A book - Cinderella

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/23303/23303-h/23303-h.htm
So what can you do here?

You can add details to the story and edit it to make it better

• You can add more descriptive language to the story
• You can write words from the text into the glossary if you don't understand them
• You can add definitions to words in the glossary if you do understand them

But most of all I would like you to start writing and adding to the story by writing it from the perspective of the different characters from the text.
Each one has a separate page set up for their version of the events, so please feel free to add to or improve these texts.

So I hope you enjoy the story and feel that you can contribute to enhancing it.

The Cinderella story- open here   http://cinderella-their-story.wetpaint.com/page/The+Cinderella+Story

Writing for Wikipedia

At the beginning of June 2008 Wikipedia was the 7th most visited site on the World Wide Web and in it's English version alone had more than 2,400,000 articles. This activity gets students adding to that number by writing an article for Wikipedia.

Until recently it was very difficult to get your written work published. With the advent of the Web, and more recently, with websites that allow user-generated content it is very easy to publish your own work.

Time to stop and think for a while. Why might it be motivating for learners to publish their work to the web? What kind of articles would your learners have the knowledge to write about?

The following stages describe how to get students publishing to Wikipedia. This idea would run over a series of lessons or even an entire course. It is best to see this as a project rather than something that could be done in one lesson. Some time may be needed to allow students to familiarise themselves with Wikipedia.
By the end of this project students will have published an article about their home city on Wikipedia. Students will need to create an account with Wikipedia to post an article. See the useful links section at the bottom of this page for instructions from Wikipedia on how to create articles and guidance for writing articles.
There are two phases to this idea.

Phase 1
In phases 1 students decide on their topic, write the article and upload it to Wikipedia.
Here is a suggested list of stages:

1. Explain the assignment to the students - that they are going to produce an encyclopedia entry for their hometown on one of the following topics:

• local transportation
• a building (a theatre, mall, landmark etc)
• a local festival
• a suburb or district

2. Students work in small groups and chose a topic and check that no such article exists on Wikipedia. Finding something that has not been written about before could be difficult or easy depending on where the students come from.
3. Students, in their groups, start brainstorming the content of the article.
4. Students write a first draft which is then reviewed by the teacher but not for grammar nor structure. Instead the teacher should give advice on the content.
5. Students work together to produce a version they are happy with.
6. Students post to Wikipedia.

Phase 2

• Phase 2 takes part over the coming lessons and involved tracking the changes that the Wikipedia community have made to the article posted.
• Wikipedia has a Talk feature and students should use this to discuss changes that have been made with the other contributors.
• If possible, it would be a good idea to edit any poor language once the article has been posted on Wikipedia. If this has been possible, ask students to note what language has been changed.

Useful links (all links will open in a new window or tab depending on your browser settings)

Wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_PageGetting started - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:Contents/Getting_started
Writing an article - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Your_first_article

Blogi

Blogging for ELT

Submitted by TE Editor on 6 March, 2005 - 13:00

This article takes a look at blogging, which is becoming increasingly popular as a language learning tool. It gives an overview of blogging websites, suggests why you might want to use them, and gives some practical advice on setting up blogs for use with your own classes.

• What is a blog?

• Types of blogs used in language teaching

• Why blog?

• Where to start

• Tips for managing learner blog settings

• Keeping students interested

• Some ideas for activities

• Pitfalls to watch out for

• Advanced feature

What is a blog?
A blog (short for weblog) is a frequently updated website that often resembles an online journal. It's so easy to create and update a blog - it requires only basic access to the Internet, and a minimum of technical know-how. Because of this, it is one of the easiest ways to publish student writing on the WWW. It's almost as easy as sending an email.

Nowadays, blogs can also display photos and some people are using them with audio and even video, but this article will concentrate on the basics, showing how a simple text-based blog can be used to great effect with your English language learners.

