Critical Review of Karin’s ESL Partyland

Merve ELDEM
1491331

The website of http://www.eslpartyland.com/default.htm is called as Karin’s ESL Partyland and it is both for ESL students and teachers. The creator of the website is Karin M. Cintron who says that her aim was to create a place for students and teachers highly interactive. She introduces her site as in the following “Karin's ESL PartyLand has quizzes, lessons, and lots of opportunity to talk to people around the world”. The website has also some famous rewards such as the Blue Web'n library. "Inclusion in the Blue Web'n library is an honor reserved for the best online lessons, activities, projects, resources, references, and tools." Moreover; Karin's ESL PartyLand was chosen by the Community Learning Network as a Network Nugget Selection! "Network Nuggets" is a listserv serving thousands of teachers around the world. This was PartyLand's first award.
In the home page of the site, there are two sections consisting of the box of student and teacher. Its student pages have over 75 interactive quizzes, 15 discussion forums, and interactive lessons on a variety of topics, a chat room, and lots of great links. On the teacher side, there are loads of lesson plans and reproducible materials to use in class.the site also provides discussion forums, ideas for communicative practice activities, a chat room, a job board, links, and more.
In the student page, there are some learning pages which are Dating& Relationship, Food, The Internet, The Media, Movies, Music and Travel. When you click on them, the discussion form appears questions related with the topic so that you can discuss about them.
Also there are the section of Activites&Games which are also related with the same topic. In the activites section, there are the parts of thinking about the topic, vocabulary, reading, writing and finally links for the further information. In this part, you choose the best option according to the statements above the questions. There is also idioms and expressions part where you can see some examples about different idioms.
In the quiz center, there are the sections of Business Center, Grammar, Idioms, Slang& Phrasal Verbs, Reading and Toeflesque, Trivia, Useful expressions, Vocabulary which changes according to level of difficulty such as difficult, medium, easy and very easy. They are made up pf multiple choice tests, fill-in-the-blanks and matching activities prepared by Hot potatoes.
In the discussion part, there are discussion forms for students where they can choose a variety of topics and write posts about their ideas. Dating and relationships, extreme sports, international cooking and cuisine, learning languages are some of the topics.
In the shopcool part, you can access to a variety of links related with learning and teaching resources. In the learning resource, there is Business English, Basic Texts, Dictionaries, Grammar, Idioms, Slang & Phrasal Verbs, Listening &Speaking, Picture Dictionaries, Pronunciation, Toefl Prep. and Vocabulary. Teaching resource includes Conversation and Grammar and finally Games.
In the teacher page, there are the pages of teacher under the title of Teaching Conversation, Teaching with Film& Video, Teaching with the Internet, Teaching with Music, Teaching Grammar, Teaching Listening& Speaking, Teaching Reading, Writing and Vocabulary, Teaching Integrated Skills. In the first part, there are the discussion questions for the teachers to use in the classroom. In the second part, there is films and videos also the activities to do before and during the film. In the third part, there are useful websites so as to use the technology efficiently. In the fourth part, there is music to involve the students by using songs. In the integrated skills part, there are a variety of activities with different topics to use each one of the skills.
In the chat section, you can have the chance of chatting with other ESL students and teachers in real time. Also there is the employment section where you can post job vacancies for free, look for a new job, or get the inside scoop on ESL.
Evaluation of the web site
It is quite easy to use this site and you do not need anything except a computer and internet connection. For the listening activities, you can need a headphone. This product is useful for the elementary and intermediate learners as it has simple examples and activities. The upper-intermediate and advanced learners can find these activities easy. The teachers also can benefit from this site. There are games, quizzes and activities for them to apply in the classroom.
The advantage of this site is the easiness of accessing as you can follow the pages by links and clicking on them is enough. Also every topic is in an order you do not mixed up by surfing on the site. By the way, the examples and discussion questions are very useful and creative. They can encourage students to speak and use their skills. The integrated skills part is another important section in the site which is an essential part to achieve in an ESL classroom. The best part of this site is the availability to both students and teachers freely. You do not need to register. The activities can be applied to students to increase their reading, speaking, writing and listening skills which makes the site quite useful. Also the vocabulary part can be taught with quizzes which help students to keep them in mind with ease.
The drawback of the web site is that it does not include enough visuals and it has quite simple web design layout. These can be a negative effect on the starters of the learners. Also some pages cannot be found when clicked on which shows the poor framework of the site. Apart from these, the website offers a variety of original examples and an elaborated content.

