. Some people have some misconception towards the idea 'photo story' - They think it has to be self-revealing, telling others their own stories. In fact, this is not. The story can be concerned with something else, something which is of the interest of the students. For example, if a student loves a great person, s/he can narrate a story of him/her; If a student is in love with a drama, s/he can also narrate a descriptive story for the drama series. In these ways, the usage of Photo Story can be varied and extended.

 

Using the same inspirational quote, I have created a photo story (with my audacious voice) for my favourite football team, Arsenal. The video transits from the defeats Arsenal have experienced to the triumphs Arsenal have got, with the assistance of a piece of powerful background music.

 

You can access the video via the following Dropbox link:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/a8ja4mslailfh2i/Arsenal_Photo_Story.wmv?dl=0