Games and language learning

Hello everyone,

I am here after a long time. I did not write because I could not manage my daily duties. In other words, I was so, so busy by translating, by studying, by working and so on.
In this new post, I am going tell something about the rewarding ways of how young learners acquire their first words in English, especially those who are not native speakers of English. I will also present my "Diploma paper" because I wrote about it therein.

INTRODUCTION

One of the most fascinating aspects of human development is the ability to learn language.We all watch and listen with absolute fascination as the first `coos` and `googles`.We all share in the pride and joy of parents whose one-year-old has uttered the first `bye bye`. Learning a language is an amazing feat.Language learning is hard work.One must make an effort to understand, to repeat accurately, to manipulate newly understood language.Games help and encourage many learners to sustain their interest and work.The contribution of drilling lies in the concentration on a language form and its frequent use during a limited period of time.Games provide the key feature of `drill` with the opportunity to sense the working of language as living communication.

Games and Language Learning

Traditional behaviourists believed that language learning is simply a matter of imitation and habit formation.Children imitate the sounds and patterns which they hear around them.They continue to imitate and practice these sounds and patterns until they form `habits` of correct language use.According to this view[1], the quality and quantity of the language which the child hears should have an effect on the child`s success in language learning.Children`s imitation is selective and based on what they are currently learning.Even when the child imitates, the choice of what to imitate seems to be based on something the child already knows, not simply on what is `available` in environment.Children appear to pick out patterns and then generalize them to new contexts.

They create new forms or new uses of words until they finally figure out how the forms are used by adults.The behaviourist explanations for language acquisition offer a reasonable way of understanding how children learn some of the regular and aspects of language.The linguist Noam Chomsky claims that children are biologically programmed for language and that language develops in the child in just the same way that other biological functions develop.The child does not have to be taught, most children learn to walk at about the same time.For Chomsky language acquisition is very similar to the development of walking.The environment makes a basic contribution.The child, or rather, the child`s biological endowment will do the rest.Chomsky argues that the behaviourist theory fails to recognize what has come to be called `the logical problem of language acquisition`.

This logical problem refers to the fact that children come to know more about the structure of their language.According to Chomsky, the language the child is exposed to in the environment is full of confusing information.The evidence seems very strong that children are by no means systematically corrected or instructed on language points.When parents do correct, they tend to focus on meaning and not on language itself.According to Chomsky, children are born with a special ability to discover for themselves the underlying rules of a language system.Chomsky refers to this special ability as being based on a language acquisition device(LAD)[2]. This device was often described as an imaginary `black box` which exists somewhere in the brain.This  `black box` prevents the child from going off on lots of wrong trails in trying to discover the rules of language.For the LAD to work, the child needs access only to samples of the natural language.

Once it is activated, the child is able to discover the structure of the language to be learned by matching the innate knowledge of basic grammatical relationships to the structures of the particular language.Chomsky and his followers no longer use the term LAD, but refer to the child`s innate endowment as Universal Grammar.Universal Grammar is considered to consist of a set of principles which are common to all languages.If children are pre-equipped with `UG`, then what they have to learn is the ways in which their own language makes use of these principles.Children seem to develop language in similar ways and on similar schedule, in a way different from the way all children learn to walk.The child comes to `know` certain things about the language simply by being exposed to a limited number of examples.

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[1] How Languages are Learned,Pasty M.Lightbrown and Nina Spada, page 8

[2] How Languages are Learned, Patsy M.Lightbrown and Nina Spada, page 11 

The critical period hypothesis

Lennebreg observed that this ability to develop normal behaviours and knowledge in variety of environments does not continue indefinitely and that children who have never learned language cannot return to normal.He argued the the language acquisition device works successfully only when it is stimulated at the right time.The strong version is that children must acquire their first language by puberty.The weak version is that language will be more difficult and incomplete after puberty.

