LAST ENTRY FOR PBEY 3102~ BLOGGING~

What do you like about blogging?

I like blogging because you get to chew on life, like a cow chewing its cud, you get to think through your experiences, make connections, appreciate stuff again and taste it all anew. It matters not whether people read it, agree with it or enjoy it.

What you do not like about blogging?

I don’t like the fact that I have to spend hours infront of my my computer to write blogs. It’s okay if I have time but due to hectic load of work I don’t really have time for blogging so I really don’t like the fact that I need to spend lot of time for blogging.

What have you gained from blogging e.g. Language skills, improved fluency, critical thinking, improved thought processes, technology skills etc. How?

I’ve learned to organize my thoughts and to be disciplined writing on regular basis, contributing to the blogosphere. Blogging also helped me improve my knowledge and understanding of the issues related to my niche. Apart from that, I have also learned that I need to avoid certain types of posts. For instance, I don’t write very good reviews, so I’ve decided that my blog will not include reviews of books I’m reading. I’m much better at taking what I read and using it as a starting point for what *I* want to say, much like you described in your post about what you do when you can’t think of something to write. I’ve also learned that I’m not very good at strictly informational/news type posts. This has been really good for me, because learning what my weak points are as a writer has helped me to see what my strong points are as well, and I know how to make my blog different from the competition by doing what I do best.

On the other hand, I have also I have learnt a lot of things since I started blogging. I have learnt to use more precise words which can represent what I say in a better way. I have learnt to manipulate Blogger, Yahoo! 360 and Word Press softwares and in this process, I have learnt a little bit of HTML too. I have learnt more things about blog promotion, syndication etc. And because of the nature of my blog, I have learnt to view an issue from different perspectives before giving my point of view.

What do you like about this course?

I have learned many things in this course especially about finding resources from the internet to use it in ESL classroom. I also learn how to adapt the things that I find in the internet to use in ESL classroom. On the other hand I also learn about burning, converting, editng and etc.

What you do not like about this course?

Personally I don’t like the workload in this course. I personally think that this course should only pick one software for picture editing one software for video and one software for conversion and really dig deep and make full use of it. I don’t like that this course is using too many software for same things.

What have you learnt from this course?

I have learned many things in this course mainly about blogging because I am not much of a writer so in this course when I am forced to write I have learned that I am pretty much not a bad writer at all.

What have you expected but do not learn from this course?

Nope. Everything I expected was thought in this course.

9-Comments regarding modules:

Internet and computing skills

a. What do you like about this module?

I have learned on how to find the resources for using in ESL classroom in the internet and improve my computing skills.

b. What do you not like about this module?

I did not like when I have to download something from the internet and the download speeds are very slow. The module also was too thick for my liking.

c. What do you like about the task given for this module?

Some of the audio and video task given.

d. What do you not like about the task given for this module?

Nope I really think the task given was interesting. I hope that the task given will be increased and the module given should be decreased.

e. What are the specific skills that you learn in this module?

Picture editing I guess. I am not a fan of photoshop because I use a different software in editing pictures so when I am forced to learn how to use photoshop, I really improved my skills in editing pictures using photoshop.

f. How the skills learnt in this module can help in the making and choosing of teaching aids for the ELT classroom?

It can help me find resources in the internet for the use for the ESL classroom.

Photo Editing

a. What do you like about this module?

Many ways of editing pictures.

b. What do you not like about this module?

Too many photo editing softwares.

c. What do you like about the task given for this module?

Interesting and promotes creativity to use pictures to create teaching aid for students.

.

d. What do you not like about the task given for this module?

Too many teaching aid need to produce. When this happens, it will decrease the quality of the teaching aids.

e. What are the specific skills that you learn in this module?

Editing pictures, adding border, Improving the quality of pictures and etc.

f. How the skills learnt in this module can help in the making and choosing of teaching aids for the ELT classroom?

It will help me in choosing the appropriate pictures and adapt it to become useful.

Audio Editing Skills

a. What do you like about this module?

I can edit the audio , cut the song and do various things with the audio.

b. What do you not like about this module?

The time taken to do this module. I think this module needs to be compressed and made more specified using only one or two software which can cover everything.

c. What do you like about the task given for this module?

I like the activity of designing the ringtone that I can use after producing it.

d. What do you not like about the task given for this module?

Task 3 the noise removal process was not really perfectly possible.

e. What are the specific skills that you learn in this module?

