emilychen
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Language learning experience with CALL software/website
Based on your language learning experience with CALL software/website, please discuss pros and cons of multimedia CALL with your group members. Think about what you like and what you do not like when using CALL software/website to learn English or other languages. Then come up with a list and examples.
Note: Every group needs to answer this question.
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10/18/2004, 12:41 pm
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claireou
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Reply From Group 6
Our group has learnt how to use BBC English Learning website. And we decided to answer this question based on the BBC experience.
According to what we’ve learnt from BBC, we’ve found some pros and cons:
Pro 1:
BBC uses multiple modalities to support various learning styles and strategies. Through visual functions, you are able read news or to watch some films from BBC and listen to foreigners speaking native English. BBC also allows you to listen to some English music while reading the introduction of the singer and the lyrics from many famous singers. So BBC uses multiple modalities to support various learning styles and strategies to help people learning English.
Pro 2:
BBC provides interaction, communicative activities. You can communicate with different people in the message board through discussing questions that you encountered. Or you can interact with the website by doing the quizzes and get feedback. All these could be done in a short time without meeting someone or any difficulty. So it’s really very convenient.
Pro 3:
BBC utilizes task-based and problem-solving activities. As I mentioned, you could read news articles or watch a piece of film and do the multiple choices question right after your reading, watching and listening to check whether you understand the article or film or not and get feedback which solves your problems.
Con 1:
You might not find articles that fit your English level, which means BBC doesn’t separate the news articles by the standard of difficulty. So it’s possible that you get to BBC and found that all the articles are too hard or too easy for you. Even there are vocabulary and grammar for you to read, you might still losing patience to read all those English words if you can’t understand most of them.
Con 2:
The front page of BBC English Learning website isn’t very attractive. The words are too small, and it’s quite tiring reading from the PC screen for too long. That’s the thing that we don’t like when learning from websites.
Con 3:
There are always too many things for people to choose and read from an English learning website. Take BBC as an example, when we first got into the front page, we were a little confused about how to use and what should we choose to read. So for people who are not very good at computer, like me, it sometimes takes a lot more time reading news from website than from newspaper. That’s what we don’t like when learning English through websites.
Last edited by claireou, 10/21/2004, 11:01 am
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10/21/2004, 11:00 am
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Janet5
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 Reply From Group 5
Our group decided to choose the CALL website “English Digest” as an example to discuss about its pros and cons.
Pro1: Learners can seek help, e.g. on grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation, cultural content from the on line English Classroom. They can post some questions on the website to ask teachers help them on Monday, Wednesday and Friday and also can chat with other learners just like a discussion board.
Pro2: The program includes sound recordings. It is easy and convenient for learners to listen to different articles on line. They can also listen to explanations on line if they don’t understand the contents of the articles. Besides that, the voices are clear and easy for learners to understand because there are two teachers, one is a male Foreigner, and the other is a female Taiwanese. Both of their speaking speed is not so fast.
Con1: We think the level of language that the program offers is not clearly indicated. The program does not tell browsers about the level of English article sections. It is hard to know that whether the article it shows is easy or difficult for learners to read and listen. Therefore, learners will probably lose their patience to see whether the program is suitable for them or not.
Con2: We think the user interface is not easy to understand. For example, there are some ambiguous icons that can cause confusion. The program has four items for learners to choose such as English Digest, Landmark English, English 4U, and A＋English and under those items, each of them has six sections such as the level introduction and tests, listening on line, articles, the radio time schedule, subscription, and on line English Classroom. The four items cannot tell differences between them because they all show the title of articles for learners to listen.
Con3: It is a pity that the program does not have any interaction activities such as games or crossword puzzles for learners to exercise. And it also doesn’t provide the record function for learners to record their voice in order to see whether their pronunciation is correct or not. Learners cannot get any feedbacks from the program. Learners can only listen to the articles and the explanation on line and learn English vocabulary and sentences by themselves.
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10/22/2004, 11:20 pm
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Christine Wu
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Reply From Group 3
Group 3 members: Eugene, Christine Wu, Jean, Stacey Chen, Queenie
We group 3 selected the CALL website “Online Writing Lab of Ted Knoy” to discuss. Besides, our group members shared some experience with using blog. Emily guided us to get our own blog, so we got some ideas about this.
Pro 1: About “Online Writing Lab of Ted Knoy”, this website provides listening exercises which we can practice without worrying about time and space limitation, and we can save our budget, too.
Pro 2: CALL website is full of diversity learning materials which attract us to surf on the internet to search whatever we like to learn. We don’t study under pressure and anxious about someone will laugh at our ability or mistakes, because we just face the computer.
Pro 3: We discussed some interesting things about our own blog website. We considered that it is a good communicative environment between peers. Now, our blog provides us post some messages to talk about what we have learned from CALL or what kind of difficulties we face. We can share our learning experience together.
