TECHNOLOGY: The T in Stem: Technology in the World Language Classroom

Sharon Birch (James M. Bennett High School, Wicomico County) sbirch@wcboe.org

October 11, 2013

I. General links for all languagesA. Typing with accent marks and punctuation in Spanish and French (and a host of

other languages)

http://spanish.typeit.org/ http://french.typeit.org/

B. The coolest dictionary known to HOMBRE……..paste the url of any page into this site, and the whole page becomes “clickable”. http://lingro.com/

C. Forvo: all the words in the world pronounced.

http://www.forvo.com/

Forvo can best be described as an audio wiki for word pronunciations. One of the problems with learning to speak a language that is not phonetic is trying to figure out how to pronounce the words. Forvo hosts hundreds of recordings of word pronunciations by native speakers. Along with word pronunciations, Forvo provides some basic demographic information about each language. Forvo's content is user-supported and user-generated. New pronunciations are added on a regular basis.

D. Conjuguemos: Conjugate any verb in your language, practice the tenseshttp://conjuguemos.com/list.php?type=verbs&division=verbs&language=spanish

E. Culturally authentic images http://capl.washjeff.edu/

CAPL, Culturally Authentic Pictorial Lexicon, is a project developed by Dr. Michael Shaughnessy at Washington & Jefferson College. The purpose of CAPL is to provide images that demonstrate the true meaning and intention of the words in a language. CAPL currently has collections of images for teaching and learning English (North American), German, French, Chinese, and Spanish. CAPL also has images for Japanese, Russian, and Ukranian. All of the images in the collection are licensed under a Creative Commons license that allows for re-use and manipulation for non-commercial purposes.F. Textivate

You can copy and paste any text up to 500 words into textivate and get, in return, multiple different exercises using that text, ranging from “scrambled sentences” to “Fill-in-the-blanks.” In fact, you can automatically try twenty-seven different variations. You can get a public url for it. It has the potential of being an incredible learning tool for both teachers to create online activities and for students to do the same (for their classmates to try).

TEXTIVATE TUTORIAL: http://textivate.posthaven.com/video-tutorials

II. Writing tools/creative writingA. Storyjumper http://www.storyjumper.com/

B. Kerpoof - Kerpoof is a site that provides free multimedia software that can be used directly from any browser, on any computer with Internet access and an up-to-date Flash player. The site can be used to create original artwork, animated movies, and storybooks, among other things. Kerpoof’s look and feel will be sure to keep the students actively engaged and allow them to create and view content that is exciting and can be easily adapted for specific school assignments. The work can then be shared with the Kerpoof community, but only after it passes an inspection of the content to make sure that it is all appropriate.Please note that Kerpoof offers paid, premium services directed to at-home use of the site, but all basic content directed to in-school use is entirely free.

C. Bombay TVhttp://www.grapheine.com/bombaytv/ Grab your student's attention by creating subtitles over old video clips from Bombay. There are several movie clips from which to choose. The subtitles can appear as text, or be turned into speech. It is also possible to record your own voiceover. Their second site, Bombay TV 2, lets the viewer drag and drop scenes to create their own unique video sequence. All videos are published on-line and come with an embed code and web address. Teachers

and students can share videos by embedding them on websites, by email, or social bookmarks.

D. Bitstrips http://www.bitstrips.com/

Bitstrips is an easy to use comic building site. Students (and teachers) of all ages can use this webtool to create a comic cell, strip, or story and then share it with their peers or the world. The possibilities are endless with this simple to use website. You simply click on attributes of a character'sbuild, pick the colors, the background, and add dialogue. It would be a fantastic tool to use with illustrating a scene from a novel, or even to help a student understand a complex theory such as gravity in science. Bitstrips is fun, free (although there are paid features available), and very useful as a teaching tool.

E. Storybirdhttp://storybird.com

Storybird Story bird is a fun collaborative storytelling website. Storybird makes it easy to create and tell stories digitally. Students and teachers can create stories together by combining imaginative artwork and text. The final product can be printed, watched on screen, played with like a toy, or share in an online library with the world. Storybird “promotes

imagination, literacy, and self-confidence.” Creating, sharing, and reading a Storybird is free. Storybird has free class accounts that allow students to use Storybird without providing an email address. For all ages.

