Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!

My Personal Learning Environment (PLE)

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Dear all,

In the image above you can see my PLE (Personal Learning Environment). As Sarah (my English teacher) told us, there isn’t one single definition of PLE; however, I’d define it as “a mindmap through which you can organize your learning process, both formal and informal. It can be built on various nodes, such as the tools, places, people, skills, technologies that are somehow involved in your learning”. This is a very generic and wide definition because, as Sarah said, in the end “a PLE is yours, there’s no right or wrong, there’s just the way you see it”. (For more information, have a look at the links Sarah suggested us in e-tivity 9). As for my PLE I must admit that, after reflecting for a while upon the possible key nodes of my map, i.e. the nodes that had to function as the roots of the whole structure (language competence, cultural competence, information,…), the building process was quite straightforward since this map is actually the result, the product of what I’ve been thinking about all these last months, from October onwards.

Before starting my English course with Sarah, I was completely aware of what formal education could offer me to improve my language acquisition, and maybe I had never felt the need to think about other possible learning contexts more informal than university. I mean I had such a narrow vision of my ‘Learning Environment’ that it coincided more or less with university! A radical change started taking place in October for two reasons: October marked the beginning of my last year at university and the beginning of a surprising and revolutionary English course as well that was going to change my too restricted idea of ‘Learning Environment’. As regards the first reason, the fact that this is my last year at university urged me to reflect on how to keep my language knowledge ‘alive’ and how to achieve those goals I haven’t fully met so far at the uni. Considering the second reason, i.e. the course with Sarah, this has allowed me to discover the potential of Web 2.0 for language learners. Now I’m keener on the use of technologies to learn a language; in these months I’ve felt like a baby who is exploring the world and the people living in it for the first time! Well, I’ve been exploring a virtual world that is offering me what I’ve always dreamt of since when I was 14 and decided to study foreign languages: the opportunity to exchange ideas with foreign people, thus testing my language and cultural competence.

Going back to my PLE, I must say that, though I’d like to make a PLE for my German learning too, I built it mainly focusing on my English learning. Given that you can look at it, I think that a detailed description of my PLE would be boring and useless, that’s why now I’ll give you only a brief explanation of some choices I made while building it that can help you to read and understand the map. Let’s start with the four core branches:

1- LANGUAGE COMPETENCE

This was the most complex and difficult part to represent graphically. I pointed out what learning tools I’ve been using or I’ll use in the near future to increase my ‘language competence’, by making a distinction between the four main skills it consists of (listening, speaking, reading, writing); then, within each skill I distinguished between formal and informal learning contexts. Remember that with ‘formal’ I don’t mean only formal education (i.e. education at school, university or other courses), but any context that can help me to learn formal English (e.g. future jobs, media, academic writing); in other words, it is a matter of register. In order to highlight tools that are helpful to develop two or more skills at the same time, I used the same colour; for example, SkyPe is written in light blue so you can easily notice that it’s a tool I make use of for all the four skills: to practice listening/speaking if you have a phone exchange, or to practice reading/writing if you have a chat.

2- CULTURAL COMPETENCE

The ways through which I can increase my knowledge about English or American culture (lifestyle, food, traditions, holidays, educational system, religion, government, history, literature, etc.); again I distinguished between formal and informal tools.

3- INFORMATION

Under ‘Retrieving’ I tried to answer to the question: “How can I gather new information, i.e. material that can be exploited for my language learning (grammar rules & exercises, handbooks, podcasts, essays, software, social networks, etc.)?”. Under ‘Storing’, on the other hand, I included all the devices I use for keeping and arranging information (feeds, bookmarks, tags, folders, and links in my blog).

4- PLACES & PEOPLE

This node contains the places where I can find useful ‘information’ for increasing my language and cultural competence and the people ‘living’ in those places who can contribute to my learning process. At present my ‘learning environment’ is mainly made up of university education (English courses, lab lessons, literature classes) Web 2.0 (my blog and those of my classmates, podcasting, del.icio.us, Bloglines, YouTube, Myhappyplanet, Facebook) and some young students I’m coaching in English (sometimes giving private lessons allows me to refresh ‘real life English’, that is the basic vocabulary used everyday at home, at the restaurant, on the telephone, in a shop, etc.). In the near future I hope to travel a bit abroad and find a job that allows me to enrich my language knowledge (e.g. translator, clerk in a foreign trade office, English teacher).

