English as a Second Language

http://esl.about.com/gi/o.htm?zi=1/XJ/Ya&zTi=1&sdn=esl&cdn=education&tm=322&gps=99_1020_1419_695&f=10&tt=14&bt=1&bts=1&zu=http%3A//yourenglishstudio.blogsome.com/

This is a crazy blog with a great otter video. I like the idea of showing something fun like this and then letting your English students write about it. I think it lends to more creativity than an essay about some topic that requires research.

http://esl.about.com/gi/o.htm?zi=1/XJ/Ya&zTi=1&sdn=esl&cdn=education&tm=595&gps=67_1463_1419_695&f=10&tt=14&bt=1&bts=1&zu=http%3A//azargrammar.com/grammarGuy/

Easily, my favorite comedian was George Carlin. I especially enjoyed the way he picked on the English language. Whether it was oxymorons of “jumbo shrimp” and “military intelligence”, or “errors” versus “fowels” in sports, he was always right on target. As an English teacher, you’re often taken to task, as in this blog, which asks, “How can “fat chance” and “slim chance” mean the same thing?”

http://esl.about.com/gi/o.htm?zi=1/XJ/Ya&zTi=1&sdn=esl&cdn=education&tm=1005&gps=119_1935_1419_695&f=10&tt=14&bt=1&bts=1&zu=http%3A//separatedbyacommonlanguage.blogspot.com/

Here’s another favorite topic. British English versus American English, and, I would add, Brooklyn English versus Dallas English. I often told students, as they were struggling with pronunciation, not to sweat it. If I put someone from London, someone from Dallas and someone from Brooklyn in the same room, they wouldn’t be able to understand each other either.

Blogs in Education

http://esl.about.com/gi/o.htm?zi=1/XJ/Ya&zTi=1&sdn=esl&cdn=education&tm=322&gps=99_1020_1419_695&f=10&tt=14&bt=1&bts=1&zu=http%3A//yourenglishstudio.blogsome.com/

This is a crazy blog with a great otter video. I like the idea of showing something fun like this and then letting your English students write about it. I think it lends to more creativity than an essay about some topic that requires research.

http://esl.about.com/gi/o.htm?zi=1/XJ/Ya&zTi=1&sdn=esl&cdn=education&tm=595&gps=67_1463_1419_695&f=10&tt=14&bt=1&bts=1&zu=http%3A//azargrammar.com/grammarGuy/

Easily, my favorite comedian was George Carlin. I especially enjoyed the way he picked on the English language. Whether it was oxymorons of “jumbo shrimp” and “military intelligence”, or “errors” versus “fowels” in sports, he was always right on target. As an English teacher, you’re often taken to task, as in this blog, which asks, “How can “fat chance” and “slim chance” mean the same thing?”

http://esl.about.com/gi/o.htm?zi=1/XJ/Ya&zTi=1&sdn=esl&cdn=education&tm=1005&gps=119_1935_1419_695&f=10&tt=14&bt=1&bts=1&zu=http%3A//separatedbyacommonlanguage.blogspot.com/

Here’s another favorite topic. British English versus American English, and, I would add, Brooklyn English versus Dallas English. I often told students, as they were struggling with pronunciation, not to sweat it. If I put someone from London, someone from Dallas and someone from Brooklyn in the same room, they wouldn’t be able to understand each other either.

Use of b;ogs in Education

Blogs in Education
Martha Mays
EDU255
02/14/10

1) How can you see blogs being used in a F2F class as well as an online course?

Blogs can be used to give the teacher immediate feedback on their success in getting their lesson across successfully. If some students are confused or if the pace is too quick, or too slow, the teacher can adapt to the needs of his students.

Blogs can be used for assignments, as a means for the teacher to assess what level of computer skill/savvy her students possess. Often, for example, the teacher may have older students who are not very computer knowledgeable.

For an online class, the teacher is also able to access how the students are disseminating the assignments. Is the workload too much or too little, for example, or are the assignments poorly explained, leaving the student to ask, “What am I supposed to be doing?”

2) What are the benefits of using a blog over another medium?
Up-to-date feedback, so the teaching methods can be customized to illicit the optimum learning for the students. Other methods could include email or F2F meeting, but our society has become so needy for immediate gratification that a blog may be the best method of communication.

2) What are the challenges of using a blog in education?

In a learning environment like YC, teachers are often working with “older” students who may lack the technological ability to us all that the Internet and computers have to offer. This can create a level of frustration that may turn a “returning” older student off to pursuing a new subject or even a degree by giving the sense the “technology has passed me by” or the “old dog, new tricks” theory of evolution with returning students.

My Teaching Phylosophy

Teaching Philosophy
Martha Mays
EDU255
2/14/10

I am a certified K-12 teacher with an endorsement in ELL – English Language Learners (formerly ESL- English as a Second Language). For those of you who learned a second langue, Spanish, French, German or something else, I am the teacher of students who need to learn English.

The “Old School” method was traditionally classroom based and if you were lucky, you had a “Language Lab” where you’d put on a huge set of headphones and listen to tapes of the language you were learning. You were also usually taught reading and writing of the same language in the class. Depending on your age and location, as laws and language teaching theories varied state-by-state, you experienced emersion, translation or any other form of the new “it” way to learn, as dictated by the state or local school board.

My philosophy of teaching had always varied, depending upon the age, level of knowledge and reason for why the student was learning English. Due to my physical location, I have always been working with a native Spanish speaking population, sometimes children and sometimes adults. English always represented a tool, much like a carpenter needs to know how to use a speed square, drill and measuring tape in order to be successful in her trade. For a six-year-old, the learning of English was necessary in order to learn everything you needed to survive and succeed in school. For an adult, the working knowledge of English represented new and better employment opportunities and a path to a better future.

I’ve been an English teacher for over thirty years in a variety of settings. I’m personally excited about the advancements in technology and their applications in a language-learning environment. Many language courses are now taught online in an audio and visual context. The use of all new media tools can easily be adapted for language learning. Access to a computer is really the only roadblock to language learning, as well as residency in some states.

Catch up - A Week Late

Maestra
Always
Reaching
Towards
Higher
Awareness

After the dizzying affects of the opening weeks of the new semester in my new position, I realized I was already behind. Oh So Sorry.

Now I'm going for a hike up Sycamore Canyon, having spent the afternoon at the Pecan & Wine Festival in Camp Verde, representing Yavapai College.

Tonight, dinner out and going to enjoy the Ordo Sakhna, a theatre troupe from
Kyrgyzstan.

Here's a link: http://www.myspace.com/ordosakhna

Looking forward to it :)

M

Martha's 1st Blog Post

I'm experimenting w/a couple things.
Here's the link experiment