The interactionists`position is that language develops as a result of the complex interplay between the uniquely human characteristics of the child and the environment in which the child develops.To the interactionists' theory, what is important is the conversational give-and-take in which the adult intuitively responds to the clues provides as to the level of language he or she is capable of processing.One-to-one interaction gives the child access to language which is adjusted to his or her level of comprehension.

Theories of first language acquisition

The fascinating ability of child to acquire the native language has been a subject of interest for linguists and psychologists for many centuries.Even if we ask ourselves a very simple question:`How did we learn our own language?`, we will find that it is almost impossible to answer.However,if a child is given a normal developmental environment, he or she acquire the language fluently and efficiently.The most amazing fact is that will acquire it almost intuitively, without special instruction.As I mentioned previously, they are able to communicate efficiently by about age 3.There are two polarized positions in the study of first language acquisition.At the one pole, there are scholars who claim that language acquisition is a learned behaviour, which is not different from general learning system and that parents teach language to their children.They claim that children come into the world with tabula rasa, a clean state without notions about the world or about the language itself.At the other pole, there are scholars who assume that language is innate, that there are universal principles, which govern language acquisition and that children already have knowledge of language and the world.

Theories of second language learning

It is clear that a child or adult acquiring a second language is different from a child acquiring a first language in terms of both personal characteristics and conditions for learning.All second language learners regardless of age, have by definition already acquired at least one language.This prior knowledge may be an advantage in the sense that the learner has an idea of how languages work.The first language learners does not have the cognitive maturity, metalinguistic awareness or world knowledge of the older second language learner.Young secong language learners have begun to develop cognitive maturity and meta- linguistic awareness.

Behaviourism:The second language view

According to the behaviourists, all learning, whether verbal or non-verbal takes place through the same underlying process, habit formation.Learners receive linguistic input from speakers in the environment.Where there are similarities between the two languages, the learner will acquire target language structures with ease.The influence is simply a matter of `habits`, but rather a systematic attempt by the learner to use knowledge already acquired in learning a new language.

Cognitive theory:A new psychological approach

Cognitive psychologists tend to see second language acquisition as the building up of knowledge systems that can eventually be called on automatically for speaking and understanding.At first, learners have to pay attention to any aspect of the language which they are trying to understand or produce.Gradually, through experience and practice, learners become able to use certain parts of their knowledge so quickly and automatically that they are not even aware that they are doing it.Cognitive psychologists have also investigated a phenomenon they call `restructuring`[1]. They seem rather to be based on the interaction of knowledge we already have, or on the acquisition of new knowledge which somehow `fits into an existing system`. The theory itself cannot easily predict what kinds of structures will be automized through practice.Cognitive theory is also not able to predict which first language structure will be transferred and which will not.This theory is incomplete without a linguistic framework of some kind.

Creative construction theory

What is a distinctive about this theory is that it proposes that internal processing strategies operate on language input without any direct dependence on the learner.The creative construction theory which has had the most influence on second language teaching practice is the one proposed by Stephen Krashen. Krashen has developed an overall theory of second language acquisition.Five central hypotheses constitute his `monitor model`. They are:

1)The acquisition-learning hypothesis

2)The monitor hypothesis

3)The natural order hypothesis

4)The input hypothesis

5)The affective-filter hypothesis

The acquisition-learning hypothesis

There are two ways for adult second language learners to approach learning a second language: they may `acquire` it or they may `learn` it. He says, we acquire as we engage in meaningful interaction in the second language, in much the same way that children pick up their first language with no attention to form.For Krashan, acquisition is by far the more important process. He asserts that learning cannot turn into acquisition, citing that many speakers are quite competent without ever having learned rules, while other speakers may `know` rules but continue to break them.

The monitor hypothesis

Krashan argues that the acquired systemacts to initiate the speaker utterances and is responsible for fluency and intuitive judgements about correctness.The learned system acts only as an editor or `monitor`, making minor changes and polishing what the acquired system has produced. Krashan has specified three conditions necessary for monitor use:sufficient time, focus on form and knowing the rules.Thus, writing is more conducive to monitor use then is speaking, where the focus is on content and not on form.The obvious weakness in this hypothesis is that it is very difficult to show evidence of `monitor` use.It is impossible to determine what has been produced by the acquired system. Krashan`s claim that learning cannot turn into acquisition means that anything which is produced quickly and apparently must have been acquired rather then learned.

