TEACHING GRAMMAR TO YOUNG LEARNERS USING INTERACTIVE WHITEBOARD Final 
MASARYK UNIVERSITY IN BRNO
FACULTY OF EDUCATION
DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE
TEACHING GRAMMAR TO YOUNG
LEARNERS USING INTERACTIVE
WHITEBOARD
MASTER THESIS
BRNO 2012
Supervisor: Mgr. Ivana Hrozková
Written by: Alexandra Povjakalová
Acknowledgement
I would like to express my thanks to Mrs. Mgr. Ivana Hrozková for her helpful comments and encouragement. 2
Declaration
I hereby declare that this diploma thesis was done by my own and I used only the materials that are stated in bibliography.
I agree with the placing of this thesis in the Masaryk University Brno Information system, in the library of the Department of English Language and Literature and with the access for studying purposes.
In Brno ............................................
........................................................
Alexandra Povjakalová
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Bibliography
POVJAKALOVÁ, Alexandra. Teaching Grammar to Young Learners using Interactive
Whiteboard; diploma thesis. Brno: Masaryk University, Faculty of education, Department of
English Language and Literature, 2012. 82 pages, the supervisor is Mgr. Ivana Hrozková.
Resume
The main aim of my thesis “Teaching Grammar to Young Learners using Interactive
Whiteboard” is to design teaching objects for Interactive Whiteboard to teach English grammar in the 5th grade of primary school and to find out, based on practical examination in lessons, how this technical tool helps learners in the complex process of education.
The thesis is divided into theoretical and practical part. The theoretical part deals with the theory of motivation and its role in education, the use of modern technology in today’s school. This section is also dedicated to the characteristics of young learners, learning styles, key competencies and expected outcomes in teaching English grammar at primary school, aspects that are important theoretical basics for the practical part of my thesis. In the practical part I conducted a market research on the availability of materials for teaching English using
Interactive Whiteboard. On its basis I did a questionnaire survey at schools. The main part
I dedicated to teaching objects that I designed and then applied in lessons. Finally I stated the criteria for designing teaching objects which I reached when designing the objects and in their actual use in lessons.
Keywords
motivation, interactive whiteboard, young learners, grammar, grammar teaching, learning styles, market research, school survey, teaching object, designed material, key competencies
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Resume
Hlavním cílem mé diplomové práce “Teaching Grammar to Young Learners using
Interactive Whiteboard” je vytvoření výukových objektů pro práci s interaktivní tabulí k výuce anglické gramatiky v 5. ročníku základní školy a na základě praktického ověřování ve výuce zjistit, jak tato technická pomůcka pomáhá žákům v komplexním procesu vzdělávání. Práce je rozdělena na teoretickou a praktickou část. V teoretické části se zabývám teorií motivace a její roli v procesu vzdělávání, využití moderní technologie v dnešní škole.
V této části se dále věnuji charakteristice mladších žáků, učebním stylům, klíčovým kompetencím a očekávaným výstupům v oblasti výuky anglické gramatiky na prvním stupni základní školy, tedy aspektům, které jsou důležitými teoretickými východisky pro praktickou část mé práce. V praktické části jsem provedla průzkum trhu týkající se dostupnosti výukových materialů pro výuku anglického jazyka a následný dotazníkový průzkum na školách. Hlavní součástí praktické části práce jsou výukové objekty, které jsem vytvořila a následně aplikovala v hodinách. V závěru jsem uvedla kritéria pro tvorbu výukových objektů, ke kterým jsem dospěla při vlastní tvorbě materiálů a jejich použití v hodinách.
Klíčová slova motivace, interaktivní tabule, mladší žáci, gramatika, výuka gramatiky, učební styly, průzkum trhu, školní průzkum, výukový objekt, vytvořený materiál, klíčové kompetence
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Content
Introduction ...................................................................................................................... 8
I
1
2
3
Motivating learners to learn ............................................................................................. 10
1.1
Role of motivation in terms of educational psychology ............................................ 11
1.2
Factors influencing motivation .................................................................................. 12
Interactive teaching .......................................................................................................... 14
2.1
What interactive teaching means ............................................................................... 14
2.2
What supports interactive teaching............................................................................ 15
2.3
Using technology in a classroom – Interactive Whiteboards .................................... 15
2.4
Advantages and disadvantages of Interactive Whiteboards ...................................... 17
Learning styles ................................................................................................................. 19
3.1
4
Theoretical part .......................................................................................................... 10
How can Interactive Whiteboard help? ..................................................................... 20
Teaching grammar to young learners ............................................................................... 21
4.1
Young learners ........................................................................................................... 21
4.2 What is grammar ........................................................................................................... 23
4.3
The role of grammar in teaching young learners ....................................................... 23
4.4
Ways of teaching grammar ........................................................................................ 24
4.5 Stages in teaching grammar .......................................................................................... 24
5
Grammar structures in primary teaching .......................................................................... 26
5.1
Framework Educational Programme ......................................................................... 26
5.2
Expected outcomes according to the Framework Educational Programme .............. 28
II Practical part .............................................................................................................. 29
6
Market research ................................................................................................................ 29
7
School survey on using IWBs .......................................................................................... 32
8
7.1
Questionnaire ............................................................................................................. 32
7.2
Questionnaire summary ............................................................................................. 43
Grammar in 5th grade of primary school ......................................................................... 44
8.1
Designing teaching objects ........................................................................................ 44
8.2
Designed materials in use .......................................................................................... 46
8.3
Evaluation of the lessons ........................................................................................... 64
6
8.4
Criteria for designing interactive teaching materials ................................................. 66
Conclusion ....................................................................................................................... 71
Bibliography ................................................................................................................... 72
Appendix ......................................................................................................................... 74
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Introduction
Teaching, its methods and forms got through many innovative changes during a period of several years. Mass development of information and communication technologies, new education programmes, multimedia technology and especially Interactive Whiteboards allow teachers to improve English language teaching. Teachers have amazing tool to make their teaching more motivational, funnier and effective.
I worked out my thesis by drawing on the teaching methods and forms that lead pupils to achieve learning outcomes and to the creation of key competencies in accordance with the
Framework Educational Programme. The methods that I have chosen correspond with the style of my work and level of teaching experience and knowledge that I have reached in my experience. From pupils’ perspective I put emphasis on the methods to be interesting, fun and motivating. I tried to choose methods so that pupils’ skills and knowledge are related to their practical life.
If we design teaching materials for the age group of young learners, we have to take into account the many factors that I mentioned in the theoretical part of my thesis. The
Interactive Whiteboard is undouptedly excellent technical tool, but it cannot work alone without teacher and quality preparation. If we want to design educational material that works and pupils get the most out of it in terms of skills and knowledge, we must take into account these aspects. One of them is motivation which I gave a lot of attention in my thesis, because it is one of the most important driving forces in the lerning process. I outlined the factors that increase motivation and I followed by technical tools which are for pupils, in today’s world technology, very motivating and natural to use. The Interactive Whiteboard is one of the most modern teachers’ tools in education. Its use has both advantages and disadvantages to which I pointed out. Another unforgettable factor is a learning style that pupil prefers. Learning styles play a big role in the learning process in view of the fact that pupils are different and prefer different approaches. Based on these finding, I also tried to design my teaching objects to suit pupils with different learning styles. Further I devote to the characteristics of young learners, the issue of grammar and its role in teaching young learners.
In today’s school the
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importance is placed on the Framework Educational Programme. Therefore I proceeded from the key competencies and expected outcomes that are enshrined in this document.
In i crucial part of my thesis, the practical part, I conducted market research. I focused on interactive educational materials for teaching English in primary school available. Based on the results of the survey I conducted a questionnaire survey in schools on Interactive
Whiteboards and interactive educational materials, where I also determined what of the materials available on the market are actually used at schools. Then I designed teaching objects for teaching English grammar to young learners, which I verified in practice and made reflection of the lessons. Finally I outlined the criteria that should be accomplished in designing teaching materials, so as to be most effective.
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I
Theoretical part
1
Motivating learners to learn
“You were not born a winner, and you were not born a loser.
You are what you make yourself be.”
Lou Holtz
From a pedagogical point of view, according to Hanuš and Chytilová, motivating learners in education is considered to be one of the most important fields. Pupil´s success in the educational process is not determined only by his innate abilities but also by other stimuli.
The task of the teacher is to support and develop these impulses. Motivation is one of these stimuli. Motivation helps to develop pupils positively. Suitable motivational activities of teachers can raise and maintain pupil´s interest in learning, particular subject or other learning activities. (Hanuš, R., Chytilová, L. ,2009)
The word motivation can be explained in this way: “The word motivation comes from the Latin word ‘moveers’ which to move. Motivation is the energizing force that directs and controls our behaviour towards the achievement of our goals. It refers to those factors, which increase the vigour of an individuals’ activity. It energizes the person, prompts and compels him to act and behave in particular way so as to satisfy his needs. In education, motivation is arousal of interest in learning and is required for effective management of the learning process.” (Available on World Wide Web: <
http://59.163.61.3:8080/GRATEST/
SHOWTEXFILE. do?page_id=user_image&user_image_id=827>)
In pedagogical activities motivation has an irreplaceable and indispensable role.
Motivated child explores the world, asks the questions, disarrange what he can only to discover how it is.
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1.1 Role of motivation in terms of educational psychology
Skalková in her book Obecná didaktika deals with the theories of motivation. I agree with her theories that teachers use motivation to lead pupils to the chosen target. If teacher motivates pupils inappropriately, their relation to school and also to particular subjects has a negative effect on their positive relation to learning. It often causes pupils´ lack of interest in given subject. Pupils in the beginning of their education look forward to school. Pupils who are getting ready for school are motivated by the vision of school, where they will learn how to write, read, count, paint, find out many interesting things in particular subjects. But it may happen that due to the inappropriate motivating activities of some teachers the opposite can occur, a pupil is afraid of school.
Skalková states that in teaching terms it is very important to divide the primary and secondary motivation. Primary motivation is based on the natural pupils´ needs. All children are naturally inquiring and try to learn everything new. If we set pupil a task or if he tries to learn something new, we get to know that energy inherent in every human inspires effort to perform the tasks and discover them. (Skalková, J. 2008)
Secondary motivation encourages a pupil up to achieve something. Motivational factor in this respect is a good mark or teacher praise. Punishment or prohibition can also be good secondary motivational factors. Teachers can very well affect secondary motivation either positively or negatively. (Skalková, J. 2008)
In the learning process, both primary and secondary motivation motives shade into each other. Primary motivation works in close conjunction with secondary motivation in view of the fact that pupils in learning process have to learn also what does not arouse their natural interest. In these cases it depends on the teacher and motivational activities that he choose, the way that he choose to achieve the goals so that the curriculum is meaningful for children. I also agree with the opinion of Starý, who says that it is important for teacher to be aware of the real function of motivation. If he teaches young children he has to use immediate motivation, can take advantage of an interesting game, use an interesting pictures, praise or change activity. This kind of motivation enables teacher to achieve the goals better and increase children´s interest in learning. (Starý, K. A kol., 2008)
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Document Interactive Whiteboards and Learning states that “another types of motivation are intrinsic and extrinsic motivation. Motivation in the context of the classroom is measured by a student´s drive to participate in the learning process. Although students may be equally motivated to perform a task, the sources of their motivation may differ. Some students are intrinsically motivated do learn because they are driven to understand through reflection and enjoy participating in learning activities. Others are extrinsically motivated by enticements, rewards or teacher-defined objectives.”(Available on World Wide Web:
<http://www.its-networks.com/pdfs/White_Papers/smart/Int_Whiteboard_Research_White
paper.pdf>)
1.2 Factors influencing motivation
The teachers’ task is to increase the motivation of learners that they already bring into the learning process. Motivational factors, which should always be in the spotlight when teachers prepare their lessons, Petty1 states in his book Teaching Today.
These are the factors:
Fantasy
Lessons should be variable and enjoyable and teachers should:
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give sufficient space for pupils´ activities, that should be funny.
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direct learning so that it is related to pupils´ real life.
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use personal dimension.
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give pupils opportunities for expressing themselves and their creativity.
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give pupils opportunities to become enthusiastic about the subject.
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be mindful of having a good relationship with pupils.
Appreciation
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Pupils´ effort should be often appreciated in the form of marks, praises, encouragement etc.
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Success should be appreciated only when it is achieved.
1
Petty, G.: Moderní vyučování, Portál, 2006. According to Hanuš, R., Chytilová, L.: Zážitkově pedagogické učení, Praha: Grada, 2009.
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Goals
Teachers should:
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place demands on pupils so that they can achieve the goals.
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set goals so that pupils do not lose the desire to reach the goals.
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motivate pupils by unpleasant consequences if they do not learn.
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assign individual targets and praise pupils when they accomplish them.
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encourage pupils to take responsibility for their own learning
Success
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Teachers should keep in mind that the level and pace of work have to be suitable for all pupils of different abilities.
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Each pupil should have such a work programme so that it corresponds with his abilities, current knowledge and experience.
Sense
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Pupils should understand the personal benefits that learning brings.
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Pupils should be aware of the importance of learning for their success in life.
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Teachers should sell what they teach.
Pupils’ creativity, development of key competencies and motivation are in the educationa process positively affected by the factors mentioned above. (Hanuš, R., Chytilová, L., 2009)
The British Educational Communications and Technology Agency (Becta) in its ICT
Research refers to the fact, that the right choice of teaching method significantly contributes to increase pupils´ motivation, development of key competencies and pupils´ creativity.
Interactive Whiteboard (IWB) is one of the means and teachers’ tools that can motivate pupils in learning. Increasing motivation is one of the most important benefits that using IWBs brings. Reasons for this are:
-
things that pupils love like videos and websites can be easily integrated into lessons -
the high level of pupils involvement in lesson – pupils love being physically in touch with the board , manipulating texts and images
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To enable pupils to use the board so that they are engaged with learning materials is fundamental in increasing motivation and learning gains. (Available on World Wide Web:
<http://www.ansn.edu.au/files/BECTA%20article%20on%20interactive%20whiteboards.pdf)
2
Interactive teaching
What do we imagine when somebody says interactive teaching?
The free
encyclopedia Wikipedia explains as one of the possibilities of the word interaction “a kind of action that occurs as two or more objects have an effect upon one another.” (Available on
World Wide Web: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interaction>)
2.1 What interactive teaching means
From the previous definition of the word interaction is possible to derive concept of interactive teaching as two-way influence of two factors. In the school environment it is the interaction between teacher and pupil, pupil and technical equipment (interactive whiteboard or computer) or between pupils themselves. Years ago teachers used in lessons just books for explaining new curriculum. Teachers mostly presented new curriculum through explanation or lecture. Pupils were forced to listen and make notes in their exercise books. Currently the method of teaching through interactive activities is very desirable. Teachers try to assist students in obtaining knowledge and support pupils´ effort to achieve knowledge. Pupils do it not only through listening but mainly through active approach in lessons.
Teacher´s work is currently much more demanding than it was once. If the teacher wants to use interactive approach and interactive forms of teaching, if he wants to involve pupils into the educational process, he has to prepare for this activity. He has to prepare activities which support pupils´ interactive approach. It is necessary to find and classify information that are usable in lessons and are connected with the practical life. The benefit of present time is that teachers can illustratively and actively work with materials designed in digital environment and save them for later use.
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Nowadays modern technologies are used in school educational process. Interactive teaching is mediated through the “interactive learning object”. Interactive learning object is an integrated whole and didactical complex of teaching elements (sounds, charts, texts, pictures, images, videos, graphs), assembled into one unit, that enables interaction between the teacher and pupils.
2.2 What supports interactive teaching
On the basis of the previous facts we can say that interactive teaching supports pupils’ active approach to their education and learning. Teachers work with materials which pupils can apply in their real lives and that is why they are close to them. This form of learning supports pupils´ independence, cooperation, creativity and helps pupils to express their own opinions and ideas. It creates a sense of responsibility for collective task.
Modern
technologies used in interactive teaching help teachers to mediate the relations between subjects more illustratively. It helps to improve cross-curricular links. Various types of interactive teaching help pupils to remember and understand new things.
2.3 Using technology in a classroom – Interactive Whiteboards
According to Dudeney and Hockly using technology in teaching language is not new.
Technology has been used in teaching many years ago. Tape recorders, later CD players, videos, overhead projector and video have been used and they are still used in classrooms around the world. (Dudeney, G., Hockly, N., 2007)
Computer –based materials for language teaching called as CALL (Computer Assisted
Language Learning) started to appear in the 80’s. These programmes usually required learners to respond to stimuli on the computer screen and perform tasks such as filling in gap texts, matching halves of sentences and doing multiply choice activities. When Information and
Communication Technology (ICT) spread more, computer-based materials for language teaching started to use the Internet and web-based tools. The term TELL (Technology
Enhanced Language Learning) appeared in the 1990s, in response to the growing possibilities
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offered by the Internet and communications technology. Although teachers still do not use technology so much, the use of technology in the classroom is growing so fast, that soon it will be an usual part of English Language Teaching (ELT). One of the significant reasons is that young learners are growing up with technology and it is a normal and natural part of their lives. I teacher uses technology with these learners, he brings the outside world into the classroom. Other reasons for this are:
Internet accessibility – nowadays you can connect to the Internet almost everywhere – at home, in school, in cafés, in a bus, in a shopping centre
English as an international language is being used in technologically mediated contexts
Technology, especially the Internet offers many opportunities for real tasks and materials and almost infinite number of ready-made teaching materials
The Internet enables great opportunities for making contact with learners around the world
Technology is usually connected with published materials such as course books and teacher´s books.
Learners come to school with expectation of using technology in learning
Technology opens new ways of language practice and success evaluation
Using a variety of ICT tools enables learners to practice all the four main language skills – speaking, listening, writing and reading. (Dudeney, G., Hockly, N., 2007)
Dudeney and Hockly say: ”As there is not enough ICT training for teachers, they
avoid using technology in language teaching although the use of technology nowadays is so natural as the use of books or pencils or paper”.( Dudeney, G., Hockly, N., 2007)
One of the ICT tools is the interactive whiteboard (IWB). It is an irreplaceable technological tool that has its place in teaching. According to the document Interacctive
Whiteboards and learning published by SMART Technologies, Inc.2
2
the interactive
Smart Technologies, Inc., a full service computer and networking center.
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whiteboard is “ a touch-sensitive screen that works in conjunction with a computer and a projector. The first interactive whiteboard was manufactured by SMART Technologies Inc. In
1991”. (Available on World Wide Web:<http://www.itsnetworks.com/pdfs/White_Papers/ smart/Int_Whiteboard_Research_White paper.pdf>)
IWB is a modern teachers’ tool that influence learning process in many ways. It helps in the field of pupils’ engagement in a classroom, it increases pupils’ motivation and enthusiasm. IWB’s can be used with learners with various learning styles so that they can support pupils with different learning needs.
“The effective use of interactive whiteboard technology can radically transform the interaction between teachers and learners and allows for discussing and analysing in a visual, auditory and kinaesthetic medium”. (Available on World Wide Web:< .”(Available on
World Wide Web:<http://www.dit.ie/lttc/media/ditlttc/documents/gettingthemost.pdf>)
2.4 Advantages and disadvantages of Interactive Whiteboards
IWB is undouptedly excellent tool and if the teacher knows how to use it, he can transform his teaching style and support his pupils to learn more effectively. The use of IWB in teaching has certainly its advantages as disadvantages. Both teachers and pupils can benefit from using IWB in classroom. In the document Getting the most from your interactive whiteboard – A guide for primary schools, published by Becta3, some benefits of whiteboards are mentioned.
