Reading Reflection for session 4 - blogging

Godwin-Jones, R. (2006). Tag clouds in the blogosphere: electronic literacy and social networking. Language Learning & Technology, 10(2), 8-15.

The picture above is tag cloud from flickr. The tagging process is a way of categorizing resources. The user of the site can find common interests in the tag cloud. The web is a place for users to get benefit and contribute. The users have to do a lot of reading and writing in discussion forums and when they give feedback and comment in the social networking site.

Blogs are the places to encourage readers to give feeback, so it is a kind of reading and writing activity. Writing on blogs encourages debate, critical analysis and articulation of ideas and opinions. IT is so common to write blogs in the recent years. It has been estimated that around 70,00 new blogs are created every day. The blogs can also integrated with other tools and services. Blogs offer reading and writing practice with informal language everyday. There are a lot of different types of electronic texts on the Internet, such as e-books, online dictionaries, encyclopedias. After the students read the texts online, teachers can give them comprehension questions to test students' understanding.

It is so popular to have a blog for personal use or business use or educational use, etc. nowadays. Some teachers may ask students to have daily or weekly writing. The aim is to let students practise writing more and let the teachers know more about their personal thinking. Some teachers may give them a topic to write about from time to time to train up their writing skills. Some teachers may give them a passage to read and answer some questions about the article to practise their reading skills. No matter which ways to practise students' reading and writing, I think writing on a blog can help achieve the aims of the above. Comparing to writing on an exercise book, the advantage of writing on a blog is more interactive and pictures, cliparts, video also can be put onto it. The other classmates also can read it and give feedback. So, I quite recommend my students using blogs to do the reading and writing exercises.

Essential Reading Reflection for session 11

Schwienhorst, K. (2003). Learner Autonomy and Tandem Learning: Putting Principles Into Practice in Synchronous and Asynchronous Telecommunications Environments. Computer Assisted Language Learning, 16(5), 427-443.

It first clarifies the misconception of “learner autonomy”.It discusses three different approaches to learner autonomy: an individual cognitive perspective which focus on reflection and awareness; a social-interactive perspective which focus on interaction; an experimental-participatory perspective which focus on involving the learner in creating less stressed learning environments and experiment with cognitive tools.
Then, it introduces tandem learning as an implementation of learner automomy principles. The main principles of tandem learning are learner autonomy, reciprocity, using bilingualism.


Synchronous and asynchronous telecommunications environments are just like chatting in a chat room and sending emails to others respectively.

I think social interaction approach is very common in HK’s classroom. We can have asynchronous and/or synchronous communication modes with the NET and peers. HK’s schools almost promote project-based group work to encourage personally meaningful interaction.

Reading reflection for session 6

Reading reflection for session 6

Hubbard, P. (1988). An integrated framework for CALL courseware evaluation. CALICO Journal, 6(2), 51-72.



This article is about the evaluation of courseware for CALL. It provides a good and structure framework to evaluate the advantages and disadvantages of the courseware. The three major sections of the framework are operational description, learner fit and teacher fit. The function of the operational description in the framework is to provide an objective and detailed view of the operation of the software and various accompanying elements, such as activity type, screen layout, input judging, feedback, help options, recording keeping, accompanying text, etc. In the framework, teacher fit refers to the notion of approach and learner fit corresponds to Richards and Rodger's design.

Actually, it is a very detail framework for teachers to evaluate a courseware. Just like Hotpotatoes, we can use this framework to analyze Hotpotatoes 's advantages and disadvantages and limitations. It helps teachers decide to use it or not to satisfy their needs.

Reading Reflection for session 5

Chapelle, C. A. (1998). Multimedia CALL: Lessons to be learned from research on instructed SLA. Language Learning and Technology, 2(1), 22-34.

It states that the design and evaluation of CALL learning activities are interdependent. It gives the readers the relevant hypotheses about SLA (Second Language Acquisition). Basic components in the SLA porcess in interactionist research are illustrated by a flow chart. The flow starts from "input", "apperception", "comprehension", intake", "integration" to "output". It elaborates each step one by one and give a detail explanation. Based on the model of SLA, seven hypotheses relevant for developing multimedia CALL are elaborated. And it suggests some implications for multimedia task design and the evaluation of multimedia CALL activities.

This paper attempted to point out some specific implications of research findings for CALL design and evaluation that can provide a guideline for development of SLA research with CALL practice. I think it is worth to read as a reference for teachers to develop multimedia CALL teaching and learning because it gives a detail guideline of integrating multimedia CALL into SLA lessons and helps teachers to choose a good CALL software for meeting students' needs. For example, the CALL software should be able to analyze the mistakes the students made by the software. Because sometimes there are a few acceptable answers for a questions. The CALL software should be able to detect the acceptable answers and the incorrect answers and the minor mistakes. This is one of the conditions the authentic CALL software should have.

