Blog 15 (halfway there!!!): Kapwing: a simplified place for online video editing

Language is, as I’ve said, learned in chunks. It needs to be embedded in a broader context for it to be a)meaningful and b) useful for our students.

Technology can definitely help in this process (but so can extensive reading, probably to the same degree- just saying).

I have been looking for an easy way to edit, add subtitles to and mute videos for my classes, and so far, with all the technological progress we’ve made so far, I’ve fallen short.

Once upon a time, you had to BUY a video editor, but not there are some great free online tools, and you tube has even got in on the game. But trust me, it’s bloody complicated for a non-native like me. Kapwing has simplified video editing to such a ridiculous degree that even I can use it.

I have tried three kapwing features successfully. Firstly, adding subtitles.

Now you can

How can this feature help language acquisition? Well, some video clips are unclear, and having the English subtitles underneath can integrate listening and reading skills. But what about having students create their own subtitles for a 1 minute video? It means really, really listening to how natural language sounds and deciphering it. I think this is a very useful task to give kids to improve their listening skills (as long as they don’t cheat, that is)

The next feature I tried was muting and uploading my own audio file instead. I created a meme of a few seconds and recorded myself saying the same words and uploaded the file, converted it to MP3 and added it to the meme. I am not a great trimmer so it didn’t come out as well as I would have liked, but I suggest my students video editing skills are better. I’ve always dreamed of them doing a project where they add their own sound/change the dialogue to a short scene. It involves a trememdous amount of different skills and I think it’s great for working on their spoken language. Now I’ve finally figured out a way.

 

The last thing was creating a meme. I’ve been talking about memes a lot in my blogs, because I feel we need to relate to how English is used to communicate in the 21st century. Well, you can create your own meme with text pretty painlessly on this site. I could ask students to create memes that explain new words that they’ve learned, or create a meme based on a movie or a series they love.

I have my husband, Avi to thank for finding me kapwing. I hope to use it again, or have my students use it in the near future.

Ella

blog 13:Digital ways to bring vocabulary learning alive

As we know, looking up a word in an online dictionary does not give us anything close to the full picture. Odds on, if it just simply translated in order to understand the text, it will be rapidly forgotten.

So teachers have students learn words off by heart for vocabulary tests. Great, now they know how to translate it (in the context in which they learned it- otherwise it would be too overwhelming) but they still don’t know how to use it

So the teacher goes a step further, she says ‘Students, write sentences using the word.’ Well, that’s a broad instruction which can invite sentences like ‘He is a companion’- the sentence doesn’t reveal any knowledge or understanding of the word.

OK, so how else can we test knowledge? Cloze sentences where they pick the word which is appropriate within the context. The guessing game that still won’t allow the student to activate his knowledge but at least allows the word to be seen in an appropriate context. And so it goes on.

Technology can give us some imaginative ways for visualizing vocabulary. For example with wordle, synonyms appear in an image which helps us understand the word more deeply.

Wordle automatically generated the words according to their frequency.

They can also see the word mapped out thanks to amazing apps such as visual thesaurus (not free, except 14 day trial) and graphwords

All of these synonyms are links to further word maps. It’s also a great tool for creative writing.

Another way of them showing how well they’ve understood a word is finding a meme that appeals to them that reflects the meaning of the word. Let’s take the word ‘flabbergasted’- now.

When I look at how memes are used so cleverly, I being to really feel my age. A meme, the combination of verbal and visual really is a new means of communication. Yet our students use memes instinctively. It is therefore very helpful to encourage student ownership of their knowledge by giving them meme projects. We really get to see a visual display of their understanding of a word. The plus is the word is embedded in a collocation (see here ‘totally flabbergasted’) which is a heck of a lot more useful than a vocabulary list.

How can they use memes – well, they can find the meme they most like to reflect a new word on sites such as the one I used above. Or they can create their own, using sites such as imageflip.com  to create something like this (I’m sure my students could do better):

Happy visualizing!

Ella

Day 8: Canva Resources for Education

I remember when Canva came out and people got very excited about it. It was the first time that I felt you had access to the most beautiful templates for presentations, posters and other documents without actually having to pay a graphic designer to do it for you. I actually really feel sorry for graphic designers these days, I mean you really can create some impressive looking publicity without needing anyone!