IWB as a teaching tool:
3
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is well adapted to whole class teaching (Glover, D., Miller, D., 2001)
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encourages an interactive approach in that setting (Ball, 2003)
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enables to use a variety of multimedia resources (Levy, P., 2002)
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enables faster pace through the use of prepared materials
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encourages sharing materials among other teachers (Kennewell, S., 2001)
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teacher can control and lead all activities on the touch board
Becta, British Educational Communications and Technology Agency
17
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gives teachers possibility to use a wide range of resources in preparating the materials
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through the new technology encourages teachers in trying out new ways of teaching, using more ICT (Smith, H., 2001)
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supports demonstrating and modelling
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gives great opportunity to integrate ICT in lessons while teaching from the front of the class (Smith, H., 2001)
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enables to increase spontaneity and flexibility if teachers can draw on a variety of internet resources (Kennewell, S., 2001)
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enables teachers to save and print whatever on the board, notes written in the lesson
(Walker, D., 2002)
IWB as a learning tool:
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support pupils of a variety learning styles
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increases pupils’ motivation and engagement in learning
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increases pupils’ interest with visual stimuli
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keeps pupils focused on the board for a longer time
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makes pupil’s attention and concentration better
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develops pupils’ personal and social skills (Levy, P., 2002)
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pupils do not have to use a keyboard to engage with the technology, increasing access for younger children and pupils with disabilities (Goodison, T., 2002)
Like everything, the IWB has also its disadvantages in addition to its benefits. Some deficiencies in using IWB that I have found during my teaching experience and using IWB are: -
getting IWB to school is usually a question of money, they are more expensive than other teaching tools
-
if IWB is used too often, it is no longer so attractive for pupils
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excessive use of IWB can suppress abstract thinking of pupils
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IWB is usually installed permanently and its height may not be suitable for different pupils and teachers
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3
Learning styles
Pupils are different, have different values, needs and to acquire new knowledge they
use a variety of methods. These methods are called learning styles. Due to the fact that the emphasis is put on individual approach to pupils nowadays, teachers should be aware, that pupils prefer different learning styles. According to Seifert and Vedralová4, the new approaches and habits regarding drawing new information appear. Today’s pupils are from birth in contact with the computer and the Internet, the world of information technologies affects them from all sides. The value of new information declines proportionally to increasing availability and quantity of information. (Seifert, M., Vedralová, A., 2010)
The best ways of learning differ. Pupils prefer variety of learning styles, but there is not usually just one style that pupils prefer, it is mix of styles that pupils use in learning process. One learning style may be dominant, but it is accompanied by less dominant styles.
Dominance of individual learning style is not a constant thing, it may change during life.
(Seifert, M., Vedralová, A., 2010)
When transferring information to pupils, teachers should find appropriate ways of doing that, they should try to diagnose pupils’ learning styles. They can use standardized tests or their own pedagogical diagnostics. Study of pupils’ learning styles can help to make teaching more efficient and supports the idea of diversity in teaching. (Seifert, M., Vedralová,
A., 2010)
Pupils can prefer following learning styles:
Verbal (linguistic) – ability to learn through words and language – reading, speaking, writing.
Logical (mathematical) – ability to learn through data – collecting, organizing, analyzing and interpreting.
Visual (spatial) – ability to learn through movies, pictures, images, videos and demonstration. 4
Seifert, M., Vedralová A. Učební styly žáků - výzva pro české učitele? Rodina a škola, 2010, vol.57, no. 7,
p. 22-23
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Bodily (kinesthetic) – ability to learn through body, hands, sense of touch, sports and physical activites.
Naturalistic – ability to recognize plants, animals, minerals, learn through classification activities.
Musical (aural) – ability to learn through music, sounds, rhythm and tones.
Interpersonal – ability to learn with others, in group.
Intrapersonal – ability to learn through own emotions and motivation, self-studying.
(Available on World Wide Web:<
http://projects.coe.uga.edu/epltt/index.php?
title=Multiple_Intelligences_and_Learning_Styles>)
3.1 How can Interactive Whiteboard help?
Smart Technologies, Inc. in its document deals with the question of how to help in educational process with using IWB. Educators constantly try to develop approaches and tools for pupils with different and various learning needs. As mentioned above, IWB is a teaching tool that can support different pupils learning styles. IWB can help pupils that require visual, hearing-impaired and other special needs. Pupils with different learning styles and needs can be:
“Visual learners - benefit from notes taken on the interactive whiteboard in addition to diagramming and manipulating objects or symbols. As the IWB is easy to use, it enables pupils of all ages to see their own writing ond objects of their own creation.
Kinesthetic or tactile learners – are typically difficult to engage in traditional classroom activities that are usually more visual or auditory in nature. They are able to reinforce learning through exercises involving touch, movement and space on IWB.
Deaf and hearing-impaired learners – rely primarily on visual learning, and the IWB facilitates the presentation of visual material with the use of sign language simultaneously in front of students.
Visually impaired learners – with some vision ability can manipulate objects and use large text on an IWB’s big surface and participate in computer-based learning in ways that would not be possible on a smaller computer screen.
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Other special needs learners with learning challenges, such as physical ability needs and behavioural issues, Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD), also find the large interactive surface helpful. Its large size and touch sensitivity facilitates ICT learning beyond the standard keyboard and mouse type of computer interaction, and its appeal can be used to promote good behaviour.”(Available on World Wide Web:< http://downloads01.smarttech.com/ media/ research/whitepapers/int_whiteboard_research_whitepaper_update.pdf>)
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Teaching grammar to young learners
4.1 Young learners
Children around the world begin to learn English at different ages. Different children have their differences, weaknesses, strengths, prefer different learning styles. So if we want to characterize the young learner, we have to focus on average child.
Scott and Ytreberg in their book Teaching English to children, divide young learners into two groups, because there is a difference between what children of six can do and what children of eleven can do. Differences between these children are undouptedly large and the teacher has to be aware of the characteristics of particular age group of children, their needs and adapt to these aspects to his teaching style, methods and activities. Children under seven, specifically, the five to seven years old, belong to the first group. According to Slattery and
Willis, this group is also called “very young learners”. The second group – young learners – are the eight to ten year olds or children between eight and twelve. (Slattery, M., Willis, J.,
2006)
As said before, pupils of different ages can do different things. There are some abilities that pupils can do at their own level.
Very young learners:
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learn through hearing real English, the same ways as they learn their native language
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learn through actions, games, playing, they learn new words naturally
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learn through sounds, playing with words and phrases, songs
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like having fun and need not to be aware of learning a foreign language
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usually cannot read and write, so they need to learn new words through talk and games
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are not able to understand grammatical rules, they need to hear lots of English, words and phrases so that their grammar will develop on its own (Slattery, M., Willis, J.,
2006)
Children between seven and twelve:
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usually can read and write or are in process of learning it
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develop their ability to think
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are becoming aware of the real worlds and the world of fantasy
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are able to plan and do the activity in the best way
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can work with others and learn from others
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are aware of the importance of reliability and responsibility for the whole class activities -
are able to make the most of reading books in English
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can understand very simple explanation about how language works
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are able to experiment with language, working with language creatively
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can help teacher with organization of activities (Slattery, M., Willis, J., 2001)
Slattery and Willis say, that generally we can characterize all young children by these characteristics, they:
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are developing very quickly as individuals
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learn in variety of ways, by watching, listening, imitating, doing things
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are not able to understand grammatical rules and explanations about language
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try to make sense of situations by making use of non-verbal clues
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talk in their mother tongue about what they understand and do – this helps them learn
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can generally imitate the sounds they hear quite accurately and copy the way adults speak -
are naturally curious
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love to play and use their imagination
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are comfortable with routines and enjoy repetition
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have quite a short attention span and so need variety (Slattery, M., Willis, J., 2001)
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4.2 What is grammar
According to Longman Dictionary of contemporary English grammar is:
“The rules by which words change their forms and are combined into sentences, or the study or use of these rules.” (Longman Dictionary of contemporary English, 2001, p. 619)
The question is, if it is important to study grammar, if we need to know grammatical rules if we want to speak any language. The answer for this question is “No, we do not have to study grammar”. People around the world speak their first language without studying grammatical rules. Small children begin to speak without being aware of grammar. But if people want to use foreign language, grammar is necessary in a way of learning the language more quickly and efficiently. If people know grammatical rules and structures, they are able to understand things themselves. Grammar is essential language skill and it is important for learning foreign language.
According to Jim Scrivener, “grammar is not just a dry list of facts and rules. It is in our heads and it is a living resource that gives us the ability to communicate our ideas and feelings and to understand what other people say or write to us.” (Scrivener, J., 2003)
4.3 The role of grammar in teaching young learners
Young children are wonderful in absorbing new languge. They can get maximum of language through games and activities that they find funny. Their success in learning foreign language does not depend on their knowledge of grammar. They can use grammatical structures very well, they can speak language clearly, but they are not able to say why they use particular structure. Some pupils are able to deal with simple grammar at the age of ten or eleven. Teachers, of course, should be aware of grammar and structures that they want their pupils to know. But they should teach just a minimum of grammar and what is important, the older pupils only. (Scott, W., Ytreberg, L., 1990)
If teachers teach grammar, it is very important to do it in context. For children it is necessary to have lots of opportunities and chances to use the new languge in their real lives.
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Pupils have to learn new structures and rules in depth, they should feel that they can use what they have learnt for everyday communication. (Phillips, S., 1993)
4.4 Ways of teaching grammar
There is a question “How do pupils learn grammar?”
It is not easy to answer.
According to Jim Scrivener learning is “a slow, messy business. It is better to acknowledge that, because then you will not come out of class angry with yourself and saying things like
I taught it well, but they did not learn it!” (Scrivener, J., 2003)
There are two different ways of teaching new grammatical structure. The grammar can be covert or overt. There is a fundamental difference between teaching grammar through these two ways.
covert/inductive grammar – indirect grammar teaching, teacher does not provide grammar rules. There is a text where new grammatical structure is introduced. Pupils read the text and find out the new structure. Pupils’ attention is not focused on the new structure, but on the text. Pupils work with the text, they practise new language and the focus does not have to be on the grammar. Pupils play with the words, sentences and they can take the new grammar in incidentally.
overt/deductive grammar – explanation of the new grammatical rules and structures to pupils. 4.5 Stages in teaching grammar
Grammar teaching includes four stages that pupils should go through before being able to use a new grammar item. (Scrivener, J., 2003) They need to:
notice the grammar item in presentation
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Presentation should be:
-
clear – there should not be any difficulties in understanding, pupils should understand the text
-
efficient – there should be a maximum of new grammar, pupils should be forced to use new language
-
enjoyable and interesting – pupils should be motivated on the highest level and be interested in the activity. Doing things that they find enjoyable and are interested in them is the best motivation to learn.
-
appropriate – it has to be proper for language that is presented
-
productive – pupils should be allowed to make own sentences and questions using the grammar that they have learnt (Harmer, J., 1998)
All previous characteristics can be achieved through following activities:
-
using charts
-
texts
-
stories
-
songs and rhymes
-
dialogues
-
visuals for situations (Harmer, J., 1998)
It is not easy to learn a new structure the first time pupils meet it. The more times pupils are exposed to the structure, the more sense it will give them. Teachers should plan activities so that there are as many grammar items, he wants pupils to learn, as possible. (Scrivener, J.,
2003)
understand the form of the structure – the way it is made up, how the words fit together, what the endings are. They should know the meaning and use of new grammar item. Teacher should show the structure in context, introduce it in the typical situations.
practise new language – pupils should be allowed to try the language in safe environment, they need to practise structures as much as possible. There are some techniques that allow pupils to practise grammatical rules.
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-
drills
-
interactive activities
-
games
use the new grammar item – pupils should be allowed to use the new language that they have learnt. It may take time before children start to use the new language, even they have practised the items a lot. Teachers should encourage pupils to use the language – “sometimes getting things wrong and sometimes getting things right”, that is the way that people learn new things. (Scrivener, J., 2003)
There is one important thing that teachers should be aware. All the things that teachers do in their lessons using the language is grammar teaching. If teachers use English in their lessons as much as possible, they give pupils language examples. Pupils can benefit from what teacher says in lesson, they can notice and learn new language including grammar only by the way.
5
Grammar structures in primary teaching
5.1 Framework Educational Programme
The Framework Educational Programme for basic education defines binding
educational norms. This document is a part of the National Education Programme which is the basic document in the new curricular education system in the Czech Republic. This document defines everything what is common and necessary in the basic compulsory education. The programme defines educational content, the expected outcomes and curriculum. It is based on a new education approach that emphasizes key competencies and their interconnection with educational content. (Available on World Wide Web: < http://www.msmt.cz/vzdelavani/framework-education-programme-for-basic-education>) Key competencies are a complex of knowledge, abilities, attitudes and values. They should not be developed in isolation but in connection with each other. To develop these
26
competencies teachers should adapt their teaching, educational content and all activities that take place at school. (Available on World Wide Web: < http://www.msmt.cz/vzdelavani/ framework-education-programme-for-basic-education>) The key competencies are:
Learning competency enables pupils to observe and experiment, compare results and draw conclusions. For development of this competence it is needed to present the grammar so that they use all their senses using colour demonstration, colourful pictures, moving and mystery objects, songs, stories and chants. Furthermore it is necessary to enable pupils to manipulate objects, observe, classify and distinguish them. It is also very important to make pupils think about problem, express their own conclusions and rediscovery of knowledge. We have to point out application in common life. The designed object should lead to the acquisition of knowledge from other sources than the school materials are.
Problem-Solving Competency is supported by involvement of pupils in deducing the grammatical rules. Students are motivated by situations that they know from their common life. Pupils are encouraged to not let discourage if they are wrong. They are encouraged to continue and find the solution.
Communication Competency is encouraged by effort to let speaking as many pupils as possible. Pupils are also encouraged to understand various types of texts, records, graphic materials and react to them. It is also very important to talk to pupils about the ways of solving problems, advise the weaker pupils, come up with new questions and let pupils communicate with each other.
Social and Personal Competency is developed by respecting agreed rules, opportunity for expressing feelings and mood. Pupils have to be able to ask for help if needed as well as they should be able to give succour to anybody.
Civic Competency is encouraged by support of collective solidarity, mutual conversation, discussions about problems, telling own experience. Pupils are also encouraged to admit acknowledge the ideas of others.
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Professional Competency is developed by using materials and tools safely and effectively. (Available on World Wide Web: < http://www.msmt.cz/vzdelavani/frameworkeducation-programme-for-basic-education>)
5.2 Expected outcomes according to the Framework Educational
Programme
Framework Educational programme for basic education defines within the area of foreign language educational content and different language skills that pupils have to know at the end of each period. (See appendix 2) The educational field is divided into two stages.
Young learners belong to stage 1 of basic education. Educational content of stage 1 is divided into 2 periods. (Available on World Wide Web: < http://www.msmt.cz/vzdelavani/ framework-education-programme-for-basic-education>) Grammar is a part of educational content in period 2. Expected outcomes of this period include knowledge of basic grammatical structures and sentences types. Pupil is able to make a simple sentence, question and negation and to form a sentence with correct word order. Knowledge and use of basic grammatical structures go through all the skills that are included in the expected outcomes of this period, since words are placed in sentences according to grammatical rules and pupils should know these rules if they want to use words in sentences in a meaningful way. (Available on World Wide Web: < http://www.msmt.cz/ vzdelavani/framework-education-programme-for-basic-education>) 28
II
Practical part
6
Market research
Interactive whiteboards are becoming a popular tool used in language teaching. The
most important condition of engaging IWB in teaching the interactive teaching materials are.
Without appropriate educational materials can be IWBs hardly effectively used in teaching.
Nowadays there is a number of educational materials for IWBs available in the market, but for teachers it can be difficult to be knowledgeable in this offer. Especially the teachers who have no experience with interactive lessons may have difficulties in finding and selecting a specific training program that whould that would best help to develop specific skills or specific subject matter covered. Variety of flyers and catalogues offering teaching materials for IWBs constantly comes to schools, but teachers always do not get all that market offers.
On this basis I have done the market research in which I focused on interactive learning materials available in the market of the Czech Republic. First of all, my goal was to find educational materials for teaching grammar to young learners using IWB. In a subsequent questionnaire solution that is another part of my thesis I wanted to find out, among other things, which of these materials primary English teachers know, which are available for them and which they really use in their classes. One of the main purposes of the research was to determine what educational materials I should include in the survey.
For collecting information for the survey I used a very widespread source of information – the Internet. I also visited the regional office of the largest publishers of educational materials, Oxford University Press in Prague, where they provided me with information about their educational materials for IWBs that are currently available in the market. This way I found out 12 publishers that distribute English textbooks and teaching materials for primary schools. Those are included in the research. In research of publishing houses’ interactive materials I focused on:
quantity and variety of interactive materials
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content of interactive materials, language focus
Mainly I focused on which of these materials can be used especially for teaching grammar to young learners.
I focused on following publishing houses , that publish books and teaching materials for primary schools – Fraus publishing house, SPN – pedagogické nakladatelství, Fortuna,
Prodos, Nová Škola, Macmillan, Terasoft, Leda, Cambridge University Press, Oxford
University Press, Longman and Langmaster. Present market offers following interactive materials for English teaching in primary schools. Some of these materials are created directly for the course books and fully correspond with them. Some of these materials are designed as supplementary materials and do not correspond with any course book available. (See appendix 3)
In the research I found out that eight of twelve researched publishers offer interactive materials for teaching English in primary schools. These publishers usually produce IWB software to be used in connection with course books. IWB materials designed for course books are concentrated on developing of all language skills as well as most of the additional materials that I found out. Only two programmes are more specific. Zak´s Wordgames
(Langmaster) learning material is focused mainly on vocabulary development, Tell me More
Kids (Leda) courses are focused mainly on listening and speaking development. The largest publisher in our market is Oxford University Press (OUP). This publishing house produces interactive materials designed for nine of its course books that can be used in primary schools.
The educational program that is most focused on practicing English grammar is TS Angličtina
2 pro školáky. This new English course is intended namely for the 5 th grade of primary school. But this educational program is not designed specifically for IWB teaching, but also for practicing language using the computer both at school and at home.
Although teaching using interactive whiteboards is currently widely used, there still isn´t so many teaching materials as we would wish. Publishing houses offer some materials for purposes of using interactive whiteboards but these materials are mainly designed for course books. They are very good but I (maybe more teachers using IWBs) still miss more materials for extra work and practising particular language skills such as grammar.
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Generally speaking, the programmes offered by different companies are due to competitive struggle very good. The only major drawback can be incompatibility of designed programmes with various school educational programmes. The way out of situation when there is no programme in market that would cover what we need to teach – such as grammar, is creating own teaching material in the software supplied with most interactive whiteboards.
With growing demand and use of interactive whiteboards in schools the new internet websites were created. On these websites we can find freely downloadable, already created interactive materials for English lessons. From these well-sorted databases we do not have only to draw but we can also insert own materials to share them with others.
In the research I also focused on these websites. I mainly focused on these things:
Quantity of interactive materials designed for primary teaching
Language skills that are developed by these materials
Quality of designed materials
Clarity of web pages where the materials are available
I researched following eight websites that I arranged into the chart and evaluated against the criteria. The main task was to determine whether they contain educational materials to use for teaching grammar to young learners. A detailed content of these pages have been added to the overview. (See appendix 4)
As I have mentioned before, there is a big amount of materials that teachers can find on websites. Each teacher is different, prefers a different style of teaching, pupils are individuals with different learning styles. If you really want to find something special, nice, suitable, simply something created just for your lesson, for your learners, it may be quite difficult. And from my experience it usually is. I don´t use IWB every lesson, there are many ways of teaching grammar such as everything, but if there is something that I know can be great to teach using IWB and pupils can benefit from it, I need amazing teaching material.
I mean amazing especially for my pupils. For these reasons I usually design my own materials. That is what I occupy with in another part of my thesis.
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7
School survey on using IWBs
This part of my thesis includes questionnaire that I have sent to many schools in
Central Bohemian Region.
The goal was to confirm the hypothesis that the IWb is now a fixture of most schools.
I also wanted to find out what possibilities to use IWBs the teachers have. The main goal was to build on the market research and find out what interactive teaching materials teachers know and which they use in their classes. Based on survey results, I also wanted to know whether the teachers create their own teaching materials for teaching using the IWB.
