GOODBYE

It is time for me to go home. Thanks for everything. I learned a great deal from each one of you. I would never forget my memories from here and I guess Australia would always feel like another home to me. This is my email address
m_mashoufi56@yahoo.com

I will send you photos from Iran.

BEST WISHES

My Reflections on the Friends' Comments

Thanks everyone for all your positive and constructive comments.

I will first state all the constructive comments and then give my own opinion about them.

• The match activity was a bit hard to do.

I think, as I have stated in my rationale too, this activity is hard for people who are not familiar with the topic but I am quite confident that it will not be so for my students because the monuments are quite famous in Iran. Students will match each definition to the related picture using their ability in finding the key words in each text. So they have the benefit being familiar with the topic.

• The pictures in the match activity are too big. So it is hard to work with them.

I absolutely agree with this because I had this difficulty too! I will edit as soon as I can!

• Activities are challenging but not impossible.

Yes, I think the activities are a bit hard especially in terms of vocabulary, they are for advanced learners and are supposed to help them in doing the WQ module, which involves searching lexically dense WebPages and writing an academic assay. So I think they need to get ready, don’t they?

• You could have added some extra definitions to match activity to reduce the chance of guessing.

I do not think that adding extra information will be necessary, the activity is already challenging.

• The literature crossword was hard to do.

Yes, so I think I will need to change the instructions for that activity a bit and ask the students to read the original text first. There is a link to the original text in the activity.

• It would be good to add a button, back to top, for easier navigation.

Yes,

• It would be good to change the position of WQ, if it is the first activity to introduce to students.

Yes, it would be if this was the case, however, I will introduce the website first.

• Instructions could be clearer on how to go to HP activities and how to come back. It would benefit the learners with less computer skills.

Yes, I was really amazed by how some of us had thought about all these details. Some of WebPages can be done individually very easily and without any help because of all of the clear instructions.

• In order to avoid spelling mistakes, it would be good to have the website proofread.
  Yes, Absolutely right
  
• How would you mark the students’ work?
• 
  I actually thought about it a lot, and in the end I decided not to mark it because I really did not know how we can make the testing reliable and valid. Monitoring might be a good idea but how you do it where, fortunately or unfortunately maybe, by the help of technology, getting the answers can be a mater of one click? So in real situation, I will introduce the website at the beginning of a course, a writing course most probably, and strongly persuade the students to do the activities and visit the links because it will be a lot easier for them when it comes to the WQ module, which is of course marked and taken into account when students are given their certificate.
  
  Will the students be working individually or in groups?

They can work individually or in pairs. They can do it in their own time or in the institute. If the later is the case, they will have to book for the computer lab.

I also received nice comments from CLN 618 colleges on design and content:

• Including the original text was a good idea
  
• Color, pictures and the lay out is good and relevant.
• The WebPage gives the immediate clues about the topic without reading the content
• The additional links to different websites were appreciated
  
• The language and the instructions are clear
  
• The topic is good and interesting and provides useful information. and therefore
• Can be used for ESL students as well.
• The instructions for HP activities are clear.
  
  Thanks again every one for all the nice and helpful comments.
  
  I must also admit that after seeing all wonderful websites, the designs and the thoughtful pedagogical approaches I felt like I have done nothing!
  
  Finally, I think this unit was one of my best experiences in QUT. However, it did not seem like that at all when we first started the course, and I believe we all have come a long way and learned a great deal.
  Thank you
  Mahsa
  
  
  
  
  

My website finished! Iran Zamin
Thanks to any one who will give me some feedback. It is designed for a group of EFL learners (adutls, adnanced level).

Here is a link to my website. I have been trying to add "next exercise" and "main page" buttons to my hot potatoes activities but for some reasons they won’t appear. I will have to solve this on Friday. I should start writing the rationale

Some points for the article Communicating and Interacting: An exploration of changing roles of media in CALL/CMC (Debra’s 2006 article

The main discussion in this article is about the nature of changes in media use for language learning and what does it mean to us as teachers.

According to Hoven (2006) before the advent of multimodal CMC, computer-mediated communication, the following three areas were the major focus of the use of multimedia for language learning:
1. The media available or used (what could be done with it and activities based around it),
2. Skill development (listening and viewing comprehension and the related sub skills), and
3. Media as illustration or enrichment-bringing authentic aspects of the real world into the classroom to promote target cultural and language awareness.

But now that Non-educational uses, email for example, have influenced how we see the capacities of the Internet and the teaching and learning opportunities it can make available to us, the greater emphasis is on the use of the media for

4. Exploratory learning such as web quests


5. Learning through communication involving negotiation of meaning as exemplified in e Tandem projects, discussion lists, etc.
6. Collaborative and negotiative learning, often problem based, such as CMCL (computer-mediated collaborative learning)

7. Composite forms which are derived from or built on instructionally oriented CALL, but which now employ features of these three newer approaches
(points 4-6).

The article goes on discussing some related issues including some considerations for the teachers.

· It is teachers’ responsibility to choose the best possible and available options that will best meet their students’ need and learning styles. They also need to be aware of their own learning and teaching style.

· They need to know that computers do not teach the students. Students learn through thinking. Therefore, what teachers should be more concerned with in designing and choosing these programs is the process of thinking that the learner goes through not the technological design.

· A realistic assessment of Web-based teaching is that it is not a time-saving approach, but rather a time-shifting one. Teachers will save on the time they would otherwise spend preparing elaborate materials, but they will also have to invest time in assisting in the organization of tasks and projects, moderating communication, and creating sound assessment strategies (236).

Vague ideas about the third assignment

Third workshop once again was pretty good. We learned a lot of good stuff about hot potatoes, we created our e-portfolio, we also were about to mess Basim’s blog but thank God Yvonne helped us out.
ALSO I saw Robee yesterday, she showed me how to work with some of the hot potatoes’ exercises…So thanks a lot Robee,
I think I am going to continue with the same topic as in my WebQuest.

My WebQuest advanture (2)

Thank you Nilly!
It is finished now, but for me it was quite an adventure. In my lab tab at home, I have got too many pages that I have created for my WebQuest in Dreamweaver. Now I know that my only problem with dreamweaver was the linking process. If I knew how to link the pages properly I would not have to do every thing from scratch in quest garden. However, I am really grateful that I had Nilly to help me out, I would not be able to work on Quest Garden if it was not because of her. So thanks a lot Nilly!