Reflection on Week 5

This week we covered some beneficial and attention-grabbing topics; PBL, WebQuest, Rubrics and Alternative Assessment. At first, I wondered why we were given too many topics to read and as I read all the materials attached, it made sense to me on how they correlate with each other. 

Alternative Assessment

Alternative assessment focuses more on language use and communication to accomplish goal. It gives opportunity for students to ‘use’ the targeted language on authentic tasks. Students get to experience to evaluate and to learn on their own as well as to develop linguistics and learning process. This type of assessment focuses on students’ strength rather than their weaknesses. Having read the article on ‘Practical Ideas on Alternative Assessment for ESL Students’ written by Jo-Ellen, I particularly like the idea on K-W-L Chart and Portfolios. K-W-L Charts gives students a target to learn. They learn in order to fill in the ‘What I’ve learned’ column of the chart. It is also a good way for the teacher to know students’ background knowledge and what they are interested to know. I would also say that this could be a good way for students too, to know how much they have learned and progressed. I also like the idea on portfolios. Well, portfolios are not something new to most of us. Students get the chance to put in their thoughts and make use of their language in presenting their portfolios. 

 

 Rubrics 

 Discussing on alternative assessment, how can we miss rubrics? Well, this week I learned how to create rubrics online. To be very honest, I never knew that we can create our own rubrics online. I found it easy to create one. A rubric is a way to measure the quality of work especially for oral and written works. It is a good idea to ask students to create their own rubrics as they can know what to focus; as in grammar, sentence structure, vocabulary or etc. When they know the target, it is easier for them to work. At the same time, students will know how to evaluate their own work as well as their peers’. This is important because when students know how to evaluate, they will know the value of their own work and this will give a sense of pride for the students if they do well. Here is my link to a rubric which I designed using Rubistar:

http://rubistar.4teachers.org/index.php?screen=ShowRubric&module=Rubistar&rubric_id=2406237&

I created this rubric for the lesson plan which I submitted for last week’s task.

  

PBL

I have relatively a lot of things to share on PBL based on my own understanding and my reading from many different sources. PBL can be regarded as students-centered informal learning which takes place both in and outside classroom. Students bring outside world into their work. Although PBL intends to create an end-product, yet the main focus is on the process of creating it. Students develop confidence in using the language and at the same time they work collaboratively in English speaking environment. When they work in groups, they share and learn from each other as different students have different talents and skills. At the same time, as a group member, they will be given responsibility to complete the project. This is where they will get a sense of belonging to the group and in the project. In carrying out PBL, technology plays a crucial role. Students can use the Internet to look for information and also to present their project. All in all, PBL enhances all the four skills within the students and through PBL, students can remember the contents for a longer time. However, PBL can be time consuming and teachers’ role is also important that if we don’t monitor the progress, PBL lead to failure.

WebQuest

WebQuest is amazing. It is basically an inquiry-oriented activity that uses resources on the World Wide Web as to how Professor Dodge defined it. Thanks to him for this great, inspiring idea. WebQuest is divided into few sections; Introduction, Task, Process, Evaluation, Conclusion and Teacher’s Page. Teachers are able to give instruction as well as to provide students with resources in the form of links to websites and videos. I thoroughly enjoyed creating my WebQuest page and I’m so excited that I plan to give the URL to my friends so that they can learn and create theirs as well. Most importantly, students get to learn with the help of technology and at the same time, teachers can save on time as students can visit the page even after school-hours. This is a great platform to assign tasks after-school hours and during school holidays. Here is the link to my WebQuest page. 

 

http://zunal.com/webquest.php?w=229484

I used Zunal.com to create my WebQuest as this website offers more features. Based on the WebQuest which I created, students will be able to benefit a lot as it not only allows them to write argumentative essay but they also learn on global climate change. Reading different viewpoints on whether the climate change is man-made or a natural process, students will get awareness on their role in contributing to the protection of environment. They get to compare and contrast the two different viewpoints and this enables them to make judgement and to decide if they agree or disagree with the topic. This activity will be an outside-class activity as I have mentioned in Nicenet that I intend to overcome time management problem with this class. Thus, I hope that through such activity, students can learn how to make decision in their life-to know and learn the background knowledge and to investigate different viewpoints before choosing or deciding on something.

 

Have fun exploring it and I wish you to leave comments so that I can improve on it in future. Thank you.  In a nutshell, I enjoyed working on this week’s tasks.