We Are The World 25 For Haiti - Official Video

Dear Arbi,

We used to listen to the radio and tape the songs that we liked! Things really change! Ask kids of today about radios and they don't know what a radio is!!!

I am uploading the Haiti song for you! I am so sorry for the floods in Pakistan! Hope things get better soon.

Regarding teaching the song! You can do it as a pre reading activity for a unit about "kindness" or you can teach C&C Hots (Compare and Contrast) using both videos: the one dedicated to Africa and the one dedicated to Haiti. Students can use graphic organizers to list the differences and similarities between the two videos.

So much misery in our world… we have natural disasters and human disasters too… I have a dream one day people all over the world understand the meaning of "We are the world" and live in a peaceful world because we are all brothers and sisters!
"We can do it"

Khuloud.

USA for Africa - We Are The World (w/M.Jackson) + Lyrics HQ

"We Are The World"

Heal the World Lyrics - MICHAEL JACKSON

OK. I just can't post the Earth song and leave you with sad feelings! Here is another Jackson's song! Full of hope…

"If You Want To Know Why
There's A Love That
Cannot Lie
Love Is Strong
It Only Cares For
Joyful Giving
.
.
.
We Could Fly So High
Let Our Spirits Never Die
In My Heart
I Feel You Are All
My Brothers"

Michael Jackson Earth Song with(lyrics)

This song is dedicated to you all!
I teach this song as a pre-reading activity of a unit about environment.

Khuloud.

My reflections: Week 10!

As I said in our wiki, this course has exceeded all my expectations! It is one of the most informative courses I've ever taken… What I like most is that we not only discuss theories and updated articles here...we also create teaching activities based on the assigned reading and given web tools. We've not only learnt about Web 2 tools but also experienced using Web 2 tools. So Deborah helps us create real life applications to the web tools/resources in this course.

I believe we've learnt new teaching methods and long life computer skills. Using blogs, wikis, nicenet and other online tools is really a unique experience for me…


Our final project/product is the fruit of our extensive weeks of learning about incorporating technology in EFL classes. We have various projects and each one uses different tools and resources that match the teachers' teaching settings. Reading other colleagues posts, comments, tasks, and reflections are really useful and helpful. We share many experiences and knowledge with each other.

What I like most is the friendly learning atmosphere… mutual respect, mutual help and mutual support. I would like to thank all my colleagues in this course for their huge contribution in the success of the course. The special thank you goes to our instructor Deborah.



I wish we can have an online graduation ceremony or an online party to celebrate successful completion of this course! Any ideas??

Wish you all
good health
happiness
and a successful
teaching year,
Khuloud.

My reflections: Week 9:

Can you believe it! Week 9?


Multiple intelligences and Learning styles can answer the questions (what-content) and (how-method) for students…Multiple intelligences makes students think about the type of intelligences they are! This makes them think of their decisions… they can choose to study a subject where they are most intelligent! Learning styles can help students learn faster and even learn better! At the same time they can practice learning in other styles so they can improve other learning modes…




Both teachers and students should be aware of their different learning styles/teaching styles. This can be done as suggested by many of my colleagues by taking an online questionnaire. Here is a link to one online questionnaire:
http://www.engr.ncsu.edu/learningstyles/ilsweb.html
(Soloman and Felder's questionnaire)


Now we have good explanations for our students and principals why integrating technology in our classes is so important. Technology can offer teachers activities for different learning styles. My colleagues offer many useful activities that can suit different learning styles. I believe that teachers should try match their teaching styles to their students' learning styles… this way we can help students better understand the material/skills we want to deliver!



I know that there are many sites that help us with MI and LS but I suggest you visit the following site too:
http://fastsmartwebdesign.com/multiple_intelligences_learning_styles.htm
(Identifying Multiple Intelligences & Learning Styles)

Have a great week!
Khuloud.

My Reflections: Week 6!!

Dear Deborah and my colleagues,

Thank God! I finished all my tasks/posts/articles for week 6!!! I read most of your comments in the nicenet environment and commented on some of your posts. I visited our wiki and your PPTs are amazing!!


Technology can really help teachers a lot dealing with large classes! In a regular class a teacher can not give attention to all her/his large group! But if we use a wiki as a classroom students will feel much better since they document their discussion/work! Students won't feel bad if their teacher doesn't respond to them personally… students feel safe since their work is posted.


Teaching large classes is very challenging! I've experienced teaching large and small classes and there are huge differences! Teaching small classes are much more effective than large ones… Sometimes I wish that teachers and parents start a revolution demanding governments having small classes… I think the money that governments pay for extra curricula hours and damages in our societies cost governments much more than providing good education to their kids. But of course for now we should do our best and utilize the resources that we have to help our students!