7.1 Questionnaire
In developing the questionnaire I emphasized that the questionnaire is understandable, clear, linguistically correct and easy to fill. I administered the questionnaire in the Czech language. I chose this option because I addressed the Czech teachers that are natural to use their native language. From my experience I know that some teachers, particularly those in primary schools may feel limited by language and they could be simply discouraged by filling in the questionnaire in English.
At the beginning of the questionnaire i politely addressed the respondents and asked them to fill out a questionnaire on the topic of IWB. I briefly explained the importance of the questionnaire, its content and meaning of its completion. I also wrote the brief instructions on how to fill and return back. I thanked for the time spent on filling out a questionnaire. (See appendix 5)
I formed the questions so as to be clear, understandable, concise and valid above all.
This means that the answers to these questions help to achieve the research objectives. The questionnaire included following types of questions:
Open questions – the respondents could express in their own words, this type of questions allowed me to get the answers that would not occur to me (4,6,10)
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Enclosed questions – I directed the respondents directly to what interests me
(1,3,5,7,9)
Semi-closed questions – they combine the previous two types of questions.
(2,12)
Filter questions – they allowed me to divide the respondents into sub-groups or alter the flow of questions according to answering this question.(1,3,5,9)
After completing the questionnaire I proceeded to test it. The first step was that I had filled the questionnaire myself honestly. I went through the questionnaire in random order to verify that the answers are still the same. I also gave the questionnaire to fill in the test group of respondents who gave me important feedback when the questionnaire was still possible to edit. Group of these respondents was seven of my current and former colleagues that teach
English in primary school. After testing the questionnaire I inspected the results of the test survey to evaluate whether the questions lead to the aim of the survey. Based on this I found out that using these questions can lead to the research objectives. In the next part of the thesis
I deal with the questions in detail.
I sent the questionnaire to schools via e-mail correspondence. I created list of 70 schools in Central Bohemina Region. This method of collecting data from the questionnaire seemed to me the simplest and in today’s world of communication technologies natural. I had serious doubts about the return of completed questionnaires in this way, but I wanted to see how today’s teachers are able to react this way, if they are at least in this basic way able to compete in today’s world of information and communication technologies. The response came back from 45 schools in a very short time. I found this number sufficient, so I could evaluate the questionnaires and identify the research results.
In following part I am analysing particular questions that were set in the questionnaire.
Question 1
Do you have Interactive Whiteboard in your school?
The use of the IWB in the classroom is conditioned by its existence in the school. The target group were mainly respondents who have the opportunity to work with IWB and thus
33
design interactive teaching objects. Through the first question I directed to divide the respondents to two groups. Those who have opportunities to work with IWB and those who do not – so that I did not analyse their questionnaires any more.
I found out that 5 schools from 45 schools surveyed still does not have IWB. But almost all of these schools are going to get it in the near future.
Is IWB in school?
YES
NO
Question 2
If you have IWB, what type of board is it?
Another question deals with the type of IWB that respondent has the possibility to use in teaching. On the market there are more types of boards and interactive systems that differ from each other. If teacher designes own materials to use them on the IWB, the software which is a part of the board and through which the teacher designs the materials is very important. Each of these has different tools, including other types of activities, picture gallery, etc. I personally had the opportunity to use the Smart Board and the Activboard – the two most popular boards that market offers. If I compare these two boards from my perspective,
I can say that it is much easier to work with the software for Smart Boards and I like its activities more as well. Based on this question I wanted in connection with question number 5 to determine whether this fact could also influence other teachers.
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I found out, that schools are mostly equipped with Smart Boards and ActivBoards. Other types of IWBs are used in a very small extent.
18
16
14
12
10
8
6
4
2
0
Smart Board
ActivBoard
Interwrite
Triumph Board
Star Board
I do not know
More types
Types of board
Other
In terms of designing teaching materials depending on the type of board I evaluated the two most popular boards – Smart Board and Activboard. I found out that 100 percent of teachers that are able to use Activeboard design their own teaching materials and 88 percent of teachers in schools where Smart Board is available design interactive teaching materials.
This fact does not confirm my hypothesis. Maybe when the teacher use particular board for a long time, he is accustomed to work with it, the activities of which he knows that works great and then when he has to work with another type of board, he may feel frustrated before he gets used to this new board and software. It is therefore a matter of custom rather than a type of board.
Question 3
Is IWB in classroom where you permanently teach?
This question I wanted to find out how many teachers have the opportunity to have IWB in the classroom where they teach permanently, language lab. In connection with the following questions I also wanted to clafiry whether the teachers who are always available to the board, designe teaching materials themselves or use ready-made interactive books or teaching materials from the websites. I also wanted to know how often the IWB is used in their classes if they have it permanently available.
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I found out, that 21 respondents has IWB in classroom where they teach permanently.
Is IWB in classroom where you permanently teach? YES
NO
Based on survey I also found out that if teachers have the IWB constantly in the classroom, use the following materials to work with it.
14 % or respondents – own designed materials
19 % of respondents – own designed materials, internet sources
19 % of respondents – own designed materials and ready-made books
48 % of respondents – own materials, ready-made books, internet sources
Kind of sources used
Own designed materials
Own materials and interactive course books
Own materials and internet sources Own/interactive course books/internet sources
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Question 4
How often do you use IWB in your lessons?
As I have mentioned above, I was interested in how often the IWB is in use by the teachers who have it always at hand and by those who have not. I also wanted to know if there is a direct correlation between frequency of use of the IWB in the classroom and creating educational materials.
IWB in use
Almost every lesson Once a week
Very often
From time to time I found out that 30 percent of respondent teachers use IWB very often – almost every lesson. 12 percent of teachers use the board very often. 25 percent of teachers use IWB about once a week. 23 percent of teachers use it from time to time and 10 percent of respondents use it never in their lessons.
In the following chart you can see how often is IWB used in classes by the teachers who have it permanently in the classroom and who do not.
14
12
10
8
6
4
2
0
Teachers having IWB permanently Teachers who cannot have IWB permanently
Once a week Very often Almost every lesson
Rarely
Never
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Here I have summarized the relation between frequency of using IWB and designing interactive materials.
100% teachers who use IWB almost every lesson design own materials
100% teachers who use IWB very often design own teaching objects
80% teachers who use IWB once a week design own teaching materials
44% respondents who use IWB in lessons rarely design own teaching materials
From this follows that the more often teachers use IWB in lessons, the more they design their own teaching materials for its use.
Question 5
Do you design your own teaching materials for IWB?
Since the thesis deals with designing teaching objects on IWBs, it seemed natural to include this question in the questionnaire. This question was directed toward the clear goal – to find out how many teachers interwieved design own teaching materials.
I found out that three quarters of the respondents design own interactive materials for their lessons.
Designing own teaching materials YES
NO
Question 6
If your previous answer is yes, for developing what language skills do you design your materials?
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This question was only for those who answered yes to the previous question. The goal was to determine what language skills teachers usually develop through the interactive materials that they design. Based on market research, which I did and my experience as well I know, that there are interactive teaching materials that focus on a comprehensive balanced development of languge skills, what is undoubtedly good. There are some educational materials for practicing vocabulary, but significantly less on teaching and practicing grammar.
I wanted to find out whether teachers respond to this lack of these materials by creating own teaching objects or what else they prefer.
Language skills developed
Vocabulary
Grammar
Facts
Listening
Teachers create their materials to develop the following languages skills:
vocabulary 43%
grammar 27%
facts 17%
listening 13%.
Question 7
If you design your own materials, do you provide them for other teachers?
If the teacher makes his own teaching material for IWB it takes a lot of time, especially if he wants to design a good material. Then it is a shame to have such educational material only for him when he can share it with colleagues who can use the material in their lessons and more pupils can benefit from it. My experience is that the sharing of educational materials in schools is far too prevalent. So I wanted to see how it actually works, whether teachers share created materials among themselves. If this happens, it is another step for teachers to more, better and more efficient use of IWBs in the classroom.
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17 of respondents of those that design own teaching materials, provide these materials for other teachers, 13 of them do not.
Providing materials for other teachers
YES
NO
Question 8
Do you know these materials? Do you use them in your lessons?
One of the main objectives of my research was to determine what ready-made interactive books that are available primary English teachers know and use them in theri classes. The questionnaire consists of all the ready-made materials that are included in market research.
I wanted to find out which of the 17 titles (see appendix 6) teachers actually use in practice.
I found out, that the most commonly known and used materials are those that are published by Oxford University Press. They are called iTools and are designed for course books. There are 5 materials that are not known for any of the teachers surveyed (Tell me
More Kids, The Busy Board, Way Ahead, Treetops iTools, Super Surprise iTools).
ChitChatiTools
10
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
0
Family andFriendsiTools
HappyEarthNew EditioniTools
HappyHouseNew EditioniTools
HappyStreetNew EditioniTools
NewChatterboxiTools
IncredibleEnglishiTools
Startwith Click
Kid´s Box
LongmanChildren´sPictureDictionary
Known (number of respondents) Used (number of respondents) Angličtinaproškoláky
Zak´s Wordgames
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Question 9
Do you use any materials for IWBs that you can find on websites?
In market research I also focused on teaching materials that teachers can freely download from the websites. Through the questionnaire I wanted to find out whether these sites are really used in practice and whether there are other resources that teachers often use that I did not include in the market survey.
I found out that almost half of the teachers surveyed (22) does not use free available materials on websites. More than half of the respondents (18) do.
Websites use
YES
NO
Question 10
If the previous answer is yes, state the website you use.
Websites in use www.rvp.cz www.msmt.cz www.veskole.cz www.oup.cz
www.cambridge.cz
The most commonly used websites are www.veskole.cz and www.rvp.cz .
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Question 11
Are you man or woman?
Man or woman
Men
Women
The majority of respondents are women, but is commonly known that majority of primary teachers are women. Regarding the use of IWBs in the classroom, both men and women teachers use IWB in classes at the same rate.
Question 12
How old are you?
The last question concerned the age of respondents. Depending on the age of respondents
I examined their relation to the use of IWBs on the basis of whether they design own teaching materials or not.
Age of the respondents
20-29
30-39
40-49
50-59
I found out that the largest percentage of respondents belongs to age group 30-39 years.
I learned that age of the respondents does not affect the approach the teacher to work with
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IWB. Here is an overwiev of what percentage of teachers of the particular age group designs own teaching materials.
20-29 years – 86% teachers
50-59 years – 80% teachers
40-49 years – 78% teachers
30-39 years – 71% teachers
7.2 Questionnaire summary
As mentioned above, the questionnaire shows that almost of the schools are equipped with IWB today. There is just a small percentage of schools that still miss IWB. It´s probably due to the fact that getting IWB is mainly a question of money that is often difficult to find.
But representatives of these schools mentioned that they are going to buy IWB in the near future. The most commonly used boards are SMART Boards and ActivBoards. This is what
I know from my experience too. There is inconsiderable amount of other types of IWBs used in schools. Some teachers were not able to say what type of IWB it is. Naturally, these teachers never use IWB in English lessons. About half of the teachers who have IWB in school have it also in classroom where usually teach. The questionnaire also shows that teachers using IWBs in lessons use them commonly quite often but not every lesson. This is good due to the fact, that we should use variety of teaching aids and resources.
Next part of the questionnaire refers to designing interactive materials. What I have found is quite surprising for me because during my nine years of teaching I have not met many teachers who created any own teaching materials. Maybe it is just a bad experience. In any case what I have found is very positive, three quarters of teachers who use IWB, design materials for these purposes as well. And what is even more positive, more than half of them provides these teaching objects to other teachers.
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The questionnaire also concerns interactive materials already designed. This part includes 17 materials offered by publishing houses. The result shows that there are more products that teachers know than they can use. Some of the teachers have also mentioned their desire to have these materials in school, but the price and the financial situation of the school do not allow having them. As mentioned above the most commonly used materials are offered by Oxford University Press and Terasoft. There are also some materials on websites, but naturally, they are not of so good quality like those offered by publishing houses and companies. These IWB materials are commonly used by a half of respondents. Those who don´t use these object in lessons probably prefer creating own teaching objects or buying available materials in the market.
Finally I wanted to know what age group the respondents belong to and their gender.
I found there is nothing surprising about the gender, it is commonly known there are much more female primary teachers. Both male and female teachers use IWBs, design own teaching objects but naturally in proportion to the number of male and female respondents.
8
Grammar in 5th grade of primary school
8.1 Designing teaching objects
According to the Framework Education Programme for Elementary Education the
educational area Language and Language Communication – Foreign Language is based mainly on acquisition of a foreign language. In cycle 2 pupils acquire the language through receptive and productive language skills. To achieve the expected outcomes, mainly productive language skills, they have to be aware of basic grammatical structures and sentences types – simple sentences, formation of question and negation and word order in a sentence. )
Therefore, I have decided to design some teaching objects for primary English teachers that can be used for exploration, explanation and expression of basic grammatical structures in 5th grade. The objects are designed for teaching with Smart Board. The main
44
motive for creating objects for IWB was for me finding, that English, especially grammar, is still often taught in standard way, where you can see pupils sitting passively at desks and working with books or worksheets. I think that the situation is increasingly improving thanks to the pressure exerted on English teachers in educational area. Teachers are forced to complete their education and participate in special courses to support English teaching. There are many companies engaged in further education of English teachers. There is infinite number of materials that help and support teachers to make their lessons better and better.
Another reasons for designing these objects were, that although there are some books and photocopiable materials to choose from when teaching new grammar, teachers can not use them with IWB. Grammar teaching using IWB is modern teaching process that brings new ways that can take English teaching one step further. Learning with IWB becomes more interesting and attractive as well for pupils as for teachers. All pupils can be easily involved in learning process and teacher can easily attract their attention. These advantages of IWB use can be especially beneficial when presenting and practising new grammar, which is usually quite boring for pupils. They are usually not interested in grammar and grammatical rules and that is why I try to find ways of involving them in grammatical structures so that find it funny and enjoyable. IWB helps me a lot to achieve these goals.
The requirements for learning outcomes are determined by our educational programmes. These requirements are not based only on subjects´ specifics, but they concern more universal knowledge, skills and attitudes of pupils, that they commonly need in their lives. These skills and attitudes are useful in many living and working situations. The
Framework Education Programme identifies them as key competencies. I designed my teaching objects to be aimed, help to form and develop these competencies.
As I designed my teaching objectives according to the principals of Frame Educational
Programme I think, that it won´t be difficult for pupils to acquire the curriculum. Designed teaching objects contain all the necessary tasks to develop all the competencies mentioned in theoretical part of my thesis and to achieve the expected outcomes.
The interactive grammar book for teaching grammar in the 5th class of primary school
I created with Smart Notebook software for Smart Boards. I have chosen this software because I know the Smart Board very well from my experience. I had this board in school where I was teaching for three years and I was using it very often. Another reason for
45
choosing the Smart Board is that all the programmes included in computer can be displayed on the board. One of the best advantages is that pupils can be actively involved in lessons.
8.2 Designed materials in use
Within the research part of my thesis I applied the teaching objects that I have designed in five English lessons in Elementary School Petra Strozziho, Praha 8, Za
Invalidovnou 3. As my materials are designed for teaching grammar in the fifth grade I have chosen the pupils of the fifth grade. I had a little problem with IWB that is available in the school. There is ActivBoard and I have designed materials for Smart Board. The problem was quickly solved because one of the pros of objects designed in software for Smart Boards is that it can be easily transferred into ActivInspire. It is software for designing objects for
ActivBoards. So I could use designed materials with ActivBoard.
Teaching practice took place with 20 pupils of fifth grade in six lessons over two weeks. Their English teacher, my colleague, went through the the grammar structures contained in materials that I have designed in first months of the school year. In lessons with
IWB pupils fixed already familiar grammar structures. What is necessary to mention is the fact, that the English teacher doesn´t use IWB in her lessons. In all the lessons I tried to speak only English.
The homepage of the interactive book contains the content and an overwiev of the symbols. The first page of the interactive grammar book includes contents (see appendix 7 pic. 1) with particular grammar structures. Each grammar structure is made as link to the relevant page in the book. It enables us to get quickly the page what we need at the moment.
Explanatory notes are the essential part of each learning material. On the second page of the interactive grammar book we find an overview of used symbols and their meanings. (See appendix 7 pic. 2) All the images, graphics and symbols are used from the basic elements of gallery that is a part of Smart Notebook software. The gallery consists of essentials for educators including images, lesson activity toolkit consists of images, interactive and multimedia objects, files and pages of application Notebook, background and motives.
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Everything is arranged in particular categories, that enables better orientation. If we are online, we can update the gallery anytime.
Lesson 1 – Present Simple Affirmative
Teaching object 1
Activity in use
At the beginning of the lesson I introduced the IWB to pupils and explained the basic controls due to the fact that pupils have never worked with IWB before. I shortly showed pupils on home page what they are going to work on in following six lessons. I introduced the symbols that they have to understand and their meanings. After the initial information we started the first chapter entitled "Present simple affirmative."
Pupils impatiently waited for what will follow and were looking forward for the work apparently. I set them up for listening to the song and gave them a task – listening and thinking about the song. After listening they tried to say what they think the song is about.
I played the song and almost all the hands raised. Pupils understood the lyrics very well and agreed that the first part of the song is about love. Because they didn´t know the word “hate”
I gave them a cue, that it is the opposite of the word “love”. They liked the song and wanted to sing it again and again. After I played the song one more time, I asked pupils to find the verb in the song and underline them. Pupils were raising their hands and were going up to the board one by one so that they underlined all the verbs. Some pupils were disappointed that
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they could not go to the board. At this point I played the wizard and let fly the angel with heart away from the board. I asked those pupils to complete the chart with the verbs. They did it without any problems and correctly. They properly marked verbs in the text and also added them to the correct pronoun. They realized that the verb in the third person singular has ending –s. As a reward for good work we made a circle, grabbed our hands and sang the song one more time.
The goal of the lesson was to become pupils familiar with a new grammar in a funny way. I can say that this activity worked very well, children liked it, weren´t bored at any time, everybody was involved and they themselves found out the verb rule. If you want to teach grammar, songs can make the lesson more interesting and effective. Songs are very motivating for children and teaching through them is a great way of becoming pupils familiar with a grammatical structure. From my experience I know that pupils like listening to songs in
English lessons. This way they are very gently introduced to the new grammatical structure.
Teaching object 2
Activity in use
This activity thematically linked to the previous page. Pupils become familiar with a boy in the same age as they are. The photograph of the boy appeared on the board. I asked pupils what the boy´s name is and what the think his mood is. Pupils correctly answered that the boy´s name is Jack and that he is sad. Then I asked why they think he is sad. They answered he is sad because of an ilness, he got a bad mark at school, he lost his favourite toy.
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All their answers were right but I uncover the main reason of his sadness – pupils understood that Jack is sad because is unhapilly in love. I asked children if they were ever in love, they began to shy laugh. I understood that they can easily empathize with Jack´s role. I drew attention to the next slide – Jack´s daily programme.
This activity was rather relaxing, the task was to introduce pupils to the next part – new grammar fixing. They met Jack, were talking about him, and uncovering secrets about his bad mood.
Teaching object 3
Activity in use
On this page pupils could find out what Jack usually does every day. I circled the word
"daily" on the board. First I read the text and then let pupils read it again. We didn´t focus on mistakes, but the content of the message. Based on the text understanding pupils placed the pictures of activities to the correct time. The result was a properly designed program. Then we were talking about whether their daily programme is similar or different. The task was to use the new grammar structure through reading and speaking.
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Teaching object 4
Activity in use
In this part of the lesson pupils found out the verbs in the text about Jack´s daily programme and underlined them. They took turns at the board one by one. I reminded again that there are verbs ending in –s, because it is about Jack. I asked them to imagine they are
Jack. They had to transform the text into the 1 st person singular. I covered the text about Jack and uncovered another text to be completed. Children went to the board one by one and filled the empty sentences with the correct verbs. First they made some mistakes but after realizing the rule they did it correctly. After completing the whole text we checked it together explained the mistakes that they made. Then I introduced their homework – worksheet to write their own daily programme.
