Group items tagged

"This study aims at investigating the efficiency of web quests in enhancing the 8th graders' descriptive writing. The 8th graders in the Lebanese public schools in general usually demonstrate poor writing skills. Consequently, they don't show motivation to write in English. The subjects of the study are one control group (n=22) and one experimental group (n=23) enrolled in grade eight in a public school in Beirut and whose ages range from thirteen to fifteen years old. The purpose of the study is to examine whether or not the web quest helps 8th graders achieve unity and coherence in writing descriptive paragraphs and to examine if the motivation towards writing is increased after using the web quest. Based on a pilot study conducted earlier by the two researchers, the prospective findings of the study shall convey that the experimental group produces unified and coherent writings. More importantly, the experimental group is expected to reveal great motivation towards writing. The researchers' prospective recommendations will be mainly urging the teachers of all levels to use the web quests as an indispensable tool requested to enhance students' motivation and to better their descriptive writing skills."

This link gives you 3 sources including the title: Visual Writing Prompts, The Literacy Shed, and Video Writing Prompts. Some can be browsed by genre, grade, or subject area. And some have the prompts written directly on each image. The title site includes a prompt explanation, an explanation of any relevant vocabulary and language, and a convenient one-click download button. I always used a set of images, culled over years of browsing magazines and newpapers, as writing prompts for various types of writing. Sites with prompts built-in can be an advantage for the busy teacher, or a disadvantage if you don't want to search for something that precisely fits your assignment goals. You can also have students create their own portfolio of images and prompts to share with other writers. T/H to Nick LaFave.

"Each day author/teacher Bill Zimmerman is offering excerpts from a new ‘’Make Beliefs’’ book aimed at encouraging students to express their thoughts through writing and drawing, as well as to spur their creative imaginations. They are in the form of comic strip panels in which comic characters raise a provocative question and students can write their responses by creating comic strips at MakeBeliefsComix. com, a free educational resource. " These are imaginative prompts and many could also be used for stand-alone creative writing activities.

A lesson plan for writing dialogue/short play online at a cartoon creation site.\n\n"Lesser controlled computer room writing activity. This activity can be adapted to the level and grammar area of your choice.\n\nLevel: Intermediate & above\n\nLocation: Computer room\n\nTopic: Writing direct speech in a cartoon\n\nLanguage Focus: Direct speech, present tenses etc\n\nTime: 30 minutes"

If you want to write an awesome descriptive essay, the worst thing you could do is get straight to the writing process. This is not an easy assignment to undertake; you need to go through a lot of planning and research before you can settle for a topic and tackle it from a unique perspective.

"Here's a powerful example of a poem-photo combination that can inspire unlimited possibilities for writing. In the poem "Skateboarding" by Massbay College student Rose Scherlis, colorful images swirl and converge until the world blurs and the skater's mind becomes receptive to new ideas. The swirling lines and shapes in the accompanying photo add to the effect:" Using digital images to inspire writing.

Potentially a place to publish your students' creative writing. A good place to learn about writing by reading short narratives and poetry. Some classic authors also.

"Even if you are an established and respected writer who has mastered the fundamental writing techniques, you can still use great tools that will make you more productive and help you relate to your readers. The following list will provide you with writing tools and techniques that are worth exploring."

R. Stannard shows how to use ELT Pics, which is hosted by Flickr. You can also get an email feed to show pictures as they are updated. A nice way to garner resources for writing or student projects. Pictures are crowd-sourced, and curated by EFL teachers. I use pictures often for teaching writing: description, emotions, cultural comparisons, if-clauses, etc. Don't miss the "Making Collages" part of this video, as it includes PicMonkey, which has templates for collages. ELT Pics also has its own blog with ideas for using images.

" Mind maps are content- and purpose-agnostic. Use them for anything that requires thinking, planning, organizing, or writing." This is the third of three articles (linked here) ab out using mind-mapping productively. Great article for teaching writing. It's not all about "outlines."

This might be an improvement over Google Docs for collaborative writing, as revisions are clearly labelled by color for each participant. The teacher could keep track of who was doing what.

Great ideas for tools and their uses, categorized by media aspects, e.g., blogging and writing, photos, audio, PLNs, presentations, research databases, search, etc., with an intro to get you started. The list then continues with other, less frequently used tools, such as digital portfolios, Google drawings, notetaking tools, apps, etc.

Several suggestions for teaching short poems, and websites with author interviews and poetry readings. Learning how to write poetry will help students appreciate the language better.

This important article by the ACTFL discusses how the U.S. Common Core standards can be aligned with the National Standards for Learning Languages. Presents several diagrams and other visuals to help teachers see the crossovers for each skill--reading listening, speaking, and writing--in presentational and interpersonal modes, and how culture is woven into the whole.

R. Stannard shows how to use Bubblr to make cartoon strips or anime novella with your students for writing activities that can be embedded in a blog or website and shared by email.

Students can write and then read the commentary on their poems.

"he success of social media content writers is practically dependent upon thorough proofreading. If you skip this part, your writing and marketing efforts will be useless. Spelling, punctuation, word usage, and grammar mistakes can ruin the overall impression your content makes."

Stannard gives a quick overview of http://www.rhymes.net, which helps you find words that rhyme with other words. But he doesn't mention that the site speaks the word too! There are also many other tools, such as a dictionary, words with multi-syllables, quotations using the word, phrases, abbreviations, etc. Great for vocabulary work, pronunciation, and writing poetry.