Life made easy Internet ideas for the classroom

1. Life made easyInternet ideas for the classroom Brought to you by: Csíky Anna & Tibor Prievara Karinthy Frigyes Dual Language School

2. What do teachers of English believe about using computers and the Internet? • Frightening • Challenging • Difficult • Problems • Needs technical expertise

3. On the plus side • Great… maybe later • Useful • Exciting • YET: not knowing too much about it • 250 people, 10 applications: 2500 answers • 100 correct answers • 2400 incorrect answers

4. Paying attention to your students • how do your students learn? • what do they like doing in their free time? • is it possible to link the two? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aEFKfXiCbLw

5. TXT MSGS – text message converter • try to decode the text messages • type them in proper English • great way to check spelling • pronunciation practice http://chotard.frederic.free.fr/animations/fun/txt_msgs/txt_msgs1.htm

6. Vozme – text-to-speech converter • enter any text in English and listen to it • male and female voice • you can save it as an mp3 http://vozme.com/index.php?lang=en

7. Oddcast – a more lifelike TTS • choose an avatar • watch the person’s face as they say what you typed • listen to a variety of accents http://vhost.oddcast.com/vhost_minisite/demos/tts/tts_example.html

8. A.L.I.C.E. the intelligent chatbot • a safe chat partner who talks as long as you want • it takes a long time to find out you’re talking to a robot • authentic everyday spoken English http://www.pandorabots.com/pandora/talk?botid=f5d922d97e345aa1

9. Slow down week • use it as a discussion starter about pace of life • ask students to reflect on their own daily routine • don’t forget about the educational benefits on students’ life http://pagesperso-orange.fr/prof.danglais/animations/issues/slowdown/slowdownweek.htm

10. ToonDoo – Online comic creator • a great way to practice, recycle or even test words, grammar, or practically anything • motivating, engaging, and fun • a new way of expression for those who do not have the talent to draw www.toondoo.com

11. Online calorie calculator • a fun way of expanding or revising food vocabulary • generates lively discussions • raises students’ awareness about how healthy their diet is http://www.labpixies.com/gadget_page.php?id=31

12. Get out of the room • simulates the computer games students love so much • stimulates a lot of language use • students can be asked to write up their solution, i.e. how they got out http://www.gotmail.jp/jobpico/

13. Newsmap • gives you the news that make the headlines • shows how important or popular a certain item is • allows you to search for certain types of news, e.g. entertainment http://www.marumushi.com/apps/newsmap/newsmap.cfm

14. On cover page • create a magazine cover with your own photo • also includes a customized news caption • wide selection of different magazines http://oncoverpage.com/

15. Newspaper clipping generator • looks exactly like a real news article • allows you to choose the date • makes your students proud of what they have written http://www.fodey.com/generators/newspaper/snippet.asp

16. Protagonize – Collaborative story writing • writers encouraged to start a story and see how others develop it • a chance to add new „branches” to existing stories • a page you can always come back to http://www.protagonize.com/stories/post.aspx

17. SortFix – a friendly search engine • helps you and students find what you / they really need • finds power words in results and lets you choose what’s relevant and what’s not • more efficient, takes less time, produces better results http://www.sortfix.com/index.aspx

18. Pagebull – the visual search engine • shows you actual screenshots of search results • helps you avoid harmful content • no sponsored results http://www.pagebull.com

19. Mahalo – human-powered search • gives you organized and spam-free search results • saves you time: enjoy instead of search • takes you to linksother search engines won’t find http://www.mahalo.com/Main_Page

20. Delicious –social bookmarking • a collection of favourites: yours and everyone else’s • remembers what you’ve found once • shows you what you might never have found http://del.icio.us

21. iGoogle – my Google • your personalized webpage – for free • the news, gadgets, links you always need • your own design http://www.google.hu/ig?hl=hu&source=iglk

22. Quizlet – the end of flashcards • the second best way to learn words after a brain injection • interactive teaching and testing, great for self-study • keeps track of your answers and goes back to problems www.quizlet.com

23. NING – your own social network • keep in touch with your students outside class • upload homework, songs, grades, events etc. • be amazed by how actively they use forums and discussions http://tizdee.ning.com

24. Bubbleply – Speech bubbles • add speech bubbles to any video • or insert images and add subtitles • then post it anywhere you wish – e.g. ning http://www.bubbleply.com/Default.aspx

25. NetAngol – hundreds of lesson (plan)s • 4000 pages of EFL material • interactive, ready-to-use materials from A1 to C2 classes • multimedia, spoken English video archives, fun and games • Nettanár: free database of ideas www.netangol.hu

26. E-twinning – A day in the life of… • Argentina, Brazil, Kuwait, Romania, USA, Hungary • Shared websites • Engaging topics, real interaction • A day in the life of Budapest – a project http://www.netangol.hu/Budapest_part1-final/engage.swf

27. Net Smartz Kids – Internet safety • games and activities to teach students about Internet safety • engaging and fun, but also educational • helps your students be safe outside class http://origin.www.netsmartzkids.org/games/

28. Teachers’ TV • thousands of education videos on TV and online • the digital channel for everyone whoworks in schools • daily education news summary • regular specialist hour www.teachers.tv

29. The End • Frightening? Needs technical expertise? • Useful? Exciting? • Later? Thank you for your attention! E-mail: info@netangol.hu