LiveMocha

I was introduced to LiveMocha.com in my French class, as an option for our assignment to do an hour a week of activities outside of class interacting with the language. One of our resources on campus is a conversation lab with French speaking international students who were employed by the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures to talk with us students for a few hours a week. This was an amazing resource, as it gave us experience talking with native speakers and learning about their cultures while we practiced our French.

One semester, though, the department couldn't find very many students to be lab assistants, and so the hours we could go to language lab became very limited. So someone in my class found LiveMocha, an online language learning community that matches people up who have similar or complimentary language learning goals for video chat. Thus, I was matched up with several French speakers who wanted to practice their English, and we are able to help each other and chat in either language. In secondary schools, there is no language lab. This is a shame, because language lab has been amazing for learning to speak conversationally. I would love for my students to be able to do some sort of video chat like LiveMocha, although I would rather it were a website aimed more at high school aged students so they would be matched up with their peers.

Assistive Technology

Watching these two videos was a wonderful insight into how much certain technologies can help students in the classroom, allowing them to excel in their education.

Here are some of the technologies mentioned:

Speech-to-text voice recognition software allows students to write essays and other responses if they have a disability that limits their mobility or otherwise makes it hard or impossible to write or type.  This kind of technology can give such students independence in their own learning, whereas without this kind of technology they might be forced to dictate to another person, or be able to get an education at all.

In Josh's case, the Ablenet Super Talker and Bookworm helped him work past his autism and learn communication skills.  The technology formed a bridge between him and others, making him feel safe and confident as he strove to communicate his feelings and needs.  Eventually, his confidence grew enough for him to start phasing out of using the technology, helping him become more independent and overcome his disability.

The videos also mention some very specialized technologies, such as Lucas's joystick that helped him play his euphonium and the picture-based speech software that the boy operated by moving his eyebrow.

It is amazing how much technology there is that can help disabled students succeed in school and life, and it's sad how little such technologies are used in schools.  Hopefully in the future, we can work to make these kinds of technologies more accessible.

Jigsaw Classroom

I have never been much of a fan of group work.  The reason why not is a combination of my dislike on relying on other people for my grade and that I never seem to learn much in group projects, focusing most of my energy on trying to keep people getting along and on-topic.  As a student studying to be a teacher, I also know that most students hate group work.  It just doesn't seem like a good way of teaching.

That said, I rather like this Jigsaw Method, which seems like it would lessen a lot of the flaws in group work.  For one thing, it increases the accountability of each student, making it impossible for someone to just sit back and let everyone else do the work.

One of my professors presented me with a hypothetical conundrum: how would I make Jigsaw work if I only had five computers?  I'm inclined to have the "expert"groups meet at the computers, but then it seems like the old group scenario would kick in there, with one person running the computer and doing all the work. The major flaw with the jigsaw method, I think, is the expert groups.  There, since they're all trying to find out the same information, each student's accountability goes way down again.  Instead of a drive to research information for themselves, a student only has a drive to squeeze their expert group for information, then take it back to their regular group.  Once again, only a few students end up doing the work of an entire class.

I think this could work if done with the right subject matter and some good classroom management, but I would always think twice about doing group projects.