Becoming a Webhead 2006

About 30 excited BAWers got together at the Webheads in Action office today at 17:00 GMT eager to follow Isabel Perez’s presentation: “Creating Materials for Blended or Online learning.” Just as the time to start approached, chit-chatting was intense, and all participants were enthusiastically gossiping, when Daf asked for “silence” and introduced our presenter:

“Isabel Pérez is an English Teacher at the Universidad de Granada, in Spain. She is also the webmaster of the ESL site.  With a PhD in English Philology from the University of Granada, she has produced a dissertation on the topic of Designing WebQuests for learning and teaching English. She has published several articles and given numerous talks and courses on the the Internet and CALL.  For several years Isabel has lead several vocabulary acquisition e-learning projects at the University of Granada.”

Isabel’s impressive career was enough to get everybody quiet… All eyes were set on the screen, ready now to see what she had to demonstrate! Isabel held the floor and asked everyone to have a look at a Powerpoint slideshow she’d prepared for us:

 
And that was when the action really started! In less than an hour she skillfully talked us all into trying Zoomerang, Discovery.com , Quizstar, Wizard  and many other tools.  (NB: links to some of these tools are presently in our database in our Yahoo! group).

Just in time for Valentine’s day, she was even thoughtful enough to present some games with poems we could use with our classes!  Sharon has already posted these to our group, so check your email for them!

By the end of the session, all attendants agreed extra lives would be needed to try our hands at all these wonderful tools. Some even went as far as to start wondering how many wigs they’d need to order for week 5!

 The session finished with Isabel’s offer to reply to any questions on her presentation posted to the group during the week, and an invitation for all BAWers to join her at next EUROCALL, which will take place next September in Spain.

If you were there, you must already have received the transcript TappedIn automatically emails all participants. If you missed the session, you can still see everything that went on by reading the chatlog. 

And, of course, you don’t want to miss Isabel’s site!

Finally, Tere has already uploaded her traditional “integrated page” for this presentation. Add that to your bookmarks today!

So what did you think of it? Have you already tried any of the tools presented? Do you know any others you can recommend to the group? Post your comments on this session here, and share your tips with all BAWers at our Yahoo! group.

Only two weeks to get through!

Cris, Gladys and Sharon

Hey BaWers!

It was wonderful to see so many of you at Alado today

As usual lots of enthusiasm, many questions about Alado, and tons of humor.

Who attended the session?

Moderators and Comoderators: Teresa (Portugal), Daf (Venezuela), Chrissan(Sweden), Barb (Germany)

Participants: Aiden, Amanda, Analía, Angeles, Annie, Berta, Carla, Cecilia, Claudia, Cora, Cris, Daniele, Erika, Gladys, Hala, Horacio, Isabel, Jean Michele, Julia, Kat, Leanne, Moira, Sasa, Susan Canelo, Vanya, Nina, Silvana.

What a wonderful group of participants

If you were not able to attend our informal informative session, this is the link to the whole presentation. And this is the link to the audio.

(((hugs)))

Daf

PS: Leanne and I took the screenshots almost at the same time, that’s why they are so similar 

More than 30 participants eagerly attended Barbara Dieu – Bee – and Graham Stanley presentation on Blogging and Podcasting at the Alado. First Barbara focused on different types of blogs, then she explained the advantages of RSS feed. Finally she explored some of the pedagogical implication of this extremely dynamic tool. Bee pointed out that blogs are causing a shift in paradigm which is bound to change our teaching and learning patterns in more than one way.

Bee backed her lively presentation with a set of clearcut, up-to-the point PP slides and a choice selection of different types of blogs and RSS blog aggregators. She also provided useful hints on how to use blogs in ESL/EFL.

During the presentation participants were actively involved in text chat. They asked many questions and raised a few challenging issues to reflect upon.

• How can teachers fit blogs in their often tight and already too crammed syllabuses?
• Is it appropriate to correct blogs? If yes, how can it be done?
• In case blogs are used to create portfolios, how can they be assesed?

Graham Stanley, on the other hand, tackled this year cutting edge CMC tool, podcastig. This was almost an absolute first for BAW and raised the participants’ interest at unprecedented levels, both on the technical features and the pedagogical – or ‘podagogical’, as Graham called them – implications.

Graham used a few, extremely clear, PP slides and provided plenty of examples and web references for those interested in further exploring this topic.

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During the presentation participants compared tools. exchanged suggestions for tech purchases and discussed some possible uses of podcasting. Nina Liakos raised a very interesting issue: can podcasting be of any use in an ESL environment, with full availability of native speakers and authentic materials?

Both presentations were attended by the BAW06 moderators, Dafne Gonzales and Teresa Almeida d’Eca – who introduced the speakers – and week 3 co-moderators, Cora Chen and Maria Teresa Ciaffaroni, – who welcomed participants, re-directed lost bawers to the right spot, and actively contributued to the text chat.

Recording of the proceedings were kindly made by Tere and Daf for those who missed the session. An integrated web page with audio and video recording, as well as a chatlog, is available at BAW website chat session.

We will greatly appreciate your comments both on the double presentation – whether you attended it live or listened to the recording – and on the venue.

We would also like you to explore some of the issues raised.