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[1] How Languages are Learned, Patsy M.Lightbrown and Nina Spada, page 30

I will continue more in the next post. I hope that some of you will find this constructive for your studies.

I also want to thank all those people who visit my blog.

Everything the best

Best regards

Rade  

 

Eight Things Skilled Teachers Think, Say, and Do

As a young teacher, who is eager to find always something good and rewarding, I like to improve myself more and more. I always like to share the pieces of information with others. So, I also like to learn from someone's experience. In this post, I will put up something I found on Facebook that my colleague published. 

As the title says, it is about what a good teacher should do in every situation in order to attract students and to motivate them to achieve more.This constructive text is written by Larry Ferlazzo.

Among the many challenges teachers face, often the most difficult is how to engage students who seem unreachable, who resist learning activities, or who disrupt them for others. This is also one of the challenges that skilled teachers have some control over. In my nine years of teaching high school, I've found that one of the best approaches to engaging challenging students is to develop their intrinsic motivation. The root of intrinsic is the Latin intrinsecus, a combination of two words meaning within and alongside. It's likely that our students are intrinsically motivated—just motivated to follow their own interests, not to do what we want them to do. Teachers' challenge is to work alongside our students, to know their interests and goals, and to develop trusting relationships that help students connect their learning to their goals in a way that motivates from within. How can teachers do this? It's helpful to consider this question in three parts: What skilled teachers think, what they say, and what they do.

What Skilled Teachers Can Think

What we think guides how we view the world, including how we view challenging students. Developing and maintaining three mind-sets will help teachers maintain their equilibrium in the face of behavior or resistance to learning from certain students that would ordinarily knock us off balance.

1. Remember that authoritative beats authoritarian.

Being authoritarian means wielding power unilaterally to control someone, demanding obedience without giving any explanation for why one's orders are important. Being authoritative, on the other hand, means demonstrating control, but doing so relationally through listening and explaining. Studies of effective parenting have found that children view parents who use an authoritative style as legitimate authority figures; such children are less likely to engage in delinquent behavior. The opposite is true for children of authoritarian parents (University of New Hampshire, 2012). It's not too much of a stretch to apply this finding to teachers and students. As you interact with students, frequently ask yourself which of these two styles you use. Do you want to always lead with your mouth—or with your ears? Bring this authoritative-authoritarian question to bear on your classroom practices. In terms of instruction, are you always the sage on stage? Do you have students periodically evaluate your class and you as a teacher—and seriously consider their feedback? Do you explain to students why you teach the way you do? When a student's behavior is causing a problem, do you control the behavior at any cost, or do you try to find out what's going on with that student? Opting for the authoritative style will make students more likely to respect your authority—and probably more eager to cooperate.

2. Believe that everyone can grow.

Many teachers are familiar with Carol Dweck's distinction between a "growth" mind-set and a "fixed" one. When we have a growth mind-set, we believe that everyone has the inner power to grow and change. We see mistakes as opportunities to learn. Holding a fixed mind-set leads us to believe that people's traits—such as intelligence—are immutable. A mistake on the part of someone we believe is unintelligent seems to validate that belief. Which mind-set we hold makes a tremendous difference. In one study, a researcher measured teachers' mind-sets at the beginning of the year. In classes led by teachers who showed fixed mind-sets, few students with learning challenges advanced academically during the year. But in classes taught by those with growth mind-sets, many previously low-performing students made gains (Dweck, 2010). Teachers with a fixed mind-set tend to immediately and permanently place students into categories. They place the primary responsibility for overcoming learning challenges on the students. Those with a growth mind-set consider responding to a student's challenges to be the joint responsibility of the student and the educator. Teachers aren't superhuman. There are some things we cannot accomplish. But we must ask ourselves whether we too readily write off students who try our patience as "incapable," or some similar adjective, without considering whether differentiating instruction for these students might spur change and growth.One of my students had never written an essay in his school career. He was intent on maintaining that record during our unit on writing persuasive essays. Because I knew two of his passions were football and video games, I told him that as long as he used the writing techniques we'd studied, he could write an essay on why his favorite football team was better than its rival or on why he particularly liked one video game. He ended up writing an essay on both topics.