All things considered, representing my own PLE was very useful; it forced me to categorize the tools I’ve got at my disposal to improve my English; this way I realized that in the last few months I’ve begun using tools through which, finally, I’m learning informal and colloquial language. I’m especially referring to social networks such as Myhappyplanet.com; this is a language learning community, a place to learn a language naturally by interacting with people around the world that speak the language(s) you want to learn and want to learn the language(s) you speak. Lastly, my map shows what a small role formal, academic education plays in my ‘Learning Environment’. That was a bit surprising but quite good now that I’m finishing university and need to find out new ways to keep up my lifelong learning!

Elena

Criteria to evaluate sources of information

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Judging a source of information as reliable or not can be very hard and challenging! This has become even truer with the advent of Internet as an unlimited source of online books, journals, essays, abstracts, articles, reports, conference proceedings, etc. because anyone can put material on it and online publications are less controlled than paper ones.

I’d like to start with an overview of some Web tools you can use to retrieve useful sources online:
(My reflections are based on information I found in the University of Essex & Monash University websites)

SEARCH ENGINES
In general, to find useful sources, I start asking a search engine using keywords related to the subject I’m interested in. This is often very frustrating because you can end up with so many useless results. For this reason I usually have a look only at the first result pages; there you’re more likely to find relevant links, and if I don’t get anything interesting, I try to reformulate my query in the search bar. As stated in the University of Essex website, in order to cut off irrelevant material, you can enclose the words you want appear together within inverted commas, or you can use the Boolean operators. Sometimes I carry out advanced searches with Google; this way I can ask only for PDFs (this is the file type academic papers written by university professors or experts are mostly published) or for .edu, .ac.uk websites, which are more trustworthy since they’re websites of American or British universities.

META-SEARCH ENGINES & SPECIALIZED SEARCH ENGINES
Reading the Tips from the University of Essex allowed me to learn of meta-search engines, like Mamma (i.e. ‘search engines which search other search engines and give you the most relevant returns from each’), and of specialized search engines, such as Google Scholar, which enables you to search for scholarly literature (peer-reviewed papers, theses, books, abstracts and technical reports) belonging to all areas of research.

WEB DIRECTORIES
According to the Monash University, Subject Gateways or Directories are lists of webpages, divided into subject areas; I’ve never considered the usefulness of such tools to find sources, but if you are interested in Languages and Linguistics, as I am, let’s have a look at these pages from Yahoo Directory (click here) and from Google Directory (click here). They show how much directories can be of help to quickly find out a number of relevant sites that undoubtedly deal with the subject you are doing research.

DATABASES
There are lots of repository sites offering lists of links to other sites that are arranged by topic and that can be trusted because they have been evaluated and selected by subject specialists; two examples are the Librarians' Internet Index and the Intute website.


By the way, whatever tool you might use to retrieve reference material, before opening a webpage, you should always have a look at the URL: the domain can tell you a lot about the organization hosting the webpage: whether it’s a commercial (.com or .co), educational (.edu or .ac), non-profit (.org), military (.mil), government (.gov), international (.int) organisation, etc. The fact that a webpage is hosted by a .edu or .gov organization is a further guarantee of its quality and relevance. Another thing you ought to look at is the site rating. For example, now that I can subscribe to feeds or bookmark on del.icio.us, I often check the number of subscribers a site has. If it’s high, this can be considered further evidence for its reliability.

CRITERIA I used or will use to evaluate sources of information (no matter whether they are on paper or on the Web)
(My reflections make reference to information I found both in Purdue’s OWL and San Diego State University websites)

TABLE OF CONTENTS & PREFACE
First of all, I always have a look at the table of contents in order to have an overview of what is discussed in each chapter or section of the source and so to decide if it’s worth reading it. Then, I always read the preface or introduction of a document to have a deeper insight into its content and to better understand what the author’s aim is.

AUTHORSHIP
I try to find out who the author is (this can be more difficult if the source is a webpage), and once I know the author, I search for further information about his/her career: what his/her profession and education level are, what else he/she has written, if he/she is an expert in the field and why. Finally, another relevant aspect is to see if the author is quoted in other sources and whether he/she gives a contact address; this is actually a good signal of the author’s responsibility.

TIMELINESS
Another point is the publication date: when the source was first published, if and when it has been revised or updated. This is quite important since outdated material cannot be useful any more.

PUBLISHER
As I’ve said above talking about the importance of the domain in the URL, the publisher’s reputability (in case of a webpage the organization hosting it) is meaningful too. According to OWL, some publishers ensure some quality control over the material, for example, ‘a university press or a government agency is likely to be a reputable source that reviews what it publishes’. As a matter of fact, the fact that a work has been reviewed increases its reliability.

