ELLLO ENGLISH

WHAT IS ELLLO ENGLISH

Elllo English is a great website for listening practice which contain more than 1000 listening activities.You can find interviews, mixer, video response, listening games, songs, vocabulary and many more.While you listen you have the option to show or hide the text. The text version also offers audio explanations of difficult words and phrases. Elllo’s mp3 recordings are unique in that they offer English accents of people from all over the world, including America, Canada, Britain, Australia, and countries where English is not a first language. Conversation topics, such as housing, relationships, and jobs are modern and practical in daily life. Besides, you can download all the audio on the site except the song on the music pages.

AGE AND LEVEL OF LEARNERS
# Age of learners - Thirteen and above (I assume that this is a listening website for secondary school learners since this website uses quite long audio recording/visual recording/text)
# Level of learners -  All level of learners 

HOW TO USE ELLLO ENGLISH

# Simply go to the Elllo English website. HERE is the link.

Elllo English webpage

# Then you can choose any activity that you want to do based on your preference.
#  For full tutorial in using Elllo English, you may refer to Russell Stannard video. Please click HERE

SUGGESTION OF ACTIVITES

1.  Listening activity - Teacher could use the audio or video recording in this website as a listening activity for the whole class. Teacher can print out the material (comprehension question or quizzes) and use the audio or video recording in this website as a listening activity.
2. Teacher could suggest this website to the students so that they could do the activities  during their free time outside the classroom. This would promote independence and autonomous learning since the students do the exercise on their own. In addition, the students could use the activities for self-assessment/self-evaluation in which they can evaluate how good their speaking skill are.
3.  Another thing which teacher could do is get students or a computer and internet and then asks students to go to Elllo English website and do any activity that they prefer. In this situation, teacher just monitor the students as to make sure that all of them do it. This would lead to personalisation since they can choose any activity which they prefer. 

*This website could accommodate the students' multiple ways of learning. This is due to the reasons that this website offers various activities which includes a lot visuals etc.*
*This website is also a good website to enhance the students listening skill as it provides a lot of audio listening that the students can choose.*

WHAT I LIKE ABOUT ELLLO ENGLISH

1. Students can listen to a variety of lesson in English
2. Authentic materials - this website provide the conversation/language that people use in their daily lives
3. It can accommodate different learning style - It has audio, video, text as well visual in which students can choose which they prefer
4. Can promote autonomous learning - students can do it outside the classroom without the teacher's guidance. 
5. This website shows different culture or multicultural society. For example, African American and Japanese culture.
6. The teacher can vary their lesson and use this website as a source to teach in the classroom - teacher can download the material such as mp3 files and text
7. Personalisation - Students are given variety of choices (the topic) based on their interest/preferences
8. This website could be the opportunity for the students to practise variety of skills such as speaking (including communication and pronunciation), listening and vocabulary.
9. The activities (such as comprehension activities and games) provides the purpose for listening
10. This website extract the language for context in which students can learn through context/situation
11. Provide variety of level. Thus, all level of students can engage in the activity. 
12. Students can gauge their level - they can use this website to evaluate their progress (self assessment) 
13. Learners can learn other stuff as well such as history and Science. 

PROBLEMS WITH ELLLO ENGLISH

1. Problem with control - when you want to go back to the main page, you need to click the back button
2. Organisation of the website - this website does not shows any categories to distinguish all the topics
3. This website has the link to twitter. This could be a distraction for the students as they may focus more on twitter rather than on this website. 

MY BRAINSHARK

WHAT IS MY BRAINSHARK
It is a free web tool that enable users to create, store and share multimedia presentation (including powerpoints, videos and photo albums). Then, users can add audio in their presentation.

AGE AND LEVEL OF LEARNERS
# Age of learners - Fifteen and above because this tools is quite complicated (need to prepare presentation, record your audio)
# Level of learners - suitable for intermediate and advanced students


HOW TO USE MY BRAINSHARK 
Go to this webpage: My Brainshark Website

Then, you need to sign up - need to include few information such as username and e-mail address.You can start to upload content - there are five choices available; add voice to powerpoint, narrate a    document, upload a video, make a photo album and produce a podcast

Add voice to your content (if you wish to). Finally,you can embed your presentation in your blog or sent it to others. 

For step by step instruction in using My Brainshark, you may refer to this website: 

My Brainshark Tutorial


EXAMPLE OF MY BRAINSHARK
This is an example a presentation made by me using My Brainshark:

SUGGESTION OF ACTIVITIES

1. Could be used for students to practice their speaking skill - Teacher asks students to make a power point presentation and add audio using My Brainshark and then show it in the classroom and teacher can also asks other classmates to comments on the presentation
2. Story telling activity - Students create a story and being as the narrator and present it in the classroom
3. Could also be used for a listening activities in which students listen to the presentation and at the same time, teacher can provide an activity during the while-listening and post-listening stage.
4. Ask students to upload the pictures by making it as a photo album and narrate it. The topic could be about 'My vacation' or 'My family'.