Teaching object 5
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Activity in use
At the end of the lesson pupils got a worksheet which was connected to the activity on the board. Pupils completed the sentences with the correct verb both to their worksheets and on the board. They all did it correctly! It was a great feedback for me that they understood the rule. Finally they drew the rule again and one of the pupils wrote it down in the grammar table. They stuck the worksheet into their exercise books.
After the lesson pupils evaluated the lesson and I have heard comments that after a long time they enjoyed English lesson. Based on this view, of course, we can not say that the interactive whiteboard is the only teaching tool that pupils really enjoy and that there are no more interesting and enjoyable lessons at all. But it just supports the fact, that teacher should use all available tools in his lessons and change them in his classes so that pupils’ motivation to acquire knowledge is the highest.
Lesson 2 – Present simple affirmative
Teaching object 6
This object is designated to deduce forms of the verbs go and have in the third person singular. Pupils could already see the forms when they were reading about Jack´s daily programme. There are the sentences in the first person singular but when you click next to the
"writing" symbols, the sentences in the third person singular appears. These sentences miss the verbs - pupils have to write the missing verbs.
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Activity in use
At the very beginning of the lesson we checked the homework from last lesson. Four pupils wanted to present their homework in front of the board. Checking homework was a grammar review as well. I read a sentence about Jack and pupils read their information. We reminded again the verb form. Then we went on with exercises on IWB. I highlighted the presence of irregular verbs on the board. I let pupils to think about the verbs and two of them found out the right forms of verbs “go/have”. They wrote them down on the board. Children also got the worksheet to write the rule down. Then they stuck it into their exercise books.
This feedback was also very important for me, I realised that most of the children were already familiar with the verbs even I did not mention them previously. The goal was to discover the rule themselves. That is the best way for learners to remember the grammatical structure and they did it.
Teaching object 7
Activity in use
In this part pupils could practice what they have learnt before. Pupils liked this activity very much. There were sentences with two verbs and they had to decide for the right one. They were going to the board one by one “throwing” the incorrect verbs into the trash.
They were laughing all the time. After cleaning the sentences up we checked the work by revealing the correct sentences. Pupils were delighted and applauded themselves. During this
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activity I found out, that pupils have no more problems with choosing the correct verb, they became already familiar with this grammar.
Teaching object 8
Activity in use
I invited pupils in front of the board for the activity and explained what to do. I know from my experience that this activity is somehow magical and always attract and keep pupils´attention. That is what I confirmed also in this lesson. Pupils liked both swallowing and spitting verbs out. Sometimes it seemed to me that they made mistakes purposely to see how the incorrect verb is spitted out, which might be slightly counterproductive and confusing for weaker pupils. I had to calm them down a bit. Generally the activity worked very well, pupils felt comfortable and found the activity enjoyable. During this activity both me and pupils could have a prompt feedback.
Teaching object 9
This is a manual for the "Memory game". Children can easily see it and understand it.
They say the sentences one by one and add more and more ideas. They speak about everyday activities. The bank of activities that they can use is on the next page.
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Teaching object 10
Activity in use
I introduced the “Memory game”. First we had to revise the vocabulary required.
I revealed the pictures, say the words and covered them again to be ready for a game. Pupils already knew this game from Czech lessons, so it was not difficult to explain the rules at all.
We sat in front of the board in a horseshoe shape facing the board. I was gradually revealing pictures and pupils formed the sentences in present simple tense. Pupils had to say all the sentences that have been said before and add one more. Pictures on the board helped him. If there was a longer pause I lit the dynamite. When the dynamite exploded and the pupil said nothing, he was out of the game. Finally three pupils who didn´t make any mistake won.
Although I was a little afraid of this activity, I thought it might be too difficult, I was pleasantly surprised. Children were very good and even when they were out of the game, they
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listened to their classmates. The large role in this sub-succes I ascribe to the IWB, especiall the tool called “firecracker”. This tool made the boring activity very exciting. The greatest succes, however, was that pupils made grammatically correct sentences in present simple tense. At the end of the lesson I asked pupils to evaluate the lesson using a scale from one to five – one is the best, five is the worst mark. Almost all the pupils showed me “one”. I noticed that pupils took pleasure in the lesson.
Lesson 3 – Present Simple Negative
Teaching object – 11
Activity in use
This lesson was devoted to the use of a negative in present simple tense. At the beginning of the lesson, we repeated the rule of formation of negative sentences. That was something what pupils already known. Pupils chose their representatives at the board who completed the sentences with the correct verb form and not. All the pupils checked the accuracy together in the form of debate. When I made sure that pupils are familiar with that, we could go on the next activity.
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Teaching object 12
Activity in use
This activity was designed for practicing negatives. The chart appeared on the board.
The chart contains images of six people, seven different activities and hidden fields. I read aloud examples of the sentences and clearly showed the way of making sentences. Then I read the names of people and activities, pupils repeated after me so that they became familiar with them. Pupils went closer to the board. One after another came to choose a covered box and uncovered it. If the cross appeared, I invited him to make a negative sentence. If the check mark appeared I asked him to make a positive sentence. Initially, this activity seemed to be difficult and I had to help the children a lot. They had more problems with negative sentences.
Gradually, due to the drill, they started to make correct sentences without my help. During this activity also talented children help weaker children. The target was met, almost all of the children be aware of making both positive and negative sentences. This kind of activity also developed pupils´ sence for curiosity and imagination. Before one of pupils uncover particular part of the chart, others tried to guess what is hidden behind. After the lesson it occured to me, that this chart can be also used for short answers practice. Pupils liked it because it supported their imagination.
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Teaching object 13
Activity in use
For this activity pupils were given a worksheet. They made the positive sentences negative. They wrote the sentences down both on the board and their worksheets. Some of them worked just on their own without looking at the bord, weaker pupils worked alongside pupils that wrote sentences on the board. Finally they checked their work by uncovering the correct sentences on the board. Each evaluated himself on his worksheet. Together we justified that students made in the sentences. Five pupils made no mistakes, others had an average of two sentences wrong. During this activity some pupils were involved more, some less. They worked more individually, what is also very important due to the fakt that pupils must be encouraged to take responsibility for themselves.
Teaching object 14
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Activity in use
This activity – the last one of this lesson was for pupils much more exciting than the previous one. They went to the board and spun two rotating wheels. They made negative sentences from the words. This activity was very motivating and enjoyble. If someone did not say the sentence correctly, other pupils helped a lot. In terms of functionality (practicing grammatical structure) of this interactive activity, we made the most.
This lesson was full of interesting activities, that children enjoyed most. They were very motivating for them so it wasn´t difficult to meet the lesson targets.
Lesson 4 – There is / There are
Teaching object 15
Activity in use
In this lesson we were practicing very important grammar structure “there is/there are”. The picture appeared on the board. I tried to choose a picture which is as pleasant for children as possible. It was a picture of a sea coast with some objects that children can find funny, especially on the seacoast. They started to laugh straight away it has appeared on the board and started to name objects individually. It was the best introduction into the grammar structure “there is/there are”. First we reviewed the vocabulary needed. I pointed at objects on the board and pupils say them in English. Pupils were familiar with almost all of the
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words. During this activity we practiced a plural that is necessary. After the vocabulary review pupils were given one minute to remember all the things in the picture.
I turned on
the stopwatch at the bottom of the slide. This is one of the things that I would do differently next time. Pupils constantly monitored the stopwatch and didn´t concentrated at the picture as they should. Then I presented the picture of man who is thinking about something – about what was in the picture. I read aloud what he says and explained that they are also going to remember the picture and say what is there. In order to describe the picture properly they need to use the grammar structure “there is/there are”, as every English speaking person would use it. Through examples on the board we reviewed when they use they use”there is” and when they use “there are”. Then I asked pupils to divide into two groups, they are probably used to do it, so there was no problem. They divided immediately. Each group said one sentences about the picture. Children were talking in groups together about the picture and if somebody´s idea was wrong, they agreed what is right. If the group said the correct sentence, it got a point. But children were very good and as they could agree among themselves. So the activity finished with a difference of only one point. I praised all the pupils and announced both teams winners, as they all tried to do their best.
Teaching object 16
Activity in use
Pupils chose one representative who went to the board. He read the sentence with some missing words in the beginning. The pupils voted if “there is” or “there are” is right for the sentence. The winning structure was added to the empty box and immediately assessed by the “board”. Pupils had immediate feedback if they did a right or a bad decision. Pupils
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enjoyed the activity, they were all very active and involved, felt responsibility for their decision and their vote, which could affect the outcome of the whole group.
Teaching object 17
Activity in use
In next activity pupils came back to the introductory picture. Shortly, using the examples on the board, we reviewed the rule of making positive and negative short answers.
Pupils were divided into two groups again. Pupils from each group were going to the board alternately. They chose the question, read it aloud and said the answer. Then they clicked on the question and the correct answer appeared. If their previous answer was same with the correct answer on the board, the group got a point. At the beginning of this activity they were choosing the answer for which they knew the answer securely. However, this activity was also very balanced, so it didn´t depressed pupils and they enjoyed it. For pupils was this kind of activity very motivating, everyone was involved, nobody won, nobody lost.
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Teaching object 18
Activity in use
The very last activity of the lesson was “What is in the picture”. From my experience
I know, that children love it, it is very mysterious and funny activity, and there is never enough prepared pictures. This activity was difficult for them from the grammatical point of view. I think it was rather caused by the fact that they are not too accustomed to this form of exercise and their attention was dispersed between the picture and the grammatical structure.
However, they still wanted more and more pictures and as I revealed more and more pictures they became more familiar with the grammatical structure. This activity is a good kind of drill, children repeat the same structures again and again so that they finally become familiar with them.
Lesson 5 and 6
Teaching object 19
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Activity in use
For the last two lessons I decided to teach present continuous tense. On the basis of agreement with a colleague – an English teacher found out that this grammar is for pupils new. For presenting a new grammar I chose “The monkey song”. Here I made the most of the IWB from the perspective of what children really love – songs. This song is also very cheerful and funny and attracted pupils´attention maximally.
In the beginning of the lesson I familiarized pupils with the fact that we are going to learn something new that is sure to be very funny. I told them that I am going to play a song about animals and they have to guess what animals they are and I mimed it. As I am a very good pretender, pupils knew immediately, that it is going to be a song about monkeys.
I played the song, pupils were watching and listening with noticeable interest. Then I asked them to say some words that they could hear in the song. Pupils named the words monkey, doctor, bed, mother, jumping. Then pupils read the questions on the board (with my help), we explained their meaning. I played the song again and the task was to find answers for the questions. All the responses were available on the board. After listening, the first pupil with his hand up went to the board and pulled the first answer to the question. His action was immediately checked by the “board” like the correct answer. I praised the pupil and let him to choose one of his classmates to answer next question. The pupils answered all the questions correctly. Then I wrote the answers on the board and pupils underlined all verbs in them.
They quickly discovered that there are more verbs in each sentence. They marked the verb “to be” with a red colour and we reviewed all the forms of the verb “to be”. I was saing various nouns and pronouns and pupils were saying proper forms of the verb “to be”. Then we marked the verbs in –ing form with a green colour. We deduced the rule of making sentences in present continuous tense and I pointed out that we use it if we want to say that something is happening right now.
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Teaching object 20
Activity in use
Through this activity pupils practised the grammar structure. On the board there were three verbs in three columns and the pupils were supposed to assign them to the correct subject. They were going to the blackboard and were moving the words from the bottom of the board into the columns. Then we checked the work together and found out one mistake.
Finally also the “board” checked pupils´work, everything was alright. Whenever pupils´ work was checked by the “board” they enjoyed so much and applauded themselves.
Teaching object 21
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Activity in use
Another activity was an interactive image. First I illustratively showed pupils, how to work with the picture. I chose the object on the picture, clicked on it and some words connected to the object I have chosen appeared on the board. I made a sentence from these words in present continuous tense, wrote it down a checked it by revealing the rectangle, the correct sentence appeared. I pointed out again the structure of the sentence. I came back to the picture. One of the pupils went to the board and did the same like me before – chose an object, wrote a sentence and said it. This pupil chose another pupil for next sentence. If somebody started to make the sentence incorrectly, others helped immediately. Their cooperation was really great. All together pupils created all the sentences correctly and it was clear that they understood the grammar structure very well.
Finally we spent the time by practicing. Six images with its subjects and verbs appeared on the board. I asked the most talented pupil to choose a picture and make a sentence. Then other five volunteers made the sentences with help of others.
Because there were a few more minutes to the end of the lesson I asked children to make two groups. The taks was to mime an activity for the second group that tried to describe the activity using the present continuous tense. Pupils had a great fun and most importantly, at the end of the lesson they tried to make sentences in present continuous tense without bigger problems. The very end of these lessons I tried to evaluate previous six lessons. I asked pupils how they like the lessons with IWB and if they like the interactive grammar book that we used in these lessons. The response was very pleasant. Pupils praised this way of learning and said that they would like to have interactive books in more English lessons and in other subjects. They said that were not even aware that they learn. They were also surprised how much they have learnt. Finally I thank them for a great cooperation.
8.3 Evaluation of the lessons
Overall, I have a very good feeling about the lessons with teaching materials that
I have designed. I can say that pupils liked the lessons. These pupils, as I said before, never
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had the opportunity to work with the IWB, so these six lessons were naturally an amazing experience for them. Probably, if they had opportunities to learn with the IWB more, their interest would be on a completely different level. Since they enjoyed the learning, we changed activities all the time, they could work individually and in groups, they could help each other, for those reasons they had no problem staying focused. They were motivated to work by a new technical tool and probably also by me – a new teacher. I think that the goals and expected outcomes were met. Pupils learnt new grammatical structures with fun and everyone was involved.
I have been working for several years as a teacher. I had opportunities to change teaching in grades of primary and secondary school. At the time when I started teaching, no
IWB was used. Pupils were forced to learn but also using different teaching resources and methods. I know from my experience that preparing for these lessons was much more demanding if the teacher wanted his students to learn as much as possible. Today´s teaching resources give teachers more opportunities to make their teaching varied and more interesting for pupils. When compared teaching with conventional resources such as textbooks, blackboard and white chalk and teaching with the IWB, I can say for itself that teaching using
IWB gives much better results and therefore it is desirable in our schools.
Although IWB is an excellent teaching technical tool that brings excellent results, it´s importance in teaching in generall can not be overestimated. There are many and many ways of teaching, that can be equally beneficial and entertaining for pupils. Even the best technical tool does not do all the work. The most important is the personality of the teacher who knows the pupils best, how he organizes work, how he can react on the particular situation, how he leads his lessons. No matter if he uses the IWB or not if he can make the most of his lessons.
I prefer teaching with the IWB but I know that there are excellent teachers who never used it and never will and I respect them.
I have designed set of teaching objects to teach English grammar in the fifth grade of primary school (see appendix 1). These objects are designed to teach Present Simple, Present
Continuous and a phrase “there is/there are”. Young children have great ability to absorb language through games, stories, songs and other activities. I tried to design the teaching objects according to the rules that should be respected especially when we teach young
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children. The focus is on a language as a mean of communication and not on the grammar. I tried to set tasks in which learners discover for themselves simple grammatical rules. I also tried to design the objects to learn the grammar structures in context. It means that they do not just learn the rules superficially, but put them into practice in order to communicate. So, to be my teaching objects enjoyable and effective for children so that they make the most of them, I used plenty of pictures, songs, chants, stories and animations. The most important is to get children involved and that is what the IWB enables very well. Interactive applications which I used in designed objects arrange particular stages of the lesson. They include motivation, presentation, explanation and practice. All these stages are very important in teaching and all have their place in the lesson. IWB can be very useful for all the stages of the lesson if it used properly. But I think IWB is especially good for practice. There is infinite number of interactive applications when pupil gets immediate feedback in both sound and graphical form. 8.4 Criteria for designing interactive teaching materials
As IWB teachers still produce their own materials and as it is noticeable that not all of these materials are of a good quality, I have defined criteria for designing teaching objects for
IWBs. In the process of identifying the criteria I followed the experience I gained when creating my own materials for teaching with IWB and the didactic principles. (Skalková, J.,
1999)
Basic starting point for creating IWB teaching object is the choice of the topic that can be originally processed and interactively used in classroom.
Quality of treatment is
undoubtedly the criterion which should be directed. As regards the objects are designed for teaching, you need to keep the teaching principles. When you keep these principles you can achieve the maximum of efficiency and clarity. Some of the principles are:
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principal of clarity
Clarity is one of the oldest didactic principles. Visual effect of interactive teaching materials can be visual or auditory.
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principle of awareness and activity
It is based on theories of motivation. It is necessary to get pupils so that they embrace the learning objectives and develop activity to meet these objectives. The activities should be simple enough for pupils to understand what is expected of them.
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principle of theory and practice
Pupils have to know that they can use what they learn in everyday life.
Pupils have to be able to transfer their knowledge to enable them to be built on in next stage of their education.
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principal of adequacy
The task should be within their abilities, it has to be achievable and stimulating for them to feel satisfied with their work.
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principle of permanence
This is a very important principle which is based on the fact that the human brain forgot very quickly. Under this principle we should place great emphasis on presenting new curriculum and struggle against forgetting – revision. -
principle of consistency
The curriculum should be taught in context, particular teaching objects should follow the previous ones.
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principle of individuality
This principle is based on the fact that each pupil is different and unique from others and it is necessary to treat him or her on the basis of this principle.
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principle of feedback
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Based on the feedback you can get information about how the pupil achieves the set objectives. You can also diagnose faults that are a natural part of the learning process and explain where the mistake is. (Skalková, J., 1999)
The principles set out above are those that should be followed when creating any kind of teaching object. Now I set those that are important when designing IWB teaching materials. You have to follow specific rules:
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Before starting to design teaching material, you should find time to become familiar with the board, discover what it can do and what you can do with the board and software.
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Play with the board, explore the software options, gallery, activities, tools and other things that help you to make your materials being as most interactive, funny and enjoyable as possible.
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Look for inspiration on websites of the IWB producers, you can find interesting tips and already made lesson plans for IWBs and last but not least animation tutorials that show you how to design objects step by step.
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When designing particular objects make sure, that the background is not white.
White background is not pleasant for the eyes at all. It could affect the length of pupils’ concentration.
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Keep in mind that learning objects have to be interactive both for teacher and pupils. -
Do not design IWB materials too complex. Pupils have to be comfortable with them, understand them and need to know what is expected of them.
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Remember that the materials don´t have to be finally finished. Let the space for adding extra materials and activities or just for changes that can be necessary if you find out the current material inappropriate or out of order.
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Make the materials to be beneficial for everyone. IWBs offer a variety of activities suitable for plenty of learning styles. Remember designing the objects so that each pupil can benefit from them.
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When designing teaching object there are some formalities that should not be missed out such as title page, contents and list of symbols used.
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When making contents it is very suitable to make individual parts as links to the relevant pages. Then it is easy to get the page you want immediately with a single click. On each page you can put a button which returns you to home page with a single click.
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Good teaching materials have symbols for particular activities. To let users be comfortable with these symbols the list of these symbols is required. It is much easier for users to become familiar with the activities included. The symbols are a part of the gallery of the software or you can create your own symbols using a variety of pictures.
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Each teaching object should consist of methodological notes where it is set how to work with the object. It can be beneficial for you in the case of using the material after long time and forgetting the objects and goals. But above all it is necessary if you provide the materials for other users. If there are no methodological notes, other users can have difficulties in understanding the tasks and lesson objectives. Then they can use them inappropriately and cannot get maximum of them. Software for designing interactive materials includes special pages for these notes.
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You have to write down the list of resources used. If you used any pictures, songs, videos and anything what is not the part of the software, you have to put in resources list. If you just use the gallery, activities and tools of the IWB software it is also good to mention it.
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If there are some words or longer texts, use a font that is easily readable and of appropriate size, it is always better to use the font bigger than smaller.
If IWB is used in the classroom it is also good to think about following things:
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Think about arrangement of the classroom and your classroom location when using the board. In contrast to using classic black board there is a disadvantage of using IWB – it throws a shadow that can keep pupils from seeing the objects on the board. The best desks arrangement is a horseshoe because everyone can see the board well and has an easy access to the board. Avoid having obstacles between pupils and the board.