Find an audio format that is reliable to use in the ESL classroom without really loosing the original audio quality.

f. How the skills learnt in this module can help in the making and choosing of teaching aids for the ELT classroom?

I can use my skills to edit audio, choose any song, edit that song and use it in class especially with children. I also can make minus one songs to be used in ESL classroom and also personal use.

Video Editing Skills

a. What do you like about this module?

Learn various things about audio editing.

b. What do you not like about this module?

Nothing really, I think this module is the best module.

c. What do you like about the task given for this module?

The task itself promotes creativity.

d. What do you not like about the task given for this module?

The software was not included and downloading the video editing software was quite slow as the size is big.

e. What are the specific skills that you learn in this module?

I learn how to extract the pictures, audio from the video it helped to improve my skill in editing the video and make it to become more fascinating.

f. How the skills learnt in this module can help in the making and choosing of teaching aids for the ELT classroom?

Adapting the teaching video to make it usable for ESL learners.

Software for ELT

a. What do you like about this module?

To produce various types of teaching aids from Microsoft Publisher

b. What do you not like about this module?

The time taken to explore some software.

c. What do you like about the task given for this module?

Learn many new things in Publisher.

d. What do you not like about the task given for this module?

The task is very complicated and requires a lot of adaptation.

e. What are the specific skills that you learn in this module?

I’ve improve my creative thinking skills.

f. How the skills learnt in this module can help in the making and choosing of teaching aids for the ELT classroom?

It can help me in using various stuff like banners, quick publication and so on to produce teaching aids.

10- If you can change anything about this course, state what is and elaborate?

Too many softwares used in the modules. Choose one or two software that really can cover majority things and really work on it. When task is given give freedom to students on what software that they want to use as.

On a scale of 1 – 10, please rate your computing and technological skills for both before and after undergoing the course.

Before- 9

After-10

Week 14

Symptoms that the digital future has arrived
What’s colorless, odorless and has been silently seeping into our child’s backpack, classroom, playroom and library?
Our child’s digital future. After 25 years of rosy predictions from experts, there are signs that the long-awaited tipping point for technology & learning has arrived. If you’re one of the many impatient people—like me— who have been waiting for that LED at the end of tunnel, I think that this time it is really happening. Here’s why.
• Batteries. For the first time, batteries are able to power a netbook through a six-hour school day on a single charge. They’re smaller, lighter and powerful; the heart and lungs of iPods, Nintendo DSis, toys and netbooks. See the Cinemin, on page 20 for example.
• LEDs. (Light Emitting Diods) are molded into your child’s shoes, and lighting the earrings on the new Dora Links doll.
• Wi-Fi. Thanks to eRate, most schools were wired years ago. Unfortunately the Internet never made it to the child’s desktop. There are signs this is starting to change. For the first time in her K-12 education, my daughter, a high school senior, is now encouraged to bring her laptop to school. And half of her teachers are using Moodle for assignments.
• The App store and Google Ads. Small publishers can make money from their interactive ideas, and reach their intended audience, sidestepping the retail bottleneck.
• Cloud computing. Google’s gmail, YouTube, Facebook and Flickr have earned the trust of the masses, including many of our children who are flocking to games like FarmVille (page 21).
• Flash 10. It used to be that online animation chugged. Not anymore. I just previewed a virtual world for children that is fast, responsive and -- for the first time— is in 3D.
• Kinesthetic (motion based) interfaces. The Wii was magic. This year, there’s more. Besides the Wii-Motionplus, there’s Microsoft’s Project Natal, which uses cameras to detect motion. Interface guru Jakob Nielson points out two motion-based Windows 7 features: "Snap" (the ability to resize open Windows) and "Shake" (grab a window, hold your mouse button and give it a shake to hide the windows behind it). Nielson writes, "Both may herald a renaissance for the gestural interaction styles."
• Multitouch. Apple's multitouch/accelerometer combination is "the perfect storm" for children's interactivity. Compare it to the DSi monotouch screen and you have "dumb touch" and "smart touch" from this point forward
• There’s a Wii in the Whitehouse. Barack Obama is the first president to type a book on a computer, use a Blackberry and post speeches on YouTube. Both of his daughters play video games. This could open the door for more research and policy related to interactive media.
Now that the digital future has arrived, what does it mean? For one, there will be a lot more to review. It’s safe to say that 2010 will bring a surge in new children’s apps, sites, games and toys, and we’re ready to critique them. Enjoy the issue.

