DIGITAL storytelling

Most Popular Posts of the Year - #17, 11 Digital Storytelling Tools

Like a lot of other people are, I'm taking this week to relax a bit and do some things that I haven't had time for lately. Therefore, all this week I'm rewinding the year by republishing the 25 most-read posts of the year. I hope that those of you who are also on vacation this week, enjoy every moment of it. See you (virtually) in the New Year.

Digital storytelling comes in many forms. Digital storytelling could refer to creating podcasts, creating videos, or creating multimedia ebooks to name of few of its forms. If you're considering developing your first digital storytelling project for your class, here some resources that can help you get started.

Ebooks and web references for digital storytelling.
One of the best people I know for advice about digital storytelling is Silvia Tolisano. Silvia Tolisano, the author of the excellent Langwitches blog, offers an awesome free ebook about digital storytelling. Digital Storytelling Tools for Educators is a 120 page guide to using digital storytelling tools in your classroom. The guide offers clear directions for using tools like Audacity, Google Maps, Photo Story, VoiceThread, and other digital media creation tools. Silvia's directions are aided by clearly annotated screenshots of each digital storytelling tool. Digital Storytelling Tools for Educators also provides a good explanation of digital storytelling in general and the benefits of using digital storytelling in your classroom. You can download the ebook for free on Lulu. You can also purchase a paperback copy of the book.

The Digital Storytelling Teacher Guide is a free twenty-eight page ebook produced by Microsoft. The guide outlines the basics of digital storytelling, offers ideas for digital storytelling projects for all grade levels, and provides examples of digital storytelling projects. Microsoft's Digital Storytelling Teacher Guide also offers instruction for using Windows Movie Maker and Photo Story in the classroom.

EXPRESS yourself with the sites

GLOGSTER - Mash up music, photos, videos, & more to express what you care about. Your ideas, your emotions, your Glogster.


WALLWISHER is ideal for making announcements, wishing people, making notes, etc.

CONVERT anything to speech!!!

What do people use ReadTheWords for?

Imagination is the only limit. Our over 100,000 members (and counting) use our text to speech service to create affirmations, create messages for their loved ones, convert books or articles into recordings, create pre-recorded messages for telephone response systems, teach pronunciation to kids, use it as an English learning tool and the list goes on and on.

WRITING letters

Letterwhiz.com is a massive online literary encyclopedia. Check out our database for letter templates, quotes and poems for all occasions, we're constantly adding to it every day.

New Ways to Teach Grammar to ESL Students

5 New Fun Ways to Teach Grammar to ESL Students
 

How to Drill: Drilling Activities for Your English Classroom

How to Drill: Drilling Activities for Your English Classroom

Time Fillers For Your Classroom

Top 10 Time Fillers For Your Classroom

342 Warmers and Fillers

 

 9 Five-Minute Activities That Will Save Your Lesson One Day (And Maybe Your Reputation, Too)

Christmas Lessons

How to Teach a Christmas Lesson Adult Learners Will Never Forget

 How to Teach a Christmas Lesson with Video


Some YouTube videos with Christmas songs
We wish you a merry Christmas

Santa is coming to town

Frosty the snowman

Twelve days of Christmas

Jingle Bells

The Snowman

40 Alternative Assessments for Learning

By: Charity Preston

When people think of assessment, pencils and bubble sheets may be the first things that come to mind. Assessment does not always have to involve paper and pencil, but can instead be a project, an observation, or a task that shows a student has learned the material.

In the end, all we really want to know is that the skill was mastered, right?  Why not make it fun and engaging for students as well?

Many teachers shy away from alternative assessments because they take extra time and effort to create and to grade. On the other hand, once the assessment guidelines and grading rubric are created, it can be filed away and used year after year.

The project card and rubric can be run on card stock (one on each side of the page), laminated, and hole punched with other alternative assessment ideas.  Keep them all together in a binder or with an o-ring.  Assessment just became a snap!

Here are 40 alternative assessment ideas to get you started!

Engaging Classroom Games for All Grades

Engaging Classroom Games for All Grades
318 309

By: Rosshalde Pak



Who doesn’t like to play games? Not only are games fun, interactive, and social, but they're also great tools for learning.



With so many demands placed on educators to always be ‘standards-focused,’ game can seem like more of a distraction than an instructional tool (especially to principals passing by). I know many teachers who shy away from games completely because they don’t want their principal to walk in and say, “Umm, Mrs. Pak, why are your students playing around instead of learning?”



On the other hand, games add flair and student engagement to more tedious, yet necessary tasks like teaching math facts, grammar rules and vocabulary, reviewing for tests or even completing lab experiments. Adding an element of competition motivates and energizes students.



Here are my nine student-favorite games to use in K-12 classrooms.

