The wiki way of learning: Supporting vocabulary, grammar and writing skills in ESL classroom

The wiki way of learning: Supporting vocabulary, grammar and writing skills in

ESL classroom

Anna Bougia

Aims of this Presentation

To discuss the benefits of using wikis in ESL classroom

To familiarize ESL instructors with the use of wiki technology

To present and practice a number of successful examples of collaborative wiki activities (vocabulary-writing)

To motivate instructors to use the wiki platform as an e-portfolio

What’s a wiki?

The most well known wiki

Wikis in education

Since 2000 wikis have been used as a source of information and as a tool for collaborative learning in the educational settings.

Teachers in all over the world use WIKIS

http://educationalwikis.wikispaces.com/Examples+of+educational+wikis

21st Century skills for teachers

Amaldi-English Corner

E-portfolio Project

Teenagers’ Guide to Everywhere

Educational uses of wikis

Students

To develop research projects (share links, bibliography, resources)

To write essays, reviews, articles To write reflections on the learning process To Interact with peers-teacher

Educational uses of wikis

Teachers To build a knowledge base To share reflections regarding teaching

practices, recourses To create an e-portofio On-line teacher training platform

Literature review on wikis

Students’ perceptions for wikis

Students' perceptions of Wiki-based collaborative writing for learners of English as a foreign language (2010), National Kaohsiung Normal University, Taiwan

86% preferred writing on wiki that in a word document

71.4% they were more aware of their language use

73.5% considered Wiki helpful to work on ideas and to plan the organization into outlines 

Students’ perceptions on wikis

83.7% considered Wiki-mediated collaborative writing to be able to enhance peer interaction.

75.5% their writing ability was enhanced through member revising records in history on wiki.

Many participants reported that they learned vocabulary, spelling, and phrases as well as sentence structure by reading the work of others on the Wiki pages and learning from the writing produced by their peers.

Research on the use of wikis in second/foreign language classes

Wikis encourage interaction-active engagement. (Alm, 2006; Franklin & Van Harmelen, 2007).

Research on wikis & Motivation

Wiki has potentials for motivating students (Egbert, 2003; Fotos, 2004; Warschauer, 1996)

Motivation

Benefits in writing skills

Lee (2012, University of New Hampshire) revealed:

that collaborative engagement in wikis, peer feedback and scaffolding

Enhanced writing skills Changed students attitude towards writing Build confidence in writing

Benefits in Writing Skills

Mak and Coniam (2008,Secondary school, Shatin Pui Ying College Hong Kong)

students wrote more than what was required. sentences were more complex and creative

than usual.

Research on wikis & Grammar

Eola and Oskoz (2010,East Coast university)

Collaborative writing improved written grammar as well as the structure and the content of writing.

Castaneda & Cho (Ohio University, 2010)

Wiki writing improved grammatical knowledge

of Spanish forms of: imperfet and preterite & imperfect.

Research on wikis & Critical Reflection

Woo et al. (2011, Hong Kong, Primary School)

Results showed that engagement in creative problem solving and peer critique helped students to use their critical thinking and creative reasoning skills.

Research on wikis & Autonomy

Arnold (2012) Group members took responsibility for the

text and made formal revisions and content changes.

Kessler and Bikowski (2010) 80% of the students demonstrated

autonomy as collaborative learners by either adding new information on the wiki project, either deleting/elaborating information.

Examples of good practice

Writing Activity

Vocabulary Practice

E-Portfolio

Familiarizing Teachers with wikis

Create a wikispaces account

http://www.wikispaces.com/

Writing activity

Activity Title: Write a paragraph about a talented person.

Level: Intermediate.

Learning Objective: To assist students developing descriptive writing skills.

Language focus: vocabulary for success-talented people).

Grammar Focus: Present Perfect.

Lesson Plan

Introduction of the topic / setting the scene Upload to wiki pictures of famous talented

people and ask students which one do they admire and why?

Exposure to good samples of writing in keeping with the lesson objectives (companion- internet).

Analysis of the sentence structures, vocabulary and writing conventions contained in the samples.

Lesson Plan

Clarification of writing task.(remind students the parts of a paragraph).

Individual or group brainstorming.(use wiki forum to exchange ideas about talent vs practice.

Initiate a debate or ask students to participate in a survey:

http://www.survs.com/app/9/wa/welcome?wosid=BcEcz44pJGszRW0fPGyecw

Selection or rejection of ideas. Sorting and ordering of ideas.

Lesson Plan

First draft. Discussions with other students and / or the

teacher. (invite teacher and your peers to become members of your wiki page and ask for feedback.

Second and subsequent drafts. Go back to history and revise your teacher’s and peers edits

Assign Roles

Practical Advice for Classroom UseModel Collaboration

Innovators

Debaters

ResearchersProtectors

Editors

Vocabulary Practice Activities

"Vocabulary is not a developmental skill or one that can be seen as fully mastered. The expansion and elaboration of vocabularies is something that extends across a lifetime."

(Kamil & Hiebert, 2005) Tools: QUIZLET, VISUWORDS FLASH STASH,

CONCORDANCER

http://quizlet.com/ http://flashcardstash.com/ http://www.visuwords.com/ http://www.natcorp.ox.ac.uk/index.xml

Vocabulary Teaching

Meaning

Pronunciation

Stress

Spelling Word Family

Register

Grammatical Features Collocation

E-PORTFOLIO

http://www.wikispaces.com/

WIKI RESOURCES-EXAMPLES OF GOOD PRACTICE

http://aroundtheworldwithwikis.wikispaces.com/

http://esu4vocabularystrategies.wikispaces.com/

http://ictmagic.wikispaces.com/~Educational+Magazines+%26+Blogs

Around the world with wikis

Vocabulary Resources

ICT Resources

Places to create wikis

Wikispaces

http://www.wikispaces.com/

Wikis on wetpaint

http://www.wetpaintcentral.com/news

Wikidot in education

http://www.wikidot.com/learnmore:education

Start writing!!!!!!!!!!

“BE THE CHANGE YOU WISH TO SEE IN THE WORLD”, GANDHI