*Using this tool could help to reduce the students' affective filter. This is because, some of the students are very shy to speak in front of others. But, this tool would help the students to practise their speaking confidently because they do not have to speak in front of the class.*

WHAT I LIKE ABOUT MY BRAINSHARK

1. Helps the students to practice their speaking skill
2. It is FREE
3. Can embed it to a blog or share it with friends or teachers
4. Useful for students who are afraid to speak in front of the class
5. Users can edit their presentation - in case they want to change their presentation 
6. Students can view others' presentation - available in the My Brainshark 
7. Can foster the learning development for communities - ideas can be exchanged freely. 
8. Autonomous learning - students can upload their own presentation at home and can get the feedback/comments from real audience
9. Students have real audience whom will view their presentation - this could be a motivation for them. 

POSSIBLE PROBLEMS 

1. Limited space to upload files -It is only up to 200MB
2. Needs internet connection whenever you want to view your presentation 
3. For the speaking activity, it might not suitable for the beginner whom has limited vocabulary and unable to speak using second language. 
4. Students does not engage in real presentation - real presentation usually requires students to speaks lively in front of others
5. Students might get inappropriate comments from viewers as their presentation could be seen by other from all over the world. 

LISTEN AND WRITE

WHAT IS LISTEN AND WRITE
This is an online tool which could be used to practice listening/dictation skills by listening to an audio and writing the words that they hear in a box provided. The users listen to the parts of the sentence and at the same time, they need to type the words that they listen to a text field. The word will only appear if the spell the correct one. They are able to listen again to the sentence and can get some help by setting the activity to auto complete the words as they type them in. There are also other languages for dictation apart from English; Korean, Hebrew, Chinese, Finnish and Tamil. This website could be used for the students to improve their oral comprehension as well as spelling skill. 


AGE AND LEVEL OF LEARNERS
# Age of students - thirteen and above 
# Level - suitable for all level of students (activities for different level are available) 


HOW TO USE LISTEN AND WRITE
Click on the link below for the Listen and Write webpage: Listen and Write Website

Picture 1: Listen and Write webpage

The instruction is:
# Once you are directed to the page, Then You can choose the story that you prefer to listen to.The story are based on different level of difficulties. There are 25 (2 to 26) levels provided. # After that, you can choose any mode that you like. There are three options available; full mode, quick mode and blank mode. 
#Next, click the play button to listen and at the same time, you can try to write words in the box provided. If you unable to spell the word, you can click the hint button. A red 'good' will appear at the end of line if you write correct sentence. You can also submit your own oral recording as part of the bank of recorded items. 
# In order to save your score, share and save audios and collaborate with other to dictate and do audio recording, you need to sign in and establish an account. 
# For the tutorial on Listen and Write, you can click on this link: Listen and Write Tutorial

SUGGESTION OF ACTIVITIES

1. Teacher can do differentiation in the classroom based on students level. For weaker students (who has low language competency), the teacher can assign the listening story from low level, which is below level 5. Thus, by doing this, all students have the chance to try out the activity. In addition, this could be a motivation for low level learners since they still can do the same activity even though they are from different level as compared to advanced students. 
2. Teacher can also make it as a game where students can compare their score with other students. In this activity, at least two students need to choose the same listening title/text. Then, individually, they would need to do the activity and finally compare their score with those who do the same listening title/text as them. To encourage students to engage in communication, the teacher may asks the students to discuss about how they could improve their scores and what are the interesting issue which occur regarding the listening text. This activity would make the students interested to speak and discuss with their friends. 
3.  If it is done outside the classroom (for autonomous learning), teacher can make it as a homework and gradually check the students' score. The teacher can give comments and feedback whenever necessary. 
4.  Ask students to find any article of their interest. Record it and exchange it with their friends to transcribe. This is a kind of personalisation since the students can choose anything to record. 

*In my opinion, this tool is highly recommended for those who are more into aural and linguistic style of learning since it involves more listening and dictation. * 

WHAT I LIKE ABOUT LISTEN AND WRITE

1. Students can use this tool at home whenever they feel that they want to do some practice. 
2. Students can develop their vocabulary on their own autonomously. 
3. It can enhance the students' listening skill
4. It is suitable for all level of students
5. This could be a fun activities for some students 
6. 'Listen and Write' tool could be an interactive way for the students in learning.
7. Good system for evaluation and students can keep tract on their own progress. This is because, when the students sign up, they can review their scores. 
8. Practice multiple skills which are listening and writing at the same time 
9. It is a free listening practice!
10. Students can choose to listen to any topics that they like since there are 7 categories available (Learning, news, music, kids, movies, TED and words stories). 
11. Students can choose three different modes based on their preference; full mode, quick mode and blank mode.
12. Students can choose the level of difficulty based on their language ability. There are levels 2 to 26 available. So, students can work based on their own pace. 
13. Students can also download their own audio that they want to transcribe. 
14. There are possibilities for learning other languages apart from English since the audio available in other languages as well ( example: Chinese, Korean and Finnish). 