3. Understand that power isn't a finite pie.

The power isn't a finite pie. If I share the power I have, that doesn't mean I'll have less. In fact, the pie will get bigger as more possibilities are created for everyone. Power struggles are at the root of much misbehavior. William Glasser (1988) believes that students have a basic need for power and that 95 percent of classroom management issues occur as a result of students trying to fulfill this need. Having more power actually helps students learn. Giving students choices—about their homework, assignments, how they're grouped, and so on—leads to higher levels of student engagement and achievement (Sparks, 2010). Remembering that power isn't finite helps us see that asking students for ideas on what might help them feel more engaged isn't a sign of weakness, but of strength. So is seeking advice from students' parents or from teachers in other classes in which challenged learners show more success. Over the years, I've gained great insight and become a more effective teacher by asking parents, "Tell me about a time in your child's life when he or she was learning a lot and working hard in school. What was his or her teacher doing then?"

What Skilled Teachers Can Say

4. Give positive messages.

Positive messages are essential to motivation. Subtle shifts in teacher language infuse positive messages throughout our interactions. Here are three practices I've found helpful. Use positive framing. "Loss framed" messages (if you do this, then something bad will happen to you) don't have the persuasive advantage that they're often thought to have. "Positive framed messages" (if you do this, these good things will happen) are more effective (Dean, 2010). I've had more success talking with students about how changing their behavior will help them achieve their goals (such as graduating from high school or going to college) than I've had threatening them with negative consequences. Positive messages that connect students' current actions to broader student-identified hopes or goals are different from "if-then" statements focused on what teachers want students to do ("If you don't get out of your seat without permission, then you'll get extra credit"). As Daniel Pink (2009) notes, such extrinsic manipulations don't develop students' higher-order thinking skills or long-term commitments to change. Say "yes." Avoidant instruction is language that emphasizes what people should not do ("Don't walk on the grass." "Don't chew gum"). Some researchers (British Psychological Society, 2010) believe that a more effective way to get a desired behavior is to emphasize what you want people to do. For example, if a student asks to go the restroom, but the timing isn't right, rather than saying no, I try to say, "Yes, you can. I just need you to wait a few minutes." Or if a student is talking at an inappropriate time, instead of saying, "Don't talk!" I sometimes go over and tell that learner, "I see you have a lot of energy today. We'll be breaking into small groups later and you'll have plenty of time to talk then. I'd appreciate your listening now." Say "please" and "thank you." People are more likely to comply with a task (and do so more quickly) if someone asks them instead of tells them (Yong, 2010). I've found that "Can you please sit down?" is more effective than "Sit down!" Saying thank you provides immediate positive reinforcement to students. Research (Sutton, 2010) shows that people who are thanked by authority figures are more likely to cooperate, feel valued, and exhibit self-confidence.

5. Apologize.

Teachers are human, and we make plenty of mistakes. There is no reason why we shouldn't apologize when we do. But saying, "I'm sorry," may not be enough. I often use the "regret, reason, and remedy" formula recommended by Dorothy Armstrong (2009). For example, one afternoon my students Omar and Quang were paired up in my class but were sitting passively while everyone else focused on the task at hand. I said sharply, "Come on now, get working!" A few minutes later, I said simply to the two boys, "I'm sorry I barked at you earlier. I was frustrated that you weren't doing what I'd asked you to do. I'll try to show more patience in the future." They clearly focused more energy on their work after this apology.

