Week 10

And so we came to the end ...

I must admit it was an exhausting experience (regarding the time spent in front of the computer reading or writing prosts or the final project) ---> BUT a very GOOD one! A very REWARDING one!  

I've learned a lot, I've met great teachers from around the world and I've found some new enthusiam to never stop looking for new ways of teaching, of new ways to introducing the contents. I've realized I am a good teacher always trying to meet my Ss' needs, always improving myself and trying ways to make learning English fun! Now I know many new ways to do so, I have come across many new ideas bor both using in teaching as well as in my organization of the materials (such as delicious.com)

I enjoyed every minute of reading, discussing and commenting to all of the reading materials and your posts in Webskills course and hopefully we meet gain one day. The world is small ... and you ever know!

Enjoy!

Janja from Slovenia

Week 9

This week I was mainly focused on my final project. It took me quite a while to go through Ali's comments and it really helped me a lot to have another opinion of what to improve, what to add and what is already well written, so thanks, Ali!

I was happy to write a report like that because it made me realize that using technology in teaching really makes English lessons fun! I had a great experience teaching grammar with ppt presentations and both myself and the children loved it!

Hopefully, I will be able to use a webquest soon to try it out for teaching as well!

This weeks's topics are multiple intelligences and learning styles.

I believe we all have different styles that we like although there is one, two or even more that prevail in us. For that reason it is difficult to teach in a way to cover all of the learnig styles as well as all of the intelligences. At the same time, our teaching usually is a mixture of everything, many times inseparably connected activities according to learning styles and multiple intelligences.
Also, sometimes, as teachers, we are not familiar with all of them, but we only know some and a teacher most usually teaches in a way that is close to him/her which means that he/she uses mostly his/her learning style as he/she is familiar and comfortable with it.

I try to adress different styles as well as multiple intelligences while teaching and for that reason I try to use different kinds of activities for students.

Week 8

I like this week's theme, it's one of my favourites in this course.

Not a lot of reading and theory (I did read everything about Anvill though) but a lot of trying out new things and learning them in practice. It's always nice to put your work into new worsheets, new games, new bingo cards, new flashcards! Although, I must admit, I really like pages that are user-friendly and I somehow don't use those that one has to be registered into. Especially if there are too many and then I lose track of all the passwords and everything else.

It makes me as a teacher more motivated, teaching vocabulary in a new way, or even in an old way, using new flashcards! ;) It also makes Ss, especially young learnes very motivated to see new games or just new pictures on the flascards. They always admire whatever I bring into the classroom! :)

I think the knowledge I've gained in this week will be very useful while preparing new materials for teaching young learners.

Week 7

It might be that what I am going to write about does not fit here in the Webskill course ... but it's all been part of my week!

First of all, I must admit, it is not at all connected to the course! It's all about my family and ...

I was supposed to show the Webuest to my Ss on Friday, but I didn't. I was supposed to study and read a lot for the course this week as well but I didn't. I was supposed to collect all the emails for Gordana because I am really interested in the excahange of the emails - but I didn't.

Because by baby girl (not even a baby anymore - she is 20 months now) got ill on Tuesday. My husband stayed at home with her on Wednesday but then in the afternoon had to leave for Marseille, France on a business trip in the afternoon so I stayed with her on Thursday and Friday. He's coming back tomorrow night.

So I stayed at home with Ana, reading stories to her, listening to children's music, cooking, cleaning and just being a mum. I needed years to learn to only be a mom. Not to worry about how people at work will handle thing without me. I needed years to be able to stay at home with my child with no bad feelings, no regrets that I am not working when my child is sick ... I also have  a 6-year-old daughter ...

... so this week I am being a mom and I love it! I am having fun with my two daughters and I love it! My older girl goes to school so I do have to take her to school in the morning, but I pick her up right after she's done with classes at midday!  - for a change she doesn't have to stay there until 3.30in the afternoon!

Ana has had temperature since Tuesday and hopefully she'll be fine tomorrow! I'll try to catch up the course materials tomorrow - if not, everything will still be waiting for me on Monday! :)

I'm also looking forward to tomorrow night - I have a 20th universary of finishing primary school (either junior prom or valedictory ball according to the dictionary) and I know I'll have a great time - chatting, dancing, seeing old friends! :)

Also, today's my birthday! I turned 35! In the last couple of weeks I hardly found any time for myself. So in the morning I decided it was going to be my day today! Ana felt well in the morning so  I went into the basement and ran for 30 min on a treadmill (is that even the right Word? I found it in the dictionary - in the meantime she was playing and looking at me) and while she was sleeping I went to sauna (I am lucky to own an infra one at home). During the day I was spending time with her, cuddling and resting and while she was sleeping in the afternoon, my older daughter and I had a bath. It was a blast. In the evening, I opened a bottle of wine and had a glass by myself and had a long talk with my friend that called me to say all the best for my birthday.

