Teach English in Shanglian Kaifaqu - Changzhi Shi

Computer Aided Language Learning has been around for quite some time. As students become more accustomed to 21st century learning, it’s important we allow them to benefit from the innovation’s humans have made in this century. As mobile devices such as smart phones and tablets become more common place in everyday life, I’d like to examine how they can use the devices and the apps that are created with them to help students in projects they undertake in the classroom. In South Korea where I’m currently teaching, a world leading 72 percent of children own their first smart phone before the age 12, 88 percent of adults own a smart phone and 93 percent of people are connected to the internet, it’s time we start educating our children on ways to accurately and efficiently use their mobile devices for education purposes. The reason is because many teachers here in South Korea are against unlimited phone access during class. In a survey as recently as, last year conducted by the Korea Federation of Teacher’s Associations over 82 percent of teachers were strongly against the idea of letting students have unfettered access to their phones. 14.5 percent express a more moderate disagreement with the idea while 2.5 percent agreed with the idea. So, it’s important we educate our students on how to use mobile devices properly, and the right apps to use. In our quest to better educate our students on the use of mobile devices and how to more our classroom more mobile device friendly, I think it would be wise to look to fellow teacher Ken Halla. Ken has been a high school AP history teacher for the past 22 years and has begun to integrate mobile technology into his classroom as he begun to see an ever increasing usage of smart phones in his class. Ken has several tips for teachers that pertains to any level. First is to ensure the usage of smart phones stay academic. Ken has done away with traditional front of the classroom and is always roaming to help students and make sure they stay on task. Second to use the phone to help students stayed organized and to assess learning. He recommends to great apps in order to do this, which you can read about in the blog post. Now let’s look at some apps that help all learners, and some apps that are more geared to either younger or older learners. First an app I use a lot in the classroom is Naver English Dictionary. Naver dictionary is a domestically created app here in Korea, that is easily accessible to the children because 1 it's not complicated to use, and 2 it's produced in their own native language. For an EFL class a good dictionary is a must have. This app gives the translation of the word, the meaning, and examples sentences of how it’s used. For more advanced users they have various quizzes about conversations to broaden their vocabulary and increase their fluency. A project I often like to do with my students is to have them make a travel brochure for the place they are going or to a place they have been. It's relevant to them, it gets them excited about their trip if they're going on, or it helps keep the memory alive if they've already been. I'd like them to accurately describe their trip and highlight some of the fun things to do or see, so the simplest thing that can help them is a good dictionary app. This app would be appropriate from grade 3 and on. Second an app I think would be great for building conversation skills is an app called Hello Talk. This is a relatively safe app to use, because the focus is on the language exchange and not the social aspect of it. Students have many ways that they can find suitable partners. By location, by level, by online status, by nationality, by city and more. Then students can converse and actively correct each posts they talk and make mistakes. This allows students to see how their mistakes are different from the correct way of spelling or saying something. Students can also make facebook like posts on their profile with pictures and anyone can look at it make comments or corrections. I think a great way to use this app would to create a project around pen pal timeline. Students would find a pen pal and have various conversations with this penpal on their own time. They then would chronicle their conversations with another person and then do a presentation in class talking about their experiences with said pen pal. I think is app would be great for high school students and on. While this app is focused on language exchange and does its best to protect against online abuses, a more mature learner is needed to know what right and wrong behavior could potentially be. Finally, for young learners, I’d like to introduce an app called Gus on the Go. Gus on the go is an interactive language learning app in which children learn language through audio and visual aids and then can unlock games to further enable they’re language learning by reviewing lessons. Gus on the Go is currently available in Cantonese, Croatian, English, French, German, Hebrew, Hungarian, Korean, Mandarin, Polish, Romanian, Spanish, Taiwanese and Taiwanese Mandarin. A great way to use this app inside the classroom would be to create a scene using the words that they learned. For example, just like in the picture of the student learning about farm animals the student could create his/her own farm and present the animals he/she learned from using the app. These are just some of the ways I believe mobile devices help with Computer Aided Language learning in classrooms throughout the world regardless of age. Sources Rodgers, John M. “Korea’s Smartphone Obsession” The Diplomat, 23, Dec 17 https://thediplomat.com/2017/12/south-koreas-smartphone-obsession/ Accessed February 24, 2019 Song, Ashley. “Most South Korean Teachers Disapprove of Unlimited Phone Use in Class” The Korea Bizwire, 11, Jan 18 http://koreabizwire.com/most-south-korean-teachers-disapprove-of-unlimited-mobile-phone-use-in-class/107187 Accessed February 24, 2019 Graham, Edward. “Using Smartphones in the Classroom” National Education Association, http://www.nea.org/tools/56274.htm February 24, 2019 D, Stevie. “Chatting, Texting, Correcting: The 4 Best Language Exchange Apps” Fluent U https://www.fluentu.com/blog/best-language-exchange-apps/ Accessed February 24, 2019 Hello Talk Language Exchange. “Ben: How to Learn Chinese.” Youtube, Uploaded by Hello Talk Language Exchange 01, Dec 14 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5dxoc7zEBE&feature=youtu.be Accessed February 24, 2019 Tassinari, Tyler. “10 Best Language Learning Apps for Kids.” E Learning Industry 25, Mar, 16 https://elearningindustry.com/10-best-language-learning-apps-for-kids Accessed February 24, 2019 Gus on the Go. “Gus on the Go – Kids Language Learning app – iOS & Android” Youtube, Uploaded by Gus on the Go, 20, Jun 13 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oEDHNdBjClg Accessed February 24, 2019