You can see below how user friendly it is and how nice everything looks:

Canva is great for teachers in a number of ways. Firstly, it creates gorgeous, I mean gorgeous power points. A couple of my students used it for a presentation two years back and it made their power points stand out from the rest in unbelievable ways. OK, but let’s say you don’t care about presentations. They also have a massive selection of templates for other things, such as book reports, journal entries, creative writing prompts, KWL charts, infographics, posters, invites, ID cards etc. Teachers can either print them out for class distribution or turn it into an activity eg. a class newsletter.

Yes Canva is really easy to use. No, Canva is not entirely free but a lot of it is. You can down posters to PDF and share and edit presentations together.

I created a power point for you to see as an example of the aesthetic wow of canva.

Like it or not, looks are important. With more and more responsibility going falling on teachers for curriculum design and adaption, and more and more projects and tasks being created by students online, knowing how to create handouts and presentations that look good is important. It’s the world we live in.

see you later

Ella

Day 6: Using TED talks in the classroom

Does anyone remember life before TED? I can’t. I have found some of these talks truly inspiring, eye opening, revealing, shocking, tear jerking…you name it.

A good story is a great basis for a class lesson or extension activity. I will hopefully do another blog with a list of my favorite TED talks for the classroom but today I want to talk about TED ed.

TED ed is a wonderful site where TED talks can be adapted for classroom purposes. You can take any TED talk and add your own questions (multiple choice or extended answers) and the format is really user friendly. I’ve made a couple and have used them with my students. The best plus is the short animated talks used on TED ed (a potted version of the longer TED talk) are really appealing for students.

I gave a test a couple of times to my classes where students got to pick a TED ed topic to be quizzed on and they had an essay at the end. It worked very well.

There are also tons of ready made lessons on the site already. You can adapt them to your class if you want.

There are TED ed talks on so many different fascinating topics, and most likely you’ll be able to find something relevant to the one you’re teaching right now.

Remember, if it’s hard for students to understand the video, you can slow it down in the ‘settings’ menu of the video player!

Have fun and dig deeper!

Ella

Day 3: Pocket- a place to store teaching materials

One of the biggest challenges of being a teacher is staying organized. No matter how many hacks and resolutions I make, I still end up desperately searching for that item that could be oh-so handy right now. I think when you’re teaching 4 or 5 classes of 25-30 individuals who hand in work late, lose stuff, are absent, redo, resit and generally drive you mad, it’s practically impossible for you, one person, to be ‘on top of it’ all the time.

However, if I use this app ‘Pocket’ correctly, I may find that at least I can access that darned article that would be so relevant and useful right now. I share in a million different places; wordpress, facebook, whatsapp, email but I think the first thing I need to do is share with myself.

 

Pocket is a very simple app. You basically just type in the URL of the article you just read/video you saw/image you liked and it will keep it for you and display it so it’s easily accessible. As you can see, the format is easy and streamlined.

HOWEVER, I just watch a really inspiring video about Victoria Arlem this morning as I was drinking my morning cuppa. This girl was in a coma for years, and then went on to be a paraplegic olympic champion swimmer and eventually learned to walk, after everyone else had resigned themselves to her staying in a wheelchair. It’s a perfect inspiring video for kids, especially if you are teaching ‘Count that Day Lost’ or even ‘The Road not Taken’ as poems for bagrut. The best video out there is from ‘upworthy’, who post via FB. But the link doesn’t show up in my Pocket as being about Victoria Arlem, it just has a FB logo (see image), which is a little annoying. It’s darn pesky when videos can only be found embedded in FB feeds!

Pocket has another amazingly cool feature which is great for English learners, it actually reads your articles out loud, so you can read while on the go!

like, hello? what is this video about?

Before you ask me, I don’t know if Pocket is better or worse than Google Keep. One thing I do know is that Google has, on more than one occasion, ‘lost’ something of mine. This might work better.

see ya,

Ella

Reblogged: A dozen basic guidelines for educators

A dozen basic guidelines for educators

• BY VALERIE STRAUSS

• October 30 at 9:00 am

D.C. teacher Vanessa Ford and student (By Amanda Voisard / The Washington Post)

Do we really need education policies and practices to cover everything that goes on in the classroom? Author Alfie Kohn says “no” and, below, offers basic guidelines that can really help teachers. Kohn is the author of 12 books about education and human behavior, including “The Schools Our Children Deserve,” “The Homework Myth,” and “Feel-Bad Education… And Other Contrarian Essays on Children & Schooling.” He lives (actually) in the Boston area and (virtually) at www.alfiekohn.org.