Merve ELDEM
1491331
Vocabulary Teaching



Gerry's Vocabulary Teacher has been designed to make life easier, and instruction more efficient, for those who teach English as a Second or Foreign Language.Gerry's Vocabulary Teacher was created by ESL teacher Gerry Luton, and Martin Holmes, formerly an ESL instructor and now a software designer. The purpose was simply to make the teaching task for Gerry a little easier through use of a tool which would allow him to quickly and easily provide mulitiple opportunities for his students to encounter and review vocabulary. Using the program, a gap-fill exercise to review 15 words can be created in about 3 minutes. Students constantly review vocabulary throughout the session, through gap-fill exercises, crossword puzzles using gap-fill sentences in context as clues, listening exercises using gap-fill sentences, discussions which require use of the target vocabulary, and many other activities.
Gerry's Vocabulary Teacher allows you to quickly and easily :
· create gap-fill exercises as hard-copy (paper) documents
· export your exercise into a Hot Potatoes JMatch or JCloze format to create interactive web-based exercises,
· create gap-fill exercises using American, British or Canadian English,
· import a new gap-fill exercise into an existing document,
· introduce new vocabulary for study,
· review vocabulary previously introduced in class,
· repeatedly recycle target vocabulary in varying contexts in order to enhance understanding,
· generate exercises tailor-made to specific students' needs for vocabulary instruction and/or review,
· focus separately on each of the ten sublists of the Academic Word List,
· test vocabulary compehension, and
· provide opportunities for students to practise target vocabulary in discussion activities.
Gerry's Vocabulary Teacher consists of a vast collection of sentences in context, illustrating over 2,600 words with a minimum of 15 contexts each, for a total of over 50,000 sentences and 750,000 words of data. Teachers choose the words to study, select from among a variety of sentences using the word and/or its various derivations in context, and with a few simple mouse-clicks, are able to create a complete vocabulary gap-fill exercise.
Furthermore, the program also allows users to edit or delete sentences contained within the database, and users can even add to their personal database collection with words and sentences of their own. Any changes or additions made are automatically saved to disc.
Gerry's Vocabulary Teacher is a 32-bit Windows application. This means that it will run on any computer running Windows 98, NT4, 2000, or XP. The Gerry's Vocabulary Teacher software program only takes up about 5Mb of space on your hard drive, or about as much space as a single song.

· Pricing is: One single-user registration Gerry's Vocabulary Teacher: US$50
· Extra seat (allows downloading of the program onto a 2nd computer): US$35
· CDRoom One single-user registration: US$75
· WordChamp offers several ways to learn and practice any of more than 130 languages, no matter what your native language happens to be.
There are language activities such as: Language Drills with which you can use flashcards to cop yor edit them. Web Reader which helps develop your ability to read foreign language websites or texts. Find a Language Partner which helps you to practice your language. Find a Tutor which means that you can get help from Professional tutors.
There are many activity types such as: Flashcard Drills, Time per Flashcard, Websites Read, Fill-in-the-Blank Activities and Multiple Choice Activities.
Also you can teach students with this program. These are the steps you can follow:
Create a class for your students.
You can create a class by logging in, going to your home page and clicking the "Create Class" button. Once you have set up a class, you will be able to create interactive homework assignments, and invite students to join.
Create and assign interactive homework activities.
Invite your students to join your new class.
Follow up on your class's progress.
Copy homework to new classes.

However the students need to pay Enrollment fee of $12.50 per semester for joining a class and accessing homework

Content Management System

Merve ELDEM
1491331

A content management system (CMS) is a computer application used to create, edit, manage, and publish content in a consistently organized fashion. There are some types of content management systems which are Dokeos (www.dokeos.com), Nicenet (www.nicenet.org), and Moodle (www.moodle.org).
Dokeos is one of the largest and most recognized companies dedicated to open source Content Management Systems. Its main product is a SCORM compliant open source learning suite used by multinational companies, federal administrations and universities in some 60 countries for a total of 1,297,000 users. Dokeos is an open source online learning suite. It provides: Learning management which includes Authoring Mister Dokeos, Tests Authoring, Learning Path Building, Scorm Content Import, Coaching interaction, Surveys, SCORM Reporting, Portal administration, and Community extensions. It also provides Oogie Rapid Learning which convert your Powerpoint and Openoffice Impress presentations into web based SCORM compliant courses. You can import your PowerPoint presentation and convert it to a SCORM e-course and insert tests between slides and record audio. Also, you can follow course and get advanced pedagogical reporting. Accurate reporting which is to export to Excel, Business Objects etc. Videoconferencing offers you a virtual meeting and virtual classroom for live training sessions. It is not a free program but you can download free for only learning management system, scorm and survey reporting. Also you can use Dokeos free campus and create a course.
Nicenet is a web based tool used for education. A teacher can create a virtual classroom and upload activities, assignments there. There can be a discussion platform for students and they can comment on a topic. Users can join classrooms or create a lesson. It is a free tool and everyone can use it. Users need to have a code and password to use this tool. Users can also use conferencing where they share their ideas and by scheduling they arrange their time for assignments. The disadvantage of program is that you can only use files from internet, you cannot import from your pc.
Moodle stands for Modular Object Oriented Dynamic Learning Environment. It is the same tool we are using in our course. It is e-learning software. Teachers can create online lessons and publish their activities there. They can publish online materials and news, assignments, and publish grades for their students. There are many users of this software because it is easy to use and appropriate for your teaching purpose.