This is my first time to take a course which relates to technology. Dr. Crawford provides many interesting web 2.0 tools that would definitely attract students in classrooms. I am surprised that there are so many useful websites that I have never seen before.
I try to think about how to integrate some of the tools into my class in Taiwan. However, I think it is kind of difficult to transplant the "American experience" to Taiwan. I have two reasons. One is students' English ability, and the other is the equipment limitation in a classroom. Let me tell you the situation in Taiwan. Students start to learn English in 3rd grade, but many of them don't have a complete concept toward English. They even don't want to learn English and they don't know the reason why they have to learn it. Many students told me that they won't use English in the future, and they won't go to America. Why should they learn English? When they first entered junior high school, teachers have to teach them ABCD from the beginning and teach them how to pronounce. Moreover, we have 3 exams in a semester which means we have to teach 3 lessons before every exam. We only have 5 English classes a week, so it would be a little bit difficult to use web 2.0 tools in class. Moreover, we don't have computers in our classrooms. Classrooms may equip projectors but not all of them. Therefore, it is difficult to integrate those technological things into my teaching.
Many schools have white board just like the one in CTLT, but it is the beginning. Many of us don't know how to use it even though it is a great equipment. Hope I can figure out how to use web 2.0 tools to facilitate my teaching and make my students love leaning English.
Thanks for describing the situation in Taiwan related to technology use in classrooms. My hope for you is that maybe in time, some of these tools and the technologies that we are using in class can be a reality in some of your classrooms. Keep an open mind and think how can these be used in maybe - the teaching of English. Also, you remind me of the need for more translation sites related to some of these tools. Hopefully, we will get to the point where as we use these tools they are not language dependent. Meaning - I have to know English in order to use them. What if there was a version of TitanPad in Mandarin or your official language. Interesting things to think about! Thanks for sharing!
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