Types of blogs used in language teachingAaron Campbell (2003) has outlined three types of blogs for use with language classes:

• The Tutor Blog is run by the teacher of a class. The content of this type of blog can be limited to syllabus, course information, homework, assignments, etc. Or the teacher may choose to write about his or her life, sharing reflections about the local culture, target culture and language to stimulate online and in-class discussion. In this type of blog, students are normally restricted to being able to write comments to the teacher's posts. A great example of this is Aaron Campbell's own 'The New Tanuki' http://thenewtanuki.blogspot.com/

• The Class Blog is a shared space, with teacher and students being able to write to the main area. It is best used as a collaborative discussion space, an extra-curricular extension of the classroom. Students can be encouraged to reflect in more depth, in writing, on themes touched upon in class. Students are given a greater sense of freedom and involvement than with the tutor blog. A very good example of what has been done with this type of blog is Barbara Dieu's 'Bee Online' http://beeonline.blogspot.com/) and 'Bee Online 2'http://beeonline2.blogspot.com/

• The Learner Blog is the third type of blog and it requires more time and effort from the teacher to both set up and moderate, but is probably the most rewarding. It involves giving each student an individual blog. The benefit of this is that this becomes the student's own personal online space. Students can be encouraged to write frequently about what interests them, and can post comments on other students' blogs. For examples, see the links to learner blogs from the class blog and tutor blog examples above.

Of course, teachers who decide to use blogs often use a combination of Tutor or Class blog and Learner blogs, with hyperlinks connecting them.

Why blog?So, why should you blog with your students? There are many reasons why you may choose to use weblogs with students. One of the best reasons is to provide a real audience for student writing. Usually, the teacher is the only person who reads student writing, and the focus of this reading is usually on form, not content. With weblogs, students can find themselves writing for a real audience that, apart from the teacher, may include their peers, students from other classes, or even other countries, their parents, and potentially anyone with access to the Internet.

Here are some other reasons for using blogs:

• To provide extra reading practice for students.
  This reading can be produced by the teacher, other students in the same class, or, in the case of comments posted to a blog, by people from all over the world.

• As online student learner journals that can be read by their peers. 
  The value of using learner journals has been well documented. Usually they are private channels between teacher and student. Using a blog as a learner journal can increase the audience.

• To guide students to online resources appropriate for their level.
  The Internet has a bewildering array of resources that are potentially useful for your students. The problem is finding and directing your learners to them. For this reason, you can use your tutor blog as a portal for your learners.

• To increase the sense of community in a class.
  A class blog can help foster a feeling of community between the members of a class, especially if learners are sharing information about themselves and their interests, and are responding to what other students are writing.

• To encourage shy students to participate.
  There is evidence to suggest that students who are quiet in class can find their voice when given the opportunity to express themselves in a blog.

• To stimulate out-of-class discussion.
  A blog can be an ideal space for pre-class or post-class discussion. And what students write about in the blog can also be used to promote discussion in class.

• To encourage a process-writing approach. Because students are writing for publication, they are usually more concerned about getting things right, and usually understand the value of rewriting more than if the only audience for their written work is the teacher.

• As an online portfolio of student written work.There is much to be gained from students keeping a portfolio of their work. One example is the ease at which learners can return to previous written work and evaluate the progress they have made during a course.

• To help build a closer relationship between students in large classes.
  Sometimes students in large classes can spend all year studying with the same people without getting to know them well. A blog is another tool that can help bring students together.

Where to startThere are lots of sites where you can set up a blog for free, but perhaps the best known and one of the most reliable and simple blogging tools to use with students is Blogger (http://blogger.com). It takes only fifteen minutes from setting up an account to publishing the first post using this valuable tool.

The teacher sets up the tutor blog or a class blog. With a Class blog, students will need to be invited to participate by e-mail. Learner blog accounts can either be set up beforehand by the teacher, or done at the same time with a whole class in a computer room. The former gives the teacher more control of student accounts, but some advantages of the latter is that learners are given more choice (of username, design of the blog, etc) and a greater sense of 'ownership' of their new virtual writing space.

Tips for managing learner blog settings

• Use the 'Settings' in Blogger to add yourself (under Members) as Administrator of the learner blog. This is invaluable if students later forget usernames or passwords, and can also help if inappropriate posts are published

• Make sure you change the setting and turn the 'Comments' feature on. This will allow the others to respond to things the students write on their learner blogs.