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-
When using IWB in lesson, avoid dominating the board the lesson. If you let the board do all the work in lesson, pupils would not benefit from it as much as if you react on situations that occur by giving extra questions, encouraging discussion among pupils on problems occurred and other situations that you do not expect.
I think it is very important to follow the basic criteria for creating teaching materials and using IWB in the classroom at all. The criteria I have established are the barest minimum what everyone should follow. It is possible to build on them and make the lessons with IWB better and better.
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Conclusion
The aim of my thesis is a summary of theoretical aspects that are necessary for successful educational process. The emphasis is put on motivation, learning styles of pupils’ and requirements of the Framework Educational Programme, on which basis I check whether there are possibilities to improve English grammar teaching at primary schools using
Interactive Whiteboard.
I have chosen the topic for my thesis due to the findings that although schools are now well equipped with tools of information and communication technology, these tools are still not used as much as they could be. For this reason I feel that my thesis could be motivation for using information and communication technology at schools, especially Interactive
Whiteboard.
The Interactive Whiteboard is a relatively new technological tool. More and more teachers use this tool in their lessons. Based on the market research I have found out, that there is not a wide range of interactive teaching materials for grammar teaching available.
Although the Interactive Whiteboards are in the classroom today mostly used, teachers do not have these teaching materials available at schools. After studying theoretical basis, I designed a set of teaching objects for grammar teaching in primary school. My work itself can be both material that teachers can use in their classes and subject to designing their own teaching materials. I can also see the benefits of my thesis in the practical use of designed objects in classes. I have confirmed my belief that the objects that I had designed fulfil its function.
Teaching using the interactive objects met the expectations in the field of pupils’ motivation and effectivity of the educational process.
Despite the fact that the preparation for lessons with use of Interactive Whiteboard is challenging, I believe that my thesis will be useful for teachers who already work with
Interactive Whiteboard but also for those that are going to use it and do not have much experience with it. I hope that the teaching material I have designed will be available to the general public through educational materials and training database. I also hope that it will be a good manual for working with the Interactive Whiteboard as a great technical tool.
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[qtd. 21 Sept. 2011]
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Whiteboards Help? . [ online] [15 April 2011]
Available on World Wide Web:
<http://chiron.valdosta.edu/are/Artmanscrpt/vol1no1/beeland_am.pdf>.
Cuthell J.P. 2003 Interactive Whiteboards: new tools, new pedagogies, new learning?
Reflections from teachers. [ online] [qtd. 22 July 2011] Available on World Wide Web:
<http://www.virtuallearning.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/Interactive-whiteboardsurvey.pdf>.
Department for Education and Skills. The Interactive Whiteboards, Pedagogy and Pupil
Performance Evaluation: An Evaluation of the Schools Whiteboard Expansion (SWE) Project:
London Challenge.[ online]
[20 June 2011]
Available on World Wide Web:
<http://education.gov.uk/publications/eOrdering Download/RR816%20Report.pdf>.
Dictionary of Contemporary English. Harlow: Longman, 2001. 1668 p. ISBN 0-582-45630-4.
DUDENEY, G., HOCKLY, N. How to teach English with technology. Harlow: Longman,
2007. 192 p. ISBN 9781405853088.
Emerging Perspectives on Learning, Teaching, and Technology. [online] [12 Aug. 2011]
Available on WorldWideWeb:˂http://projects.coe.uga.edu/epltt/index.php? title=Multiple_
Intelligences_and_Learning_Styles˃.
Evaluation of the Primary Schools Whiteboard Expansion Project – summary report. [online]
[10 June 2011] Available on WorldWideWeb:˂http://downloads01.smarttech.com/media/ research/international_research/uk/becta_executive_expansion_summary.pdf˃. Framework Educational Programme for Basic Education. [online] 2007 [14 June 2011]
Available on World Wide Web: < http://www.msmt.cz/vzdelavani/framework-educationprogramme-for-basic-education>.
HALLIWELL, S. Teaching English in the Primary Classroom. London: Longman, 1992.
169 p. ISBN 0-582-07109-7
HANUŠ, R., CHYTILOVÁ, L. Zážitkově pedagogické učení. Praha: Grada, 2009. 192 p.
ISBN 978-80-247-2816-2.
HARMER, J. Teaching and Learning Grammar. London: Longman, 1987. 71 p. ISBN 0582-74623-X
72
Motivation. [ online]
[28 July 2011]
Available on World Wide Web:
<http://59.163.61.3:8080/GRATEST/SHOWTEXFILE.do?page_id=user_image&user_image
_id=827>.
NCTE Advice Sheet – Interactive Whiteboards. Advice sheet 16. [ online] [22 June 2011]
Available on World WideWeb:˂http://www.ncte.ie/documents/advicesheets/16Interactive
WBsNov08.pdf˃.
PETTY, G. Moderní vyučování. Praha: Portál, 2006. 380p. ISBN 8073671727.
PHILLIPS, S. Young Learners. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993. 182 p. ISBN 019437195-6 .
SCOTT, W. A., YTREBERG, L. H. Teaching English to Children. New York: Longman,
1990. 115 p. ISBN 0-582-74606-X.
SCRIVENER, J.: Teaching Grammar. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003. 65 p. ISBN
0-19442179-1.
SEIFERT, M., VEDRALOVÁ A. Učební styly žáků - výzva pro české učitele? Rodina a škola, 2010, vol.57, no. 7, p. 22-23.
SKALKOVÁ, J. Obecná didaktika. Praha: Grada, 2008. 328 p. ISBN 978-80-247-1821-7.
SLATTERY, M., WILLIS, J. English for Primary Teachers. Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2006. 148 p. ISBN 978-0-19-437563-4.
SMART Technologies, Inc. Interactive Whiteboards and Learning. [online] 2006 [qtd. 28
July 2011] Available on World Wide Web: < http://smarttech.com>.
Smartboard. [ online] [15 June 2011] Available on World WideWeb:˂http://smartboardhat.wikispaces.com/file/view/wtrs_whiteboards.pdf˃.
STARÝ, K. a kol. Učitelé učitelů. Praha: Portál, 2008. 112 p. ISBN 978-80-7367-513-4.
The Interactive Whiteboards, Pedagogy and Pupil Performance Evaluation: An Evaluation of the Schools Whiteboard Expansion (SWE) Project: London Challenge. Research. [online]
[28 July 2011]
Available on WorldWideWeb:˂https://www.education.gov.uk/ publications/eOrderingDownload/RR816%20Report.pdf˃. Wikipedia Free Encyclopedia. [ online] [qtd. 28 July 2011] Available on WorldWideWeb:
˂http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interaction˃.
73
Appendix
1
Interactive teaching objects designed - CD
2
Expected outcomes of stage 1, period 1 and 2 according to the FEP
RECEPTIVE, PRODUCTIVE AND INTERACTIVE LANGUAGE SKILLS
Expected outcomes – Period 1 pupils will
pronounce and read correctly in terms of phonetics an appropriate vocabulary range
understand simple instructions and sentences and respond appropriately
distinguish between the written and spoken form of a word
understand the content and meaning of a simple, slow and carefully pronounced conversation between two people, provided there is enough time for understanding
use an alphabetical glossary in a textbook
RECEPTIVE LANGUAGE SKILLS
Expected outcomes – Period 2 pupils will
understand familiar words and simple sentences related to the topics being covered
understand the content and meaning of simple authentic materials (magazines, pictorial and listening materials) and use them in their activities
read a simple text aloud containing familiar vocabulary; reading is fluent and phonetically correct find necessary information in a simple text and formulate an answer to a question
use a bilingual dictionary
PRODUCTIVE LANGUAGE SKILLS
Expected outcomes – Period 2 pupils will
form a simple written message, short text and response to a message that is correct in terms of both grammar and form; fill in a form with their personal data
reproduce, both orally and in writing, the content of a text and simple conversation of appropriate difficulty
modify short texts while adhering to their meaning
74
3
Interactive materials available – overview
Publisher
Primary Course Books Supplementary
Interactive Materials primary Interactive materials Oxford
Chit Chat 1,2
University Press Family and Friends 1-6
Happy
Earth
New
Edition 1,2
Happy
House
New
Edition 1,2
Happy
Street
New
Edition 1,2
New Chatterbox Starter,
1, 2
Super Surprise 1-6
Treetops 1-4
Incredible English 1-6
Macmillan
Way Ahead 1-6
The Busy Board 1-3
Animal Explorers
Fraus
Start with Click 1,2
Cambridge
Kid´s Box 1-6
University Press
Leda
Longman
Terasoft
Langmaster
Language focus all language skills – reading, writing, listening, speaking, clear grammar focus skills across the curriculum, games and activities
all language skills, vocabulary, grammar all language skills all language skills, syllabus for the Cambridge
Young
Learners English tests
Tell me More Kids listening, speaking
1-3
Longman Children´s vocabulary
Picture Dictionary
Angličtina
pro vocabulary, školáky 1-2 pronunciation, listening, reading with understanding, grammar practise
Zak´s Wordgames vocabulary 75
4
Websites overview
www.interakceprozkolu.kvalitne.cz
-
Quantity of materials – About 60 materials sorted by grades 3-5, about 70 materials sorted by topic
-
Language skills developed
– vocabulary practise, grammar practise, text
understanding, some materials are rather designed for individual work on computer
-
Quality of materials – these materials are of a very good quality
-
Websites clarity – well arranged, materials are arranged by grades or by topics
www.vyukovematerialy.eu
-
Quantity of materials – 30 links to another websites
-
Language skills developed – for practise of all language skills, large variety of materials -
Quality of materials – some of the materials are of good quality, some of poor
-
Websites clarity – the page is too clear, I miss arrangement by topics, age, groups etc.
www.veskole.cz
-
Quantity of materials – 187 materials for primary schools that are then sorted by type
(169 materials designed in Smart Notebook software and
18 links to another -
websites)
-
Language skills developed – all skills through large variety of activities
-
Quality of materials – there are lot of materials of very good quality. Some of designed materials consist of everything what a good material should – goals, key words, sources used, methodological teacher´s notes etc.
-
Websites clarity – home page is very clear, you can simply choose the material you want by type of school. You can also simply search materials by author, school or source name.
76
www.activucitel.cz
-
Quantity of materials – about 300 materials for teaching English in primary school
-
Language skills developed – all language skills, mainly vocabulary and grammar
-
Quality of materials – these materials are of medium quality. Some are better, some are worse. They mostly lack good methodological notes. It can be quite difficult to know how to work with them and make the most of them.
-
Website clarity – the main page is very clear, it´s easy to find material what you just need. You can find the material simply by keyword or by type of school and subject.
www.exchange.smarttech.com
This is an external source of professional lessons, images, web pages and other tools.
-
Quantity of materials – only two materials designed for primary English teaching.
-
Language skills developed – vocabulary
-
Quality of designed materials – these materials are rather of poor quality
-
Website clarity – the main page is very clever, it´s easy to find anything, you can search by keywords, subjects and grades.
www.avmedia.cz
-
Quantity of materials – this webpage consists only small amount of materials for
Smart Boards and also some links to the other web pages, for example those that consist sources for Smart Boards or school webs with sources for interactive teaching.
-
Quality of materials – materials that I found on these websites are of poor quality
-
Website clarity – this website is not very clear, it is not easy to search for material which you would like.
77
www.prometheanplanet.com
-
Quantity of materials – international websites with a very big amount of lesson plans teaching with ActivBoard. They can be very good for teaching other subjects through
English.
-
Language skills developed – you can find a variety of materials developing all language skills.
-
Quality of materials - the lesson plans are of a good quality with methodological notes. -
Websites clarity – the websites are very clear, you can find the lesson plan by keywords, language, age range, subject area, file format and other criteria.
78
5
Questionnaire
Letter to primary teachers
Vážený kolego/kolegyně!
Za účelem výzkumu ve své diplomové práci na téma „Teaching grammar to young learners using Interactive Whiteboard“ si Vás dovoluji požádat o pomoc a vyplnění dotazníku na téma interaktivní tabule.
Náplní dotazníku jsou otázky týkající se interaktivní tabule a výukových materiálů na interaktivní tabuli. Cílem je zjistit, zda ve škole, kde pracujete, je interaktivní tabule, zda ji využíváte, jaké interaktivní výukové materiály využíváte a zda si tvoříte výukové materiály sami. Interaktivní tabule dnes vstupuje do našich škol a zaujímá své místo ve vyučování a já bych chtěla zjistit, jaká je skutečnost, jestli a jak ji Vy používáte ve svých hodinách.
Dotazník obsahuje 13 otázek. U některých otázek naleznete možné odpovědi v závorkách, zvolenou odpověď napište pod otázku. Některé otázky jsou otevřené, napište prosím svoji odpověď taktéž pod danou otázku. V tabulce vepište křížek tam, kde bude odpovídající. Zodpovězený dotazník prosím pošlete na adresu a.verna@seznam.cz.
Předem Vám děkuji za ochotu a čas věnovaný vyplnění dotazníku. Budete-li mít zájem, s radostí Vám pošlu závěry plynoucí z mého výzkumu jakožto i výukové materiály pro výuku gramatiky na interaktivní tabuli, které jsem pro účely své diplomové práce navrhla.
S pozdravem
Alexandra Povjakalová
DOTAZNÍK INTERAKTIVNÍ TABULE
1. Máte ve škole interaktivní tabuli? (ano – ne)
2. Pokud ano, jaký typ interaktivní tabule máte? (Activboard, Smart Board, Interwrite, jiný) 3. Máte interaktivní tabuli ve své třídě či učebně? (ano – ne)
79
4. Jak často využíváte interaktivní tabuli?
5. Vytváříte si výukové interaktivní materiály sami? (ano – ne)
6. Pokud ano, k rozvíjení jakých jazykových dovedností nejčastěji vytváříte své materiály? (slovní zásoba, gramatika, jiné – uveďte jaké)
7. Pokud si vytváříte vlastní materiály, poskytujete vytvořené materiály ostatním vyučujícím, např. na úložiště výukových materiálů apod. (ano – ne)
8. Znáte tyto výukové materiály jednotlivých nakladatelství? Využíváte je? (napište křížek - x)
Interaktivní materiál (k učebnici)
Znám
Využívám
Chit Chat iTools – Oxford University Press
(OUP)
Family and Friends iTools - OUP
Happy Earth New Edition iTools - OUP
Happy House New Edition iTools - OUP
Happy Street New Edition iTools - OUP
New Chatterbox iTools - OUP
Super Surprise iTools - OUP
Treetops iTools - OUP
Incredible English iTools - OUP
Way Ahead - Macmillan
The Busy Board – Macmillan
Start with Click – Fraus
Kid´s Box - Cambridge University Press
Tell me More Kids – Leda
Longman Children´s Picture Dictionary –
Longman
Angličtina pro školáky - Terasoft
Zak´s Wordgames - Langmaster
9. Používáte volně dostupné interaktivní materiály z webových stránek? (ano – ne)
10. Pokud ano, jaké stránky to jsou?
11. Jste muž – žena?
12. Do jaké věkové skupiny patříte? (20-29 let, 30-39 let, 40-49 let, 50-59 let, jiné)
80
6
Interactive materials included in school survey – overview
Chit Chat iTools – Oxford University Press (OUP)
Family and Friends iTools – OUP
Happy Earth New Edition iTools – OUP
Happy House New Edition iTools – OUP
Happy Street New Edition iTools – OUP
New Chatterbox iTools – OUP
Super Surprise iTools – OUP
Treetops iTools – OUP
Incredible English iTools – OUP
Way Ahead – Macmillan
The Busy Board – Macmillan
Start with Click – Fraus
Kid´s Box - Cambridge University Press
Tell me More Kids – Leda
Longman Children´s Picture Dictionary – Longman
Angličtina pro školáky – Terasoft
Zak´s Wordgames – Langmaster
81
7
Pictures
Pic. 1 Contents and links to the relevant page
Pic. 2 The overview of used symbols
82
Bibliography: Cuthell J.P. 2003 Interactive Whiteboards: new tools, new pedagogies, new learning? Reflections from teachers Dictionary of Contemporary English. Harlow: Longman, 2001. 1668 p. ISBN 0-582-45630-4. DUDENEY, G., HOCKLY, N. How to teach English with technology. Harlow: Longman, 2007 Emerging Perspectives on Learning, Teaching, and Technology. [online] [12 Aug. 2011] Available on WorldWideWeb:˂http://projects.coe.uga.edu/epltt/index.php? title=Multiple_ HALLIWELL, S. Teaching English in the Primary Classroom. London: Longman, 1992. HARMER, J. Teaching and Learning Grammar. London: Longman, 1987. 71 p. ISBN 0582-74623-X 72 PETTY, G. Moderní vyučování. Praha: Portál, 2006. 380p. ISBN 8073671727. PHILLIPS, S. Young Learners. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993. 182 p. ISBN 019437195-6 . SCOTT, W. A., YTREBERG, L. H. Teaching English to Children. New York: Longman, 1990 SCRIVENER, J.: Teaching Grammar. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003. 65 p. ISBN 0-19442179-1. SEIFERT, M., VEDRALOVÁ A. Učební styly žáků - výzva pro české učitele? Rodina a škola, 2010, vol.57, no SKALKOVÁ, J. Obecná didaktika. Praha: Grada, 2008. 328 p. ISBN 978-80-247-1821-7. SLATTERY, M., WILLIS, J. English for Primary Teachers. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006 STARÝ, K. a kol. Učitelé učitelů. Praha: Portál, 2008. 112 p. ISBN 978-80-7367-513-4.
FACULTY OF EDUCATION
DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE
TEACHING GRAMMAR TO YOUNG
LEARNERS USING INTERACTIVE
WHITEBOARD
MASTER THESIS
BRNO 2012
Supervisor: Mgr. Ivana Hrozková
Written by: Alexandra Povjakalová
Acknowledgement
I would like to express my thanks to Mrs. Mgr. Ivana Hrozková for her helpful comments and encouragement. 2
Declaration
I hereby declare that this diploma thesis was done by my own and I used only the materials that are stated in bibliography.
I agree with the placing of this thesis in the Masaryk University Brno Information system, in the library of the Department of English Language and Literature and with the access for studying purposes.
In Brno ............................................
........................................................
Alexandra Povjakalová
3
Bibliography
POVJAKALOVÁ, Alexandra. Teaching Grammar to Young Learners using Interactive
Whiteboard; diploma thesis. Brno: Masaryk University, Faculty of education, Department of
English Language and Literature, 2012. 82 pages, the supervisor is Mgr. Ivana Hrozková.
Resume
The main aim of my thesis “Teaching Grammar to Young Learners using Interactive
Whiteboard” is to design teaching objects for Interactive Whiteboard to teach English grammar in the 5th grade of primary school and to find out, based on practical examination in lessons, how this technical tool helps learners in the complex process of education.
The thesis is divided into theoretical and practical part. The theoretical part deals with the theory of motivation and its role in education, the use of modern technology in today’s school. This section is also dedicated to the characteristics of young learners, learning styles, key competencies and expected outcomes in teaching English grammar at primary school, aspects that are important theoretical basics for the practical part of my thesis. In the practical part I conducted a market research on the availability of materials for teaching English using
Interactive Whiteboard. On its basis I did a questionnaire survey at schools. The main part
I dedicated to teaching objects that I designed and then applied in lessons. Finally I stated the criteria for designing teaching objects which I reached when designing the objects and in their actual use in lessons.
Keywords
motivation, interactive whiteboard, young learners, grammar, grammar teaching, learning styles, market research, school survey, teaching object, designed material, key competencies
4
Resume
Hlavním cílem mé diplomové práce “Teaching Grammar to Young Learners using
Interactive Whiteboard” je vytvoření výukových objektů pro práci s interaktivní tabulí k výuce anglické gramatiky v 5. ročníku základní školy a na základě praktického ověřování ve výuce zjistit, jak tato technická pomůcka pomáhá žákům v komplexním procesu vzdělávání. Práce je rozdělena na teoretickou a praktickou část. V teoretické části se zabývám teorií motivace a její roli v procesu vzdělávání, využití moderní technologie v dnešní škole.
