Wordpress + Anchor

 Just noticed that Wordpress had 'merged' with Anchor, a podcasting platform, a short while ago. Now, we can convert our old, as well as new, Wordpress blog posts into podcast episodes. 

I tried that with a couple of old blog posts, and the conversion was rather quick. 

After the conversion, we can listen to the respective podcast episodes either on Anchor, or on Spotify. The resulting machine-converted audio episodes sound acceptable, and not terribly robotic (and much much better than the early days of text-to-speech conversion). 

I'm still figuring how to make use of this new function in language teaching. 

Here is my newly created Spotify podcast link, titled "Teach, Write, Live", converted from my Wordpress blog of the same name: 

https://open.spotify.com/show/6P9Cb3TH7SbI2J9yrqlJST

(So far, I have converted 3 previous blog posts only.)

Looking forward to the 35th year

隨着今早本學期最後一課的完結，我亦剛好完成在中大教育學院第三十年的教學。如果加上先前在羅富國教育學院的四年，今天便是我完成教師教育工作三十四年的一天。

能夠這麼長期從事自己享受的工作，從中找到意義，期間又可以在個人和專業兩方面不斷成長，我實在非常非常幸運。

期待九月時，開始第三十五個教師教育年頭。

Lesson Study for teacher professional development

 This morning I took part in a peer lesson observation which was associated with the school's Lesson Study scheme. Teachers of the same grade level planned a lesson together, and taught the lesson, with modifications that catered to the needs of each class, to their respective classes. The teachers concerned observed each other's lessons to see how the collaboratively planned lesson worked with each class.

As a teacher educator, I must say I revere such professional development activities. It requires that the school concerned (in this case, a secondary school) values (a) good teaching and learning, and (2) teachers' professional learning from each other.

I also benefit from such lesson observations. For example, this morning, for the first time, I saw (a) how a Quizlet Live competition worked in a secondary school classroom (though I had tried it in my own classes before), and (b) how the recent Chrome QR code embedded with each URL worked (I hadn't tried this myself yet).

Blendspace is still functioning

 A few years ago, I used TES BLENDSPACE quite often to create presentations. Then, for reasons I have forgotten, I put the tool aside, and after a while, remembered the name TES only. Still later, when I wanted to use the app again, I couldn't remember the full name, and when I googled TES, I was taken to other places. 

An hour ago, while thumbing through an old notebook, I saw the name Blendspace again - the memory came back. I then googled Blendspace, and I was taken to the app which I used quite often a few years ago. 

https://www.blendspace.com/lessons

I'm glad despite the quick developments of other presentation apps in the last few years, Blendspace is still functioning. I then browsed a couple of presentations in their Library. I think Blendspace still has its merits, although PPT has improved enormously in the last couple of years. It can embed external websites, Youtube videos, and more importantly, PPT, PDF, WORD files from your Google Drive. This is something which PPT is still unable to do. 

Hence, I must keep an eye out to an opportunity in the near future to use Blendspace for a short presentation, to refresh my memory of how it works, and also to test out its advantages against other presentation apps. 

Are they happy?

 The topic of the S3 lesson I observed this morning was 'How to be happy.' Half way into the lesson, it dawned on me that these students would be aged 14 or 15. "Are they happy?"

Later when I was leaving the classroom, I asked the whole class: "How many of you can honestly say you're happy?" To my amazement, almost 80% of them put up their hands. I had anticipated a much lower percentage. 

One of the boys asked me back: "Are YOU happy?" I replied: "Yes, definitely."

The subject of subjectless sentences

 I had been thinking of a catchy title, but when I finished writing the article, it still eluded me. Then two days later while strolling in the park, the title 'The subject of subjectless sentences' suddenly popped into my head, and I submitted the article immediately.

See my language awareness article in today's Ming Pao.

https://news.mingpao.com/pns/%e8%8b%b1%e6%96%87/article/20210421/s00017/1618942434992/%e8%8b%b1%e8%aa%9eguide-the-subject-of-subjectless-sentences

Differentiated Learning Path with Padlet

 Compared with Symbaloo, Padlet is even easier for creating differentiated learning paths. The only limitation is that we cannot create a quiz directly inside a Padlet. On the other hand, we can directly add a recording to a Padlet wall!

Differentiated Symbaloo Learning Paths

 Just tried creating a differentiated learning path with Symbaloo. It works!

Choice Board vs Bingo Card

 A choice board and a bingo card may look similar, but they serve difference purposes.

Students use a bingo card somewhat receptively. They are given a Bingo card, listen to some prompts (e.g. words read aloud by the teacher), and circle what they hear on the Bingo card. 

But a choice board contains mainly tasks and activities for students to perform. They choose a row of cards on the choice board, and proceed to the corresponding tasks. 

Examples: 

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/134685845091954503/

Depending on one's objective and creativity, the tasks: 

- can be of different cognitive demands (e.g, Bloom's taxonomy - compare; analyse ..)

- may allow students to present their findings in different modes (e.g., a written text; a photo album, ...)

- may involve different elements (e.g., structure; vocabulary; theme) of a broader topic (e.g., a short story). 

As such, many writers have asserted that choice boards are good for differentiated instruction. 