• Also in 'Settings', you will find an option to receive an email whenever a student publishes their blog. This will save you time regularly checking learner blogs to see if any of your students have posted. Another way of being informed of this is to use the 'Site Feed' function (discussed further below).

Keeping students interested
Many teachers who start to use blogs find the novelty factor is enough to create student interest in starting to use them. However, blogs work best when learners get into the habit of using them. If learners are not encouraged to post to their blogs frequently, then they can quickly be abandoned. A failed experiment. Here, the teacher in the role of facilitator is vital for maintaining student interest. Here are some ideas to how this can be done:

• Respond to student posts quickly, writing a short comment related to the content. Ask questions about what the learner writes to create stimulus for writing.

• Students should be actively encouraged to read and respond (through the commenting feature of the blog) to their classmates.

• Writing to the blog could be required, and it may form part of the class assessment. Students should be encouraged to post their writing homework on the blog instead of only giving it to the teacher.

Some ideas for activities

• Mystery guest. Invite another teacher or someone from another school or country as a mystery guest to your blog. Ask the students to engage him or her in dialogue and guess their identity.

• Project work. A blog is an ideal space for developing a project, especially if the project is a shared one between several classes or even classes in different countries.

• International link-ups. Contact another educational establishment to see if they are interested in a joint blogging project. Students can write about their lives, culture, interests, etc, and be encouraged to read about the other class and respond by writing comments.

• Photoblog. If you plan on using photographs in your blog, there are lots of tools available to help you. Flickr (http://www.flickr.com) makes publishing photographs to blogs easy. If you want to make photographs central to the blog, however, it is better to use a blogging tool such as Buzznet (http://www.buzznet.com), which is a photo publishing tool and blog rolled into one.

Pitfalls to watch out for

• Unwanted comments. To avoid unwanted comments, you can always restrict comments to people in the class or to registered bloggers.

• Correction. It is difficult to use a blog for correcting students. Student written work can always be corrected before posting to the blog, or you can do class correction sessions using work published in the blogs.

• Privacy. By their very nature, most blogs are public. Anyone with access to the Web can find and read a blog, and write comments (if this feature has been turned on). If privacy is an issue, then you will be better off using a blogging tool that allows different levels of access rights. Live Journal http://www.livejournal.com is a good choice, and is particularly popular with teenagers . Live Journal allows the setting up of a closed community, which could be restricted to the members of a class or to a wider circle including other classes, parents, etc.

Advanced feature
The easiest way to keep track of a lot of learner blogs is to use the 'Site Feed' feature. You will need to use another piece of software called a newsreader or aggregator to read site feeds. Using a newsreader means your e-mail in-box won't become cluttered with posted messages from students publishing their weblogs. One of the most popular, free web-based newsreaders is Bloglines http://www.bloglines.com.

The BBC and British Council are not responsible for the content of external web sites.

Further reading
Blog-efl. My own blog with information and comments for teachers of EFL/ESL interested in using blogs http://blog-efl.blogspot.com
'Weblogs for use with ESL classes' Campbell AP (2003) http://iteslj.org/Techniques/Campbell-Weblogs.html

If you have any suggestions or tips for using blogs in the class you would like to share on this site, contact us.

Exploring the blogosphere

The blogosphere describes the collective online world of blogs. The blogs listed below are all related to English teaching or education in general. All external links open in a new window.

