The curtain came down on the stage of {Building Teaching Skills Through The Interactive Web} at 12:00 pacific time 13/December/2013. Participating into this great course has certainly help me bridge a big gap between technology  and tradition.It makes our teaching meaningful and effective.Yes, I would take full advantages of all the things I have learned throughout searching,reading,commenting,creating or achieving tasks.

I will not talk about my best or favorite week,as most of them have great usefulness among me and my students. One simple effect of this course that I feel I become an autonomous learner;i.e I will continue this long journey equipped with many technological tools and ideas.

I would like to thank the embassy of USA in Jordan for providing me this valuable opportunity.I would also like to extend my gratitude to the University of Oregon, particularly to our supportive course instructor Ms. Courtney and to you all my active classmates from different countries around the world...

Thank You All and Miss You All..
Baraat

Week 9

 A very big gap I have come over by joining this very great course, I am so fortunate and thankful for our best instructor Courtney,and to the Oregon University....may this give you some of my reflections which I filled in the given course survey.

The second thing successfully I hope I have done is the final project which mainly talks about the problem of weak or poor reading in my school , the problem that I endeavor to succeed solving it.

As for the week discussion,it concentrated on the issue of learning styles,I understood two main points about it :
1- Students have different learning styles such as:verbal,visual,musical,interpersonal,naturalist...etc.

2- Teachers should be aware in recognizing these styles and use the appropriate technological tools to cater for the learning styles.

May be  my weekly reflections are short but believe me most of the new information I learned is sticking in my mind...
Baraat

Week 8:
This is the direction that you should follow from now on, it is our turn now to be innovative as our honorable  guest,Jeff Magotto, the one who I added to a list of pioneers accompanied with our great moderator Courtney of course.

Most of this week was consumed not only on my project draft,but also reading and navigating most of the given links and posts in this very rich week,yes it is very similar to what Inesa said about it "it is a net tour."

If I was given a lot of time, I would create the best site for my class, but according to the very responsibilities I have this time concerning the preparation of the final exams of English , I chose to create a very simple and easy tool which all of us feel the usefulness of it which is the Nicenet.

Week 7: 

"Control leads to compliance;autonomy leads to engagement." Daniel H. Pink.

Yes, I absolutely blame the traditional educational systems that we had been taught through;it will be disastrous unless we,teachers,rescue the new generation whom we are teaching.Why not to make them autonomous?why not to create a sense of independence inside them? and why not to engage them in the educational process through out the activation of technological tools such as those we have learnt as blogging,web quest,emailing,interactive PPT, PBL,and many other tools.


Through out my discussion on Nicenent regarding the one computer classroom, I asked a question in which I think the answer is hinted:what are the added values of using  one or more computers?I think unless you,the teacher,create and use interactive programs,it will be a zero usefulness gained from that computer.How about mobile phones,I liked the idea of using them inside the classroom,it never comes to my mind to use mobiles to serve the proposed outcomes, but after reading many articles and the activities provided by my colleagues I believe of the necessity to start using mobiles although it is banned  in my school to allow the students to use this great device!

       

Arriving at the smooth task which I LOVE the most;Padlet or Wall wisher, I can not wait to create one for my class,believe me I see my students grin and delight to use and share whatever they like .This tool,despite of it's simplicity  I think will launch a spark of the students'creativity.







How about my final project,I started implementing some of the intended tools to improve READING, so I informed the students about Breakingnewsenglish and they jumped very eager to read fast through it. I really felt that my students start to be autonomous as they love the idea of inserting technology into their English class ,they continued surfing the net at their homes and let me know of the new things they learnt by themselves,the thing which will facilitate and serve my project which is based on a web quest.

 

Week  6 

This week, I will start talking about the most thing I loved and learned through it at the same time which is the interactive power point, I felt the importance of this great tool to use not only as presenting information,but also inserting sound, images, effects, or hyperlinks and integrating these features to produce an interactive show you can really feel it's power... I created a very simple one for a grammar lesson about simple future and I shared it on the class wiki, and I am waiting your comments and feedback, if it is good feel free to use it in your lessons.

The other new thing I learnt is how to teach large classes, the thing that I am not accustomed to yet.  However, the number and diversity of materials I read and which talked about this subject made me some times confused and shocked, but I found interest while searching and reading about the 36 formats of techniques that can be used to manage and teach large classes.

How about my project and the matter of implementing it, I made some changes to my project which is mainly focus on solving the issue  of reading,I will only use a website to enhance the reading speed which is www.breakingnewsenglis.com and creating a professional web quest.

Week 5
                                                           

 

Week after week,we step over another mountain of information & knowledge with the aid of technology.

Really,despite the fact that the fifth week was the busiest one for me,I was interested with the new things I have learned whether was PBL ,Rubrics or Web Quest.

 PBL(Project Based Learning), the new addition that week 5 carried for us,the tool that every good teacher should use and implement to motivate students for better learning they love and being eager to fulfil. As Sylvia chard said"one of the major advantage of PBL is that it makes school more like real life."

  

To sum up what is a Webquest, I was impressed by SANJIV's comment"I think this PBL and webquest should be married to get one good student,who can own a work, collaborate his work and become independent learner." I loved wewbquest very much and felt how much it is organised and useful for both of teachers and students.

The last thing, but the very important one through which you can evaluate the effort and work is Rubrics or alternative assessment,I advise every teacher to visit www.rubistar.org to get avery simple and valuable rubric that can be edited.

Week 4 :back to blogs

  

  I was nearly coming to loose my blog and most of my work in this great course,it is refered to Ms.Courtney who guided and encouraged me to proceed by following certain tips to repair my account on nicenet and blog.