AUDIENCE
In the preface (and this again proves the importance of reading it), the author usually says who his/her target is. If not, you can realize if you are the intended audience just by quickly reading through some passages and check if the style, level of information, and assumptions the author makes about the readership are appropriate for you. According to your general knowledge on the subject and to your purpose, the source may be too scholarly, too specialized, or too general to be valuable to you.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
You ought to check what material the author makes reference to in his/her work, if it is dependable and, thus, if it could be exploited for your research as well. For instance, I always check if the author documents the sources he uses both within the text and, at the end, by listing them in a bibliography; I carefully read through the bibliography to see if the reference material is valuable and might be helpful for me too.

Elena

Dreaming of the sea...

Hi there!

And finally I found a video on YouTube that reveals something about me: my love for the sea and my romantic nature! This video shows where I spent the most beautiful holidays of my life. It was in Sardinia in summer 2006 (Arcipelago de La Maddalena: Budelli and Spargi islands) and that memorable and lovely landscapes are still intact in my heart…Now I can only dream of them!

I'm sure you'll love it too!

Elena

Language Learning -YouTube or not YouTube: that's the question!

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Hi everybody,

This time I’ll delight you with a post about…YOUTUBE!!! By the way, before speaking about how it can be exploited for language learning, I’d like to share with you some data I gathered both from rev2.org and from a video on YouTube. Founded by three young PayPal employees in February 2005, YouTube is a free service that lets users upload, share, and view video clips. The first video ever was published in April 2005, and now there are, on average, more than 65,000 uploads and 100 million videos being watched daily; with 30 million visitors per month, it is the fourth most visited website in the world!

Hence, there’s clear evidence that YouTube is one of the greatest things Web 2.0 is offering us: YouTube is changing, or rather increasing, the ways we experience the world! Geographical, social, cultural boundaries have been knocked out and, thanks to YouTube, you can easily upload videos and let anyone in the world know something about you. Moreover, you can watch videos about things, events, places, TV programmes, conferences, ads, people from any country, comment them, or even start discussions about any topic: from politics to gossip, from sports to music, from religion to education,…It’s so amazing, nearly unbelievable! What’s even more startling is that it’s entirely generated by users! It’s us who decide what YouTube looks like, i.e. its content!

I was wondering if ‘Its Majesty YouTube’ :-) can be of help for language learners and education in general. Since I’m a bit sceptical, my answer is: “Yes, but with some restrictions!”. Let’s begin saying why YouTube can be an educational tool: in YouTube (mainly under categories like ‘Howto & Style’, ‘News & Politics’, or in TeacherTube) you can find a lot of videos, presentations, lectures, and tutorials useful in order to learn more about a subject (maths, science, geometry, IT, social sciences, etc.) or how to do something, such as creating a blog with Blogger or uploading a YouTube video.

As far as language learning is concerned, YouTube is an unlimited resource for language acquisition; i.e. you can listen to all kinds of spoken language (formal, neutral, informal) and genres (comic sketches, songs, parodies, debates, political speeches, talk shows, lectures, everyday dialogues,...) and, thus, learn a lot of vocabulary too. I assume, however, that the main and only edge of YouTube over podcasts is that you can watch (and not only listen to) clips; this helps memorize and hold your attention high. In addition, YouTube offers quite a lot of authoritative presentations about Web 2.0 tools applied to education and language learning, or video lessons to learn English, such as EF PodEnglish videos. I also think that creating a discussion group around a video (see the one I did in my English course this week) is a good and fresh way to practice English since students have to develop skills such as arguing in a public context that goes beyond class boundaries.

However, exploring YouTube allowed me to know its negative aspects as well. I found out very vulgar, filthy, or simply stupid videos, and this made me cut back my trust in it as an educational tool. As an English teacher, either of a primary school or high school, I’d never suggest my students to use it freely for their self-learning. It’s too dangerous! The best way a teacher can use it is to download a given video and propose it to students in order to start discussions. Anyway, I quite agree on using it freely for students at university level since it’s assumed they’re critical enough to choose what videos can be helpful or not for their language learning. What do you think?

Bye,

Elena

Web 2.0 & Language Learning

Hi world!

I was searching for a video on YouTube that says something about me, when I found something that says a lot about the English course I'm atteding at university this year! Hope it can be of help for my mates but also for anyone who visits my blog and doesn't fully undestand what I have been talking about for some weeks!

Enjoy it!

