* WWW Lesson Plan *

LEVEL: Form 2 (Intermediate)
TOPIC: The Value of Friendship
THEME: People and Social Issues
TIME: 1 hour 10 minutes
LANGUAGE CONTENT: Conjunctions

AIMS: By the end of the lesson, students should be able to locate Conjunctions on a Website and to be able to practice writing.

TECHNICAL REQUIREMENT:

1) One computer for each pair of students

2) Internet connection

3) Web Browser

4) Printer

WEBSITES: http://www.friendship.com.au/media/songs/

PREPARATION:

1) Browse and locate suitable sites about friendship songs.

2) Check the accuracy and appropriateness of the sites for the students.

3) Using the information on the site, prepare worksheets.

PROCEDURE:

Set Induction

1) Introduce the topic of the day.

2) Recap the previous lesson on Conjunctions.

Task 1

1) Ask students to sit in pairs and share a computer.

2) Send students to the website chosen and ask them to choose any song (with lyric) that really reflects their friendship at the present.

3) Ask students if they had any problems while using the website.

4) Ask them to copy and paste the lyrics in a new document of Microsoft Word.

5) Next, they will have to locate Conjunctions in the lyrics and underline it.

6) Demonstrate using the website and give an example to complete the task.

7) After the students have done this, ask them to print the document directly from the computer.

Task 2

1) Ask the students for the list of feelings that they know and write them on board. Select students to provide example for each.

2) Distribute the worksheet prepared to each student. The students need to do the task individually.

3) Find a sentence from the lyrics that describe any of these feelings. Next, write the sentence in the space provided. Put a dash (-) if there is no sentence suitable for certain feelings.

Task 3

1) Distribute the worksheet prepared to each student. The students need to do the task individually.

2) Ask them to write and explain why they chose the song and share their feelings, experience or opinions in the space provided.

3) Encourage them to use Conjunctions and type of feelings that they have identified earlier.

4) Ask the students to submit the task before the class ends.

FOLLOW-UP: Each student has to find the song that they have picked earlier and E-mail it to the teacher before the next class.

NELSON MANDELA

Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela was born in Transkei, South Africa on July 18, 1918. His father was Chief Henry Mandela of the Tembu Tribe. Mandela himself was educated at University College of Fort Hare and the University of Witwatersrand and qualified in law in 1942. He joined the African National Congress in 1944 and was engaged in resistance against the ruling National Party's apartheid policies after 1948. He went on trial for treason in 1956-1961 and was acquitted in 1961.

After the banning of the ANC in 1960, Nelson Mandela argued for the setting up of a military wing within the ANC. In June 1961, the ANC executive considered his proposal on the use of violent tactics and agreed that those members who wished to involve themselves in Mandela's campaign would not be stopped from doing so by the ANC. This led to the formation of Umkhonto we Sizwe. Mandela was arrested in 1962 and sentenced to five years' imprisonment with hard labour. In 1963, when many fellow leaders of the ANC and the Umkhonto we Sizwe were arrested, Mandela was brought to stand trial with them for plotting to overthrow the government by violence. His statement from the dock received considerable international publicity. On June 12, 1964, eight of the accused, including Mandela, were sentenced to life imprisonment. From 1964 to 1982, he was incarcerated at Robben Island Prison, off Cape Town; thereafter, he was at Pollsmoor Prison, nearby on the mainland.

During his years in prison, Nelson Mandela's reputation grew steadily. He was widely accepted as the most significant black leader in South Africa and became a potent symbol of resistance as the anti-apartheid movement gathered strength. He consistently refused to compromise his political position to obtain his freedom.


Nelson Mandela was released on February 11, 1990. After his release, he plunged himself wholeheartedly into his life's work, striving to attain the goals he and others had set out almost four decades earlier. In 1991, at the first national conference of the ANC held inside South Africa after the organization had been banned in 1960, Mandela was elected President of the ANC while his lifelong friend and colleague, Oliver Tambo, became the organisation's National Chairperson.

* Article Review *

Kessler, G. (2009). Student-Initiated Attention to Form In Wiki-Based Collaborative Writing. Language Learning & Technology. 13(1), pp 79-95. Retrieved August 21,2009 from

http://llt.msu.edu/vol13num1/kessler.pdf

1. Title : Student-Initiated Attention to Form In Wiki-Based Collaborative Writing
2. Language Learning & Technology – Volume 13, Number 1
   
3. Greg Kessler is an Assistant Professor of Computer Assisted Language Learning (CALL) and interim director of the language resource center (LRC) at Ohio University. He is active in developing instructional materials for use with new technologies and preparing teachers and students to use these materials in ways appropriate to their teaching contexts. He has taught and consulted in many places across the US as well as in China, Croatia, Czech Republic, Egypt, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, Japan, Kazakhstan, Korea, Mexico, Montenegro, Serbia & Turkey.