PS. Did you know that more kids watch online videos on YouTube.com than on Disney.com, Nick.com and CartoonNetwork.com, combined? Learn how to harness the power of YouTube for kids, in LittleClickers (p. 4)
hence, in this last blog, i would like to remind dear friends and myself that we need to update ourselves with these techological stuffs in order to cater our pupils' need.

Week 13

Assignment 4: Lesson plan. Developing fabulous teaching materials is not a credit to become a good teacher. Using those materials in the correct phase of teaching and learning is another skill a teacher should acquire. The fourth assignment not only provided me with the opportunity to develop teaching materials but also give me the opportunity to plan a lesson. Given the so called easiest skill, listening, I have to develop two lesson plans. My first lesson plan is on H1N1 and it intends to teach vocabulary such as cough, throw, sneeze, wash and wear. For this lesson plan, I intend to use a video and task sheets as below.The second lesson plan deals with ways to maintain fitness and it intends to teach vocabulary such as spin, jump, twist, flap and freeze. This lesson plan is founded on the total physical response approach.By doing this assignment, I have learnt many facts about being a teacher. Although it sounds simple, planning a lesson is not easy. Several factors such as learners, proficiency and teaching and learning theory need to be addressed while devising each step. I believe this experience will equip me to become a planner of teaching in future

Week 12

eveloping teaching materials for Year 4 pupils based on KBSR topics??? After scanning through the topics listed, I chose Story time, More Stories and Getting Connected as my topics. Then I started working on the E-Books assigned to me by my group members.
The first eBook has been produced using Microsoft Power-Point and some pictures which we have got through Google Image search engine and edited using FotoFX. This eBook is about a boy who went to beach without his mother’s knowledge to play soccer. While they were playing, one of the friends kicked the ball hard that it got into the sea. To show off, the boy went into the sea to get the ball and got into trouble which nearly make him loose his life . This eBook can be presented during while-reading stage after some of the important vocabulary, such as muttered, crept, spotted, tangled and exhausted are taught. Through this eBook, moral values such as being humble and being honest can be cultivated. Besides that, the main objective of using this eBook should be to cultivate reading habits. Humanist’s view on learning suggests that learning only take place if the learning environment is right and the learners are interested in learning. Since the setting of the story is familiar with Malaysia pupils and the characters are colourful and human characters, we believe pupils would be interested in reading and be able to comprehend this eBook.


The second eBook has been produced using Microsoft Power-Point and some pictures which we have got through Google Image search engine and edited using FotoFX. The story centres on animals in a jungle, Bako, who experiences the evolution of technology in their habitat. The postman team in the jungle were reluctant to accept this changes due to their fear of losing their jobs but the king insisted with his plan. He proposed a solution, which the team followed, and gained success from that only benefited the team but also the whole kingdom. This eBook is meant to be presented during while reading stage. Through this eBook, pupils are expected to gain some information on the latest technology which is keeping us, human being connected. Since the content of the lesson is heavy and can be quite boring, we have used animal characters, which we all know children would be interested in, to present it. Krashen in his Monitor Model 1982 via Affective Filter Hypothesis places a great emphasize on pupils’ emotion and suggest that correct choose of input would be able to lower the filter that prevents learning. Therefore, we hope through the use of animal characters and beautiful pictures, the content can be easily delivered to children.


The third is eBook would be appropriate to be used during while reading stage. This eBook has been produced using Microsoft Power-Point and pictures which we have developed in GoAnimate webpage and extracted using PhotoScape. The story depicts a lazy boy by the name Samuel who encounters an elf. The elf is supposed to help Samuel to do his homework. The elf did help but he also has turned Samuel into a hardworking boy till Samuel’s changes impressed his parents. Teacher and friends. Grabbed, granted, yelled, wrinkled and shrieked are some of the vocabulary that can be taught using this eBook. The teacher may want to use pictures to demonstrate the action words above in the pre-pre reading stage before she starts using this eBook so that children would be able to understand the words clearly as they appear in the context. We have used animated pictures in this eBook to accompany the text so that they help the children to imagine the abstract element in the story which is the Elf. Another reason behind the use of animated pictures is that they would attract and sustain pupils’ attention as they are colourful and captivating. We hope this feature added by the Comic Sans font and animation in presentation will lower pupils affective filter and support their learning.