POSSIBLE PROBLEMS 

1. It is unsure whether the sources are reliable or not since it is based on Radio station in America. 
2. Some students might not be able to use this tool if they do not have access to the internet
3. The webpage for 'Listen and Write' has a Facebook and Twitter link. Thus, this could be a distraction while they are doing the activities. 
4. As this tool is usually for autonomous learning,if the students use it outside the classroom, therefore, the teacher might not get the feedback about how the students progress in using this website.
5. Not suitable for visual types of learning students since it is more on listening and writing.
6. This tool does not allow the users to save their transcription and export them to a word processing program. 
7. Some students might not be interested to listen to the topic listed as they are not really familiar with those topics. 
8. The speaker in the audio uses American language, speak with quite fast speed and sometimes some of them have slang. It would be difficult for some students to understand the audio. 

LYRICS TRAINING

WHAT IT IS
Lyrics Training is a tool which could be used by students to learn and improve their second/foreign language skills (example: English) by listening the song and complete the lyrics as they are sung. The videos in this tool are being categorized based on three level of mastery namely beginner, intermediate and expert.The songs could be found in different language which includes English, German, Spanish and French.


AGE AND LEVEL OF LEARNERS
# Age of learners- thirteen and above (this is the age where students like to listen to music)
#  Level of learners - beginner, intermediate and advanced (the lyrics available based on this three different levels)


HOW TO USE LYRICS TRAINING 
First and foremost, go to this website: Lyrics Training Website and you will see the page as shown below: 

Picture 1: Lyrics Training Website

What would you need to do when you open the webpage:
# Choose the song based on you interest
# Choose the play level. There are three level available; beginner (Fill in the blanks 10%), Intermediate (fill in the blanks 25%) and expert (full lyrics).
# In order to continue playing the song, the students need to complete each line (the blank line). The song is paused once you start to write.
#  To listen again to the last line, press backspace key. If you get stuck, you can click the 'give up!' button and see the word. 
#  If the listener could not understand a word, they may press the tab key to jump to the next. 
# Once finished filling all the blanks, students can see their score. 
# Students can also record themselves, singing the song in karaoke style (sing the song along with the original one)
# For full instructions on using this tool, you can check out this website: Lyrics Training Tutorial


SUGGESTION OF ACTIVITIES  
Few examples of activities which could be conducted in the classroom are:

1. Pronunciation activity - In this activity, students can use the karaoke mode and try to sing the song with correct pronunciation.
2. Spelling activity -This could be done as a competition. Students could be divided into few groups with the same level of language proficiency. Each members in the group will get the same song based on their level. Then, they practice filling the blanks of the chosen song and compare the score with their friends from the same group.
3. Teacher could recommended this website for the students so that they can practise for themselves outside the classroom. They can practise their listening skills in a fun way. I am sure they like songs!

*Lyrics Training could promote autonomous learning since students can do the exercise even outside the classroom. They can also use this for self evaluation in which they can see how good they are in spelling words.*

*This website is recommended for auditory, visual and linguistic learners since it combines the listening and spelling. The students need to listen to the song with visual and at the same time they can try to spell the missing words* 

WHY USE LYRICS TRAINING

1. Fun approach to help students learn their second language - no more rote memorization. 
2. The students can learn based on their language competency. They can listen to the YouTube-hosted music video for either beginner, intermediate or experts level. 
3. There are various songs available which could be chosen by the students. 
4. It is free to use and does not require registration.  
5. Students still can see their scores although they do not register. 
6. Teachers do not grade their quality of singing. So, everyone can have fun and do not have to worry whether their voice are nice or not. 
7. Training multiple skills which are writing, listening, spelling and pronunciation. 
8. Would favour the students who prefer visual,music and audio style of learning. 
9. The score that the students get could be a motivation for them. They might try to beat the previous score which could be a motivation for them to try harder. 
10. Students can submit their own songs and put the lyrics to them themselves. 
11. There are a range of songs which not only available in English but also in other languages (German, Spanish and French). Therefore, learning other languages is also possible. 

POSSIBLE PROBLEMS

1. The Facebook link could be a distraction for them as they might log in into their Facebook account.  
2. Some songs might not be suitable for the students since it may use inappropriate language.  
3. Some students might cheat as they know the lyrics as they already familiar with the songs. 
4. Not suitable for those who are more into kinaesthetic and reading style of learning. They would not be interested in listening to music and watching videos. 
5. Some videos could possibly not suitable for the learners to watch. 
6. Some of the words in the song is quite difficult to catch. As the consequence, it might demotivate the students to carry on the activity. 
7. Facilities - some school might not have enough computers for all students and do not have access to the internet. Thus, this activity could not be done properly.