Using Software tools to enhance language learning

I have been doing some research and have found some fun tools that students could use to enhance their language learning:

• Word of the day This could be a fun little thing that students could look up and learn on top of what they do in class
• Babbel the vocabulary trainer here is especially fun to use, best of all the entire package is free. While this is a great tool I don't know how great it would be in a classroom, I think I would just use things like the vocab trainer etc... since I think that real conversation is extremely important in order to learn a language
  
• games are a fun way to get students to have fun in the class room
• This game would be a great vocab review, I think I would use it and try to see who can get the best score!
• this site is fun but I would use it for younger students it's nice because you can click on things and they are said a loud and so the student can hear what it should sound like.
  

These tools are great and I would want to use them, but we would have to make sure that students can be in a lab to use all these tools. We would also have to make sure that students don't just go looking for tools on their own, I found somethings that I wouldn't want students to use like a German "Russian roulette" chat etc...

Video project

Making this video was a ton of work. It took probably 6-8 hours. But in the end I like how it turned out. If it were up to me the video would be a bit longer and in more detail (about 4 minutes long). I would use this in a classroom setting on a "culture Friday" (in the Utah curriculum it is expected that students learn about the culture of the target language and I think that something such as a culture Friday is a must!) I would talk about the history of the pastry and then show the video. I would then hand out the pastries that I made and then as a class talk about what we think and compare it to the American culture. I don't know how often I would make these videos since they are so time consuming, but for recipes I like the idea that students can go home and do it on their own and share with friends and family.

Video Chat

This is my brother in Germany. We chat every week via MSN messenger. This time; however, I can't seem to find my webcam. As soon as I find where my daughter hid it I will take a screen shot of my in the picture as well.

I love using MSN messenger. On my computer it is a lot faster than skype. And my family in Germany somehow can't get the microphone working on skype, but there's never a problem on MSN messenger.

To be honest I don't think I'll use this in my classroom unless my student is sick and I can't go see the student or the parents can't come get the homework and the student doesn't have friends that can come help. But I think it would just be easier to meet with a student before or after school if the student has questions.

Making videos

I have decided that I will be using windows live movie maker for my video (project#2) and it's going to be a video of how to make my favorite french pastry. (Since language classes are also about learning about the culture). The recipe I'll be using is from my baking blog http://lapatisseriejessica.blogspot.com I will be following the steps exactly as shown on the recipe, but since the video is only a few minutes we will have to fast forward some parts. I will also be explaining the history behind this pastry and it's meaning in France.
So far the biggest problem I've been having, is getting so much information in just 1-3 minutes, but I think it makes sense to have that short of a video, how wants to pay attention to something for more than 3 minutes? I've worked on this for about an hour... And the recipe itself takes about 28 hours... so I'll have to make sure to bake it on a Saturday so that I have time to edit the video etc...

Classroom Website

I have set up a sample classroom website at

http://mrsbryansclassroom/home

I decided to use google sites and am glad I did. I recommend that people who like things simple but nice use google sites.

asynchronous and synchronous learning

I really enjoyed using google wave to have a class discussion and creating a document. It reminded me a bit about google docs, just faster and you can see who said what. It was really nice to know that you can work all together no matter where you are.

Using a Website for my Classroom

I have created a test website for a future classroom.

http:/mrsbryansclassroom/home

I think it would be a great tool to have a class website, so that you can post all assignments, you can have a class calendar with all the due dates that your students need to be aware of, you could post study guides. I think it's important to have many different options for your students. While some people from an older generation might prefer to have a calendar on paper, someone from the new generation might rather have an online calendar since he is online all the time and that way he can't lose it, and most importantly his dog can't eat your online calendar ;)

Using A Blog in a Classroom

Blogs can be used for many different reasons. Using a blog in your classroom can be very useful. Here are some ideas:

• You can create polls and have students anonymously respond
• Have easy homework assignments such as a one sentence answer to a question
• You can share useful websites with your students
• Explain homework assignments in details
• Have a calendar of when assignments are done
• Post "how to videos"