Blog name	Blog address (URL)
Larry Ferlazzo's websites of the day	http://larryferlazzo.edublogs.org/
Madness in the Method	http://mrscaldwell0.edublogs.org/
Teaching Journal	http://joychou.blogspot.com/
Grammar Guy	http://azargrammar.com/grammarGuy/
Learning technology teacher development blog	http://nikpeachey.blogspot.com/
Mr C’s Class Blog	http://mrcsclassblog.blogspot.com/
Daily English activities	http://daily-english-activities.blogspot.com/
British Council Italy	http://romelfblog.blogspot.com/
Don Ledingham’s Learning Log Blog and URL What’s it about and what themes are covered? Who is the intended audience for the blog? What features are included? Larry Ferlazzo’s websites of the day: http://larryferlazzo.edublogs.org/ Websites that can be useful in English language teaching Storytelling EFL / ESL teachers Feeds Comments Links Favourite links Bookmark tools Madness in the Method: http://mrscaldwell0.edublogs.org/ Class blog with exercises for the students Class students (Their parents?) (Other teachers?) Comments - her students posting comments on the blog posts Bookmark tools Blogroll (suggested links) History Teaching Journal: http://joychou.blogspot.com/ Reflections on her professional development Peers who may be interested in like minded career development Comments – mainly around career development Profile Grammar Guy: http://azargrammar.com/grammarGuy/ From the first post: “This is our chance to discuss troublesome parts of the language, vent frustrations in trying to teach or learn it, talk about pet peeves concerning how the language is used, and offer amusing, insightful observations on this means of communication we call English” Language teachers, linguists Comments including questions regarding grammar Blog is one part of a bigger site. Learning technology teacher development blog: http://nikpeachey.blogspot.com/ Learning technologies websites, applications and the classroom usage of these tools. Language teachers interested in learning technologies Commenting Polls Most read Links Past postings RSS Links to microblogs (Plurk, Twitter) Mr C’s Class Blog: http://mrcsclassblog.blogspot.com/ Classroom content, news about the class and the blog Mr C’s students, their parents and the public Students have their own blogs Comments Inline dictionary (double click on any word) Daily English activities: http://daily-english-activities.blogspot.com/ Activities for English language teachers, pupils, students Simple online activities to improve English and digital literacy EFL/ESL students and teachers For autonomous EFL/ESL learners Comments Polls Links to other blogs Sitemap Ability to print page For Teachers Web 2.0 tools Ability to subscribe British Council Italy : http://romelfblog.blogspot.com/ The aim of this blog is to provide support to students between lessons, giving them advice on how to use the Internet to learn and practise their English. It is not strictly speaking a class blog. Students at the British Council Rome Tag board Comments Links Archive Personal opinions Information on the writer Don Ledingham’s Learning Log: http://edubuzz.org/blogs/donsblog/ A reflective journal focusing on reflective and experiential learning. Teachers Comments Links to other blogs Searchable by category	http://edubuzz.org/blogs/donsblog/

Collaborative stories with Writeboard

Continue the story

This writing activity gets students collaborating on a story using a website called Writeboard (http://www.writeboard.com). It works best with small classes.

Example
Follow this link to see an example. This is a screenshot of an actual Writeboard. A screenshot is used as it is not possible to restrict editing access. Click on the image to see a larger size. 

Lesson plan
Before the lesson

1. Calculate how many groups you will have if students are working in small groups of 3 or 4. You will need to create a separate writeboard for each group.
   
2. Go to writeboard.com and create a new writeboard by filling in the yellow box. If you are going to create a number of different writeboards then use an easy to remember name like writeboard1, writeboard2 etc. Also use the same passwords.

3. Write an opening paragraph for each writeboard. Copy and paste the instructions from the example aboveinto your writeboard page. You will need as many separate writeboards as there are groups.
   
4. Save all the URLs (web addresses) and passwords to a document, allocate one URL to each group. Each writeboard will have the URL available at the top of the page as in the image below. As the URLs are very difficult to type out, it is best to make this document available to your students as a soft (electronic) copy.

In the lesson

1. Put the students into their groups and provide them with a computer.
   
2. Ask students to open a copy of the document with the URLs on and ask them to click on the link that has been assigned to them.
   
3. Ask students to complete the next paragraph of their story. Provide a time limit of 5 minutes for this.
   
4. When the 5 minutes is up, ask the students to save the file.
   
5. Ask students to rotate around the so that they are now at a computer with a different writeboard open.
   
6. Ask them to read the paragraph that has just been written and make any edits necessary. Ask the students to save this edited version.
   
7. Ask the students to return to their original story and decide whether the corrections are correct. They can compare the two versions to do this by checking the version boxes on the right.

8. This process is continued for a couple of rounds, each time the students adding an extra paragraph and another group proof reading it.