As always… Deborah's tips/PPT is so helpful. The youtube model presentation is helpful too. It is great how youtube videos can help us in teaching/learning. I have to tell you that I enjoyed creating my PPT!! As I said I visited our wiki and your work is great! These interactive presentations can make lessons much more enjoyable!


It takes time to create Interactive PPT first time. The content of my PPT is taken from our high school Literature Program "Integrating Higher-Order Thinking Skills with the Teaching of Literature". This is a relatively new program and teachers here are taking courses how to implement the innovations in teaching literature. This PPT can be presented in the lit courses for teachers. This PPT can serve both high school teachers and students. It has a content to teach and then some questions to check understanding! I think it is worth checking. It would be nice to visit our wiki and see my PPT:

https://www.google.com/accounts/ServiceLogin?continue=https%3A%2F%2Fsites.google.com%2Fsite%2F&followup=https%3A%2F%2Fsites.google.com%2Fsite%2F&service=jotspot&ul=1

All the best,
Khuloud.

Week 8: My reflections...

First of all I feel blessed to have a wonderful group in this course! Thanks a lot to all of you and especially the ones who helped me this week to catch up the material in this course…
I worked a lot in this week… my tasks and readings for week 7 and 8 are not easy ones!!
I've created two blogs that I intend to use in my classes:

http://literatureblogone.blogspot.com/2010/08/literature-blog-one.html
http://literatureblogtwo.blogspot.com/2010/08/literature-blog-two.html


I am sure my 10th graders will love these blogs. Wish me good luck!!
Additionally, I've created a wiki for my 11th graders. And here is my wiki class:
https://sites.google.com/site/classroomwikione/
In fact creating the wiki was more fun than creating the blogs… since the learning options and the functions that we can do using wikis are more than using blogs. It is so beautiful to personalize the wiki classroom!


Exploring the different teacher resources on the course website was a challenging task for me. I have to admit that at first I had a disappointing experience… since I could not save any exercises. But Azhar provided a technique how to save my exercises and also Victor provided a website that enables me save my crossword puzzles in an easier way (cut and paste!). The HOT exercises were the hotpotatoes exercises. I think they are great but the only problem is that they are web based exercises…

All these tools and exercises can help our students be autonomous learners…I am thinking that we are introduced to many web tools that can help our students in their learning processes. My question is: "Do these tools make our students more autonomous or do they make us more autonomous??" Is there a relationship between teachers' autonomy in teaching/learning and learners' autonomy in learning? I believe that these online tools help us be material designers… Are we more autonomous with these tools? The web tools empower teachers but at the same time it demands lots of work. I think some research should be done to answer these questions. What do you think?

All the best,
Khuloud.

My Reflections: Week 7:

Dear Deborah and my coursemates,

You have no idea how much time I am spending on this course this week! It usually takes much less time but since I was away I feel like I lost my compass! First I thought that I would read the articles and the tasks for week 7 then do week 6! Then I felt so lost and decided to review the articles of week 6 and the tasks of week 6. Now I am about to finish my tasks for week 7! Well I will do week 6 later. For a change and since I am doing everything not in an organized way I've decided to write my reflections now before I complete all my tasks. OK. I have to say that I usually don't miss classes- unless I am sleeping at bed. But if I want to see the positive side of missing one week is that now I can be more considerable for my students who miss classes!




Well, it was an interesting week! It is a good idea to promote learners' autonomy. The question raised here is "Do all students like this idea?" "Would this fit the different learning styles?" Anyway it would not harm to teach the students the skills that would help them become independent learners… I think that we can better foster learners' autonomy using technology. I believe that what matters is working on our students' accountability! This way they themselves will ask us for ways to become autonomous learners. Teaching students to be autonomous could be a good solution for large classes! This way teachers would not worry too much about her/his students!

I like so much the ideas in the site of 101 activities for the one computer classroom. I presented one lesson that I would like so much to teach in the future. It is a poem by Maya Angelou that I usually teach my 11th strong students. Here is the links to the poem in case you haven't read my post in nicenet:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JqOqo50LSZ0&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YlSukj81Tk4&feature=related

I highly recommend you visit the first link! Now I am totally convinced that it is a must to have at least one computer in my English classroom. My lessons would be much more enjoyable!!

All the best,
Khuloud.

Back to Class...

Hi Deborah, my coursemates and my blog ...
I am back to class! I will post my reflections ASAP...





Best wishes for you all,
Khuloud.