by Abdul Aziz bin Arsyad Summary
The Blog editorial team has recently launched a new series known as Interviews with Going Digital ELT (GD-ELT Inspirers). This series will be featuring outstanding English Language educators who have made significant contributions in the field of digital technology in language education in Malaysia. These educators have gone above and beyond their calls of duty to provide meaningful learning experiences for their students. They have also helped and inspired fellow teachers from all over Malaysia and around the world with their determination, selflessness, ingenuity, and generosity in sharing their knowledge with others. The GD-ELT Inspirer featured in this issue is the amazing Audrey Koh Sui Ean, who is well-known not only in the field of ELT but also through her involvement in charities and various humanitarian causes. In this interview with our team member Abdul Aziz Arsyad, Audrey talked about how she has turned stumbling blocks into stepping stones, and offered tips and advice on how other teachers can do the same.
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by Cynthia C. James
Summary
Interviews with Going Digital ELT (GD-ELT) Inspirers is a new series on this blog, created specifically to acknowledge outstanding English Language educators who have made significant contributions in the field of digital technology in language education in Malaysia. These educators have gone above and beyond their calls of duty to provide meaningful learning experiences for their students. They have also helped and inspired fellow teachers from all over Malaysia and around the world with their determination, selflessness, ingenuity, and generosity in sharing their knowledge with others. The GD-ELT Inspirer featured in this issue is none other than Dr Sirhajwan Idek from Keningau Vocational College, Sabah, Malaysia. In this interview with our team member Cynthia C. James, Dr Sirhajwan talked about his latest projects, his teaching philosophy, his views on teaching during the pandemic, and most of all, what inspires him and keeps him going.
by Felicity F. Malanggin
Summary
Most of the year 6 pupils in SK Kota Marudu 2 performed poorly in their writing tests because they disliked writing. The lack of motivation also contributed to their reluctance to write. This project will look into how digital storytelling can help ignite pupils’ interests in story-writing and improve their performances in story-writing tests. The tools used for developing digital storytelling had to be limited to offline resources with Microsoft PowerPoint as the main platform due to constraints involving the availability of hardware and software as well as poor Internet connectivity.
by Cynthia C. James
Summary
I have plenty of experiences with low-resource classrooms - as a student, a teacher, and someone who works with and alongside teachers. In this post, I would like to share how all these experiences have shaped my thinking about technology integration practices in the classroom, and my belief about what matters. To borrow Clandinin's (2013) term, this is my 'narrative beginning.' I am sharing my reflections on how it all started, and how I came to be part of the Going Digital community.
by Leong Siew Lee @ Iris
Summary
Nowadays and more than ever, teachers are expected to integrate digital technology in their classroom practices to help students learn better, faster, and more effectively. Fortunately, I was introduced to some Web 2.0 tools during a series of trainings organised by the Going Digital community. Through these trainings, I learned how to adopt these technology practices in my English language lessons. Using Web 2.0 tools to prepare my Form 6 students for the Malaysian University English Test (MUET) has produced encouraging results. Through this experience, I also learned that in order for my teaching to remain relevant in this age and time, it is necessary for me to understand the students’ needs and to keep myself updated with the latest technology tools and its application in language education. In this article, I aim to share a few useful Web 2.0 tools which I have utilised in my MUET classroom.
by Connie Bernard Maskilone
Summary
My Form 5 students were always bored and lacking in enthusiasm when completing their tasks for the School-Based Oral Assessment (SBOA). This project was conducted as an intervention to encourage the Form 5 students of SMK Tebobon, Kota Kinabalu, Sabah to do their SBOA in fun and creative ways. Through observations and brainstorming of ideas conducted in the classroom, I discovered that the students were not interested in doing the oral test the ‘old’ ways. In this article, I would share how an Instagram video-making project can act as an intervention to make SBOA more engaging and interesting. The students’ performances in the progress test showed tremendous improvement, and the students were also able to complete their videos and scripts within the time frame given. The findings from this project suggest that the video-making and Instagram project was able to improve the students’ speaking skills and engage reluctant speakers to converse in the targeted language. by Tok Fen Fen Summary
The call to emigrate from analog to digital was answered when our PLC organised a series of Going Digital workshops. Being a digital immigrant, the decision to venture into the unknown with 28 Form 5 students was made. This article aims to present the possibility of a newly emigrated digital-teacher to actually introduce and carry out an online classroom project and the students’ responses. A programme called PowToon was introduced to the students. PowToon is an online programme that allows its users to create animated videos and presentations. A period of 2 weeks was used to carry out this project and the results were extremely encouraging. It was found that with technology, classroom time was more student-centred and students became more autonomous in the course of completing their project. Reflections from the students collected at the end of the project suggest that the use of digital technology is welcomed and the teacher’s limited knowledge in technology should not be a hindrance. Fun assessments? Exploring the use of Kahoot! to gauge students’ mastery at the end of a topic11/3/2020 by Perry Ronald Lim Summary
The word assessment does not usually stimulate positive feelings in many people, be they students or teachers. Quite often, assessment is likened to a necessary evil; although not pleasant, it is something that has to be done. It is carried out to measure how well students have acquired the knowledge that our lesson plans say they have supposedly learned. Often times as well, such assessments are formal and tedious for both the teacher and the student. Is there some way, then, to make assessments less stressful for both parties; is it conceivable to even use the words fun and assessment in the same sentence? These questions begged an answer. This article attempts to show the viability of using Kahoot! as an exciting and invaluable tool for end-of-topic assessments. Kahoot! not only provides enough data for the teacher to make an informed decision on the direction of subsequent lessons, but also creates a thoroughly enjoyable environment while obtaining that data.
by Abdul Aziz bin Arsyad
Summary
Truth be told, when a new programme intended to improve students’ language performance is introduced to be executed in schools, most of the effort will come from teachers. This was precisely what transpired when the latest move by the Ministry of Education to introduce Highly Immersive Programme (HIP) in schools was initiated in 2016. This article aims to look at an initiative called The 60-Second Project done at Sabah Malaysian Sports School and the possibility of it encouraging students to be self-driven instead of being coerced to take part. The 60-Second Project involves several technological platforms in its implementation including video-making apps and WhatsApp to reach out to every member of the school and all students’ parents. Although the implementation of the 60-Second Project is still ongoing, it can be observed thus far that students’ involvement and motivation are higher as compared to the old ways of conducting English language-related activities. |
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