Alternative process
Students could rotate around the different computers adding a paragraph to another group's story.

The advantages of doing this on Writeboard

A similar activity could be done using Microsoft Word or any other word processor. However using Writeboard allows students to easily track versions.
As this is web-based the exercise can also be continued by students out of class, something that would be harder to do with Word.

Practising directions with Google Maps

Overview of technology

Google Maps is a free mapping service accessed at http://maps.google.com/. As well as zooming in on any corner of the world it allows users to create directions between any two locations.

Lesson plan Choose an area of your town and print off a map from Google maps that contains two landmarks. In class give students this map and read aloud directions from point A to point B. Students must follow your instructions and say where they are. Ask students to choose two points on the same map and decide how they would provide these directions. Ask students to locate this route on Google Maps and check against the directions provided by Google. Ask students to revise their directions accordingly, then work in pairs giving their partner directions from A to B without showing their partner their map. Their partner must follow the directions on their own map.

Example

An example route, from Trafalgar Square to Piccadilly Circus in London can be seen below:
You can get a handout on using Google Maps by clicking here or on the pdf icon to the left.

Practising tenses using Bubblr

Overview of technology

Bubblr (http://www.pimpampum.net/bubblr) is a tool that allows users to create strips of photos and add text through the addition of speech bubbles.

The images are all from Flickr (http://www.flickr.com), an online photo-sharing website where users can upload their photos and tag them so that they are easily searchable.
Lesson plan
This lesson plan would be used as a revision of tenses.

1. Show students three pre-prepared sentences on a Bubblr strip and ask a student to read the sentences out.
   
   See http://www.pimpampum.net/bubblr/?id=13297 for an example of the verb jump.
   
2. Elicit the tenses used in the sentences.
   
3. Explain to students that they need to think of a verb and come up with their own strip showing the use of the verb in three different tenses.
   
4. Ask students to go to Bubblr (http://www.pimpampum.net/bubblr) and enter their verb (e.g. cook, cooked, cooking) into the Search flickr images by…Tag box.
   
5. Ask students to find three suitable pictures that could be used with three different tenses: one in the present simple, one in the past simple and one in the present continuous.
   
6. Ask students to write their three sentences in speech bubbles – one speech bubble per picture. Ask students to consider carefully which type of speech bubble best illustrates their tense.

Web 2

the Web 2.0 world (all links open in a new window). Have a look at some of these sites and look at the type of interaction that can occur.

• Digg - a news website where users vote on what appears on the front page
• Wikipedia - a user generated encyclopaedia
• YouTube - user generated video sharing website 
• BigThink - a forum for new ideas
• Flickr - a photo sharing website
• TeacherTube - a video sharing website aimed at teachers
• MonkeySee - a user generated 'how to' video site
• Podomatic - a website where users can create their own radio style radio shows
• Voicethread - a tool for discussing files and photos
• VoxSwap - a language exchange site
• Palobea - a language learning site for teachers to teach online
• CourseLab -free e-learning authoring tool

Writing Effective E-Mail: Top 10 Tips

http://jerz.setonhill.edu/writing/e-text/email/

1. Write a meaningful subject line.
2. Keep the message focused.
3. Avoid attachments.
4. Identify yourself clearly.
5. Be kind — don’t flame.
6. Proofread.
7. Don’t assume privacy.
8. Distinguish between formal and informal situations.
9. Respond Promptly.
10. Show Respect and Restraint.

Tools for school link projects

http://www.globalgateway.org.uk/
http://www.elanguages.org/
http://www.rafi.ki/site/
http://www.epals.com/

Worksheets

http://www.educationworld.com/a_tech/tech025.shtml
http://tna.europarchive.org/20080502194716/http://schools.becta.org.uk/index.php?section=cu&catcode=ss_cu_ac_rel_03&rid=7249

A classroom bomb scare

A classroom bomb scare

This idea is similar in concept but is much more of an undertaking, however it can also be a lot more inspiring for students.

The following issues need to be considered.

Planning

• As in any story there needs to be a planning stage. In this example students are using their own photos to create the photo story so first need to storyboard their ideas.