PAST Simple or Present Perfect

Past Simple or Present Perfect

Five Reasons for Using Authentic Video in the Classroom | TeachingEnglish | British Council | BBC

Five Reasons for Using Authentic Video in the Classroom | TeachingEnglish | British Council | BBC

5 WAYS to speak more naturally

5ways-1

WARMERS

Warmers 1

Warmers

Road To Grammar

Road To Grammar - This blog is an extension of the free website Road To Grammar, at www.roadtogrammar.com - QUIZZES, GAMES, EXTRA PRACTICE, DOWNLOADS

 

NEWSY

NEWSY - MULTISOURCE VIDEO NEWS ANALYSIS

World News
Tens of Thousands in Moscow Call for New Election

The Road to Reading

The Road to Reading is a collection of wallcharts, flash cards, and stories designed to be used as an aid to teaching reading and English grammar.

29 WAYS to stay creative

29 WAYS TO STAY CREATIVE from TO-FU on Vimeo.

TEACHING through movies

Here are some resources for TESL with the help of movies

FilmBlog - a collection of links to the sites with movies content

Fun with Flashcards

Fun with Flashcards

View more presentations from Shelly Terrell

Type with me :a quick educative online collaborative tool

Typewith.me is an online document collaboration tool which works in real time .It is a very important web2.0 tool for teachers and educators .it is free , easy , simple to use and above all doesn’t need any registration .It has a cool functionality that allows users to work on the same document and at the same time. This feature reminds us of google document which also offers several services like collaboration,sharing, and online editing .I have already covered how we can use google docs to its utmost in Google Docs in Education.
It is Thanks to Chris Pirillo along with his friend Jake Waner  that typewith.me has  seen the light .It becomes the best alternative to the famous Etherpad which has been shut down recently by Google.

You can read the whole article here

Why You Should Always Start With a Warmer

Why You Should Always Start With a Warmer

Education World: Bullying and Cyberbullying: What Teachers Can Do

Education World: Bullying and Cyberbullying: What Teachers Can Do

Wordle Ideas

Wordle Ideas

View more presentations from ProjectsByJen.com

40 Ict Ideas In 40 Minutes

 

40 Ict Ideas In 40 Minutes

View more presentations from EffectiveICT.co.uk

TENSES Table

Verb Development Chart

How Often Do You...? Cards

How Often Do You...? Cards

 A set of cards to help students memorize the structure ´How often do you...?, leisure activities vocabulary and to practice adverbs of frequency.

Procedure for playing the game:
1. Copy and cut out the cards. You will need a copy for everyone in class.
2. Divide your class into groups 4-6 students.
3. Give each student copies of the cards. These are faced down on the table in the middle of the group.
4. Students take it in turns to pick up a card then ask someone how often they do this particular activity. The student answers with an appropriate adverb of frequency. The activity continues with the next person in the group.
5. Set a definite time limit and stop the students at the end of it, whether they have finish or not.
6. The game can .be scored by assigning one point for each correct answer.
7. The game ends when the limit time is reached. The winner is the group which has scored more points.


Using the frequency adverbs cards:

1. Each group is given a set of frequency adverbs cards. Again they are face down on the table. This time instead of asking question, the student makes a statement using the particular frequency adverb.
E.g. I often play chess.

MIXTAPE.me

ABOUT MIXTAPE.me

The internet makes it easy to share anything with anyone across the globe in a heartbeat; it's about time music joined the party.

Welcome to MixTape.me from MixTape.me on Vimeo.

Fun and Games in the ESL Classroom

Fun and Games in the ESL Classroom: Designing Your Own Games

10 Things You Can Do With Game Pieces

Powerpoint for teachers

TESL with newspapers

ACTIVITIES FOR BEGINNING STUDENTS 
--Have students cut out pictures of things they like in the newspaper and then write sentences about the pictures. 
--Read a few scores from the sports page and have students write them down. 
--Find numbers in newspaper advertisements that deal with money and have students practice reading the prices aloud. 
--Using pictures found in the newspaper, have students write sentences about the pictures using prepositions to describe the spatial relationships. 
--Discuss an issue found in an editorial that may be pertinent to students' lives. 

IDIOMS

The Teacher presents the idioms (learn the idioms with BBC)

CREATE your own stories

RESOURCES that help create comics, stories, animated cards and greetings

CardFunk - create animated cards and video greetings

Tikatok - create your own book, it's easy!

Magnoto - make your photos, notes, small videos and audios magnetic in the web - just like sticking them on your refridgerator door!

StoryJumper is a place to create and discover stories for kids.

Examples of created books are here.

Finetuna - Add Text to Pictures

Podcasts

Podcasting 101 -- How Educators Can Use This New Technology - an article


Articles on listening - British Council

TUTORIALS

ELT/ESL Training Videos

 Glogster on-line training videos

 Dvolver on-line training videos

Voice Thread on-line training videos

Online tools and applications

GO2WEB2.0.net   - http://www.go2web20.net/ 

Using Online Tools To Research, Organise And Process Information

Online tools to help students research, organise and process information.

