English Virtual Community

Yesterday I took a KET course to the computer room. Let  me share my lesson plan with you: - I prepared a questionaire. They were about 10 questions such as:  what is the level course? , how many students are there in the class? Do they have laptops/computers/ smartphones/ tablets? , how many students have wifi at home, etc.) - I asked the students to take a sheet of paper and write✎ down the questions. - Then I asked them to gather in pairs or groups of three and go to different courses to get the answers. They had 20 minutes for this task. - While the students were doing the questionaire, I went to the computing room and turned on the computers. - I wrote the digital activities to do on the board: Open Word, Set Arial Font, size 14 for the title and 12 for the text, Copy the questions and the answers, Enrich your text with images downloaded from Internet, Edit the images,  Revise spelling using the spell checker, Include your names, course code ...

Ronaldo Lima (Brazil)  asked his students to talk about "What makes (your city/country) unique" and they created a response to it using  the online tool : animoto Ronaldo's idea was pinched in by Carla Arena (Brazil) based on some project she had carried out with someone some time ago and it's great to see that the online environment allows for these ideas to be spread. http://finally5b.blogspot.com/2009/04/what-makes-brazil-unique-country.html Two other teachers joined the idea : Sasha (Slovenia) http://rostilj.blogspot.com/2009/10/what-makes-slovenia-unique.html and Mr Stout (Japan) http://mrstoutsblog.blogspot.com/2009/10/toyo-gakuen-university-homestay-english_7990.html Will you and your students be the next?

Vance Stevens is visiting La Plata! He kindly accepted my invitation to give a presentation. He will speak about "PLN ( Personal Learning Network): The paradigm shift  in learner and teacher autonomy"  at the School of Languages. When? at 12.30 p.m.  next Wednesday -August 11th .  Free entrance but you should book your place in advance by phoning 0221 423 6672

Last Sunday, Social Networking Congress 2009  finished its first session with great success. Abotu 699 participants from all over the world met on line to listen to ICT specialists and participate in MOODLE forums. The organizing team worked hard and as a testimony of this work you can have all the information about what happened in this event in a MOODLE platform, forums where to interchange knowledge and experience, and a blog. If you were not able to attend the sessions, do not worry. The videoconferences were recorded and and available at http://avealmec.blogspot.com/ Personally, I was very pleased working with so good professionals and warm people. I learned a lot about how to organize  and moderate an online event. I hope ARCALL and AVEALMEC will continue working together in projects like this one.

After nearly two months of work , ARCALL is proud to announce the opening of its first online Congress together with AVEALMEC. The organizing team has worked very hard: preparing the material, website, MOODLE platform content, WiziQ sessions. Today the forums have been opened. I will be moderating the forum about Commuties of Practice together with my dearest friend and colleague Evelyn Izquierdo. Follow us at: http://avealmec.org.ve/moodle  or in twitter http://twitter.com/avealmec I hope you will enjoy the experience.

If you are looking for an online publisher, try http://issuu.com/ where you can explore a world of publications by people and publishers alike. You can also collect, share and publish in a format designed to make your documents look their very best. Issuu is a popular destination for quality publications on the web. We can give your readers the possibility of reading your previews or entire archives. Read more in an article written by me at Lost in Technology

After having uploaded "Are Social networks Dangerous? Part I , I started looking for further information about the attack to the use of social networkings such as Facebook, Hi5, Myspace, Sonico, etc. carried out by Televisa. The funniest thing is that Televisa did not mention their own social network, called Gyggs and that J.L. Dórigo has an account in Facebook! Articles in Spanish related to the topic: · http://www.periodismodeverdad.com.ar/2008/10/29/la-verdad-sobre-facebook-hi5-myspace-sonico-etc-etc/ · http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/notas/533846.html · http://cyberholocausto.blogspot.com/2008/08/lopez-doriga-un-peligro-hi5-facebook-y.html · http://lapoliticamexicana.blogspot.com/2008/08/lpez-driga-quiere-que-cierre-mi.html Then I asked some collegues who are ICT specialists for their opinions. Most of them agree on the necessity of using Facebook because it is a popular tool, specially among young people: “I have avoided FB for a long time but this has become almost imp...

Some days ago I got a mail pointing out the dangers of networks. The mail quoted the attack to the use of social networks such as Facebook, Hi5, Myspace, Sonico, etc. carried out by Televisa. Televisa said that social networks are not safe because they provide information to kidnappers. The Mexican journalist Joaquín López Dórigo criticized the security measures of social networks due to the kinapping of an important businessman’s daughter. A video about facebook came to the e-mail I mentioned before which I found really scary.