ESL/EFL Internet-based activities

I chose the option 3 to find pre-existing Internet-based activities for ESL/EFL learners, which I think would be useful for my future EFL classroom. Although teachers could use the same activities or methods in ESL and EFL environments, there are many things that teachers should take into accounts when implementing them because two environment are very different. ESOL learners in K12 in the U.S are required to learn new language and the subject contents at the same time, and academic language skills are rather focused to learn then communicative language skills in this environment. However, in the EFL environment, e.g. teaching English in K12 in Korea, a communicative language learning with skill-based activities is a focus rather than an academic language learning because they are learning subjects in their native language. The article, Teaching ESL Versus EFL: Principles and Practices, by Daniel Krieger, gives you more insights about the issue.
This article helped me with clear understanding about how task-based webquests could be integrated into skill-based ESL or EFL curriculum.

Most of the pre-existing activities I found are for high intermediate and advanced English learners.
http://www.call-esl.com/samplewebquests/lesson-template3.htm : This is a well-designed webquest for advanced ESL college students who prepare to study in an American universities. Students are required to sit in an American college classroom to observe an American professor and students. ESL students finally learn American college customs and compare them with their native countries, which might be so much interesting if you have students from many different cultures. In the EFL environment, I think that I could use this task if I can show a video of an American college classroom (if possible) to the student, which might be a substitute for the step 4. Students can practice extensive reading, writing in preparing PowerPoint slides, and speaking while making a presentation at the end.

http://www.angelfire.com/az2/webenglish/koko.htm : In this treasure hunt task, students can practice scanning strategy in reading because it involves searching rapidly through a text to find a specific point of information. Before doing the activity, students needs to know a purpose of reading and how this strategy can be used in their reading outside the classroom.

http://www.eslgo.com/classes/mi/ : I love this site, which is a multiple intelligence webquest for adult English learners. I myself did the test to know my MI, and I received high marks on mathematics and Visual/Spatial, which I expected. :) Through this task, students could have an opportunity to evaluate their own intelligence and let the teacher know about them more. At the same time, students are exposed to read a lot of English articles. Also, they are involved in writing a report in English.

http://www.nelliemuller.com/Whydidtheydothat_Student.htm : The task is to research flags of other countries and origins of them. Through this task, students could expand their knowledge about other countries and improve cross-cultural understanding, as well as improving language skills. I like this task because multicultural understanding is my interest. Also, considering English as a global language,I hope my students in Korea learn not only English-speaking countries but also non-English speaking countries including, developing countries to have a true global mind.

Finally, I guess that one of the reasons why the Internet is so popular in the EFL learning is because the Internet is a perfect tool that students can practice listening and speaking. In the EFL environment, English learners are rarely exposed to the language-rich environment. So the technology provides a virtual place that they can hear and speak the authentic language. http://www.esl-lab.com/guide.htm provides learners with listening activities based on specific topics, which provides semi-authentic environment to practice English. Students could self-study for listening exercise, and work in a pair or a group for pre- or post-listening activities.
http://www.manythings.org/ provides word games, puzzles, quizzes, exercises, slang, proverbs and much more for fun study, which will help students with building up bottom-up skills.

IK's Response to "Working the Web"

Looking back my first semester in my master's program last year, learning about 'a student-centered instruction' was like "WOW!!" to me.
As a person who grew up in a totally different world, my learning experience in school was to memorize a great amount of knowledge from the textbooks in a teacher-fronted classroom to prepare the multiple choice questions or sometimes short-answer questions.
My high school had a good-looking library with red bricks, where I sometimes studied for preparing tests but never borrowed books to research something.
My teachers in the subjects were only the information resources and never gave us the research assignment.

More than ten years have passed since I graduated from high school, so I believe, or hope, that teaching and learning in K-12 has changed and children in my country learn to "THINK" and "SELF-LEARN" in a student-centered classroom. (But I doubt it.)
70% or more of Korean use the Internet, which made Korea rank the 3rd place in the national information index in the world, as of 2005. So I am sure that use of the Web for teaching and learning would be prevalent, but as the author pointed out, it is important how teacher and students use the Web. Do they just surf the web without any purpose or do they use technology for authentic learning?
If teachers are not familiar with student-centered instruction, they may not be able to implement the internet-based instructional activities, such as treasure hunt, webquests, and so on. In order to incorporate this activity into the classroom, teachers' teaching philosophy should be changed at first and teachers should be willing to be a guide or a facilitator, instead of a authoritative figure.
However, we cannot blame teachers for not implementing these GREAT activities in their classrooms because education is always interwined with parents belief on education, educational systems, cultural/historical philosophy on education and so on.
How can we apply western ways of teaching and learning into my country? I don't know. I am always stuck in this question.

Considering application the Web into a language classroom, I think that the internet-based activities can be combined to task-based or content-based approaches. When teachers are implementing them in the language classroom, they should remember to set up "language objectives", such as key vocabulary, language structures, and language functions to help students accomplish the task. Without language instruction, students would be frustrated.

One more consideration for the activities is to consider learners' level of language proficiency. If students just started to learn new language, they cannot perform the task in the new language. Instead, they could use the Web resources in their first language to complete the task. In this case, teachers should know students' first language and students use the same language in one classroom.

My Final Decision on the Assignment

Alright, I decided to go for a web-based presence. I am excited to learn something new!

As for the contents, I need time to think about it. It would be for anyone who is learning English as a second/foreign language or for anyone who is interested in learning Korean as a foreign language. Because I am not sure where and what grade level I will teach after graduation, it is not easy to set up my future class. :(

A second thought about the assingment

After I looked at the Brooke's blog, I had a second thought about my culmination assignment. When I looked at four options, I actually did not understand a web-based presence (I have never heard this term before. Can anyone explain me more about this? Help me! ). I guess that it is to to create the website for educational purpose.

I took Digital Photography and Literacy & Technology courses before and I worked on developing some Internet-based activities, using Webquests or something. (After finishing this course, I might be able to get an ed tech certificate.) So it would be better to try a new task although it could be challenging.

I have never created a web site before so I don't know anything about a web software. Would it be too difficult to create one if I do not have any previous knowledge on this? I cannot decide if I would go for this assignment until my understanding about this assignment is clearer.

Culminating Assignment

I decided to develop an Internet-based instructional activity for my culminating assignment. I chose this because using the Internet in my future ESL/EFL class is my interest. I am thinking to either create new activity using the Internet or integrate the Internet into my previous lesson plan that developed without use of the Internet.

Teaching a introductory Korean at college in the U.S. is also my interest. So my focus might be a foreign/second language education, either EFL/ESL or KFL.