Using Online Tools To Research, Organise And Process Information

View more presentations from S. Hendy

100 most common words in English

GRAMMAR in context

TEFL Online Tutorial: Teaching Grammar in Context

 

GAMES in the learning process

Here are some suggestions on how to create fun and engaging learning opportunities using games.

3 Fun Games to use in the Classroom

View more presentations from S. Hendy

TAG CLOUDS for your blog

A tutorial on how to create a tagul word cloud use the tags from your blog

Create a Tagul World Cloud for your Blog

View more presentations from S. Hendy

WEB TOOLS for the classroom

Current & former teachers offer suggestions for web-based and mobile apps they have found useful in their classrooms.

60 apps in 60 minutes

View more presentations from Michael M Grant

COMICS for learning purposes

This presentation offers ideas on how to use comics in the classroom and a list of online comic creators

Online Comic Creators

View more presentations from S. Hendy

Photo Fun

Now I'd like to record the links to amazing resources that let us edit our photos.
PHOTOFUNIA is a wonderful site with lots of free special effects. Here's my first steps in working with this program

WORDLE

Wordle is a toy for generating “word clouds” from text that you provide. The clouds give greater prominence to words that appear more frequently in the source text. You can tweak your clouds with different fonts, layouts, and color schemes. The images you create with Wordle are yours to use however you like. You can print them out, or save them to the Wordle gallery to share with your friends.


Here is the word cloud of the previous text.

VocabAhead

VocabAhead is a resource to study vocabulary with video clips.

Word of the Day is a free Vocabulary Video every day.

You can visit the Study Room that makes it fun and easy to build Vocabulary for SAT, GRE and ACT words. Whether you create your own word lists or share your lists with your friends or students, this clean innovative interface makes all tasks easy! Frequently Test yourself by taking Quizzes and use Flash Cards for a quick review

FILM EDUCATION

One more resource to use in the classroom suggests using film clips in teaching English - FILM EDUCATION.
From the site:
Film Education provides award-winning teaching resources, teacher training and cinema based events which support the use of film within the curriculum.
 Our free resources cover a wide range of curriculum areas and include film clips, Teachers' Notes and a range of activities.

One of my favourites - THE KING'S SPEECH -  here you can find Study guide, an interview with the film's director Tom Hooper and lead actor Colin Firth and questions to it, clip activities and even a link to the real King George VI's speech.

VIDEO RESOURCES for teaching

I'd like to represent some video resources that help make the English lessons more informative and beneficial.

1. CNN Student News - CNN Student News utilizes CNN's worldwide resources to bring each day's top news stories to middle and high school classrooms. The 10-minute, commercial-free program encourages student participation and provides classes with context for understanding current events.
 What is CNN Student News? 
Yesterday's news report

2. ESL Basics -
ESLbasics brings English to life through hundreds of ESL/EFL/TESOL videos.
  They have hundreds of ESL/EFL/TESOL videos, including:
* Vocabulary
* TOEFL Preparation
* Idioms * Phrasal Verbs
* Business English
* Teacher Tips and Activities

XTRANORMAL

Today I'd like to tell you about one more interesting resource Xtranormal - its mission is to bring movie-making to the people. Xtranormal revolutionary approach to movie-making builds on an almost universally held skill - typing. You type something; Xtranormal turns it into a movie. On the web and on the desktop.

My Address to the Students

Here you can watch Xtranormal on-line training videos

2011 TOP 100 tools

I like very much the presentation from the site “Learning in the Social Workplace”. You can find it using this link:    » 2011 Top 100 Tools List and Presentation finalised.

Top 100 Tools for Learning 2011

View more presentations from Jane Hart

Jane Hart has made a great contribution to the systematization of tech tools for EFL. They are really GREAT!!!!
And one more classification  of tools

Best of Breed Tools for Learning 2011

according to their functions.



Love,

Inna

IDEAS to inspire

I’d like to start with this resource  IDEAS TO INSPIRE as it seems to me very informative and up-to-date. One can find dozens of ideas how to use Class Blogging for teaching English, or Wikis, or to get familiar with a new kind of presentations Prezi. I often look through this site for ideas.

HELLO, everyone!!!!

I’m Inna Makovleva, an English teacher from Moscow, Russia. My students are in 2, 4, 6, 9 adn 11 grades. There’re nearly 11-14 students in each group. They enjoy learning English and I hope blogging will make this process more interesting.
Our school isn’t large, but cosy and homelike. There’re about 550 children. It caters for students from Year 1 to Year 11 (7-17 years old).

           And these are my students!!!!
This is our school
I’ve been taking an online course “Learning Technologies in the Classroom” for a couple of months. From this course I’ve learnt about WEB 2.0, various tech tools for teachers and I’d like to collect all the information here on my blog.
Love,
Inna