Using email, voiceboards, & discussion boards BETT Technological Applications in Teacher Training

Introduction Email, voiceboards, and discussion boards or forums are easy ways to give your students writing or speaking practice outside of class. Keep in mind our overall goals: To use technology to reach teaching goals To expand our student’s ability to use the target language outside of class To give them meaningful practice

Email In groups of 2-4, brainstorm how you might use email to reach a particular teaching goal Identify the goal Brainstorm possible uses of email to reach that goal – what types of activities or lessons could you do? How to give feedback?

Discussion boards What are discussion boards or forums? Places for students to write in response to a question or topic Organized in “threads” So students can respond to original topic, and/or respond to each other; students can read all responses Teachers can easily give written feedback, but feedback is public Example from Blackboard

Discussion boards Where can I find places to use discussion boards? Moodle – www.moodle.com Lefora – www.lefora.com Free site to host forums and discussion boards

Voiceboards What are voiceboards? Advantages: Disadvantages Like discussion boards, but for audio rather than written text Function in the same way Advantages: Easy way to get students to practice speaking (and listening to others, possibly) outside of class Can be short, targeted answers to questions Easy to give voice feedback Disadvantages You need a microphone to be able to record – not all computers have one built in (but potential to record with phone) Quality of audio may vary May not work on all browsers

Voiceboards Where to find them? Blackboard, Moodle Voxopop – free site – www.voxopop.com