I am now ready to go to bed, looking forward to spend tomorrow with my girls and waiting for my husband to come back in the evening ...

Week 6

Attending this course has made me think about using the technology more!

Getting an overhead projector into my classroom in September has given me the opportunity to start using it even more!

So I started and have used the PowerPoint presentation to teach grammar twice so far. Both times, I used it to teach grammar, once the verb to be and once the verb have got, both in the same classes, in the 6th classes.

It was absolutely great! I loved it, because everything was prepared in advance at home (and I had less work in the classroom) and secondly, because my Ss had fun, they loved the pictures and loved the idea of learning through a ppt presentation! They asked to learn grammar in the same way more often now!

I am looking forward to presenting Webquest into the 9th class! I've explained the idea but unfortunatelly the computer laboratory was full this week and I've made a reservation for next Friday! Can't wait!

Week 5

... to be written :) - just chenking if it works ...

I've been having some problems writing this blog lately, but with Courtney's help, I've managed to solve the issue! :) I am so happy about it! It was a bit frustrating though but it seems as I'm learning all the time which adds value to this course.
I was supposed to learn about blogging at the beginning of this course but still, if it handn't been for that problem,  I wouldn't have learned about lon in/log out thing and I might have problems later, when Courtney is not around any more ...

A lot of new things appeared in week 5 ... especially rubrics and webquests. I have never heard of the two things before and I will definetely read more about both of them. Webquest seem very interesting for Ss and rubrics seem very useful for the teacher ... I'll explore both of them in details next week when I have a bit more time ...

Enjoy learning!

Week 4

I knew it would be interesting but the more time it passes the more interesting it gets!

There are websites I have never heard of before, there are things I have never thought of before, there are ideas that would never cross my mind before and there are people I would never get to know if it wasn't for WebSkills online seminar.

So, at the moment, I am grateful for all the knowledge I am gaining, for all the people I am meeting, for all the ideas and I am reading about and having my own (due to the new knowledge), for all the reading of the articles and your blogs I am doing, for all the positive energy I am experiencing within the group, for the lovely and supporting tutor Courtney, for all the (reading) material I am getting, for ... do I need to go on and on?

I am also happy I am able to share my own experience with you (I have never before realized I am doing a great job by including my Ss into a reading project (Bookworms/Penguin Readers), preparing all the Quizlet word sets for ALL the Ss books I am using, taking them to the computer room for practicing vocabulary and grammar ...

The thing that have come out of this week and I am the most happy about is Gordana’s idea about exchanging our Ss emails! It brings back memories to my beginnings of learning English in my 5^th grade! J

Week 3

If I had to choose the best thing of Week 3, it would be getting to know about delicious!

I use Internet Explorer as my main browser and I use Favourites to organizes webpages that I often use. I also organize them according to different themes as well as either links are private or for work.

There are two kinds of problems that often occur. The first one is that the list gets too long too soon and then I have to make so many folders and it takes quite some time to get to the desired page.

The second one is that I get my computer cleaned from time to time (many of those times the whole operating system is downloaded from the start) and because I forget to export the favourites (because I can't and usually there's no time to find somebody who can) all of my links are lost.

I'm sure I'll explore delicious.com in details and learn to use it all the time, because it is accesable from any computer, it's always there and I don't have to bring my computer everywhere.

Week 2

Bloom's Taxonomy and the ABCD model for writing objectives and a list of web searching engines are this weeks reading and studying materials.

I somehow thought I can use a computer quite well and that I am also quite good not only at teaching and also at planning my teaching. While studying this week's material I've realized I got stuck in time and have completely forgot about the theory behind  (that I had been taught at the university) but is also very important when planning my lessons. It is about time to revise my knowledge about different teaching methods, models and all the theory that is really useful. I am really happy to be part of the group of the online WebSkills course!

While working on my blog, I went on Facebook to check if there's anything new there and guess what was posted in one of the pages that  I follow? This picture ... :)
- (unfortunatelly I can't make it bigger, but if you download it and have a look at it, I'm sure, you'll like it!)

Getting started ...

I cannot believe I am writing a blog!

I've always admired people who write blogs daily, weekly or monthy and in that way share their ideas and thoughts to the world! Now I am one of those ...

I've also admired them for knowing the technology well enough to be able to write one ... Now I am one of those, being able to write a blog because I've learned about blogger. I've never heard of it before! Three cheers for the course!!!

I am looking forward to learning!

"Tell me and I forget.
Teach me and I remember.
Involve me and I learn." (Benjamin Franklin)
*Thank you, Lorena, for reminding me about this quote!