V této části se dále věnuji charakteristice mladších žáků, učebním stylům, klíčovým kompetencím a očekávaným výstupům v oblasti výuky anglické gramatiky na prvním stupni základní školy, tedy aspektům, které jsou důležitými teoretickými východisky pro praktickou část mé práce. V praktické části jsem provedla průzkum trhu týkající se dostupnosti výukových materialů pro výuku anglického jazyka a následný dotazníkový průzkum na školách. Hlavní součástí praktické části práce jsou výukové objekty, které jsem vytvořila a následně aplikovala v hodinách. V závěru jsem uvedla kritéria pro tvorbu výukových objektů, ke kterým jsem dospěla při vlastní tvorbě materiálů a jejich použití v hodinách.
Klíčová slova motivace, interaktivní tabule, mladší žáci, gramatika, výuka gramatiky, učební styly, průzkum trhu, školní průzkum, výukový objekt, vytvořený materiál, klíčové kompetence
5
Content
Introduction ...................................................................................................................... 8
I
1
2
3
Motivating learners to learn ............................................................................................. 10
1.1
Role of motivation in terms of educational psychology ............................................ 11
1.2
Factors influencing motivation .................................................................................. 12
Interactive teaching .......................................................................................................... 14
2.1
What interactive teaching means ............................................................................... 14
2.2
What supports interactive teaching............................................................................ 15
2.3
Using technology in a classroom – Interactive Whiteboards .................................... 15
2.4
Advantages and disadvantages of Interactive Whiteboards ...................................... 17
Learning styles ................................................................................................................. 19
3.1
4
Theoretical part .......................................................................................................... 10
How can Interactive Whiteboard help? ..................................................................... 20
Teaching grammar to young learners ............................................................................... 21
4.1
Young learners ........................................................................................................... 21
4.2 What is grammar ........................................................................................................... 23
4.3
The role of grammar in teaching young learners ....................................................... 23
4.4
Ways of teaching grammar ........................................................................................ 24
4.5 Stages in teaching grammar .......................................................................................... 24
5
Grammar structures in primary teaching .......................................................................... 26
5.1
Framework Educational Programme ......................................................................... 26
5.2
Expected outcomes according to the Framework Educational Programme .............. 28
II Practical part .............................................................................................................. 29
6
Market research ................................................................................................................ 29
7
School survey on using IWBs .......................................................................................... 32
8
7.1
Questionnaire ............................................................................................................. 32
7.2
Questionnaire summary ............................................................................................. 43
Grammar in 5th grade of primary school ......................................................................... 44
8.1
Designing teaching objects ........................................................................................ 44
8.2
Designed materials in use .......................................................................................... 46
8.3
Evaluation of the lessons ........................................................................................... 64
6
8.4
Criteria for designing interactive teaching materials ................................................. 66
Conclusion ....................................................................................................................... 71
Bibliography ................................................................................................................... 72
Appendix ......................................................................................................................... 74
7
Introduction
Teaching, its methods and forms got through many innovative changes during a period of several years. Mass development of information and communication technologies, new education programmes, multimedia technology and especially Interactive Whiteboards allow teachers to improve English language teaching. Teachers have amazing tool to make their teaching more motivational, funnier and effective.
I worked out my thesis by drawing on the teaching methods and forms that lead pupils to achieve learning outcomes and to the creation of key competencies in accordance with the
Framework Educational Programme. The methods that I have chosen correspond with the style of my work and level of teaching experience and knowledge that I have reached in my experience. From pupils’ perspective I put emphasis on the methods to be interesting, fun and motivating. I tried to choose methods so that pupils’ skills and knowledge are related to their practical life.
If we design teaching materials for the age group of young learners, we have to take into account the many factors that I mentioned in the theoretical part of my thesis. The
Interactive Whiteboard is undouptedly excellent technical tool, but it cannot work alone without teacher and quality preparation. If we want to design educational material that works and pupils get the most out of it in terms of skills and knowledge, we must take into account these aspects. One of them is motivation which I gave a lot of attention in my thesis, because it is one of the most important driving forces in the lerning process. I outlined the factors that increase motivation and I followed by technical tools which are for pupils, in today’s world technology, very motivating and natural to use. The Interactive Whiteboard is one of the most modern teachers’ tools in education. Its use has both advantages and disadvantages to which I pointed out. Another unforgettable factor is a learning style that pupil prefers. Learning styles play a big role in the learning process in view of the fact that pupils are different and prefer different approaches. Based on these finding, I also tried to design my teaching objects to suit pupils with different learning styles. Further I devote to the characteristics of young learners, the issue of grammar and its role in teaching young learners.
In today’s school the
8
importance is placed on the Framework Educational Programme. Therefore I proceeded from the key competencies and expected outcomes that are enshrined in this document.
In i crucial part of my thesis, the practical part, I conducted market research. I focused on interactive educational materials for teaching English in primary school available. Based on the results of the survey I conducted a questionnaire survey in schools on Interactive
Whiteboards and interactive educational materials, where I also determined what of the materials available on the market are actually used at schools. Then I designed teaching objects for teaching English grammar to young learners, which I verified in practice and made reflection of the lessons. Finally I outlined the criteria that should be accomplished in designing teaching materials, so as to be most effective.
9
I
Theoretical part
1
Motivating learners to learn
“You were not born a winner, and you were not born a loser.
You are what you make yourself be.”
Lou Holtz
From a pedagogical point of view, according to Hanuš and Chytilová, motivating learners in education is considered to be one of the most important fields. Pupil´s success in the educational process is not determined only by his innate abilities but also by other stimuli.
The task of the teacher is to support and develop these impulses. Motivation is one of these stimuli. Motivation helps to develop pupils positively. Suitable motivational activities of teachers can raise and maintain pupil´s interest in learning, particular subject or other learning activities. (Hanuš, R., Chytilová, L. ,2009)
The word motivation can be explained in this way: “The word motivation comes from the Latin word ‘moveers’ which to move. Motivation is the energizing force that directs and controls our behaviour towards the achievement of our goals. It refers to those factors, which increase the vigour of an individuals’ activity. It energizes the person, prompts and compels him to act and behave in particular way so as to satisfy his needs. In education, motivation is arousal of interest in learning and is required for effective management of the learning process.” (Available on World Wide Web: <
http://59.163.61.3:8080/GRATEST/
SHOWTEXFILE. do?page_id=user_image&user_image_id=827>)
In pedagogical activities motivation has an irreplaceable and indispensable role.
Motivated child explores the world, asks the questions, disarrange what he can only to discover how it is.
10
1.1 Role of motivation in terms of educational psychology
Skalková in her book Obecná didaktika deals with the theories of motivation. I agree with her theories that teachers use motivation to lead pupils to the chosen target. If teacher motivates pupils inappropriately, their relation to school and also to particular subjects has a negative effect on their positive relation to learning. It often causes pupils´ lack of interest in given subject. Pupils in the beginning of their education look forward to school. Pupils who are getting ready for school are motivated by the vision of school, where they will learn how to write, read, count, paint, find out many interesting things in particular subjects. But it may happen that due to the inappropriate motivating activities of some teachers the opposite can occur, a pupil is afraid of school.
Skalková states that in teaching terms it is very important to divide the primary and secondary motivation. Primary motivation is based on the natural pupils´ needs. All children are naturally inquiring and try to learn everything new. If we set pupil a task or if he tries to learn something new, we get to know that energy inherent in every human inspires effort to perform the tasks and discover them. (Skalková, J. 2008)
Secondary motivation encourages a pupil up to achieve something. Motivational factor in this respect is a good mark or teacher praise. Punishment or prohibition can also be good secondary motivational factors. Teachers can very well affect secondary motivation either positively or negatively. (Skalková, J. 2008)
In the learning process, both primary and secondary motivation motives shade into each other. Primary motivation works in close conjunction with secondary motivation in view of the fact that pupils in learning process have to learn also what does not arouse their natural interest. In these cases it depends on the teacher and motivational activities that he choose, the way that he choose to achieve the goals so that the curriculum is meaningful for children. I also agree with the opinion of Starý, who says that it is important for teacher to be aware of the real function of motivation. If he teaches young children he has to use immediate motivation, can take advantage of an interesting game, use an interesting pictures, praise or change activity. This kind of motivation enables teacher to achieve the goals better and increase children´s interest in learning. (Starý, K. A kol., 2008)
11
Document Interactive Whiteboards and Learning states that “another types of motivation are intrinsic and extrinsic motivation. Motivation in the context of the classroom is measured by a student´s drive to participate in the learning process. Although students may be equally motivated to perform a task, the sources of their motivation may differ. Some students are intrinsically motivated do learn because they are driven to understand through reflection and enjoy participating in learning activities. Others are extrinsically motivated by enticements, rewards or teacher-defined objectives.”(Available on World Wide Web:
<http://www.its-networks.com/pdfs/White_Papers/smart/Int_Whiteboard_Research_White
paper.pdf>)
1.2 Factors influencing motivation
The teachers’ task is to increase the motivation of learners that they already bring into the learning process. Motivational factors, which should always be in the spotlight when teachers prepare their lessons, Petty1 states in his book Teaching Today.
These are the factors:
Fantasy
Lessons should be variable and enjoyable and teachers should:
-
give sufficient space for pupils´ activities, that should be funny.
-
direct learning so that it is related to pupils´ real life.
-
use personal dimension.
-
give pupils opportunities for expressing themselves and their creativity.
-
give pupils opportunities to become enthusiastic about the subject.
-
be mindful of having a good relationship with pupils.
Appreciation
-
Pupils´ effort should be often appreciated in the form of marks, praises, encouragement etc.
-
Success should be appreciated only when it is achieved.
1
Petty, G.: Moderní vyučování, Portál, 2006. According to Hanuš, R., Chytilová, L.: Zážitkově pedagogické učení, Praha: Grada, 2009.
12
Goals
Teachers should:
-
place demands on pupils so that they can achieve the goals.
-
set goals so that pupils do not lose the desire to reach the goals.
-
motivate pupils by unpleasant consequences if they do not learn.
-
assign individual targets and praise pupils when they accomplish them.
-
encourage pupils to take responsibility for their own learning
Success
-
Teachers should keep in mind that the level and pace of work have to be suitable for all pupils of different abilities.
-
Each pupil should have such a work programme so that it corresponds with his abilities, current knowledge and experience.
Sense
-
Pupils should understand the personal benefits that learning brings.
-
Pupils should be aware of the importance of learning for their success in life.
-
Teachers should sell what they teach.
Pupils’ creativity, development of key competencies and motivation are in the educationa process positively affected by the factors mentioned above. (Hanuš, R., Chytilová, L., 2009)
The British Educational Communications and Technology Agency (Becta) in its ICT
Research refers to the fact, that the right choice of teaching method significantly contributes to increase pupils´ motivation, development of key competencies and pupils´ creativity.
Interactive Whiteboard (IWB) is one of the means and teachers’ tools that can motivate pupils in learning. Increasing motivation is one of the most important benefits that using IWBs brings. Reasons for this are:
-
things that pupils love like videos and websites can be easily integrated into lessons -
the high level of pupils involvement in lesson – pupils love being physically in touch with the board , manipulating texts and images
13
To enable pupils to use the board so that they are engaged with learning materials is fundamental in increasing motivation and learning gains. (Available on World Wide Web:
<http://www.ansn.edu.au/files/BECTA%20article%20on%20interactive%20whiteboards.pdf)
2
Interactive teaching
What do we imagine when somebody says interactive teaching?
The free
encyclopedia Wikipedia explains as one of the possibilities of the word interaction “a kind of action that occurs as two or more objects have an effect upon one another.” (Available on
World Wide Web: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interaction>)
2.1 What interactive teaching means
From the previous definition of the word interaction is possible to derive concept of interactive teaching as two-way influence of two factors. In the school environment it is the interaction between teacher and pupil, pupil and technical equipment (interactive whiteboard or computer) or between pupils themselves. Years ago teachers used in lessons just books for explaining new curriculum. Teachers mostly presented new curriculum through explanation or lecture. Pupils were forced to listen and make notes in their exercise books. Currently the method of teaching through interactive activities is very desirable. Teachers try to assist students in obtaining knowledge and support pupils´ effort to achieve knowledge. Pupils do it not only through listening but mainly through active approach in lessons.
Teacher´s work is currently much more demanding than it was once. If the teacher wants to use interactive approach and interactive forms of teaching, if he wants to involve pupils into the educational process, he has to prepare for this activity. He has to prepare activities which support pupils´ interactive approach. It is necessary to find and classify information that are usable in lessons and are connected with the practical life. The benefit of present time is that teachers can illustratively and actively work with materials designed in digital environment and save them for later use.
14
Nowadays modern technologies are used in school educational process. Interactive teaching is mediated through the “interactive learning object”. Interactive learning object is an integrated whole and didactical complex of teaching elements (sounds, charts, texts, pictures, images, videos, graphs), assembled into one unit, that enables interaction between the teacher and pupils.
2.2 What supports interactive teaching
On the basis of the previous facts we can say that interactive teaching supports pupils’ active approach to their education and learning. Teachers work with materials which pupils can apply in their real lives and that is why they are close to them. This form of learning supports pupils´ independence, cooperation, creativity and helps pupils to express their own opinions and ideas. It creates a sense of responsibility for collective task.
Modern
technologies used in interactive teaching help teachers to mediate the relations between subjects more illustratively. It helps to improve cross-curricular links. Various types of interactive teaching help pupils to remember and understand new things.
2.3 Using technology in a classroom – Interactive Whiteboards
According to Dudeney and Hockly using technology in teaching language is not new.
Technology has been used in teaching many years ago. Tape recorders, later CD players, videos, overhead projector and video have been used and they are still used in classrooms around the world. (Dudeney, G., Hockly, N., 2007)
Computer –based materials for language teaching called as CALL (Computer Assisted
Language Learning) started to appear in the 80’s. These programmes usually required learners to respond to stimuli on the computer screen and perform tasks such as filling in gap texts, matching halves of sentences and doing multiply choice activities. When Information and
Communication Technology (ICT) spread more, computer-based materials for language teaching started to use the Internet and web-based tools. The term TELL (Technology
Enhanced Language Learning) appeared in the 1990s, in response to the growing possibilities
15
offered by the Internet and communications technology. Although teachers still do not use technology so much, the use of technology in the classroom is growing so fast, that soon it will be an usual part of English Language Teaching (ELT). One of the significant reasons is that young learners are growing up with technology and it is a normal and natural part of their lives. I teacher uses technology with these learners, he brings the outside world into the classroom. Other reasons for this are:
Internet accessibility – nowadays you can connect to the Internet almost everywhere – at home, in school, in cafés, in a bus, in a shopping centre
English as an international language is being used in technologically mediated contexts
Technology, especially the Internet offers many opportunities for real tasks and materials and almost infinite number of ready-made teaching materials
The Internet enables great opportunities for making contact with learners around the world
Technology is usually connected with published materials such as course books and teacher´s books.
Learners come to school with expectation of using technology in learning
Technology opens new ways of language practice and success evaluation
Using a variety of ICT tools enables learners to practice all the four main language skills – speaking, listening, writing and reading. (Dudeney, G., Hockly, N., 2007)
Dudeney and Hockly say: ”As there is not enough ICT training for teachers, they
avoid using technology in language teaching although the use of technology nowadays is so natural as the use of books or pencils or paper”.( Dudeney, G., Hockly, N., 2007)
One of the ICT tools is the interactive whiteboard (IWB). It is an irreplaceable technological tool that has its place in teaching. According to the document Interacctive
Whiteboards and learning published by SMART Technologies, Inc.2
2
the interactive
Smart Technologies, Inc., a full service computer and networking center.
16
whiteboard is “ a touch-sensitive screen that works in conjunction with a computer and a projector. The first interactive whiteboard was manufactured by SMART Technologies Inc. In
1991”. (Available on World Wide Web:<http://www.itsnetworks.com/pdfs/White_Papers/ smart/Int_Whiteboard_Research_White paper.pdf>)
IWB is a modern teachers’ tool that influence learning process in many ways. It helps in the field of pupils’ engagement in a classroom, it increases pupils’ motivation and enthusiasm. IWB’s can be used with learners with various learning styles so that they can support pupils with different learning needs.
“The effective use of interactive whiteboard technology can radically transform the interaction between teachers and learners and allows for discussing and analysing in a visual, auditory and kinaesthetic medium”. (Available on World Wide Web:< .”(Available on
World Wide Web:<http://www.dit.ie/lttc/media/ditlttc/documents/gettingthemost.pdf>)
2.4 Advantages and disadvantages of Interactive Whiteboards
IWB is undouptedly excellent tool and if the teacher knows how to use it, he can transform his teaching style and support his pupils to learn more effectively. The use of IWB in teaching has certainly its advantages as disadvantages. Both teachers and pupils can benefit from using IWB in classroom. In the document Getting the most from your interactive whiteboard – A guide for primary schools, published by Becta3, some benefits of whiteboards are mentioned.
IWB as a teaching tool:
3
-
is well adapted to whole class teaching (Glover, D., Miller, D., 2001)
-
encourages an interactive approach in that setting (Ball, 2003)
-
enables to use a variety of multimedia resources (Levy, P., 2002)
-
enables faster pace through the use of prepared materials
-
encourages sharing materials among other teachers (Kennewell, S., 2001)
-
teacher can control and lead all activities on the touch board
Becta, British Educational Communications and Technology Agency
17
-
gives teachers possibility to use a wide range of resources in preparating the materials
-
through the new technology encourages teachers in trying out new ways of teaching, using more ICT (Smith, H., 2001)
-
supports demonstrating and modelling
-
gives great opportunity to integrate ICT in lessons while teaching from the front of the class (Smith, H., 2001)
-
enables to increase spontaneity and flexibility if teachers can draw on a variety of internet resources (Kennewell, S., 2001)
-
enables teachers to save and print whatever on the board, notes written in the lesson
(Walker, D., 2002)
IWB as a learning tool:
-
support pupils of a variety learning styles
-
increases pupils’ motivation and engagement in learning
-
increases pupils’ interest with visual stimuli
-
keeps pupils focused on the board for a longer time
-
makes pupil’s attention and concentration better
-
develops pupils’ personal and social skills (Levy, P., 2002)
-
pupils do not have to use a keyboard to engage with the technology, increasing access for younger children and pupils with disabilities (Goodison, T., 2002)
Like everything, the IWB has also its disadvantages in addition to its benefits. Some deficiencies in using IWB that I have found during my teaching experience and using IWB are: -
getting IWB to school is usually a question of money, they are more expensive than other teaching tools
-
if IWB is used too often, it is no longer so attractive for pupils
-
excessive use of IWB can suppress abstract thinking of pupils
-
IWB is usually installed permanently and its height may not be suitable for different pupils and teachers
18
3
Learning styles
Pupils are different, have different values, needs and to acquire new knowledge they
use a variety of methods. These methods are called learning styles. Due to the fact that the emphasis is put on individual approach to pupils nowadays, teachers should be aware, that pupils prefer different learning styles. According to Seifert and Vedralová4, the new approaches and habits regarding drawing new information appear. Today’s pupils are from birth in contact with the computer and the Internet, the world of information technologies affects them from all sides. The value of new information declines proportionally to increasing availability and quantity of information. (Seifert, M., Vedralová, A., 2010)
The best ways of learning differ. Pupils prefer variety of learning styles, but there is not usually just one style that pupils prefer, it is mix of styles that pupils use in learning process. One learning style may be dominant, but it is accompanied by less dominant styles.
Dominance of individual learning style is not a constant thing, it may change during life.
(Seifert, M., Vedralová, A., 2010)
When transferring information to pupils, teachers should find appropriate ways of doing that, they should try to diagnose pupils’ learning styles. They can use standardized tests or their own pedagogical diagnostics. Study of pupils’ learning styles can help to make teaching more efficient and supports the idea of diversity in teaching. (Seifert, M., Vedralová,
A., 2010)
Pupils can prefer following learning styles:
Verbal (linguistic) – ability to learn through words and language – reading, speaking, writing.