What Skilled Teachers Can Do

6. Be flexible.

Being flexible might be the most important thing teachers can "do" to help students who challenge us—in fact all students—to get past whatever challenges of their own they confront. Three practices help me differentiate instruction and classroom management in a way that helps everyone. Help them get started. Psychologist Bluma Zeigarnik identified the Zeigarnik Effect: Once people start doing something, they tend to want to finish it (Dean, 2011). If we get a disengaged or anxious student started, that's half the battle. For a task that's likely to challenge some students, present a variety of ways to get started: a menu of questions, the option to create a visual representation of a concept, a chance to work with a partner. Encourage students to launch themselves by just answering the first question or the easiest one. Help postpone tempting distractions. Making a conscious decision to postpone giving in to temptation can reduce a desire that's getting in the way of a goal (Society for Personality and Social Psychology, 2012). My student Mai was frequently using her cell phone to text message during class. I didn't want to take her phone away, so I made a deal with her—she could text in my classroom during two specific times: from the moment she entered the room until the bell rang and as soon as the lunch bell rang. Since we made that deal, Mai hardly ever uses her cell phone during class. Even more significant, she hardly ever uses it during our agreed-on times. Acknowledge stress. As most of us know from experience, people tend to have less self-control when they're under stress (Szalavitz, 2012). When a student is demonstrating self-control issues in my class, I often learn through a conversation with him or her that this student is going through family disruptions or similar problems. Sometimes, just providing students an opportunity to vent worries can have a positive effect.

7. Set the right climate.

Pink (2009) and other researchers have found that extrinsic rewards work in the short term for mechanical tasks that don't require much higher-order thinking, but they don't produce true motivation for work that requires higher-order thinking and creativity. However, everyone needs "baseline rewards"—conditions that provide adequate compensation for one's presence and effort. At school, baseline rewards might include fair grading, a caring teacher, engaging lessons, and a clean classroom. If such needs aren't met, Pink (2009) notes, the student will focus on "the unfairness of her situation and the anxiety of her circumstance. … You'll get neither the predictability of extrinsic motivation nor the weirdness of intrinsic motivation. You'll get very little motivation at all".

8. Teach life lessons.

 These simple, engaging activities help students see how it's in their short-term and long-term interest to try their best. For example, a lesson might highlight how the learning process physically alters the brain. This particular lesson encourages a growth mind-set. It was eye-opening to one of my students who had claimed, "We're all born smart or dumb and stay that way." In terms of keeping up kids' motivation, the times throughout the year when I refer back to these concepts and reflect on how they apply to learning struggles are as important as the initial lessons.

What We Can Always Do

Consistently implementing these practices is easier said than done—and is probably impossible unless you're Mother Teresa. But most teachers already do something that makes all these practices flow more naturally, and that we can do more intensely with conscious effort—we build relationships with students. Caring relationships with teachers helps students build resilience. By fostering these relationships, we learn about students' interests and goals, which are fuel for motivation. On Fridays, my students write short reflections about the week. One Friday, I asked them to write about the most important thing they'd learned in class that week. One student wrote, "I didn't really learn anything important this week, but that's OK because Mr. Ferlazzo tried his best." Although I wasn't that thrilled with the first part of his comment, there's an important message in the second half. Even if we can't always think, say, and do the ideal thing to strengthen struggling students' motivation, there's always something we can do to meet them halfway. We can try our best.

I hope that the information will be rewarding and helpful for teachers, especially for those ones who do not have a lot of experience in teaching process.

Best regards

Rade

Activity-based, ‘whole child’ Speaking and Literacy tasks for YLE students

We all know that young learners who do not speak English as their mother tongue have some difficulties at the point of acquiring some words. They also find some book texts very boring, so the teachers must be responsible for creating so fantastic lessons in order to attract students’ attention during the teaching process. In other words, we must make students to learn certain words and expressions, especially those ones which are used in everyday English communication.

On the other side, students also have difficulties about writing certain words. As we all know that English is not like Serbian language, read as it is written or write as you speak. But I have to say that there are some exceptions in English (such as dog, pink, red, pen, and many other words) but not all.