Highly teachable classes do not just happen

 這陣子是實習觀課季節，有時候碰到一班學生超好教，會令我有走到課室前面，教教這一班的衝動。對我來說，「好教」的一班不一定指精英班，而是他們好學，投入，活潑，快樂，同學之間關係好，課室氣氛積極踴躍。

但我也知道這樣的classroom dynamics 不是自然發生，而是經過班主任或原任老師鍥而不捨的班級經營的結果。

先前有一天我便有幸遇到這樣的一班，離開學校後我忍不住text message原任老師，讚賞她的一班，和她先前的努力，使實習老師可以在這麼良好的環境下，學習教學。

Branching in Google Slides and Pear Deck

 Google Slides 的branching 功能，很適合用來製作differentiated 的self~paced study units，我嘗試用Pear Deck add~on加入interactive 元素，令self~paced learning 更engaging。可惜以self~paced 模式開啟Pear Deck 後，先前的branching 功能卻不運作，不能兩全其美。

If it is fun to you, it is not work any more

 昨晚EDB的e-learning workshop,完場時舊學生特意上前告訴我她發現我有一口頭襌，就是「很好玩」，三個小時中我不知說了多少遍「這個app很好玩」，「那個e-learning task很好玩」。

我先前不知自己有這樣的口頭禪，但聽她告訴我後也不覺得詫異。我喜歡e-learning, 就是因為覺得它很好玩，所以不斷鑽研，而不覺得是工作或責任。

a useful Chrome browser function

發現Chrome 這個新增(?)的功能對我很有用，通常一堂兩個半小時的課，我預先開定的網頁隨時十多二十個，以便省時，但看着tab bar上十多二十個tab,自己也覺得混亂。這個功能讓我把開了的tab依據課堂的發展預先分組，然後去到某一階段click 那一組的label, 那一组的tab才打開，那便不會被太多的tab擾亂了。

Practising what I preach

 So, I did use this quote to wrap up last night's refresher training course, to encourage the teachers to continue to explore e-Reading. I also mentioned what I myself had just started to explore (using VR in language teaching). I should also have mentioned that the first time I touched a computer, I was already 39 years old.

Every expert was once a beginner

Will use this quote tomorrow evening to conclude the 6-hour course on e-Reading for secondary teachers, to encourage them to continue to explore and try out e-Reading even if they are newbies today.

喜出望外

這真有點喜出望外。收到出版社通知，康文署和香港書刋版權授權協會合作，推出智慧圖書館系統，把本地出版而由本地作者撰寫的書的其中部分電子化(例如目錄及read a sample)，放上公共圖書館網站供市民試閱，計劃因而給予出版社及作者象徵式的撥款。撥款分兩级，第一級是去年全年借出量最多的二萬本，第二级是其餘書籍。

喜出望外的，不是收到(很象徵式)的撥款，而是我和歐陽偉豪合著的兩本書都屬第一级，即這兩本2011年出版的書，到去年仍是全港公共圖書館借出量最高二萭本的其中兩本!

Teachable moments

 A former teacher-student had a most satisfying time using this text to develop his students' higher-order reading skills: (1) seeing the writer's choice of words; (2) identifying the writer's underlying intentions; (3) making inferences from vague expressions, ...... Why 'saddened' and not 'sad'? Why 'learn' instead of 'know'? What is 'recollections may vary', and why put it this way? ... He succeeded in firing his students up who then kept probing deeply into the text. 

As teachers, we know that such teachable moments do not happen every day.

Kahoot as self-paced task

 前天才說過經學生提示，才知道可以裝ad blocker的chrome extension, 以避免上課時到訪某些網站而畫面卻出現令人分心的廣告。

昨早上課時又有類似的情況，我上網課如果進行quiz competition，則一定選Quizizz而不選Kahoot,  因為Kahoot 需要學生同一時間看着兩畫面，這在網課時不方便，Quizizz便沒有這問題。

怎知昨天學生告訴我，現時Kahoot game 也可以用Assign模式執行，學生毋須同時看着兩個畫面。

e-learning app不斷更新，永遠也有忽略了的功能。

iPad proficiency

 今早觀課，這一班中一學生運用ipad的純熟程度，我也望塵莫及。(我工作時大部分時間用電腦，只是從學生角度試做已製作的interactive task, 或純瀏覽時，才用iPad。)

後記：此校利用關愛基金，開展BYOD, 學生每天帶iPad回校。

e~learning 和edtech永遠也學不完

 e~learning 的點子真是永遠也學不完，例如我昨天才知道可以裝ad blocker 的chrome extension, 以避免向學生展示網站時出現不良意識的廣告。又例如昨晚上Rachel Chan的workshop, 才知道建立Google Form時，可以把word 上的問題(例如MC)直接copy and paste into Google form, 在Word 上打字，當然比在Google form 打快得多，兼且可以保存word file 作容易参考的紀錄。

昨晚另一參與老師問在pear deck 學生可否upload 圖片作回應，我翻查一下，應是不能的，但又發覺Google Form 內的MC题，distractor可以是圖片，例如問題是一表述，然後請學生選出正確的對應圖片，這在英文科教visual literacy或multimodal reading 時應該是不错的主意。

e~learning 和edtech, 永遠也學不完。