(Updated 6/3…still need help with LangMash..comments?)
John Vitaglione (LARC – San Diego)
Dennie Hoopingardner (CLEAR – Michigan State)
A Title VI NLRC Collaboration: CLEAR and NFLRC
Dennie started us off with a tour of potentially pedagogically appropriate materials on YouTube (starting with the famous Numa Numa video …a classic, but as Dennie said, not something you would want for your Chair or Principal would want you to use in class)
Search for Nestle+Maurice on You Tube, for example…and you will find French Nestlé TV commercials
Search for Chinese+wedding–> Toronto Chinese wedding videos
Liveblogger note: yes, okay fine but….
CLEAR developed Viewpoint… for teachers to upload videos (if teachers do not wish to use something as widely accessible as YouTube)… check it out…one can also record video directly into the tool (if your computer has a built in camera)
CLEAR has also developed SMILE as a web-based, non-platform specific tool for teachers to create and correct exercises (m/c, t/f,drag/drop, sentence mix…) Teachers make items–> items are turned into activities —> activities are packaged up and then become a url—> become an online activity.
But…these exercises are, as Dennie said, is BORING. (oh thank goodness he said this before I did). This is where the idea of creating a mash-up comes in: Teacers create exercise—> go to YouTube and find a video—> copy the embed tag and add it to your exercise.
Blogger’s note: Um we can already do this through tools such as Moodle or-the-CMS-that-ate-the-world, Bb? While i appreciate the fact that these folks are creating tools that are language teacher friendly, and I presume free, why not use tools that already have a community of users (and a longstanding philosophy of sharing materials in and amongst themselves)
Blogger’s note: Some of the best tools (and the best learning) happens when the students construct their own exercises (let’s hear it for constructivism) Why should the teachers be the only ones creating the tools? We need to put the tools in the students’ hands and see what they can create as they wrestle with their learning… The presenters alluded to this possibility but did not flesh it out very much (nor give examples)
John Vitaglione (from SDSU’s LARC): LARC’s Moodled MashUp Integration:
The SDSU Digital Media Archive: Check out the variety of language materials that are available…Nahuatl, Hindi, Yucatec Maya….A SCORM compliant application that allows you to package up an activity/activities from within the DMA and then put into Moodle (because Moodle is SCORM compliant ) According to the site “The goal of DMA is to provide fast, easy access to resources for teaching and learning languages.” Click here for a more thorough explanation of the DMA as well as an instructional video.
LangMash is a tool created by the LARC at SDSU to hold and then later, if I am understanding correctly, to mash-up or glue together these materials to create exercises. One of the disadvantages of liveblogging is you sometimes get only some of the info as you are typing furiously… as I find out more about LangMash I will post it here. Commenters are also welcome to leave ther 2 or 3 cents!