In this post, I want to share all new knowledge I gained during the seminar of Cambridge English Days that was held in Sarajevo. In the very beginning, I have to admit that it was really, really great time during the lectures. My colleagues and I picked up a lot of rewarding things which can be used during teaching both native speakers of English and students whose English is the second language. As I mentioned above that some students have difficulties of remembering the process of writing the words, I will say that my students also have that problem. As a professor Bob Obee had so great examples, the one caught my eye. It was a word ‘because’. Some students, even the native speakers of English, could not remember how to write the word. So, some experts developed the following system. Here it is:

Big Elephants Can’t Always Understand Small Elephants.

In order to know how to spell the word correctly, one must extract the initial letter of every word and at the end you will get the correct spelling of word ‘because’. This is so great, isn’t it? I have to say that this is very appealing for students because I showed this kind of spelling the words. They were amazed. 

On the other side, I think that all teachers have to be always in touch with the latest tech which can be used during teaching and learning. One of so constructive tech tools is Youtube. At this web tool, there are many rewarding videos which can be found in order to organize the lessons better and to make them more appealing for students. For example, we can use the following:

wrap a present … learn a dance step … sing

along …how to sign … do magic … make

projected puppet shapes …. draw cartoon

characters … learn card tricks … make a

Chinese lantern that will fly

All these things are so helpful both for students and teachers. For students, it is good because you can tell them to prepare or to find an interesting video for a certain topic. This is too motivating for students. They will be so willing and eager to go back their homes and find and prepare a video for the next lesson. Try it, it works out!

On the other side, it will alleviate the teachers’ work. So for mutual pleasure, all participants in creating fantastic learning and teaching atmosphere will be very satisfied. I tried it and I have no words to say.

In early students’ writing and reading skills, we can also use many things. For example, we can use a quick quiz:

How many sounds are there in English?

How many characters are there in the English alphabet?

How many consonant clusters are there in English?

How many consonant clusters can occur both at beginning and at end

of English words ?

What is a digraph?

Cognitive abilities, participation, sharing ..    Reading and Listening quiz

1   Can camels swim?

2   How many legs has a spider got?

3   Do snakes lay eggs?

4   Can ducks fly?

5   Does a chicken foot have three or four toes?

6   Can frogs walk?

7   Can chickens say quack quack?

8   Do penguins lay eggs?

9   Name two animals we get milk from? 

10  Can cows jump ? 

11  How many legs has a frog got ?

12 Can you spell :  bee

I hope that some of these things will be rewarding and helpful for you. As soon as I find out other things, I am going to put them on my blog.

Best regards

Sustainable Development in the process of teaching and learning

"We must build a new world, a far better world - one in which the eternal dignity of man is respected"

The idea of improved concept mapping

Hello all,

I have not written a lot since my last post in July because I was on my holiday and I was also busy at the beginning of the school year. Writing the annual plans for 2012/2013 school year and so on. Here, I want to emphasize the sustainable development in the process of teaching and learning that is becoming so important part of every teaching and learning environment. There are also tech tools which can be used so students can share the understanding of their knowledge with the other students, too. I will post about one tool that is rewarding both for students and teachers.

One of the most useful and easily adopted tools to use in teaching and the study of complex development issues is concept mapping. Concept maps are especially handy in higher education when used to clarify the shared understanding of members of a working team and study circle. Education for sustainable development encourages students and teachers to use the interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary approaches. In most cases, concept mapping can help participants to understand and clarify not only their own knowledge building but also the constructions of knowledge by other members of the study group.

Concept maps are easy to construct using pen and paper. An excellent computer software, called Cmap Tools program, is also available free of charge on the Internet. The Cmap Tools program has been developed by the Institute for Human and Machine Cognition. With this digital tool for concept mapping one can, for example share information and understanding with others in a virtual learning environment on the Internet and one can publish one’s own concept maps with pictures and data resources on the Internet. 

I hope that this tool will help you in your teaching process.

Best regards

Rade

Further development

 “Never become so much of an expert that you stop gaining expertise. View life as a continuous learning experience.”