By Alfie Kohn

To create the schools our children deserve, it’s probably not necessary to devise specific policies and practices for every occasion.  Rather, these will follow logically from a few core principles that we devise together.  Here’s a sample list of such principles, intended to start a conversation among educators, parents, and (let’s not forget) the students themselves:

1.  Learning should be organized around problems, projects, and (students’) questions — not around lists of facts or skills, or separate disciplines.

2.  Thinking is messy; deep thinking is really messy.  Therefore beware prescriptive standards and outcomes that are too specific and orderly.

3.  The primary criterion for what we do in schools:  How will this affect kids’ interest in the topic (and their excitement about learning more generally)?

4.  If students are “off task,” the problem may be with the task, not with the kids.

5.  In outstanding classrooms, teachers do more listening than talking, and students do more talking than listening.  Terrific teachers often have teeth marks on their tongues.

6.  Children learn how to make good decisions by making decisions, not by following directions.

7.  When we aren’t sure how to solve a problem relating to curriculum, pedagogy, or classroom conflict, the best response is often to ask the kids.

8.  The more focused we are on kids’ “behaviors,” the more we end up missing the kids themselves — along with the needs, motives, and reasons that underlie their actions.

9.  If students are rewarded or praised for doing something (e.g., reading, solving problems, being kind), they’ll likely lose interest in whatever they had to do to get the reward.

10.  The more that students are led to focus on how well they’re doing in school, the less engaged they’ll tend to be with what they’re doing in school.

11.  All learning can be assessed, but the most important kinds of learning are very difficult to measure — and the quality of that learning may diminish if we try to reduce it to numbers.

12.  Standardized tests assess the proficiencies that matter least.  Such tests serve mostly to make unimpressive forms of instruction appear successful.

ABC’s of teaching

Here are some of the ABC’s of teaching – I’m sure I’ll think of more as I go along

A is for analyse- we not only teach analysis but we need to be involved in the process the whole time. We need to ask ourselves – what is going right? what is going wrong? why?

B is behaviour – bad behaviour cannot be treated in a black or white way, rather it is something holistic. There are always reasons why students misbehave and our job is not to act as a shrink, but rather to readjust our lesson, our perspective and how we address the students according to their needs. Bad behaviour is not personal, it just is and we have to come to terms with how to deal with it.

C is cognition- cognitive processes go on in all shapes and forms – how to we release that spark? How do we connect our students to what they are studying?

D is for defining goals- the more a teacher defines what he or she is expecting from the class, the more cooperation he or she will get in return

E is for educator – a teacher is an educator – it’s not a job, it’s a calling.

F is for feeling – a teacher must have a feeling for the class and for the individual students. It’s not dry science here.

G is for gimmicks – a class always need a bit of lightening up here and there, so gimmicks such as games, sending answers via sms, something cute do quieten the class down can all be useful. Just don’t rely on them as a replacement for real teaching.

H is for using your HEAD – don’t get emotionally boiled over by manipulations or harrassment – always use your head and avoid knee-jerk reactions.

I is for intelligence. Remember ALL of your students are intelligent in one way or another and remind them that intelligence comes in many shapes or forms. There is no such thing as a ‘stupid’ student in my class.

J- is for judgement. There are rules and there is judgement based on a given situation. Don’t ever make yourself come across as unfair to your students. Always work on the assumption that they are doing their best.

K – is for knowledge. Your knowledge as a teacher can only take you so far. Strengthen it, increase it.

L- is for learning strategies. Teach your students the best learning strategies so they can take responsibility for themselves.

N – is for nourishment – don’t expect kids to learn on empty stomachs. It is impossible for them.

O – is for options. A class like having the power to choose. Giving them options in exercises and activities gives them a sense of empowerment.

P- is for peripheral vision – you must have your eyes on the periphery of the classroom ,as well as its center.

Q- is for questioning. Asking key questions which make them question is the best way to give them Y2K skills.revi

R – is for review – try to find time at the end of the class to review all the material you have learned.

S – sleep your brain needs it, so does theirs.

T – testing – not too much, not too little. Where, when and how have to be seriously looked into.

U – understanding. You must understand their needs, they must understand your requirements.

V – verbalize – they may know the answer, but having them say it is a different skill.

W- winning. Your class are all winners and they must understand that. Encourage them in every way, one word of encouragement can go a very long way.

X – try to not to put too many of those red X’s on a page – it’s so discouraging. If a student does really poorly, just have them do the test again.

Y – year. The school year goes by in the blink of an eye, so make it count!

Z- zest for learning. Do whatever you can to give your students a zest for learning!