1. What did you learn from the design of the CALL lesson?                                  

The pre-test, which was adopted to test our target students’ English proficiency level, and it was also an opportunity to design the evaluation or even teaching materials in the following three classes. What I noticed was that they could not really grasp the questions immediately and therefore gave very short or even irrelevant answers.

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To enhance their capability in speaking and also not to make them frightened, I adopted resources from their textbooks and added some extra vocabs that they could apply to the grammar. In the first class, under the situation of not knowing each other, I left a few minutes to do the self-introduction and also allowed them to tell me who they were. Through the slides, they got to know how to introduce themselves by looking at the sentence patterns I provided and listening to me. After that, two pictures were shown to recall their memories. Online videos from 因才網 were played and used to ask a few questions to bring out the grammar structure. They learned pretty fast, which were beyond my expectations. One of the students who could not speak much in pre-test were willing to answer the hard question I designed for others, and this really surprised me. In class, I would create a relaxing learning atmosphere and encouraged them to answer my questions without fear.

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In the second week, I reminded myself of time management, and I tried out using “busy picture” to do production stage. The outcome turned to be positive, and everyone could really engage in playing bingo games. Winners could get snacks as prizes, and they seemed to be satisfied with this deal. However, the previous homework I assigned (QRcode and google cloud) were finished by two of the students, which meant the other students did not practice at home. Therefore, I spent around five minutes to do a quick recap by requiring each student make one sentence by looking at the picture.

 

Here came to the last class, this time they were a little noisy and could not pay their attention on the slides and the narration from me. With the previous experiences, I was aware of the contents needed to be modified if they were tired of learning the similar grammar or lessons. After practicing several exercises with them and checked their comprehension of prepositions, I moved on to the game part instantly. While they played games, music (from YouTube) was played to get students into an easy vibe. Games always raised their interest and made them speak out without any forces. The passion toward games could never disappear as long as they were not as boring as lecturing.

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From the video clip and the audio file, I could tell that they did their best to answer the questions in GEPT. They were able to repeat the sentences, especially the shorter ones. Nevertheless, when it came to the long sentences, most of them would speak with lower volume and use wrong words. In the very beginning of the reading part, all of them could read fluently, but things became different when the words were unfamiliar and complex to them. Questions and answers were huge difficulties to them, and three students remained silent through out this part. Compared with the pre-test; luckily, with their own earphones, I could hear the words clearly and it separated their speaking from others’ voices.

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CALL allowed more possibilities for teachers, that is, we are able to find out much more resources on the net, such as music, games, pictures, videos and taking a look of others’ lesson plans. Homework could be transformed into e-homework, and it can be turned in and tracked online. Slides could grab their attention by showing clear grammar structures and vocabs, doubts were easy to be solved by typing the keywords and searched for answers online. Convenience is brought to humans, including teachers.

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2. How did the design of the CALL lesson enrich your professional knowledge?    With the assistance of computer, we are able to have a variety of online interaction games with students as production or review. Previously, I have not found out these helpful and interesting activities. Also, if I am out of creativity and have no idea what to put in my lesson. Worksheets and teaching demos are out there on the internet, which deserves us to click on and browse for a while. The design of slides is also important. Students are the audiences, so we have to make it clear but also as brilliant as a movie. Also, the way I gave them homework is to scan the QR-code and see whether they have the ability to produce sentences based on what I taught so far. In fact, they may forget to do it, and one of them ever told me that he did not have a smartphone to accomplish it. Technology is a tool that could assist teachers in education field, but it cannot guarantee the succeed of the lessons. How to use it wisely is the issue that teachers should consider when implementing courses.