HAPPY ONLINE: A BLENDED-LEARNING LESSON PLAN by Aiden Yeh Wen Zao Ursuine Coege of Foreign Languages, Kaohsiung, Taiwan aidenyeh@yahoo.com Leve: Upper-Intermediate and above Time: at east 3 periods (50 minutes each) Aims: 1. To enhance deveopment of four anguage skis. 2. To engage in a chat activity with a native speaker of Engish. 3. To foster ora communication skis by giving earners opportunities to use the anguage in an authentic manner or rea-ife situation. Technica Requirements: At east one computer with the Internet access In voice/text chats, you coud use any free chat software avaiabe onine. Commony used programs are Yahoo Messenger (YM) avaiabe at http://messenger.yahoo.com/ and MSN Messenger. See featured URLs beow for inks on other Free Onine Voice/Text Chat Software. In this esson, I used ivocaize from Taking Communities which is provided by ALADO (see http://www.aado.com/webheads). This chat program has been graciousy offered by Mr. Andy Pincon for members of Webheads onine community). a mutimedia projector or any broadcasting system that coud project images/sounds. an optiona webcam Introduction
The esson pan is heaviy infuenced by a musica composition written by a singer/composer, educator and a feow-webhead, Michae Coghan (see http://users.chariot.net.au/~michaec/songs.htm#ho). The theme, Happy Onine, is highy appropriate for this type of bended earning activity. The yrics fit we with the students' way of ife and they coud easiy reate to the message. The theme is up-to-date and coud be used by other teachers in different contexts. The message of the song is about meeting peope onine and getting to know more about them. It is aso about technoogy - the fun and fear that is associated with using it, about the simpe joys in ife that we experience when we go onine. On a persona eve, it is that goden smie that peope have every time they see each other's faces on the web cam. This activity is divided into three phases, 1) pre-onine chat activity, 2) during chat, and 3) postonine chat activity. Necessary Preparation Prior to the onine event, the teacher shoud arrange for a guest speaker (a native speaker of Engish or a non-native but with near-native Engish proficiency) to meet with the Ss. Since this activity requires coaboration between the teacher, the guest speaker/s and Ss, it is advisabe to invite someone you know (a friend, famiy member/s and/or coeagues). You may aso find support from professiona organizations such as TESOL or IATEFL and their respective Engish as a Foreign Language (EFL) Interest Sections (IS) or Specia Interest Group (SIG). Teachers can aso benefit from joining onine coaborative communities such as the Webheads in Action (http://www.geocities.com/vance_stevens/papers/evonine2002 /webheads.htm see the other artice in this issue), epas (www.epas.com), and Intercutura E- mai Cassroom Connections (www.iecc.org). Time and avaiabiity of the guest speaker shoud aso be taken into consideration. Note [You shoud give cear instructions to students on what to do, provide the necessary URL inks (or websites) where they coud isten to the song onine and the web page of the forum where they wi be posting their comments. This activity requires onine work, idea to give as an assignment. This wi aso give students ampe time to prepare their work.] The students were instructed to post their answers to the questions on the forum http://dcyeh.com/ipw-web/buetin/bb/viewtopic.php?t=5. Their answers were used as a springboard to get our onine discussion going. (Another aternative to creating web pages is to post the URLs and assignment questions on a bog, on a forum, via emais and other ways of making these inks avaiabe for them.)
Procedure I. Pre-Onine Chat Activity (1 week prior to the schedued bended activity) 1. Before the onine meeting, ist a the inks and forward them to students. Aso give some notes on topics/issues that coud be further expored. 2. Instruct the students to read and answer the questions posted on the forum. Advise Ss that activity in the forum is being observed by the onine guest/s in preparation for the onine discussion. II. Bended earning activity: Onine chat Warm-up and pre-onine chat in-cass activity Time: 50 minutes 1. Have a short discussion about the song "Happy Onine", which can be initiated by sharing your own experiences with meeting peope onine 3. Then, gather students' opinions and experiences by asking questions such as, "Have you ever met someone onine?", "Has this experience boomed into friendships?", "Do you have inhibitions on using chat rooms, Yahoo messenger, Skype, etc.?" 4. After soiciting answers to your questions, you can now te your Ss what the activity is about. For exampe, "You wi be meeting (name of guest speaker) onine and he/she wi share with you his/her views on meeting peope onine." 5. Expain in detai the tasks that they wi have to accompish for the day. Voice Conference with Students Time: 50-60 minutes Notes For the onine chat activity, the teacher shoud make sure that the computer to be used has Internet access and chat software has been successfuy instaed. Steps: 1. Log in and start the voice conference.
2. Test sound equipment with your invited guest making sure that the sounds from both sides are working. 3. Start the conference as soon as everybody (students and the guest speaker) has setted down. The LCD projector shoud be running at this point to broadcast and project images as they appear on the monitor. 4. Give brief information on the foowing: topic of onine discussion, onine guests' bio, and the cass (course and number of students). 5. Pass the microphone to a student vounteer who wi start the discussion. This coud be in a form of a question or statement based on the song. 6. Ss take turns in asking/giving questions or comments/opinions. 7. Aado has a buit-in recording function that aows you to record the onine discussion in.htm fie which contains both the audio (saved as.wav fie) and the web interface of Aado showing a the webpages or PowerPoint presentations that were used during the onine chat. If the chat software you are using does not have a recording function, then you wi need to have an externa recording program that coud capture audio from your computer, i.e. Tota Recorder and Rea Payer 10. Both the text and voice og can be used for assessment purposes and materia for peer feedback. Teaching Tips The interaction between the Ss and the guest speaker shoud be as spontaneous and natura as possibe. If you ose voice or any of your Ss is unabe to hear the sound, it woud be wise to sette for a text-based chat. III. Offine Post-chat Activity Time: 50 minutes 1. Foow up your guest speaker's comments with some basic comprehension questions to check whether the whoe cass understands the issues that were discussed during the onine chat. You may touch on some essons that they have earned by invoking such questions as What did you earn from the onine discussion?' 2. Summarize the topics and events that occurred during this activity by ooking back at the aims of this esson pan.
3. Take this opportunity to remind students to be carefu when using onine chat program. With the Internet, education and earning wi never be the same again but due to its open nature peope with bad intentions coud use it for their own benefit. Impications for teaching and earning Bending onine technoogy with traditiona cassroom has its own chaenges and imitations. Technica difficuties often occur when you east expect them - and they do happen. These gitches can make or break your session. Yet, simiar to any presentations, be it F2F or onine, preparation is the key. Onine discussions woud ony work if you have invited guests who are wiing to spend their time with students. Panning is important, but sti, it is not fooproof. Guests may arrive too eary or too ate, and worst; they coud miss the whoe event due to time differences and time conversions. In a nutshe, the tasks in this activity are designed to achieve the aims of the esson by combining a bended approach to earning Engish that crosses boundaries and cutura dimensions. This onine discussion gives students the opportunity to practice and use in rea time the skis that they have been trying to earn and hone for the past year. It was a chance for them to actuay speak in an authentic manner. Having said the pedagogica impications of onine discussions, we coud not, however, refute the possibe dangers of visiting pubic onine chat rooms. As teachers, we shoud take note and cautiousy address the safety issues concerning the students' use of onine chat toos outside the cassroom.