• Once they (and you as the teacher) are happy with their ideas they need to take the photos. This may involve costumes and props and obviously also needs them to have access to a digital camera. If you have many small groups working then you may need multiple cameras or arrange it so that other groups are doing other work whilst one group is taking their photos.
• You then need to arrange the photos to be uploaded to the computers the students will be using to create their photo story. Make sure you create a different folder for each group.
• You also need to be sure that the students have the necessary technical skills to insert the photos into PowerPoint (Insert > Picture > From file...) and add text (the process for adding text is the same as in the video tutorial above).

How to create a story using Clip art

http://courses.britishcouncil.org/pub/learningtechnologies/file.php/10/How_to_create_clip_art/How%20to%20create%20a%20clip%20art%20story640.swf

Activity-how people live

‚ How people live

Use following information to create two texts, one about Bedouin, the other about Bushmen of the Kalahari. You can either use Cut and Paste or drag the text into the boxes.

Be careful: the sentences in each group are not in order!

Starting in the 1950s and 1960s, many Bedouin started to leave the traditional, nomadic life

In 2002, the Botswana government forced all the Bushmen from their lands

The government has given several different justifications for their action:

especially as grazing ranges have shrunk and population levels have grown.

Similarly, government policies in Egypt, oil production in Libya and the Gulf, and a desire for improved standards of living have had the effect that most Bedouin are now settled citizens of various nations,

that it was "to enable them to share in the wealth of the country";

which forced many of them to give up herding for standard jobs.

within the borders of that country and "resettled" them in fixed encampments.

that it was for purposes of nature conservation; that it was too expensive to continue to supply them with water (the water table had been lowered by farming and other development);

rather than nomadic herders and farmers.

In Syria, for example, their way of life effectively ended during a severe drought from 1958 to 1961,

that it was for their own good to become settled and "civilized".

Traditionally they would herd camels, sheep, and goats, while riding on highly prized horses, moving according to the seasons for grazing lands.

Nonetheless, the London Daily Telegraph of October 29, 2005 reported that the government had begun another wave of forced removals.

But a different group, (the Botswana Centre for Human Rights), dispute this, claiming that the Government's motives are simply altruistic, yet misguided.

The Bedouins were traditionally divided into related tribes, each led by a Sheikh.

For centuries and into the early 20th century they were known for their fierce resistance to outside government and influence.

The campaign group Survival International say the real reason for the re-settlement is to free up the land for diamond mining.

‚ How people live – Answer sheet

Cut and paste the following information to create two texts, one about Bedouin, the other about Bushmen of the Kalahari.

Be careful: the sentences in each group are not in order!

Starting in the 1950s and 1960s, many Bedouin started to leave the traditional, nomadic life especially as grazing ranges have shrunk and population levels have grown. The Bedouins were traditionally divided into related tribes, each led by a Sheikh. For centuries and into the early 20th century they were known for their fierce resistance to outside government and influence. Traditionally they would herd camels, sheep, and goats, while riding on highly prized horses, moving according to the seasons for grazing lands. In Syria, for example, their way of life effectively ended during a severe drought from 1958 to 1961, which forced many of them to give up herding for standard jobs. Similarly, government policies in Egypt, oil production in Libya and the Gulf, and a desire for improved standards of living have had the effect that most Bedouin are now settled citizens of various nations, rather than nomadic herders and farmers.

In 2002, the Botswana government forced all the Bushmen from their lands within the borders of that country and "resettled" them in fixed encampments. The government has given several different justifications for their action: that it was for purposes of nature conservation; that it was too expensive to continue to supply them with water (the water table had been lowered by farming and other development); that it was "to enable them to share in the wealth of the country"; that it was for their own good to become settled and "civilized". The campaign group Survival International say the real reason for the re-settlement is to free up the land for diamond mining. But a different group, (the Botswana Centre for Human Rights), dispute this, claiming that the Government's motives are simply altruistic, yet misguided. Nonetheless, the London Daily Telegraph of October 29, 2005 reported that the government had begun another wave of forced removals.