2 Online Courses for EFL / ESL teachers

Learn how to integrate new technologies in your lessons with all the support you need.
CULTURA EDTECH - a course for tech beginners.
MOVING BEYOND - a course for more experienced techies.

New Groups start on FEBRUARY 07.
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PROMETHEAN Activity: Images hidden behind TIC TAC TOE

This week, I trained new teachers how to make lessons for the  Promethean IWBs we have at school.
There are several features you can use and one of them is hiding/showing. A friend of mine , Rita, sent me a message yesterday asking for help because she wants to prepare an activity where she hides images behind numbers.

This is a tutorial I've made to show her how to do it.
http://screencast.com/t/7z7IwU0vPoO

The same software can be used in other IWBs, all you have to do is download the free version of ACTIVINSPIRE from http://www.prometheanplanet.com/en-gb/support/

PROJECT: songs by the Beatles (Across the Universe)

I had an idea for a project to develop this semester with my Intermediate students.

I intend to use 5 songs by "The Beatles" from the film Across the Universe as a warmer activity every other week. The activities have been devised at http://lyricstraining.com and I'll use the IWB to ask different students to come to the keyboard to try to complete the gaps from the lyrics with everyone's help. This way students will have listening and spelling practise. After we're done, I'll play the whole song again for us to sing (pronunciation practice).

I'll save the song videos from YOutube  as favourites so that I can easily use the songs at the beginning of classes, as background for writing activities, to inspire brainstorming, and so on. Playing the same songs at different times, I believe they will memorize them.

During the semester, I expect some student will mention the songs come from the film "Across the Universe" and I believe they will naturally ask to watch the whole film in class. If my predictions don't come true, I'll tell them about the film and suggest we watch it. The film is not appropriate for younger students, therefore it's important to watch it to see if you find it acceptable for your group.

The Song Activities I plan to use:

• Because
• All you need is love 
• I want to hold your hand
• Strawberry Fields forever
• Let it be

 These are the controls which you need to use  in LYRICSTRAINING to repeat the lines, skip words, rewind and so on.

This is a TUTORIAL to show you how to make your own song activity.

Creating your own SONG ACTIVITY

LYRICS TRAINING is a wonderful site to practise listening and spelling. It has a wide variety of songs you can choose to complete the gaps from the lyrics. There are 3 levels; the higher the level the more gaps you have to complete.


The good news is that you can create your own song activity with a video clip you select from youtube, paste the lyrics and synchronize it with the video. It's quite simple really. This is an activity I've created for the song BECAUSE by "the Beatles" from the film "Across the Universe".


If you want to learn how to make your own SONG ACTIVITY to use with your students, watch the TUTORIAL below.

YOUCUBE: a cool way to share youtube videos

Let's imagine you want to share a list of videos with your students in an interesting way.

Well, I guess, YOUCUBE could be your choice. You can easily enter 6 Youtube URLs, and then click share your cube to grab the link to it.

This is a YOUCUBE I've created with 6 videos I like very much. Hope you like my selection.

Cool debate tool - Amap

Great tool to be used to help students debate a topic. You can create an argument, state your reasons and then invite people to share their views. The site provides you with the embed code for publishing.



Check out an argument I've started:


To participale, just click REPLY.

HOW TO USE THE SITE WITH STUDENTS?

• Post an argument in a class blog and have students participate either from home or at the school computer lab.
• Start an argument, invite people around the world to share their views and then in class (with the IWB) show the discussion and invite students to share their opinions about the statement.

Found the tool thanks to Ozge and her wonderful blog .