F. Ifaketext

http://ifaketext.com/

G. Piclitshttp://www.piclits.com/compose_dragdrop.aspxPicLits.com is a creative writing and e-learning site that matches beautiful images with carefully selected keywords in order to inspire you.

H. Word cloudsTaxgedo http://www.tagxedo.com/Wordaizer http://www.mosaizer.com/Wordaizer/Wordle http://www.wordle.net/

I. PhotoPeach http://photopeach.com/ Create a lively and vivid way slideshow bymoving your photos like a video with your choice of background music, captions oneach photo.

III. Games/Interactive

A. Word Play: a simple game that makes it really easy to learn and remember Spanish words and phrases. http://www.wordplay.com/ (SPANISH ONLY)

LEARN THROUGH PLAY

Master new words with a simple game that automatically adjusts to each student's unique needs. Learn the proper meaning, pronunciation, and spelling of each word.

OPTIMIZED REVIEW

Build long term retention with reviews that automatically adjust in frequency as skill improves.

MASTERY METER™

The mastery meter fills as students develop mastery, and then turns blue as they build long-term retention.

B. Lyrics Training

http://www.lyricstraining.com/

Lyrics Training is a really fun approach to helping you pick up a foreign language. Choose a YouTube-hosted music video and select one of three mastery levels; Beginner, Intermediate, and Expert. As the video begins to play, the song's lyrics appear underneath with several words missing. Your job is to fill in the missing words as they're sung.

If you get stumped, the video stops playing until you can come up with the word, but don't take too long because the app keeps track of the time it takes you to fill in the blanks. Click the "Give Up!" button to see the words that elude you.

Lyrics Training sorts videos by fluency level or language. Currently the site only offers videos in six languages (English, Spanish, French, Italian, German, and Dutch), and it doesn't have a ton of videos for every language, but the number of videos should only grow. However, an optional translation feature powered by Google automatically translates a song's lyrics into one of dozens of different languages while you're busy filling in missing words.

The site is free to use and doesn't require registration, though if you do set up an account, you can save the results of your efforts. While Lyrics Training alone won't make you fluent in another language, it's great for improving your skills or dabbling in a new language. Plus, it's just a lot of fun.

Review by: http://lifehacker.com/5481311/lyrics-training-improves-your-foreign-language-skills-through-music

ANOTHER SIMILAR SITE: http://www.lyricsgaps.com/

C. Practicopedia (Spanish only)http://practicopedia.lainformacion.com/

This site has authentic videos and pictures for many, many basic categories/units of instruction.

IV. Interactive/backchannels

A. https://todaysmeet.com/

TodaysMeet (http://todaysmeet.com) is a free chat service that can be used for holding a back-channel discussion with students and colleagues. TodaysMeet is completely free to use. Setting up a chat area in TodaysMeet is very simple. To set up your chat area just select a name for your room (that name becomes the url for your chat area), how long you want your room to exist, and select an optional Twitter hashtag for your chat area. To invite people to your chat area send them the url. What makes TodaysMeet different from similar services is that TodaysMeet doesn't have a public gallery of chat rooms containing questionable content. TodaysMeet also doesn't place inappropriate advertising on your chat area. I use TodaysMeet when we watch films in the classroom. Having an active backchannel allows students to ask questions and post comments while watching the film. I also use TodaysMeet during lectures or presentations as place for students to record their questions for discussion.

B. Polleverywhere : Polleverywhere lets your audience interact with a live presentation using their mobile phones.

http://www.polleverywhere.com/

V. Speaking/listening toolsA. Google VoiceB. PhotoStory 3

C. Veintemundos (Spanish Only) http://www.veintemundos.com/en/D. Video ELE (Spanish Only) https://www.youtube.com/user/papitusE. BBC Mundo http://www.bbc.co.uk/mundo/ BBC in French

http://www.bbc.co.uk/afrique/F. Audiria Podcasts http://www.audiria.com/frasesVocabularioLista.php?

id=4629

VI. Additional resourcesA. My Pinterest boards: http://www.pinterest.com/sraslb/boards/B. My wikispace: http://elmundodebirch.wikispaces.com/HomeC. My blog: http://elmundodebirch.wordpress.com/