SEMINAR 2. CALL & Language Skills

Get aquianted with multi-skill collections by the Kelly brothers

www.manythings.org

1. Listening, Speaking and Pronunciation

Follow the link to learn about Professor Higgins multimedia soft

http://fsm-portal.net/video_lessons/1119-professor-xiggins-anglijskij-bez-akcenta-versiya-61.html

Then  download free English pronunciation Course program from
http://englishpronunciationcourse.com/

Then learn about Rosetta Stone from
www.rosettastone.com

And finaly learn about Auralog's Tell Me More programm
 http://www.24english.ru/multimedia/programs-english/380-tell-me-more

2.  Reading and Writing

Learn the ways CALL can be used to support reading

http://literacynet.org/learningresources

http://eslus.com/LESSONS/READING/READ.HTM

http://college.cengage.com/collegesurvival/watkins/learning companion/1e/students/timed reading.html

http://www.er-central.com

Some ways computers enhance writing instruction

• Online writing resources such as http://owl.english.purdue.edu/handouts/esl/index.html and tutorials, like www.monash.edu.au/lls/llonline/writing/index.xml 
• Blank screen (where the monitor is turned off and students type in their ideas without being distracted) and other production techniques, such as using graphic organizers or concept mapping: http://library.usu.edu/instruct/tutorials/cm/CMinstruction1.htm.
• Collaborative writing tasks. These are made easier today with tools such as an online word processor now available for free from Google: http://docs.google.com/
• Writing support practice (e.g., CALL activities with fill-ins for structured writing)
• Publication opportunities (both paper and web) as motivators. See Tom Robb's classic description of an early web publishing project at www.cc.kyoto-su.ac.jp/~trobb/projects.html.   

3. GRAMMAR

Grammar practice was perhaps the earliest use of CALL. Today grammar work is largely focused on the following:

• Workbook-style exercises (on disk and online): online examples can be seen at www.grammar-quizzes.com/.
• Grammar test prep materials (especially TOEFL www.toefl.com and TOEIC http://www.toeic.com)
• CD-ROMs accompanying grammar textbooks, like Focus on Grammar at www.pearsonlongman.com/ae/multimedia/programs/fog.htm and Azar's grammar series www.azargrammar.com/materials/index.html.
• Online courses and references (e.g., Anthony Hughes'  Online English Grammar, http://www.edunet.com/english/grammar/index.cfm or www.scribd.com/doc/2586846/Anthony-Hughes-the-online-english-grammar)
• Grammar portals such as www.esltower.com/

 4.VOCABULARY

Vocabulary activities have been around since the early days of CALL in the form of electronic flashcards (linking L2 word to L1 translation or L2 word to L2 definition). Other common CALL implementations for vocabulary include the following.

• Hypertext dictionaries/glossaries. Babylon (www.babylon.com) is a commercial memory-resident dictionary system that runs in the background on your computer; www.voycabulary.com is a web application that automatically links items in a web page to a variety of dictionaries.    
• Talking dictionaries: Longman, Oxford, and Newbury House have learner's dictionaries with CD-ROMs that include pronunciation and sometimes other multimedia support. An online version is at www.ldoceonline.com.
• Concordance programs: these programs look for words in collections of texts, or corpora, and return examples of the word in the immediate context it occurs in: an online one is available at www.edict.com.hk/concordance/.
• Picture dictionaries: http://www.pdictionary.com/ has a picture dictionary for English, Spanish, French, German, and Italian. Of course the largest "picture dictionary" in the world is at http://images.google.com. Try alizarin, fennec and axolotl if you don't know what they mean (or even if you do)
• Word lists and vocabulary tests for English: General service list, http://jbauman.com/gsl.html; Academic word list, www.victoria.ac.nz/lals/staff/averil-coxhead/awl/; Level tests, www.er.uqam.ca/nobel/r21270/levels/.

An outstanding site for vocabulary teaching and research tools is Tom Cobb's Compleat Lexical Tutor:  http://www.lextutor.ca/

 Leave your comments in your Blogs

Try to share your opinion on

either the online services and multimedia soft you learned about new? interesting? useful?

then describe services you liked most

and finaly 

Home tast: Please, prepare the sample of using a servce/ services within particular discipline you're studing this year and for selfeducation