Con 1: If we finish an exercise without any clean corrective feedback at spot, what we get is just the answer without any explanation. We may feel confused about why the answer in our mind is wrong. Sometimes, as we chose the wrong answer, computer will show that please try again. It is useless for us to understand our weaknesses.
Con 2: We think that language learning through the CALL website without interaction between teacher and peers. To those students who are extrovert, this way will be a boring task.
Con 3: For a novice learner who learns the pronunciation of the foreign language without corrective feedback from teachers, he or she will not know whether their pronunciation is correct or not. It is hard for foreign language learners to practice pronunciation by themselves from the CALL website.
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10/24/2004, 12:11 pm
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glenn97
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Reply from Group 4
Our group has learnt how to use Nicenet and Go My Access in last year. We decide to answer the question based on the function of the two website.
Pro1. Using the Nicenet, students can post their own writing and everyone can share their opinions. We can post our personal thoughts and opinion on the Nicenet. It is a helpful method for us to get different kinds of opinion. It could be a good chance for us to appreciate other’s writing. Sometimes, we may make the same mistake in English writing, such as grammar mistake and sentence structure mistake. We could learn English by correcting others’ mistake.
Pro2. Nicenet has many learning center links that could provide us with a lot of information and materials in English learning. For example, on-line dictionary and word usage are those learning centers that could help us a lot in writing.
Nicenet helps us have interaction with the writer. We can post our commits after reading ones’ writing. Then, the author can reply our question later.
Pro3. Most of our group members agree with Go My Access can give us appropriate writing direction. It would tell you that your writing might have some problem in logic or meaning mix. Then, we could revise it by the commits by the soft.
Con1. When I enter Nicenet, I may get lost in the complex website. It has too much links in each field. Sometimes, it is too hard for new user to use. For me, I can only use those simply function in Nicenet.
Con2.. Take Go My Access as an example, it is a good soft for us to revise our article by it. After we write more articles, we realize that the commits in the Go My Access are almost the same. You may get a high grade by changing some key words that the soft prefer. Suddenly we realize that its function is limited.
Last edited by glenn97, 10/24/2004, 1:20 pm
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10/24/2004, 1:18 pm
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d8753033
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 Group 1
List of what we like when using CALL software/website to learn English or other languages.
1. Student-centered and promote student autonomy:
When using CALL websites/software, we have a high degree of control over our learning. Since Call website/software presents different materials and feedbacks on an individualized basis, it allows us to proceed at our own pace.
2. Use multiple modalities to support various learning styles and strategies:
As we know, CALL websites are always combining text, images, sound and video together in a variety of activities. In other words, it integrates the learning of four language skills - listening, speaking, reading, and writing. It can satisfy all types of learners at the same time. For instance, as visual learners, we can learn better when it provides lots of pictures, images, and videos.
3. Provide interaction, communicative activities, and real audience:
CALL software/website provides authentic synchronous and asynchronous communication channels. With the use of it, we can communicate directly, inexpensively, and conveniently with other learners or native speakers of the target language at any time and in any place. Besides that, I can publish some multimedia materials or share ideas with other learners around the world.
List of what we do not like when using CALL software/website to learn English or other languages.
1. Time consuming:
It wastes too much time just for downloading files.
2. Lack of content:
Some websites uses a lot of high-tech techniques to attract audiences or users’ attention. However, after a while, the user may find out the website is more like an entertainment, which does not really provide useful content.
3. Complicated design:
Not few of people may have similar experience that when you visit a website you see so many sources and get lost totally! Too much information on one page which sometimes makes users or learners feel frustrated!
4. Lack of interactivity:
In most of the language learning websites, the feedback or response learners get are sometimes too general. Even the website offers email or voice mail to answer learners’ questions, it can be that the answers do not really satisfy or make sense to students.
Last edited by d8753033, 10/24/2004, 2:27 pm
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10/24/2004, 2:25 pm
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Kathywang
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 Group 2 (10,12,14,16,56)
【Pros 】
1.We can repeatedly review what we’ve learned, and what we don’t hear clearly at any time. The magazine, Studio Classroom, is released along with CD ROM, whether oral reading CD (to practice speaking and listening), or MP3 lecturing (to learn English just like you are in a class). When you use the CD ROM, you can choose what to hear by dates, or topics. Also, you can always hear it again and again if you like, at any time if you have a set of PC or a Walkman.
2.We can learn with big fun. Vivid images, animation, and games make learning more interesting, and attract our attention to learn by ourselves. EX: Triple Play Plus, Live ABC, and English Free (http://www.englishfree.com.tw/tw/home/)
3.Learn, and practice, and review. Many websites provides exercises for learners to practice, so that we can if we absorb what we’ve learnt. If we don’t do a good job on the exercise, we can always review the text to learn it better. (http://www2.nkfust.edu.tw/~emchen/Pron/vowel.htm)
4.Choose the speed of presented dialogue (Fast/Slow) (http://www.liveabc.com/site/dailytalk/life_2.asp?lesson=2&sort=食衣住行&course=Making%20Breakfast%20/做早餐&it=食衣住行)
5.Without time and place limitation. Language learners can communicate directly, inexpensively, and conveniently with other learners or native speakers of the target language at any time and in any place. It makes the learning is every time and everywhere.