I am here again after a holiday which I really deserved because I was so overloaded with my work, professional, translation and project writings responsibilities. As I mentioned in my previous posts that the Webinars are the places where we can find a lot of constructive pieces of information, I have to say again that I am still addicted to them.  I also said that the tech tools are so rewarding for students to improve their skills especially the ones for learning the second language and also for building the students' autonomy. 

Being a member of Simple K12, I receive many messages about the upcoming Webinars and about the Webinars I missed. By skimming through the messages, I came upon one which caught my eye. There, I found an interesting tool which is very useful both for teachers and for students. It is called a Museum Box. 

If you could put a number of items into a box that described your life, what would you include? What do you think would be included if you were a Victorian Servant or Queen Elizabeth; If you lived during the English Civil War, what items would you include to make a case for, or against, the parliamentarians? And what if you were an abolitionist and wanted to show that slavery was wrong and unnecessary, how would you create your evidence.? A museum box provides the tools for you to do just this. It allows you to build up an argument or description of an event, person or historical period by placing items in a virtual box. You can display anything from a text file to a movie. You can also view the museum boxes submitted by other people and comment on the contents.

I hope that some of you will find this box a rewarding tool for you and for your students.

P.S. If you have some suggestions or you know a constructive tech tool, let me know at my e-mail: radepetricevic@yahoo.com.


Best regards

Rade

Using photos to bring your classroom to life

After a short holiday and rest of all my obligations, I have just returned to my continuous PD. I simply like it because I think that if one does not do a continuous development in his/her job, he/she won't be able to keep in touch with all up-to-date and constructive pieces of information which are very helpful for PD. 

The next thing I am going to post is about how we can make our classroom more lively by using photos with Flickr. The Flicker is almost certainly the best on-line photo management and sharing application in the world. 

From my experience, I can say that students like to learn and they are very eager to find out more about something when the photos are used during a lesson. I use photos a lot because I found out that it is the best way to keep students concentration during the teaching process. 

By discovering Flicker, it will be easier for me to keep all photos in one place and to organize them better. The Flicker can be used for many school subject not only for English. Here are some tips if you want to open your Flicker account:
Open Flickr Accounts
With your school and parents’ permission, have you and your Art students open Flickr accounts. Have
them photograph all of their artwork and upload it to their Flickr account. Share the pictures with Art
classes from other schools, as well as with their friends and families.
Use a Flickr Slideshow to Teach History
When giving your next History lectures about the Victorian era in England, play a slideshow on Flickr
of photos or paintings that you have collected of notable people from the time period. Point out each
person's picture with name, and noteworthy accomplishments.
Use Flickr as a Digital Yearbook
Have the yearbook class take digital photos of things that happen during the school year, such as sports
games, club meetings, field trips, performances, and spirit activities. Have them post the pictures to Flickr as a set, and order calendars be made from them for the next school year. Sell the calendars as a
fundraiser.

Start a Synonym Search Game
Create a game for your English students to have them do speed drills to see who can search for relevant
photos on Flickr the fastest. Give them a word and have them search for photos using it and as many
synonyms as they can think of, and see who is the most successful at using Flickr’s search engine to
find the photographs.
Hide and Seek
Take some photos of different cities that you have visited in your travels and post them to Flickr. Make
sure that you geotag them with the location of the photos. Have your geography students then conduct
a search using Flickr’s World Map to see if they can find your photos.
Use Searchable Tags
Use the searchable tags feature to find as many pictures as you can for your science students about the
various animal species that they’re studying. Once you find the pictures and monitor them for content,
download them into a folder so that you can play them as a slideshow for your class.
Constellations and Comets
Take some digital photos of the night sky’s constellations and of any comets that have recently passed
by. Load the photos in Flickr and organize them into a set titled, “Astronomy.” Share the pictures as a
slideshow with your Science students as an alternative to a planetarium visit.
Photos for Spanish Vocabulary
Have your Spanish students take pictures of items that represent the Spanish culture, such as foods,
clothes, flags, or people. Have the students upload their pictures to Flickr and organize them into sets
labeled with appropriate titles. Have them learn the Spanish vocabulary words to accompany each
photo in the sets. As they learn new words, have them add corresponding pictures to the sets.
Practice Uploading with Tags
Have your Art students upload and organize pictures on Flickr. Have them take pictures of their own
work, as well as anything that can be used as a reference, such as a horse or a bottle cap. Have your
students organize their favorite photos in sets, such as “My Work” or "Inspirations." Once they've
loaded the pictures, have them label them with searchable tags to be used as a portfolio or as a body of
reference material for future art projects.
Photo Blog with Math Students
Take some pictures of geometric shapes and angles that can be found in daily activities. Post the
pictures to Flickr, tag them, and create a group for your Geometry students so that they can view the
pictures. Have them blog about the different pictures, and discuss which formulas can be used to solve
the various angles.