Logical (mathematical) – ability to learn through data – collecting, organizing, analyzing and interpreting.
Visual (spatial) – ability to learn through movies, pictures, images, videos and demonstration. 4
Seifert, M., Vedralová A. Učební styly žáků - výzva pro české učitele? Rodina a škola, 2010, vol.57, no. 7,
p. 22-23
19
Bodily (kinesthetic) – ability to learn through body, hands, sense of touch, sports and physical activites.
Naturalistic – ability to recognize plants, animals, minerals, learn through classification activities.
Musical (aural) – ability to learn through music, sounds, rhythm and tones.
Interpersonal – ability to learn with others, in group.
Intrapersonal – ability to learn through own emotions and motivation, self-studying.
(Available on World Wide Web:<
http://projects.coe.uga.edu/epltt/index.php?
title=Multiple_Intelligences_and_Learning_Styles>)
3.1 How can Interactive Whiteboard help?
Smart Technologies, Inc. in its document deals with the question of how to help in educational process with using IWB. Educators constantly try to develop approaches and tools for pupils with different and various learning needs. As mentioned above, IWB is a teaching tool that can support different pupils learning styles. IWB can help pupils that require visual, hearing-impaired and other special needs. Pupils with different learning styles and needs can be:
“Visual learners - benefit from notes taken on the interactive whiteboard in addition to diagramming and manipulating objects or symbols. As the IWB is easy to use, it enables pupils of all ages to see their own writing ond objects of their own creation.
Kinesthetic or tactile learners – are typically difficult to engage in traditional classroom activities that are usually more visual or auditory in nature. They are able to reinforce learning through exercises involving touch, movement and space on IWB.
Deaf and hearing-impaired learners – rely primarily on visual learning, and the IWB facilitates the presentation of visual material with the use of sign language simultaneously in front of students.
Visually impaired learners – with some vision ability can manipulate objects and use large text on an IWB’s big surface and participate in computer-based learning in ways that would not be possible on a smaller computer screen.
20
Other special needs learners with learning challenges, such as physical ability needs and behavioural issues, Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD), also find the large interactive surface helpful. Its large size and touch sensitivity facilitates ICT learning beyond the standard keyboard and mouse type of computer interaction, and its appeal can be used to promote good behaviour.”(Available on World Wide Web:< http://downloads01.smarttech.com/ media/ research/whitepapers/int_whiteboard_research_whitepaper_update.pdf>)
4
Teaching grammar to young learners
4.1 Young learners
Children around the world begin to learn English at different ages. Different children have their differences, weaknesses, strengths, prefer different learning styles. So if we want to characterize the young learner, we have to focus on average child.
Scott and Ytreberg in their book Teaching English to children, divide young learners into two groups, because there is a difference between what children of six can do and what children of eleven can do. Differences between these children are undouptedly large and the teacher has to be aware of the characteristics of particular age group of children, their needs and adapt to these aspects to his teaching style, methods and activities. Children under seven, specifically, the five to seven years old, belong to the first group. According to Slattery and
Willis, this group is also called “very young learners”. The second group – young learners – are the eight to ten year olds or children between eight and twelve. (Slattery, M., Willis, J.,
2006)
As said before, pupils of different ages can do different things. There are some abilities that pupils can do at their own level.
Very young learners:
-
learn through hearing real English, the same ways as they learn their native language
-
learn through actions, games, playing, they learn new words naturally
-
learn through sounds, playing with words and phrases, songs
21
-
like having fun and need not to be aware of learning a foreign language
-
usually cannot read and write, so they need to learn new words through talk and games
-
are not able to understand grammatical rules, they need to hear lots of English, words and phrases so that their grammar will develop on its own (Slattery, M., Willis, J.,
2006)
Children between seven and twelve:
-
usually can read and write or are in process of learning it
-
develop their ability to think
-
are becoming aware of the real worlds and the world of fantasy
-
are able to plan and do the activity in the best way
-
can work with others and learn from others
-
are aware of the importance of reliability and responsibility for the whole class activities -
are able to make the most of reading books in English
-
can understand very simple explanation about how language works
-
are able to experiment with language, working with language creatively
-
can help teacher with organization of activities (Slattery, M., Willis, J., 2001)
Slattery and Willis say, that generally we can characterize all young children by these characteristics, they:
-
are developing very quickly as individuals
-
learn in variety of ways, by watching, listening, imitating, doing things
-
are not able to understand grammatical rules and explanations about language
-
try to make sense of situations by making use of non-verbal clues
-
talk in their mother tongue about what they understand and do – this helps them learn
-
can generally imitate the sounds they hear quite accurately and copy the way adults speak -
are naturally curious
-
love to play and use their imagination
-
are comfortable with routines and enjoy repetition
-
have quite a short attention span and so need variety (Slattery, M., Willis, J., 2001)
22
4.2 What is grammar
According to Longman Dictionary of contemporary English grammar is:
“The rules by which words change their forms and are combined into sentences, or the study or use of these rules.” (Longman Dictionary of contemporary English, 2001, p. 619)
The question is, if it is important to study grammar, if we need to know grammatical rules if we want to speak any language. The answer for this question is “No, we do not have to study grammar”. People around the world speak their first language without studying grammatical rules. Small children begin to speak without being aware of grammar. But if people want to use foreign language, grammar is necessary in a way of learning the language more quickly and efficiently. If people know grammatical rules and structures, they are able to understand things themselves. Grammar is essential language skill and it is important for learning foreign language.
According to Jim Scrivener, “grammar is not just a dry list of facts and rules. It is in our heads and it is a living resource that gives us the ability to communicate our ideas and feelings and to understand what other people say or write to us.” (Scrivener, J., 2003)
4.3 The role of grammar in teaching young learners
Young children are wonderful in absorbing new languge. They can get maximum of language through games and activities that they find funny. Their success in learning foreign language does not depend on their knowledge of grammar. They can use grammatical structures very well, they can speak language clearly, but they are not able to say why they use particular structure. Some pupils are able to deal with simple grammar at the age of ten or eleven. Teachers, of course, should be aware of grammar and structures that they want their pupils to know. But they should teach just a minimum of grammar and what is important, the older pupils only. (Scott, W., Ytreberg, L., 1990)
If teachers teach grammar, it is very important to do it in context. For children it is necessary to have lots of opportunities and chances to use the new languge in their real lives.
23
Pupils have to learn new structures and rules in depth, they should feel that they can use what they have learnt for everyday communication. (Phillips, S., 1993)
4.4 Ways of teaching grammar
There is a question “How do pupils learn grammar?”
It is not easy to answer.
According to Jim Scrivener learning is “a slow, messy business. It is better to acknowledge that, because then you will not come out of class angry with yourself and saying things like
I taught it well, but they did not learn it!” (Scrivener, J., 2003)
There are two different ways of teaching new grammatical structure. The grammar can be covert or overt. There is a fundamental difference between teaching grammar through these two ways.
covert/inductive grammar – indirect grammar teaching, teacher does not provide grammar rules. There is a text where new grammatical structure is introduced. Pupils read the text and find out the new structure. Pupils’ attention is not focused on the new structure, but on the text. Pupils work with the text, they practise new language and the focus does not have to be on the grammar. Pupils play with the words, sentences and they can take the new grammar in incidentally.
overt/deductive grammar – explanation of the new grammatical rules and structures to pupils. 4.5 Stages in teaching grammar
Grammar teaching includes four stages that pupils should go through before being able to use a new grammar item. (Scrivener, J., 2003) They need to:
notice the grammar item in presentation
24
Presentation should be:
-
clear – there should not be any difficulties in understanding, pupils should understand the text
-
efficient – there should be a maximum of new grammar, pupils should be forced to use new language
-
enjoyable and interesting – pupils should be motivated on the highest level and be interested in the activity. Doing things that they find enjoyable and are interested in them is the best motivation to learn.
-
appropriate – it has to be proper for language that is presented
-
productive – pupils should be allowed to make own sentences and questions using the grammar that they have learnt (Harmer, J., 1998)
All previous characteristics can be achieved through following activities:
-
using charts
-
texts
-
stories
-
songs and rhymes
-
dialogues
-
visuals for situations (Harmer, J., 1998)
It is not easy to learn a new structure the first time pupils meet it. The more times pupils are exposed to the structure, the more sense it will give them. Teachers should plan activities so that there are as many grammar items, he wants pupils to learn, as possible. (Scrivener, J.,
2003)
understand the form of the structure – the way it is made up, how the words fit together, what the endings are. They should know the meaning and use of new grammar item. Teacher should show the structure in context, introduce it in the typical situations.
practise new language – pupils should be allowed to try the language in safe environment, they need to practise structures as much as possible. There are some techniques that allow pupils to practise grammatical rules.
25
-
drills
-
interactive activities
-
games
use the new grammar item – pupils should be allowed to use the new language that they have learnt. It may take time before children start to use the new language, even they have practised the items a lot. Teachers should encourage pupils to use the language – “sometimes getting things wrong and sometimes getting things right”, that is the way that people learn new things. (Scrivener, J., 2003)
There is one important thing that teachers should be aware. All the things that teachers do in their lessons using the language is grammar teaching. If teachers use English in their lessons as much as possible, they give pupils language examples. Pupils can benefit from what teacher says in lesson, they can notice and learn new language including grammar only by the way.
5
Grammar structures in primary teaching
5.1 Framework Educational Programme
The Framework Educational Programme for basic education defines binding
educational norms. This document is a part of the National Education Programme which is the basic document in the new curricular education system in the Czech Republic. This document defines everything what is common and necessary in the basic compulsory education. The programme defines educational content, the expected outcomes and curriculum. It is based on a new education approach that emphasizes key competencies and their interconnection with educational content. (Available on World Wide Web: < http://www.msmt.cz/vzdelavani/framework-education-programme-for-basic-education>) Key competencies are a complex of knowledge, abilities, attitudes and values. They should not be developed in isolation but in connection with each other. To develop these
26
competencies teachers should adapt their teaching, educational content and all activities that take place at school. (Available on World Wide Web: < http://www.msmt.cz/vzdelavani/ framework-education-programme-for-basic-education>) The key competencies are:
Learning competency enables pupils to observe and experiment, compare results and draw conclusions. For development of this competence it is needed to present the grammar so that they use all their senses using colour demonstration, colourful pictures, moving and mystery objects, songs, stories and chants. Furthermore it is necessary to enable pupils to manipulate objects, observe, classify and distinguish them. It is also very important to make pupils think about problem, express their own conclusions and rediscovery of knowledge. We have to point out application in common life. The designed object should lead to the acquisition of knowledge from other sources than the school materials are.
Problem-Solving Competency is supported by involvement of pupils in deducing the grammatical rules. Students are motivated by situations that they know from their common life. Pupils are encouraged to not let discourage if they are wrong. They are encouraged to continue and find the solution.
Communication Competency is encouraged by effort to let speaking as many pupils as possible. Pupils are also encouraged to understand various types of texts, records, graphic materials and react to them. It is also very important to talk to pupils about the ways of solving problems, advise the weaker pupils, come up with new questions and let pupils communicate with each other.
Social and Personal Competency is developed by respecting agreed rules, opportunity for expressing feelings and mood. Pupils have to be able to ask for help if needed as well as they should be able to give succour to anybody.
Civic Competency is encouraged by support of collective solidarity, mutual conversation, discussions about problems, telling own experience. Pupils are also encouraged to admit acknowledge the ideas of others.
27
Professional Competency is developed by using materials and tools safely and effectively. (Available on World Wide Web: < http://www.msmt.cz/vzdelavani/frameworkeducation-programme-for-basic-education>)
5.2 Expected outcomes according to the Framework Educational
Programme
Framework Educational programme for basic education defines within the area of foreign language educational content and different language skills that pupils have to know at the end of each period. (See appendix 2) The educational field is divided into two stages.
Young learners belong to stage 1 of basic education. Educational content of stage 1 is divided into 2 periods. (Available on World Wide Web: < http://www.msmt.cz/vzdelavani/ framework-education-programme-for-basic-education>) Grammar is a part of educational content in period 2. Expected outcomes of this period include knowledge of basic grammatical structures and sentences types. Pupil is able to make a simple sentence, question and negation and to form a sentence with correct word order. Knowledge and use of basic grammatical structures go through all the skills that are included in the expected outcomes of this period, since words are placed in sentences according to grammatical rules and pupils should know these rules if they want to use words in sentences in a meaningful way. (Available on World Wide Web: < http://www.msmt.cz/ vzdelavani/framework-education-programme-for-basic-education>) 28
II
Practical part
6
Market research
Interactive whiteboards are becoming a popular tool used in language teaching. The
most important condition of engaging IWB in teaching the interactive teaching materials are.
Without appropriate educational materials can be IWBs hardly effectively used in teaching.
Nowadays there is a number of educational materials for IWBs available in the market, but for teachers it can be difficult to be knowledgeable in this offer. Especially the teachers who have no experience with interactive lessons may have difficulties in finding and selecting a specific training program that whould that would best help to develop specific skills or specific subject matter covered. Variety of flyers and catalogues offering teaching materials for IWBs constantly comes to schools, but teachers always do not get all that market offers.
On this basis I have done the market research in which I focused on interactive learning materials available in the market of the Czech Republic. First of all, my goal was to find educational materials for teaching grammar to young learners using IWB. In a subsequent questionnaire solution that is another part of my thesis I wanted to find out, among other things, which of these materials primary English teachers know, which are available for them and which they really use in their classes. One of the main purposes of the research was to determine what educational materials I should include in the survey.
For collecting information for the survey I used a very widespread source of information – the Internet. I also visited the regional office of the largest publishers of educational materials, Oxford University Press in Prague, where they provided me with information about their educational materials for IWBs that are currently available in the market. This way I found out 12 publishers that distribute English textbooks and teaching materials for primary schools. Those are included in the research. In research of publishing houses’ interactive materials I focused on:
quantity and variety of interactive materials
29
content of interactive materials, language focus
Mainly I focused on which of these materials can be used especially for teaching grammar to young learners.
I focused on following publishing houses , that publish books and teaching materials for primary schools – Fraus publishing house, SPN – pedagogické nakladatelství, Fortuna,
Prodos, Nová Škola, Macmillan, Terasoft, Leda, Cambridge University Press, Oxford
University Press, Longman and Langmaster. Present market offers following interactive materials for English teaching in primary schools. Some of these materials are created directly for the course books and fully correspond with them. Some of these materials are designed as supplementary materials and do not correspond with any course book available. (See appendix 3)
In the research I found out that eight of twelve researched publishers offer interactive materials for teaching English in primary schools. These publishers usually produce IWB software to be used in connection with course books. IWB materials designed for course books are concentrated on developing of all language skills as well as most of the additional materials that I found out. Only two programmes are more specific. Zak´s Wordgames
(Langmaster) learning material is focused mainly on vocabulary development, Tell me More
Kids (Leda) courses are focused mainly on listening and speaking development. The largest publisher in our market is Oxford University Press (OUP). This publishing house produces interactive materials designed for nine of its course books that can be used in primary schools.
The educational program that is most focused on practicing English grammar is TS Angličtina
2 pro školáky. This new English course is intended namely for the 5 th grade of primary school. But this educational program is not designed specifically for IWB teaching, but also for practicing language using the computer both at school and at home.
Although teaching using interactive whiteboards is currently widely used, there still isn´t so many teaching materials as we would wish. Publishing houses offer some materials for purposes of using interactive whiteboards but these materials are mainly designed for course books. They are very good but I (maybe more teachers using IWBs) still miss more materials for extra work and practising particular language skills such as grammar.
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Generally speaking, the programmes offered by different companies are due to competitive struggle very good. The only major drawback can be incompatibility of designed programmes with various school educational programmes. The way out of situation when there is no programme in market that would cover what we need to teach – such as grammar, is creating own teaching material in the software supplied with most interactive whiteboards.
With growing demand and use of interactive whiteboards in schools the new internet websites were created. On these websites we can find freely downloadable, already created interactive materials for English lessons. From these well-sorted databases we do not have only to draw but we can also insert own materials to share them with others.
In the research I also focused on these websites. I mainly focused on these things:
Quantity of interactive materials designed for primary teaching
Language skills that are developed by these materials
Quality of designed materials
Clarity of web pages where the materials are available
I researched following eight websites that I arranged into the chart and evaluated against the criteria. The main task was to determine whether they contain educational materials to use for teaching grammar to young learners. A detailed content of these pages have been added to the overview. (See appendix 4)
As I have mentioned before, there is a big amount of materials that teachers can find on websites. Each teacher is different, prefers a different style of teaching, pupils are individuals with different learning styles. If you really want to find something special, nice, suitable, simply something created just for your lesson, for your learners, it may be quite difficult. And from my experience it usually is. I don´t use IWB every lesson, there are many ways of teaching grammar such as everything, but if there is something that I know can be great to teach using IWB and pupils can benefit from it, I need amazing teaching material.
I mean amazing especially for my pupils. For these reasons I usually design my own materials. That is what I occupy with in another part of my thesis.
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7
School survey on using IWBs
This part of my thesis includes questionnaire that I have sent to many schools in
Central Bohemian Region.
The goal was to confirm the hypothesis that the IWb is now a fixture of most schools.
I also wanted to find out what possibilities to use IWBs the teachers have. The main goal was to build on the market research and find out what interactive teaching materials teachers know and which they use in their classes. Based on survey results, I also wanted to know whether the teachers create their own teaching materials for teaching using the IWB.
7.1 Questionnaire
In developing the questionnaire I emphasized that the questionnaire is understandable, clear, linguistically correct and easy to fill. I administered the questionnaire in the Czech language. I chose this option because I addressed the Czech teachers that are natural to use their native language. From my experience I know that some teachers, particularly those in primary schools may feel limited by language and they could be simply discouraged by filling in the questionnaire in English.
At the beginning of the questionnaire i politely addressed the respondents and asked them to fill out a questionnaire on the topic of IWB. I briefly explained the importance of the questionnaire, its content and meaning of its completion. I also wrote the brief instructions on how to fill and return back. I thanked for the time spent on filling out a questionnaire. (See appendix 5)
I formed the questions so as to be clear, understandable, concise and valid above all.
This means that the answers to these questions help to achieve the research objectives. The questionnaire included following types of questions:
Open questions – the respondents could express in their own words, this type of questions allowed me to get the answers that would not occur to me (4,6,10)
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Enclosed questions – I directed the respondents directly to what interests me
(1,3,5,7,9)
Semi-closed questions – they combine the previous two types of questions.
(2,12)
Filter questions – they allowed me to divide the respondents into sub-groups or alter the flow of questions according to answering this question.(1,3,5,9)
After completing the questionnaire I proceeded to test it. The first step was that I had filled the questionnaire myself honestly. I went through the questionnaire in random order to verify that the answers are still the same. I also gave the questionnaire to fill in the test group of respondents who gave me important feedback when the questionnaire was still possible to edit. Group of these respondents was seven of my current and former colleagues that teach
English in primary school. After testing the questionnaire I inspected the results of the test survey to evaluate whether the questions lead to the aim of the survey. Based on this I found out that using these questions can lead to the research objectives. In the next part of the thesis
I deal with the questions in detail.
I sent the questionnaire to schools via e-mail correspondence. I created list of 70 schools in Central Bohemina Region. This method of collecting data from the questionnaire seemed to me the simplest and in today’s world of communication technologies natural. I had serious doubts about the return of completed questionnaires in this way, but I wanted to see how today’s teachers are able to react this way, if they are at least in this basic way able to compete in today’s world of information and communication technologies. The response came back from 45 schools in a very short time. I found this number sufficient, so I could evaluate the questionnaires and identify the research results.
In following part I am analysing particular questions that were set in the questionnaire.
Question 1
Do you have Interactive Whiteboard in your school?
The use of the IWB in the classroom is conditioned by its existence in the school. The target group were mainly respondents who have the opportunity to work with IWB and thus
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design interactive teaching objects. Through the first question I directed to divide the respondents to two groups. Those who have opportunities to work with IWB and those who do not – so that I did not analyse their questionnaires any more.