Developing these e-books allowed me to have a taste of preparing teaching materials. I realised that ICT has made teacher’s life in this era of globalization easy by providing them with lots opportunities to develop great teaching resources. It just lies on the teacher’s effort and initiative to utilize these resources and make their classroom a better one or not.

Week 11

Though we planned well, but not everything we planned works. After searching for the casts for almost one and half week, we gave up. So, we switched to the only alternative we had which is GoAnimate.After completing the animations through various steps that includes few above, we recorded our video using Camtasia software.
Then, using moviemaker, we inserted an audio as background music to make the vedio more interesting.
At last, we managed to produce the video below.

By producing this video, I personally improved in using window movie maker. I would say it is a new venture in my learning because this is my first experience. Through many trial and errors, I learnt how to use windows movie maker effectively. After completing the animations through various steps that includes few above, we recorded our video using Camtasia software. Then, using moviemaker, we inserted an audio as background music to make the vedio more interesting. At last, we managed to produce the video below. By producing this video, I personally improved in using window movie maker. I would say it is a new venture in my learning because this is my first experience. Through many trial and errors, I learnt how to use windows movie maker effectively.

Week 10

Hi!!! As I promised, here is the story entitled ‘Triple Filter’. It is moral story founded on the theme on friendship. This is the way we would like to present our story.

Scene 1
"Sam, do you know what I just heard about your friend?"
(A static photo flashback)

Scene 2.
"Hold on a minute," Sam replied. "Before telling me anything I'd
like you to pass a little test.
It's called the Triple Filter Test."
"Triple filter?"
(A static image of big question mark)

Scene 3.
"That's right," Sam continued. "Before you talk to me about my
friend, it might be a good idea to take a moment and filter what you're
going to say. The first filter is Truth. Have you made absolutely sure
that what you are about to tell me is true?"
"No," the man said, "actually I just heard about it and..."
"All right," said Sam. "So you don't really know if it's true or
not.
(A slide with the word “truth”)

Scene 4.
Now let's try the second filter, the filter of Goodness. Is what
you are about to tell me about my friend something good?"
"No, on the contrary..."
"So," Sam continued, "you want to tell me something bad about him,
but you're not certain it's true.
(A slide with the word “goodness”)


Scene 5.
You may still pass the test though,
because there's one filter left: the filter of Usefulness. Is what you
want to tell me about my friend going to be useful to me?"
(A slide with the word “usefulness”)

Scene 6
"No, not really."
"Well," concluded Sam, "if what you want to tell me is neither
true nor good nor even useful, why tell it to me at all?"
(A slide on moral of the story)
This is the story we have chosen and the way we have planned it to be recorded.

“Good business leaders create a vision, articulate the vision, passionately own the vision, and relentlessly drive it to completion.”

Jack Welch quotes



Since we wanted to become a good video maker in UMLand, we have followed the first two steps in the quote, which we embrace as our guide for this ‘project’. Hopefully, we can go through the next two successfully especially the video shooting stage which consists of choosing the casts, finding the props and editing the recording.

Week 9

One of the topic which captured my eyes’ attention when I first saw Proforma was video editing. At last, today we arrived at the “Land of UMwood”.
The lecture started with an exposure to different types of videos and suggestions on software that can be used for this topic. After a review on senior’s assignments, we were asked to come up with a 5 minutes video proposal. After squeezing our brain, we came up with the idea of producing an animated video. The story line...


Scene 1: A five years old girl called the operator

Scene 2: The girl asks for heaven’s number
Operator gets shocked and asks why
Girl answers that her grandmother told her that her mother went to heaven
and she wants to talk to her mother because she is having a terrible
stomach ache
Scene 3: Operator asks for apology and tells that she does not have

Scene 4: The girl walks to her father’s room and tells the father
The father reflects upon his act that not only leads to HIV transmission to
him, his wife and child but also his wife’s death


Scene 5: The father ask for apology from the girl and give her medicine

Scene 6: Question the audience

After checking the availability of setting and characters in Goanimate website,with full of confidence, we presented our proposal.:( It was rejected due to several factors. Firstly, the use of heaven concept is not appropriate. Secondly, negative matters should not be exemplified to children although the moral message is there. Lastly, the mood of the video is too gloomy for children. This incident, personally have taught me to be more careful in my planning of content of video as my target audience are children.

Then, we started working on a new story which we called ‘Triple filter’. Want to know what is it about? Wait for my next blog...Till then, take care.