This week both of my discussions on nicenet and my project step were cocentrating on READING,I start my discussion thread by summarising what did Mei-Ya Liang say in her article"Three Extensive Reading Activities for ESL/EFL Students Using E-books.most of this article fouce on the importance of the activities that lead students to improve their reading,writing and thinking skills.I chose www.breakingnewsenglish.com as an ideal website to increase the skill of reading specially the speed of it.I notice that many of our classmates chose www.fog.cbc.org and after searching it I directly will add to my delicious page.

This important skill ,reading,was the core or the main issue also that I focuse on in the part of the project.It is so depressed for me to see the 16+ years old student read as if he is only half of that age!!! I am so eager to catch up with you,my dear classmates,to find out sollution for this problem.

Another valuable article I chose to read is Using Internet-Based Children Litereture to teach EFL by Larry J.Mikulecky,through which I felt the importance of practicing English language not only at schools, but also through motivating students to visit related websites as: www.manythings.org  or www.elt.oup.com  which I advice you all to visit and share.

How much  it is fantastic to plan the lessons as the one that we learnt this week through using a template by google.document, I tried to prepare a very simple grammar lesson for the beginner level students of the 9th grade aided by technology components as computers,software,internet....etc.

Week 3 Reflections:

I don't know if the next weeks would be busy but fruitful as the third week? but I assume they would.
Many many things we learned this week,most of the concentration was on improving listening,speaking, and pronunciation skills.I chose Lindey Miller's"Developing Listening Skills with Authentic Materials."It is a must,I think that not only new teachers should read this informative article,but also the experienced ones.What a fantastic Vocaroo which I will be a huge fan for.I love it and I am so eager to start activate it in my oral lessons.Also great thanks to Daiana for presenting us the WASP (Windows Tool for Speech Analysis) which I can use in my pronunciation lessons through recording and then replaying the sound.

What a delicious task we have to construct a delicious page,through which  I learned how not to lose my work and book marks in seconds-thanks to Delicious .com, the tool which helps me have every thing I need with me, no matter where may I go ,as long as I have a computer and internet access.

Nicoli Carmen's"Project Report for Lorin Salagean Technical High School" was the project that I chose, and through which we learned about how can I as a teacher use blogs to solve the problems of reading,speaking,and communication skills.

Week 2:

What the words might say to thank your great efforts  our great instructor ,Courtney ???
We are landing now on the second of the tenth stations, and it is only the beginnig of openning my scope and increasing my knowledge and information. I think it was difficult for me to catch all my mates who are enthusiastic and creative.

To start talking about achieving my assignment and tasks,I found it is valuable to repeat Waseem's reflection about web searching (the first assignment in week 2) as he said"this ocean is endless, and the more you dive , the more interesting and knowlegeable you get". It took me three days to pick or select the search engine that fits my searches, so after visiting www.noodletool.com I found that www.gleancomparisonsearc.org is useful to recommend for use as it help me compare and contrast differing view points of resarch topics. A very important issue I thank Jennifer Ramdonee to highlight which is :the students' tendency to copy and paste information,which I think it is the role of the honest teacher to try and try to erase it from their mind, by giving the students reasonable homeworks that keep them in favourable touch with their material.

Daily lesson planning is no more mattering for me after learning how to use ABCD model to write class objectives correctly and easily by following the Pennsylvanya's State University survey. May I get you bored while reading my first step of the project "classroom description" as it should be carried out in details about the classroom, students and the available technology.

This is most of what I have for this rich week...

getting beter

Week 1: My reflective blog...   

Hello, I am Baraat from Jordan. I want to reveal to you, my colleagues, the great happiness when I fulfilled creating this modest blog, for me it is similar to a baby whose own words were only Yahoo, Goggle, face book...and suddenly starts not only the process of pronunciation, but also starts reading ....etc.
By creating my blog -and it is the first time I use it- I learn how to depend on myself, how to read every piece of information and try to understand and then apply it correctly as I hope. I think by using such a valuable tool with my instructor and colleagues, we will form a strong starting out to gain knowledge and to improve our web skills. It is an invitation from me to exchange new experience and enthusiasm through your comments on my blog....
welcome,
Baraat.

Getting better

 The first week nearing to finish, I nearly start understanding the rules of this game!!! yes, it is a game in which I feel interested and day after day I am getting more eager to learn more and more.Really, this course reverses my previous expectations of learning and studying in traditional way.

As a summary of what I have learnt in the first week , most of my concentration was on constructing a blog which I never use it, by reading the attached materials I got helpful information about blogs which is similar to online journal through which we -the classmates- can reflect and post about the things we have learned.Moreover,there are three types of blogs according to http://iteslj.org/Tecniques/campbel-weblogs.htm which are tutor,learner and class blogs.

For me, I find the utmost of pleasure when I navigate the others` blog and not only commenting on them but also learning much about the creativity of them,I was very impressed by Waseem`s blog and his repeated saying "practice makes perfect" and his clear examples that he provides for his students, also the organised blog of Ahmed, and many other colleagues as Lopez,Lingani,Paramita,Ewa,and Diana.However, I was surprised of Darshan`s coclusion of how blog could be useful in making effective teaching!!! on the contrary of Ewa who clarified that she may soon change the way of teaching in her class as a result of using this GREAT tool.

How to log in Nicent and share the class discussions as the ground rules that we have discussed and how to make reply or send personal messages progressing well for me, what about you ? I advise you to read thoroughly what our respectful instructor,Courtney sends to us at the discussion board.

Last but not least, as the way we communicate has changed dramatically, it is a must to  also change our teaching technique through which we can have lively and interactive classes.So, let us try our best ....

Baraat