Post Photos with Your Class
Have your photography students take pictures of nature as a homework assignment. In class, help them
create Flickr accounts and their own group to join as a class. Have them post their nature pictures to
their Flickr accounts and arrange them as sets. Then have them share their pictures with each other
from in their Flickr group and then blog to each other about the photos.

Advanced Upload
Download one of Flickr’s advanced uploading tools so that you can upload larger numbers of pictures at a time. Post in Flickr random pictures that you have taken as a set for your Creative Writing
students. Show the class the pictures as a slideshow, and have each of them choose one picture to write
a story about.

Download Bilingual Photos
With your Spanish students, browse Flickr for pictures that people have taken of street signs, airport
signs, park signs, or building signs that are written in both English and Spanish. Have your students ask
the Flickr authors of the photos for permission to download their pictures by e-mailing them from a
Flickr account. If permission is given, download the photos and have your students use them as flash
cards to learn the Spanish phrases on the signs.

Download for the School Paper
Have the school newspaper staff perform a search on Flickr to see how many students in the school
also are Flickr members. Have them start a group with a blog for members of the school, and see how
many students from the school are willing to submit photos of their pets. Download the photos and
publish them in the school paper.

Download a Presentation
Conduct a search on Flickr for photos to illustrate your next science lesson. Ask the photos’ authors for
permission and download the photos to your computer. Create a slideshow to use as a visual
presentation for your class.

If you want to open Flicker account, here is the address: www.flickr.com/. 

Best regards 

Continuous PD (professional development)...

At the very beginning, I would like that to say that I am really glad to have friends from all over the world especially those ones who studied with me at the University of Oregon. They are all true experts. I also want to point out that I am so happy of being able to access to many rewarding web tools which are very constructive for learning and teaching English.

At first, I would like to say a few words about Grammar movies. They are all very useful and helpful both for teachers and students. The movies are consisted of interesting and motivating clips which explains grammar in every detail. They are also illustrated with examples, e.g. how and when to use a certain tense. If you want to use them in your teaching process, you can just visit this page at Grammar movies

www.youtube.com. 

On the other hand, there are also tips how to build positive relationship with English Language Learners. If you want to find more about the tips, just click here Seven Tips for Building Positive Relationships with English Language Learners, www.edutopia.org.

I would also recommend a Word Dynamo. It is very interesting site for students where they can improve their vocabulary by doing the quizzes. It is very motivating and all levels of English are included. All quizzes are scored, too. Here is the address: How many words do you know? | Word Dynamo, http://dynamo.dictionary.com.

I also want to remind you of Webinars which are very rewarding and helpful for teachers. There are many of them and teachers can find a lot about new methods and ways of teaching. They can also make their teaching process more appealing and motivating where both students and teachers can contribute to better ways of gaining new knowledge. If you want do your professional development, here are some addresses where you can do it:

1) Classroom 2.0 LIVE - www.classroom20.com

2) simplek12.com

3) http://ef.adobeconnect.com/teacherzone

I warmly recommend you to attend the webinars because the professional development is very important part for all teachers.

Best regards