Essential Reading Reflection for session 4

As I could not log in the run run shaw library, I did not read the essential reading. But I downloaded it from City U the next day.

Roed, J. (2003). Language Learner Behaviour in a Virtual Environment. Computer Assisted Language Learning, 16(2-3), 155-172.

This is the study to investigate the behaviour of language learners communication via computers. 13 first and second year students of Danish were put into the same room and communicate through a chat room in WebCT. The aim of the task was for the students to interview each other and find out the identities of their fellow guests. As the result, the study shows there are a number of advantages for language students when working online. There is no accent to be distracted by. There is no time pressure and no interruptions from students or teachers. The shy and introvert langauge students speak up and talk freely in the chat room while they are anxious to speak up in the classroom. They are equally important when they are online. They are confident to embark on conversation in the target language. It allows full participation.

I think talking online is a really good way for the shy people to express themselves and communicate with others. So, I would like to encourage my students to commuicate with me through msn or email. The purpose is to build up the relationship with them, to keep good relationship and to collect their opinions for my teaching. I hope that they would reflect their learning difficulties to me in order to improve my teaching. However, I think we cannot have an English lesson only through a chat room even working online has its advantages. Because learning a language needs a variety of practices, like trying to pronunce the words, listening and communicating with others. But with no doubts, it s a good tool for a causal talk between teachers and students.

Reading Reflection for session 4

Chinnery, G. M. (2006). Going to the MALL: Mobile Assisted Language Learning. Language Learning & Technology, 10(1), 9-16.

Because I was not able to log in run run shaw library, I could not download the essential reading "Language Learner Behaviour in a Virtual Environment". But I read the above one instead.

It introduces how mobile learning (m-learning) work in language teaching and learning. It discusses about benefits of m-learning and challenges are reviewed. It also argues against "technology-driven pedagogy". It encourages us that we should have a thoughtful application of second language pedagogy first. Then, we consider how to effectively use of the technology tool.

The advantages and the limitations of using the portable media, such as cell phones, PDAs, iPods in language teaching and learning were introduced. Numbers of studies done by the scholars showed the practical uses of mobile technologies and supported that the tools could help learning effectively. The main limitation is that the costs to educational institutions of purchasing the tools are very high.

In HK, some schools are trying out m-learning for a particular subject and a particular class. The school was assisted by the government with a great amount of money to buy Palms for every student in that particular class. They have lessons and do projects outside the classroom with Palms. When the teachers upload the information to the Internet, all of the students can get it immediately by downloading from the Internet with their Palms. I think it s really a good idea to use a mobile media device to learn as it is fast, updated, convenient and learning is not limited by space. I can get the most updated news or information I want to learn wherever I am. But it is not common to use mobile technology in HK's classroom. The first limitation is the high cost. The second is that the teachers and students are not familiar with mobile learning.

Reading Reflection for session 3

Warschauer, M., Shetzer, H., & Meloni, C. F. (2000). Internet for English teaching: TESOL Alexandria, VA. [Chapter 7]

I'm responsible for the section on teaching guidelines.

Five teaching guidelines are introduced to help us organize our classes to achieve the goals of incorporating the Internet into teaching. They are "dual immersion", "integration", "project-based learning", "student-centred learning" and "learning with a purpose".

Dual immersion refers to students engage in learning language skills and technology skills at the same time with the teachers' help. The teacher may provide the necessary structure and support in the lesson. It is as same as an electronic literacy approach.

CALL(computer-assisted language learning) has gone through three stages: behavioristic, communicative, and integrative. Integrative CALL means using the computer naturally and regularly together with other tools and media "serving the creation of an enriched workplace for accessing resources and using language constructively" (Barson & Debski, 1996, p. 52). Internet-based activities should not be used in an isolated way. It should be involved in the entired curriculum.

Project-based learning is a kind of integrated teaching and learning. Students can solve problems and achieve their learning goals by using the Internet. The Internet activities they can learn must move beyond simple chatting or Web surfing. Teachers can require students do more on the Internet, such as on-line publication.

Student-centred learning does not mean that teacher is absent or passive but they become a guidance to lead students' learning. Curriculum should be designed according to students' needs and interests.

To use Internet with a meaningful purpose, student projects should be connected with a real-world purpose. That helps students access the important information and communicate with the real audience on Internet.

I think IT in language teaching is not new to us because the government promoted IT in teaching 10 years ago and it spent a great amount of money for schools to buy computers. That's why there is at least a computer room in every primary and secondary school. The students in teacher training programmes were required to achieve a certain level of IT skills. However, we seldom consider how to use IT to teach language in a better and efficient way. The most I consider is about project-based learning in general studies because primary students usually do at least one project for this subject every year.