Let’s now venture full sail on blogging and podcasting, with the helpful support of Bee and Graham

Cheers

Maria Teresa MT

The 2006 edition of Becoming a Webhead included, for the very first time, a live webcast presentation at WorldBridges. Dafne, Teresa, Hala and Leanne welcomed over 50 participants from BaW and other EVO sessions to hear firsthand from Jeff LeBow and Dave Cormier, the site’s founders.

The Q&A format brought several participants into the Skype conference, to comment on the topic, ask questions, relay their experience or, as Teresa says, “put in their two euro cents”. Meanwhile, the very-active chatroom took on a life of its own – with participants asking questions and getting them answered by other participants. Eventually, an overview of what a webcast entails and how it might be used in ESL teaching was covered. But, as is often the case, answers often led to more questions…leaving participants with some food for thought.

In true WebHead spirit, some participants were also multitasking in YM, getting in more practice with their webcams. Ibrahim Rustamov captured Cris Costa, Randa Effat, Moira Hunter and Amanda Fava-Verde with this screenshot.

For those of you who missed the presentation, by definition, a webcast becomes a podcast when it is recorded for later listening…so you can enjoy it at your leisure at

http://worldbridges.com/livewire/2006/01/30/baw2006/  

and be sure to add your comments below.

A big WebHead thank you to Jeff and Dave for providing this taste of webcasting, and for recording the proceedings for posterity. Congratulations to BaWers who braved the unknown to “skype in” to the conference, sometimes after several attempts. Thank you also to Teresa d’Eca and Ibrahim Rustamov for their screenshots.

We welcome your comments on this presentation and the venues, Worldbridges and Skype, as well as your suggestions for how webcasts or podcasts could work into your teaching context.

Yours,

Leanne

A record number of WebHeads-to-be attended the first voice conference of BaW 2006, enjoying Michael Coghlan’s excellent overview of voice chat. 33 participants from all five continents heard “The Voice” detail how chat can be used in today’s ESL classrooms. Michael’s oration was backed by a selection of slides, and questions and comments were posted in Yahoo Messenger’s chatroom. Aiden Yeh and Bee Dieu also contributed to the discussion, providing explanation on their particular voice-based projects.

Meanwhile, particpants were lively in greeting each other and some tried out the video capability of YM. Here are Sasa Sirk from Slovenia, Bee Dieu from Brazil and Carla Arena from Argentina as viewed on Dafne’s screen:

Thanks to Leanne, who ably invited participants into the conference, and Hala, who warmly greeted them from Sudan on their arrival. Hala introduced Michael with the flourish that only she can provide, and Michael capped his presentation with an impromptu command performance of “Happy Online”.

Recordings of the proceedings were kindly made by Fernanda, using Total Recorder, and Dafne, who captured the text chatlog. Teresa has kindly posted these for future review at

http://64.71.48.37/teresadeca/webheads/baw06/sessions/mcoghlan-25jan06.htm

Please take a moment to give us your comments on this presentation, whether you experienced it “live” or from the recording.

Yours,

Leanne

Dear Friends,  

We are finishing our first week, and you have already explored some asynchronous tools, the distribution list, the forum and the blog. We will start now “playing” with synchronous tools, that is, real time communication, and the first place we have visited is Tapped In

Thanks to the almost 40 participants who joined us today

Some of you had already had the opportunity to visit this community, but for others this was the first time.

Whether you are a newcomer or an experienced visitor, please, let’s share our opinions on this synchronous experience:

• How is it different from interacting with asynchronous tools?
• How do you feel?
• Which one would you prefer for your studenst? Why?
• What advantages and drawbacks do you perceive?

If you missed the session , read the chatlog (also available on our chatsessions web page ), and tell us what it feels like reading the trascript of a chat where you have not participated:

• Is it difficult to follow the flow of the conversation?
• Are transcripts helpful to get the information you were expecting to find?
• Can you describe the discourse of the chat?

Well, and share whatever ideas you have

Let’s keep blogging! 

Cheers,

Daf  

Yes! This year’s session started with a “grand opening” at Worldbridges. As announced by EVO coordinator, Elizabeth Hanson-Smith, the session was scheduled for 15:00 GMT, yet over 20 participants had started exploring such an interesting environment about half an hour before.

This being my second time as a BAWer, I felt ready to try this tool. Had I started like that last year, I think I would have fainted! Making use of Skype and teleconference, supplemented with text chat. Over 40 EVO participants from God knows how many countries interacted at the meeting. Over 47 countries from the five continents were reported to have joined EVO even before its official launch, and workshop moderators briefly presented the sessions they will be conducting.The atmosphere was superb, as it is always the case with EVO meetings, and a mid-term and end-of-the-workshop meetings have already been announced.

Jeff was a superb moderator, and the quality sound was just perfect! Even though most of us had never been at Worldbridges before, the whole session was a success, and I’d say it encouraged all participants to try new synchronous activities soon.

Did you miss it? Or were you there but you’d like to re-live it? Listen to what went on at:

http://worldbridges.com/livewire/2006/01/15/118/ (downloadable MP3)

or just read the chat transcript!

Were you there too? What did you think of it?

Gladys Baya

It is a pleasure to have such a diverse audience

Hi everybody,

Welcome to our third round of the Becoming a Webhead workshop! Before you create your own blog, you can explore this one, and write your opinion about the use of blogs.

Looking forward to reading your comments,

your co-moderators,

Daf   and

                                 Tere