(E-mail: kessler@ohio.edu )

Summary of the article

Technology has been implemented in second or foreign language teaching and learning because of its effectiveness. One of the advantages of using technology in the classroom is the potential to develop autonomous learning. Therefore, the aim of the research is to identify students’ autonomous language learning ability, specifically focusing on their attention to grammatical accuracy throughout the task. There are three research questions listed which are : 1) To what degree will NNS (Non-Native Speakers) EFL teacher candidates perform autonomously as they attempt to correct their own and other’s grammar errors in along-term collaborative writing task? 2) How accurate will they be in making these peers and self corrections? 3) What can these postings tell us about students and long-term web-based collaborative writing?

As for the methodology of the study, the researcher used an academic course (cultures of the English Speaking World) for the students to participate in the required tasks such as weekly discussion, access to static and dynamic web-based content, live video lectures, student video presentation and on-going collaboration on a wiki. The participants will be observed over a period of a sixteen week semester related to this online content-based course. The subject/sample used in this study were 40 final year students of a BA programme in English Language Teaching in Mexico. Moreover, they ranged in age from 21-23 years old. All of them were at the same level of language proficiency, received passing grades and participated extensively throughout the class. Additionally, they demonstrated comfort and familiarity with the technology.

The findings revealed that the participants have the tendency to focus on meaning rather than form. A total of 233 edits were made by the students in an overall history of 160 total iterations of the wiki. They considered this web-based collaboratively activity to be less demanding and tended to defer to meaning rather than attend to grammatical concerns. Based on the high frequency of peer-edits, the students appear confident in their collaboration. A total of 130 of the iterations were devoted to contributing to others’ previous contributions. Thus, the nature of peer-edits suggests that students were not afraid to critique one another. Other than that, all of the 40 students demonstrated at least one incident of self-correction of some sort. Self-correcting in such an environment may be support for the notion that public display of texts instills a sense of responsibility and obligation. In conclusion, the students are willingly to collaborate in such autonomous environments, but may not willingly strive for total accuracy. Thus, certain tasks and environments need more explicit practices and related expectations.

My reaction

I chose this article as it implements the use of wikis to promote collaborative writing. In my opinion, this is an effective method of teaching instead of just asking the students to write an essay of a given topic. Furthermore, wikis is a tool which already there in the Internet. It depends on one’s creativity and innovation to make use of it by designing activities that can capture the students’ interest. Besides, the research is understandable and consists of a few numbers of pages to be reviewed. Based on the result of the study, I would say that the research is well conducted. Besides the methodology mentioned before, the researcher also conducted follow-up interviews with participants to provide insight into the perception of the importance of grammar in the context of collaborative technologies.

This research proved that methodology of teaching writing can vary with interactive activities such as by using wikis. Instead of the traditional way of teaching writing, this can increase the students’ interest to participate in writing activities. Most of the schools have been equipped with computer labs where teachers can implement this method. Teachers can play an important role by giving instructions and providing feedbacks as there will be writing interactions between students and teachers, and among students. Besides, this can be an outside classroom activity where students can collaborate doing this activity at home. Furthermore, this can promote autonomous learning as students are willing to take over their own responsibility for learning. All in all, technology really helps the teachers in improvising their teaching methods as well as making the lesson more meaningful to the students.

* second in-class assignment *

* first in-class assignment *

Hi there!

• I'm zaHirah and my friends call me Zaza. I just know some of the basic skills and knowledge of computers e.g switch on or shut down the computer

• Microsoft office is one of the computer softwares that I know how to utilize as I use it since I was in primary school. I use other apllications such as Nero to burn or copy Cds, Ares to download songs or vclips and Switch to convert some files.

• I usually update my Facebook and Friendster ( which is the first thing that i will do ), download songs, watch videos and find articles or sources for my academic purposes as well. Sometimes, I sign in my YM but as our internet connection was not that good, I'm very reluctant to use it...

• I planned to use computer during my practicum as I enjoy exploring the technology. Unfortunately, I only managed to use two periods each with my classes (no observation was conducted at that time). There was only one room available in the library to use the technology. Nonetheless, I brought a laptop and a speaker to the classroom for a few of my listening activities.

• I don't have any experience with online learning but will try someday....