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Get around firewalls by using Google Translate - does this really work?  Those of you who have blocked access to YouTube movies at school - let us know!

Some good advice for online and hybrid course engagement. One of the comments below says - even for F2F classes! One of the comments also questions the point about responding to all student posts - saying that it's better to let them discuss without you, only adding in occasionally or with a summary or notes in a weekly wrap-up. This "hands-off" discussion method is the route Alyssa and I have taken, what has worked for you?

Thanks for sharing this (and for the highlights). It's something I need to explore further.

I love this idea.

Here's your chance to learn more about working with VoiceThread - free workshops!

Easy ways for students and teachers to be digital authors - "it can help students produce quality work by giving them an authentic audience."

Sign-up for the 30-day, but a year - free! Here's info I got in an email notification: We are glad to announce a free WizIQ individual membership for K-12 and College teachers. To be eligible for this offer, teachers need email addresses associated with their educational institutes (e.g., aprofessor@college.edu or ateacher@adistrict.k12.ma.us.) If you are a teacher from K12 or a College, apply and claim your free membership by following the steps below: Steps to get free WizIQ membership: 1.Sign up for a 30-day trial by clicking on the 'Apply now' button below 2. Verify your email address from your email inbox 3. You'll receive a confirmation email from us once your free membership is approved Apply now  WizIQ's free teacher accounts give educators at accredited institutions access to a range of teaching tools. To many educators, the virtual classroom for which WizIQ is best known only means live classes, which they might not need considering they see their students in person every day. But with the WizIQ Virtual Classroom teachers can also: Offer online courses for their school Run virtual office hours and homework help Run summer school online to address transportation and facilities issues Give AP students a jumpstart with virtual summer class sessions Let athletes or homebound students work with their classes, live, even if they can't be there Easily set up classes - without IT help Bring subject matter experts into their classrooms virtually Support group and project-based learning Engage hard-to-reach parents with: Virtual parents' nights Virtual conferences Adult education and community outreach Virtual math and literacy nights Broadcast live school committee meetings on the web Record lectures or flip their classrooms Conduct virtual field trips Run professional development when and where staff are available Share teaching resources among schools Teachers can take full advantage of every WizIQ feature, including screen-sharing, polling, video-confe

This is for the iTouch - but it also works on Android devices pretty much the same way

I like that audioboo is an app. I am pretty much connected to my iphone (it's an extension of my arm) and audioboo seemed to be the only one that was mentioned that had an iphone app.

Here is an article that describes boomwriter, a technology tool that allows students do collaborative writing. Activities may have to be simplified for beginning level students, but I can see how this might work well with higher level students as well as with native speakers.

This video clearly explains how to evaluate and give feedback about online collaborative group work.

Dan found this site - for creating online activities with voice recording that incorporate images and video. Limited free version, but only $79/year for the full version.

Online tools for helping foreign language teachers and students get the most out of language education. I have been using this site for few years now. Mira Angrist

I've used this and really like it. The kids adapted to it very easily. You can have students type or record answers to audio, video, or photo prompts. You can also send back verbal feedback! One caution though, we had we not able to get the recording to work with Google Chrome on our 2010 MacBooks. Worked flawlessly in Safari. We're getting new laptops this year, so I'll have to see if we have the same problems. Will keep you posted on that.

"the easiest way to communicate and work in groups" - might be good for classes? - communicate via group email, text, and voice messages - host web meetings, conference calls, chatrooms - keep shared calendar - store and edit files in one common folder -poll group in real-time - keep track of group's task, resources

A virtual learning platform that looks very simple to use and can create an environment much like Facebook without the security issues or Twitter exposure

Although this article is about British language education and it's two years old, my interest was piqued when I read it: ""Languages cannot be taught, they can only be learnt. The best way is to tell students right away that they are responsible for their own learning process, and the teacher is just a guide who has to motivate them."" Made me think about relevancy and how Tech is only one part of that.

Really interesting. I wonder if we changed the setting to the U.S. if the same difficulties would apply. I never really thought about grammar being discarded simply because students don't know it well enough. While I've found that most students we teach don't understand their mother tongue, I still think that the shift to task-based work had as much to do with the lack of real communication skills. Just teaching them grammar and relying on them to go abroad to learn to speak wasn't doing it. That being said, I think the mixture of methods is best, and by mixture I mean the integration of many methods into accomplishing a task. And I agree that the meta-learning is key.

I remember getting a comment from a student once, many years ago, that she had learned more about English grammar in my Spanish class than anywhere else... (sigh)

I think this Blog is rich with possibility for utilizing social media for the teaching of a second language. Students so much into social media and they also get motivated by change in ideas and activities. The variety of possibilities that this blog offers provides a teacher with a good resource that would work for various language levels.

Wow - not only a really cool tool, but also a really well-done video explaining what it is and how it works!

Sorry, this is a U of MN tool, but I thought you'd like to see what it is - and the way they've done the video to explain it is really nicely done!

Elementary teachers using wikis for showcasing student work, portfolios, and connecting with a larger audience outside the classroom.

Using Twitter for a 10 minute verb activity.

This is so cool! I know it would keep my students more engaged and focused on what could potentially be boring grammatical exercises. I do not currently use an on-line notebook and want to use Google docs more often. Lots to think about!