Week 3 :Reflections

Week three is almost over and I realized how much it has been challenging and fruitful as the preceding ones . I first created my delicious page . It took me a couple of minutes to enrich it with some bookmarks , sites which would help my colleagues and me to elaborate our final project . I came to the conclusion that this delicious page ,which is really delicious , is going to allow me to save my bookmarks even when I formate my computer and exchange my bookmarks with the community of teachers.
I had fun enriching it with the different sites communicated by my colleagues via the discussion based on skill building websites and CALLS for listening , speaking and pronunciation . The discussions were a space for sharing teaching materials , experiences about what works and what doesn't , what might help students learning and what might hinder it . These discussions are going to be a platform to our tasks for the coming weeks . Though my school is not very " Technologically " equipped, I'm beginning to apply what I 'm learning and this change in my teaching will be for great benefit for my students and my 3 other colleagues who teach with me at the same school who are sometimes reluctant about he use of technology in their classes .

Week 2 reflection

Week 2 :
Discussion on the topics suggested by Deborah and Sandra this week has been very rich . I can say that I have learnt very much about schools in different parts of the world and how it works there . We certainly come from different countries , different cultures . Our classes are set differently . We deal with students from different ages , cultural backgrounds and objectives . Some of us work under very tricky conditions . Others have the chance to use very sophisticated and high tech teaching aids .Some teacher have the chance to work with very small groups , others have large classes . But I think we all share the same objective which is improving our students performances in English by introducing and using computer technology and Internet..

Different countries have different educational finalities and work with different approaches . But another aspect that makes us one community is that from now one we are going to formulate our objective in the same way using the ABCD approach .
We had a lot of fun posting our objectives , asking friends and colleagues to comment about them and reformulate them .The debate was great due to the fact that it was dominated by a lot of collaboration , commitment , group spirit . with no taboo , no prejudices . And that , really , reinforced our relationship Now , I'm convinced that we have become a strong community . Whoever you are , Amjed , Nina , Manana or Mohamed , wherever you are in Japan , Haiti , Ecuador or Bulgaria you have been and you are going to be of great help and what I learn from you is going to have an important impact on my teaching . Thank you .

Another dominating point this week was the NoodleTools and which , according to my colleagues ,can be beneficial to us with the wide variety of web sites it offers , the limitless number of teaching materials it provides and how much it can help us gaining time in searching . So again and again , thank you Sandra , thank you Deborah .

Week 1 : Reflection

The discussion on the use of blogs in teaching English and which I had with my friends and colleagues during last week was one of the most interesting debate I have never had during my teaching career . I have leant a lot about the benefits of integrating blogs in language classes and the discussion generated a limitless number of activities that can be used by language teachers .
At the beginning my worries were how to involve some of my students with poor computer skills in blogging activities . The teacher community helped me . Today I know that the success of the task doesn't depend on my students computer skills but it depends on my class management , the choice of the activities and my objectives .
It is clear now that blogging improves students writing , reading , speaking and listening . As the Algerian education policy is based on the competency based approach , blogging will not only allow me to integrate the four skills ( reading , writing , listening and speaking ) and thus gain time but it will also help me involve as many students as possible in the learning process . They will become responsible for their learning , monitoring the activities themselves and learning from each other . In this way , I'll improve the three competencies which are the objectives of leaning English in Algeria , that's to say : interpreting , producing and interacting . I think that my students will certainly use their blogs for presenting their projects and exchanging information with each other .
I'm looking forward trying blogging activities in my class the coming weeks . Once more thank you !

A survey findings

Once the discussion about the use of blogs had started , with the advantages of blogs and the limitless numbers of activities it generated , I was very motivated in using them in my classes . I 'm in charge of 5 classes at a secondary school in Algeria . My classes are quite large with a number of students sometimes exceeding 40 . I wanted to try the experience of blogging in my classes . Because of the important number of students I teach , I decided to try what I have leant with a class . I opted for a class with the least number of students ( 32 students ) and the one which in my opinion is the slowest and the least motivated concerning learning English .
I conducted a survey about computer skills and Internet use . When I handed the papers to the students and explained what it was meant by this survey , they showed great excitement and responded positively to the task .
While studying their answers , I was surprised to discover that 7 of the 32 students have no computer skills and do not have access to Internet .
Only 13 have the opportunity to have Internet at home and 20 of them said they had e-mail addresses . 6 of the students interviewed have personal blogs and 10 of them have Facebook accounts . Most of the students think using Internet can be beneficial for them especially for learning languages ( Arabic , English and French )

Action Points : Next week I intend to take this class to the school computer room , make the students who have no e-mail account , create one and help the students who have no computer skills to have their first step in Internet . I know the task is difficult but I 'm determined to involve all the students in this amazing experience of learning . I'll split the class into groups and involve the students with good computer skills in helping their classmates . It's important to mention that our school has been equipped with Internet recently and that there are only 16 computers in the room . The challenge is tough but it's worth trying !

Thank you !

First of all , I would like to thank Deborah , Sandra from Eugene University and the staff working for them for all their commitment and their effort in building this community of teachers from different part of the world , learning and setting a common objective which is improving their teaching and involving as many students as possible into an E class . I 'm very grateful to you all , my colleagues . I have learnt so much from you and I'm sure the common weeks will be very fruitful in exchange and collaboration .

Welcome to you all !
When can I have a look at your blogs !