Elena

Exploring the world of podcasts with the eye of an ESL learner

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Dear all ,

In this post I’ll speak about learning English with podcasts. Let’s start with a definition of podcast (iPOD + broadCAST) from pcmag.com encyclopedia:

An audio broadcast that has been converted to an MP3 file or other audio file format [Podcasts can be available in a number of audio formats including WMA and AAC, though MP3 tends to be the most favoured format due to wide spread acceptance by pretty much all types of portable media devices.] for playback in a digital music player or computer. The "pod" in podcast was coined from "iPod," the predominant portable, digital music player, and although podcasts are mostly verbal, they may contain music. Using the RSS 2.0 syndication format, podcasts are made available to subscribers just like news feeds. The client program that captures the audio feeds and synchronizes them with the music player is a "podcatcher," such as Curry's own iPodder.

The definition itself suggests that the greatest advantage of podcasting is portability: you can listen to whatever you want wherever and whenever you want! Podcasts can be listened to online and even offline by downloading them on your computer, mobile phone, Ipod or any other Mp3 player. It's wonderful! Podcasts enable you to listen to TV and radio programmes, videos, conversations, lectures, news bulletins, interviews, documentaries and books at home, on your way to school or work,... All you need is a PC and a tool not much bigger than, let’s say, a lighter, which is called Mp3 player! True that something very similar was possible with walk-men or CD players, but the biggest difference is the easy and quickly access to plenty of freely downloadable podcasts and the great variety of podcast genres available, which is definitely without precedent.

I remember that, when I studied English in high school, the most cutting-edge technologies my English teacher might use were audio or videocassettes and CDs! This implies that listening activities could be done only on a small amount of stuff and only in a lab or in class provided that a VCR, a DVD player or a stereo was available! How things have changed!!! Nowadays we have thousands of English podcasts belonging to a wide range of text types (dialogues, reports, bulletins, lectures,…) and dealing with plenty of topics, from a beginner to an advanced level. However, I assume this is true only with reference to English…Unfortunately, I don’t think that podcasting has developed so much in other languages too.

By the way, your criticism is essential with so many podcasts! The Web is becoming a ‘rubbish can’ full of podcasts; some of which are really of poor help with language learning… In order to find out useful podcasts to learn English, I suggest you to search del.icio.us, podcastalley, or odeo (these last two allow you to browse podcasts by topics).

Here are four websites I subscribed to in order to be always updated on the most recent podcasts:

www.eslpod.com & www.china232.com/podcasts:

On both these sites you can listen to freely downloadable podcasts concerning any possible situation in daily life and, by clicking on the podcast titles, transcripts are available too. Podcasts are very didactic: they are followed by exhaustive and friendly explanations on the vocabulary used.

ESLPod.com has a singular approach to ESL learning with podcasts, which is well explained by this quote: "We believe the fastest way to improve your English is to listen to conversations and discussions you can understand. Many people try to improve their English by listening or reading things that are too difficult. They understand only 40-50%, which means they are wasting half of their time!" It’s so frustrating not to understand the greater part of what you are listening to! On ESLPod.com it’s impossible not to understand: it’s not that the language used is too easy, but that they provide English at a slower speed; in this way you have time to reflect on pronunciation, to memorize and take notes of new vocabulary. Of course, this is only a starting point to be able then to understand audioclips characterized by more natural English.

China232.com, instead, is a really useful tool to learn how a daily English conversation works. In the first part of each episode there is a dialogue on a given topic, while in the second part explanations about the expressions used are given in a dialogic style. This kind of podcasting is, therefore, particularly useful to learn real English, right intonation, rhythm, and speed in spoken conversations.

www.englishpod.com:
EnglishPod.com includes a huge ‘Podcast Archive’ dealing with business and regular English used in very common situations: giving feedback, being diplomatic, building relationships with people, making presentations, bargaining, making contact over the telephone, etc. Podcasts are arranged from an elementary to an advanced level so you can choose which ones to listen to. Unfortunately, while podcasts are free, transcripts, sample sentences, glossaries require paid subscription, yet even advanced-level podcasts are not very difficult and things are repeated several times, so that you have time to memorize and take notes of new structures.

www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/today:
This is the web page 'Today' from BBC Radio 4. There you can listen to today’s top news; latest reports on politics, international issues, science & nature, arts & culture; interviews with important and powerful people on current affairs. It’s a very useful tool to get used to formal speeches on major issues and to the language of broadcasts.

I can't wait for reading your comments ;-)

Elena