6.Good for the disabled. Learning can be in several forms such as taught by a tutor, learn by learners’ own and multimedia software. It’s not convenient for the disabled go to school. If they can learn at home or even in bed, it’s will be good news for them.
7.Provide feedback. After we have done a language-learning test, the computer would give us a feedback, suggestion or even an encouragement. We can take it to be our reference to make our learning better!
8.Real persons’ pronunciation. Lots of English learning websites provide pronunciation function. We can click on what we want to hear and repeat it over and over. We can learn how native speakers pronounce some words or sentences to improve our pronouncing and listening.
9.Radio / TV programs on line. In this part, many websites provide radio / TV programs on line to teach or to explain their daily article. Sometimes we needn’t buy the magazine or newspaper, we can pick up the articles they release on line and listen in on line. It is very convenient and for free. EX: Live ABC and Studio Classroom
10.Saving lots of money. Using CALL website to learn English or other languages can save us lots of money because we can pick up what information we want without buying a book or a magazine. We don’t buy a book or magazine just for one article or a piece of information. So using English learning websites can save us money.
【Cons】
1.Look the computer monitor. When we learn with CALL software or website, we have to make our eyes focus on the screen, which makes our eyes tired easily and poor eyesight.
2.Technical problem. A. We are learning on line, watching videos or listening to dialogues. If the Internet access is not stable or is restrained by the bandwidth, there would be a lag to complete the learning. B. If the server of the website goes failure; we can’t take advantage of its learning resource as we have scheduled.
3.Not familiar with computer, Internet, or software. Sometimes, websites would ask you to download certain software for execute their programs. And that would be a troublesome matter for those who are not familiar with computer stuff.
4.Membership required. Some websites only allow their members to learn, and that really sucks. If we want to make use of the material on the websites, we first have to fill in lots of personal information to get an account and password.
5.Without detail description. The computer will give us a predetermined answer and suggestion instead of a clearly feedback in detail. That is, you still don’t know what’s wrong with you after getting it.
Last edited by Kathywang, 10/25/2004, 11:18 pm
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10/24/2004, 8:22 pm
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pigdodoo
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group 7
Pro1: The website has many different kinds of English materials for us. For example, it has grammar section, exercise section, conversation and slang section. The web offers download English books and common mistakes in English and TOEFL vocabulary.
Pro2: The web can link to the Google search bar.
Con 1: In the main page, I though there are a lot of things for me to learn, after entering each of it. I see some defects. For instance, in idiom or conversation zone, it is hard for me to find what I really want to learn because those content do not be categorized from A-Z or from types. So I have to read one after one to find what I may want to know.
Con 2: The download English books section seems good, but when I start to read it. It only gives me one chapter and asks me to buy the book. I think it interfere my interest towards the book and I will not want to enter download English books zone again.
Con 3: The web did not offer online discussion for learners. It just offers what the web master want to give us. And it has no levels for us to choose. For example, in the grammar zone, the master gives us the Chinese learners’ common mistake and gives us easy grammar to learn. I have no idea if the mater knows who his or her readers are.
Con 4: In the main page, I think the index is whole of the content. After entering one of it, I found the above line was links for us to link. However, I was wrong. Those are not links, and those are also part of the content. Users are very easily to get lost and confused in this website.
Con 5: The audio software is need for learners. In the English songs zone, the web also post lyrics but no real songs for us to listen. I wonder what the use of those lyrics. I suggest the web supply audio functions so that we can listen and learn.
Last edited by pigdodoo, 10/24/2004, 11:46 pm
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10/24/2004, 11:45 pm
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yukia
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Group8- Language learning experience with CALL software/website
We want to take the software TOFEL Advanced Listening as an example:
Pros:
1. It uses multiple modalities to support language learning. For instance, in every listening practice, users can see a relevant picture in that page to be an aid which help users understand the content. Besides, users can also click the text button to see the whole text.
2. It provides three sections including short conversation, long conversation, and long talk. Users have their autonomy to focus on what they want to practice. Also, in every section, users can choose the topics they want to use by the ways of random or sequence.
3. It provides appropriate feedbacks. For instance, if learners get something wrong in the practice, it will show a sentence, “Your choice is incorrect.” Then, the users can click the button, Chinese explanation, to see why the answer is wrong.
4. The user interface is easy to understand. For example, in the first page, there are three icons: tutorial, practice, and tests. It is clearly show what the users will need.
Cons:
1. It might be a little bit hard to navigate through the program. The users might need to take time to learn how to use it because there might some functions that users are not sure how to use.
2. Some parts of the practice do not include scoring. Therefore, users could only do many practices and might get bored eventually.
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10/25/2004, 9:22 am
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