Haga clic aquí para la traducción al español (Google Translate) Introduction As universities & colleges seek to internationalise, English is becoming established as the de facto common medium of instruction, communication, & participation. English language teachers in EAP departments frequently note that students have broad repertoires of vocabulary & can parse complex grammar structures with… Continue reading Integrating extramural English: Developing stronger communicative proficiency in universities & colleges
Category: Multimedia
Ensuring success for adult EFL students
Haga clic aquí para la traducción al español (Google Translate) Introduction In Spain & in many other countries, English language academies play an important role in supplementing the instruction pupils receive in schools. For children & adolescents, academies function largely as after-school “top-up” lessons. Since school-based English classes often amount to only 2-4 hours per… Continue reading Ensuring success for adult EFL students
The transformative potential of open educational resources in English language teaching: Benefits for organisations, teachers, & students
Haga clic aquí para la traducción al español (Google Translate) Introduction Imagine a world where every English language teacher has free access to a rich library of teaching materials; textbooks, videos, assessments, & interactive tools; without concerns about cost, copyright, or inflexibility. Imagine students worldwide starting their courses fully equipped with engaging, personalised resources tailored… Continue reading The transformative potential of open educational resources in English language teaching: Benefits for organisations, teachers, & students
What does “going FOSS” look like for the average user?
Haga clic aquí para la traducción al español (Google Translate) Introduction “Going FOSS” (using free & open source software) isn’t hypothetical or in the distant future. It’s making practical changes for all of us here & now. You’re definitely already using FOSS whether you’re aware of it or not, e.g. almost all of the internet… Continue reading What does “going FOSS” look like for the average user?
How multitasking inhibits learning
Haga clic aquí para la traducción al español (Google Translate) Introduction In today’s tech, social media, & smartphone dominated world, multitasking is often believed to make us more productive. However, research suggests that this modern-day “skill” may be more harmful than helpful, particularly when it comes to learning. From impaired focus to decreased memory retention,… Continue reading How multitasking inhibits learning
Online ELT & CALL activities in Moodle
Great news! For those of us who use Moodle to create online English language learning/teaching (ELL/ELT) activities & courses, things just got better. Previously, I’ve held off from writing about H5P because, although it is very useful & has great potential, I found the Moodle integration problematic & difficult to manage, but with the latest Moodle upgrades I think that we can take online ELL/ELT to a whole new level.
Monitoring & supporting students during online synchronous lessons
Introduction In this article, I have a suggestion for ways to improve the quality of English language teaching (ELT) via webinar apps, e.g. BigBlueButton, Blackboard Collaborate, Adobe Connect, Cisco WebEx, or Zoom, while making minimal changes to learning & teaching as they are currently being practised as emergency remote teaching due to the COVID-19 pandemic… Continue reading Monitoring & supporting students during online synchronous lessons
Dictations made easy!
Dictations are a very difficult activity to get right. Traditional computer based dictations are usually a quite awkward, unhelpful and ultimately frustrating experience to say the least. The idea of this learning application is for it to be more of an enjoyable exploratory, learning activity than a listening test. So far it has been my… Continue reading Dictations made easy!