I found out that 5 schools from 45 schools surveyed still does not have IWB. But almost all of these schools are going to get it in the near future.
Is IWB in school?
YES
NO
Question 2
If you have IWB, what type of board is it?
Another question deals with the type of IWB that respondent has the possibility to use in teaching. On the market there are more types of boards and interactive systems that differ from each other. If teacher designes own materials to use them on the IWB, the software which is a part of the board and through which the teacher designs the materials is very important. Each of these has different tools, including other types of activities, picture gallery, etc. I personally had the opportunity to use the Smart Board and the Activboard – the two most popular boards that market offers. If I compare these two boards from my perspective,
I can say that it is much easier to work with the software for Smart Boards and I like its activities more as well. Based on this question I wanted in connection with question number 5 to determine whether this fact could also influence other teachers.
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I found out, that schools are mostly equipped with Smart Boards and ActivBoards. Other types of IWBs are used in a very small extent.
18
16
14
12
10
8
6
4
2
0
Smart Board
ActivBoard
Interwrite
Triumph Board
Star Board
I do not know
More types
Types of board
Other
In terms of designing teaching materials depending on the type of board I evaluated the two most popular boards – Smart Board and Activboard. I found out that 100 percent of teachers that are able to use Activeboard design their own teaching materials and 88 percent of teachers in schools where Smart Board is available design interactive teaching materials.
This fact does not confirm my hypothesis. Maybe when the teacher use particular board for a long time, he is accustomed to work with it, the activities of which he knows that works great and then when he has to work with another type of board, he may feel frustrated before he gets used to this new board and software. It is therefore a matter of custom rather than a type of board.
Question 3
Is IWB in classroom where you permanently teach?
This question I wanted to find out how many teachers have the opportunity to have IWB in the classroom where they teach permanently, language lab. In connection with the following questions I also wanted to clafiry whether the teachers who are always available to the board, designe teaching materials themselves or use ready-made interactive books or teaching materials from the websites. I also wanted to know how often the IWB is used in their classes if they have it permanently available.
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I found out, that 21 respondents has IWB in classroom where they teach permanently.
Is IWB in classroom where you permanently teach? YES
NO
Based on survey I also found out that if teachers have the IWB constantly in the classroom, use the following materials to work with it.
14 % or respondents – own designed materials
19 % of respondents – own designed materials, internet sources
19 % of respondents – own designed materials and ready-made books
48 % of respondents – own materials, ready-made books, internet sources
Kind of sources used
Own designed materials
Own materials and interactive course books
Own materials and internet sources Own/interactive course books/internet sources
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Question 4
How often do you use IWB in your lessons?
As I have mentioned above, I was interested in how often the IWB is in use by the teachers who have it always at hand and by those who have not. I also wanted to know if there is a direct correlation between frequency of use of the IWB in the classroom and creating educational materials.
IWB in use
Almost every lesson Once a week
Very often
From time to time I found out that 30 percent of respondent teachers use IWB very often – almost every lesson. 12 percent of teachers use the board very often. 25 percent of teachers use IWB about once a week. 23 percent of teachers use it from time to time and 10 percent of respondents use it never in their lessons.
In the following chart you can see how often is IWB used in classes by the teachers who have it permanently in the classroom and who do not.
14
12
10
8
6
4
2
0
Teachers having IWB permanently Teachers who cannot have IWB permanently
Once a week Very often Almost every lesson
Rarely
Never
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Here I have summarized the relation between frequency of using IWB and designing interactive materials.
100% teachers who use IWB almost every lesson design own materials
100% teachers who use IWB very often design own teaching objects
80% teachers who use IWB once a week design own teaching materials
44% respondents who use IWB in lessons rarely design own teaching materials
From this follows that the more often teachers use IWB in lessons, the more they design their own teaching materials for its use.
Question 5
Do you design your own teaching materials for IWB?
Since the thesis deals with designing teaching objects on IWBs, it seemed natural to include this question in the questionnaire. This question was directed toward the clear goal – to find out how many teachers interwieved design own teaching materials.
I found out that three quarters of the respondents design own interactive materials for their lessons.
Designing own teaching materials YES
NO
Question 6
If your previous answer is yes, for developing what language skills do you design your materials?
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This question was only for those who answered yes to the previous question. The goal was to determine what language skills teachers usually develop through the interactive materials that they design. Based on market research, which I did and my experience as well I know, that there are interactive teaching materials that focus on a comprehensive balanced development of languge skills, what is undoubtedly good. There are some educational materials for practicing vocabulary, but significantly less on teaching and practicing grammar.
I wanted to find out whether teachers respond to this lack of these materials by creating own teaching objects or what else they prefer.
Language skills developed
Vocabulary
Grammar
Facts
Listening
Teachers create their materials to develop the following languages skills:
vocabulary 43%
grammar 27%
facts 17%
listening 13%.
Question 7
If you design your own materials, do you provide them for other teachers?
If the teacher makes his own teaching material for IWB it takes a lot of time, especially if he wants to design a good material. Then it is a shame to have such educational material only for him when he can share it with colleagues who can use the material in their lessons and more pupils can benefit from it. My experience is that the sharing of educational materials in schools is far too prevalent. So I wanted to see how it actually works, whether teachers share created materials among themselves. If this happens, it is another step for teachers to more, better and more efficient use of IWBs in the classroom.
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17 of respondents of those that design own teaching materials, provide these materials for other teachers, 13 of them do not.
Providing materials for other teachers
YES
NO
Question 8
Do you know these materials? Do you use them in your lessons?
One of the main objectives of my research was to determine what ready-made interactive books that are available primary English teachers know and use them in theri classes. The questionnaire consists of all the ready-made materials that are included in market research.
I wanted to find out which of the 17 titles (see appendix 6) teachers actually use in practice.
I found out, that the most commonly known and used materials are those that are published by Oxford University Press. They are called iTools and are designed for course books. There are 5 materials that are not known for any of the teachers surveyed (Tell me
More Kids, The Busy Board, Way Ahead, Treetops iTools, Super Surprise iTools).
ChitChatiTools
10
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
0
Family andFriendsiTools
HappyEarthNew EditioniTools
HappyHouseNew EditioniTools
HappyStreetNew EditioniTools
NewChatterboxiTools
IncredibleEnglishiTools
Startwith Click
Kid´s Box
LongmanChildren´sPictureDictionary
Known (number of respondents) Used (number of respondents) Angličtinaproškoláky
Zak´s Wordgames
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Question 9
Do you use any materials for IWBs that you can find on websites?
In market research I also focused on teaching materials that teachers can freely download from the websites. Through the questionnaire I wanted to find out whether these sites are really used in practice and whether there are other resources that teachers often use that I did not include in the market survey.
I found out that almost half of the teachers surveyed (22) does not use free available materials on websites. More than half of the respondents (18) do.
Websites use
YES
NO
Question 10
If the previous answer is yes, state the website you use.
Websites in use www.rvp.cz www.msmt.cz www.veskole.cz www.oup.cz
www.cambridge.cz
The most commonly used websites are www.veskole.cz and www.rvp.cz .
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Question 11
Are you man or woman?
Man or woman
Men
Women
The majority of respondents are women, but is commonly known that majority of primary teachers are women. Regarding the use of IWBs in the classroom, both men and women teachers use IWB in classes at the same rate.
Question 12
How old are you?
The last question concerned the age of respondents. Depending on the age of respondents
I examined their relation to the use of IWBs on the basis of whether they design own teaching materials or not.
Age of the respondents
20-29
30-39
40-49
50-59
I found out that the largest percentage of respondents belongs to age group 30-39 years.
I learned that age of the respondents does not affect the approach the teacher to work with
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IWB. Here is an overwiev of what percentage of teachers of the particular age group designs own teaching materials.
20-29 years – 86% teachers
50-59 years – 80% teachers
40-49 years – 78% teachers
30-39 years – 71% teachers
7.2 Questionnaire summary
As mentioned above, the questionnaire shows that almost of the schools are equipped with IWB today. There is just a small percentage of schools that still miss IWB. It´s probably due to the fact that getting IWB is mainly a question of money that is often difficult to find.
But representatives of these schools mentioned that they are going to buy IWB in the near future. The most commonly used boards are SMART Boards and ActivBoards. This is what
I know from my experience too. There is inconsiderable amount of other types of IWBs used in schools. Some teachers were not able to say what type of IWB it is. Naturally, these teachers never use IWB in English lessons. About half of the teachers who have IWB in school have it also in classroom where usually teach. The questionnaire also shows that teachers using IWBs in lessons use them commonly quite often but not every lesson. This is good due to the fact, that we should use variety of teaching aids and resources.
Next part of the questionnaire refers to designing interactive materials. What I have found is quite surprising for me because during my nine years of teaching I have not met many teachers who created any own teaching materials. Maybe it is just a bad experience. In any case what I have found is very positive, three quarters of teachers who use IWB, design materials for these purposes as well. And what is even more positive, more than half of them provides these teaching objects to other teachers.
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The questionnaire also concerns interactive materials already designed. This part includes 17 materials offered by publishing houses. The result shows that there are more products that teachers know than they can use. Some of the teachers have also mentioned their desire to have these materials in school, but the price and the financial situation of the school do not allow having them. As mentioned above the most commonly used materials are offered by Oxford University Press and Terasoft. There are also some materials on websites, but naturally, they are not of so good quality like those offered by publishing houses and companies. These IWB materials are commonly used by a half of respondents. Those who don´t use these object in lessons probably prefer creating own teaching objects or buying available materials in the market.
Finally I wanted to know what age group the respondents belong to and their gender.
I found there is nothing surprising about the gender, it is commonly known there are much more female primary teachers. Both male and female teachers use IWBs, design own teaching objects but naturally in proportion to the number of male and female respondents.
8
Grammar in 5th grade of primary school
8.1 Designing teaching objects
According to the Framework Education Programme for Elementary Education the
educational area Language and Language Communication – Foreign Language is based mainly on acquisition of a foreign language. In cycle 2 pupils acquire the language through receptive and productive language skills. To achieve the expected outcomes, mainly productive language skills, they have to be aware of basic grammatical structures and sentences types – simple sentences, formation of question and negation and word order in a sentence. )
Therefore, I have decided to design some teaching objects for primary English teachers that can be used for exploration, explanation and expression of basic grammatical structures in 5th grade. The objects are designed for teaching with Smart Board. The main
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motive for creating objects for IWB was for me finding, that English, especially grammar, is still often taught in standard way, where you can see pupils sitting passively at desks and working with books or worksheets. I think that the situation is increasingly improving thanks to the pressure exerted on English teachers in educational area. Teachers are forced to complete their education and participate in special courses to support English teaching. There are many companies engaged in further education of English teachers. There is infinite number of materials that help and support teachers to make their lessons better and better.
Another reasons for designing these objects were, that although there are some books and photocopiable materials to choose from when teaching new grammar, teachers can not use them with IWB. Grammar teaching using IWB is modern teaching process that brings new ways that can take English teaching one step further. Learning with IWB becomes more interesting and attractive as well for pupils as for teachers. All pupils can be easily involved in learning process and teacher can easily attract their attention. These advantages of IWB use can be especially beneficial when presenting and practising new grammar, which is usually quite boring for pupils. They are usually not interested in grammar and grammatical rules and that is why I try to find ways of involving them in grammatical structures so that find it funny and enjoyable. IWB helps me a lot to achieve these goals.
The requirements for learning outcomes are determined by our educational programmes. These requirements are not based only on subjects´ specifics, but they concern more universal knowledge, skills and attitudes of pupils, that they commonly need in their lives. These skills and attitudes are useful in many living and working situations. The
Framework Education Programme identifies them as key competencies. I designed my teaching objects to be aimed, help to form and develop these competencies.
As I designed my teaching objectives according to the principals of Frame Educational
Programme I think, that it won´t be difficult for pupils to acquire the curriculum. Designed teaching objects contain all the necessary tasks to develop all the competencies mentioned in theoretical part of my thesis and to achieve the expected outcomes.
The interactive grammar book for teaching grammar in the 5th class of primary school
I created with Smart Notebook software for Smart Boards. I have chosen this software because I know the Smart Board very well from my experience. I had this board in school where I was teaching for three years and I was using it very often. Another reason for
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choosing the Smart Board is that all the programmes included in computer can be displayed on the board. One of the best advantages is that pupils can be actively involved in lessons.
8.2 Designed materials in use
Within the research part of my thesis I applied the teaching objects that I have designed in five English lessons in Elementary School Petra Strozziho, Praha 8, Za
Invalidovnou 3. As my materials are designed for teaching grammar in the fifth grade I have chosen the pupils of the fifth grade. I had a little problem with IWB that is available in the school. There is ActivBoard and I have designed materials for Smart Board. The problem was quickly solved because one of the pros of objects designed in software for Smart Boards is that it can be easily transferred into ActivInspire. It is software for designing objects for
ActivBoards. So I could use designed materials with ActivBoard.
Teaching practice took place with 20 pupils of fifth grade in six lessons over two weeks. Their English teacher, my colleague, went through the the grammar structures contained in materials that I have designed in first months of the school year. In lessons with
IWB pupils fixed already familiar grammar structures. What is necessary to mention is the fact, that the English teacher doesn´t use IWB in her lessons. In all the lessons I tried to speak only English.
The homepage of the interactive book contains the content and an overwiev of the symbols. The first page of the interactive grammar book includes contents (see appendix 7 pic. 1) with particular grammar structures. Each grammar structure is made as link to the relevant page in the book. It enables us to get quickly the page what we need at the moment.
Explanatory notes are the essential part of each learning material. On the second page of the interactive grammar book we find an overview of used symbols and their meanings. (See appendix 7 pic. 2) All the images, graphics and symbols are used from the basic elements of gallery that is a part of Smart Notebook software. The gallery consists of essentials for educators including images, lesson activity toolkit consists of images, interactive and multimedia objects, files and pages of application Notebook, background and motives.
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Everything is arranged in particular categories, that enables better orientation. If we are online, we can update the gallery anytime.
Lesson 1 – Present Simple Affirmative
Teaching object 1
Activity in use
At the beginning of the lesson I introduced the IWB to pupils and explained the basic controls due to the fact that pupils have never worked with IWB before. I shortly showed pupils on home page what they are going to work on in following six lessons. I introduced the symbols that they have to understand and their meanings. After the initial information we started the first chapter entitled "Present simple affirmative."
Pupils impatiently waited for what will follow and were looking forward for the work apparently. I set them up for listening to the song and gave them a task – listening and thinking about the song. After listening they tried to say what they think the song is about.
I played the song and almost all the hands raised. Pupils understood the lyrics very well and agreed that the first part of the song is about love. Because they didn´t know the word “hate”
I gave them a cue, that it is the opposite of the word “love”. They liked the song and wanted to sing it again and again. After I played the song one more time, I asked pupils to find the verb in the song and underline them. Pupils were raising their hands and were going up to the board one by one so that they underlined all the verbs. Some pupils were disappointed that
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they could not go to the board. At this point I played the wizard and let fly the angel with heart away from the board. I asked those pupils to complete the chart with the verbs. They did it without any problems and correctly. They properly marked verbs in the text and also added them to the correct pronoun. They realized that the verb in the third person singular has ending –s. As a reward for good work we made a circle, grabbed our hands and sang the song one more time.
The goal of the lesson was to become pupils familiar with a new grammar in a funny way. I can say that this activity worked very well, children liked it, weren´t bored at any time, everybody was involved and they themselves found out the verb rule. If you want to teach grammar, songs can make the lesson more interesting and effective. Songs are very motivating for children and teaching through them is a great way of becoming pupils familiar with a grammatical structure. From my experience I know that pupils like listening to songs in
English lessons. This way they are very gently introduced to the new grammatical structure.
Teaching object 2
Activity in use
This activity thematically linked to the previous page. Pupils become familiar with a boy in the same age as they are. The photograph of the boy appeared on the board. I asked pupils what the boy´s name is and what the think his mood is. Pupils correctly answered that the boy´s name is Jack and that he is sad. Then I asked why they think he is sad. They answered he is sad because of an ilness, he got a bad mark at school, he lost his favourite toy.
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All their answers were right but I uncover the main reason of his sadness – pupils understood that Jack is sad because is unhapilly in love. I asked children if they were ever in love, they began to shy laugh. I understood that they can easily empathize with Jack´s role. I drew attention to the next slide – Jack´s daily programme.
This activity was rather relaxing, the task was to introduce pupils to the next part – new grammar fixing. They met Jack, were talking about him, and uncovering secrets about his bad mood.
Teaching object 3
Activity in use
On this page pupils could find out what Jack usually does every day. I circled the word
"daily" on the board. First I read the text and then let pupils read it again. We didn´t focus on mistakes, but the content of the message. Based on the text understanding pupils placed the pictures of activities to the correct time. The result was a properly designed program. Then we were talking about whether their daily programme is similar or different. The task was to use the new grammar structure through reading and speaking.
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Teaching object 4
Activity in use
In this part of the lesson pupils found out the verbs in the text about Jack´s daily programme and underlined them. They took turns at the board one by one. I reminded again that there are verbs ending in –s, because it is about Jack. I asked them to imagine they are
Jack. They had to transform the text into the 1 st person singular. I covered the text about Jack and uncovered another text to be completed. Children went to the board one by one and filled the empty sentences with the correct verbs. First they made some mistakes but after realizing the rule they did it correctly. After completing the whole text we checked it together explained the mistakes that they made. Then I introduced their homework – worksheet to write their own daily programme.
Teaching object 5
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Activity in use
At the end of the lesson pupils got a worksheet which was connected to the activity on the board. Pupils completed the sentences with the correct verb both to their worksheets and on the board. They all did it correctly! It was a great feedback for me that they understood the rule. Finally they drew the rule again and one of the pupils wrote it down in the grammar table. They stuck the worksheet into their exercise books.
After the lesson pupils evaluated the lesson and I have heard comments that after a long time they enjoyed English lesson. Based on this view, of course, we can not say that the interactive whiteboard is the only teaching tool that pupils really enjoy and that there are no more interesting and enjoyable lessons at all. But it just supports the fact, that teacher should use all available tools in his lessons and change them in his classes so that pupils’ motivation to acquire knowledge is the highest.
Lesson 2 – Present simple affirmative
Teaching object 6
This object is designated to deduce forms of the verbs go and have in the third person singular. Pupils could already see the forms when they were reading about Jack´s daily programme. There are the sentences in the first person singular but when you click next to the
"writing" symbols, the sentences in the third person singular appears. These sentences miss the verbs - pupils have to write the missing verbs.
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Activity in use
At the very beginning of the lesson we checked the homework from last lesson. Four pupils wanted to present their homework in front of the board. Checking homework was a grammar review as well. I read a sentence about Jack and pupils read their information. We reminded again the verb form. Then we went on with exercises on IWB. I highlighted the presence of irregular verbs on the board. I let pupils to think about the verbs and two of them found out the right forms of verbs “go/have”. They wrote them down on the board. Children also got the worksheet to write the rule down. Then they stuck it into their exercise books.
This feedback was also very important for me, I realised that most of the children were already familiar with the verbs even I did not mention them previously. The goal was to discover the rule themselves. That is the best way for learners to remember the grammatical structure and they did it.
Teaching object 7
Activity in use
In this part pupils could practice what they have learnt before. Pupils liked this activity very much. There were sentences with two verbs and they had to decide for the right one. They were going to the board one by one “throwing” the incorrect verbs into the trash.
They were laughing all the time. After cleaning the sentences up we checked the work by revealing the correct sentences. Pupils were delighted and applauded themselves. During this
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activity I found out, that pupils have no more problems with choosing the correct verb, they became already familiar with this grammar.
Teaching object 8
Activity in use
I invited pupils in front of the board for the activity and explained what to do. I know from my experience that this activity is somehow magical and always attract and keep pupils´attention. That is what I confirmed also in this lesson. Pupils liked both swallowing and spitting verbs out. Sometimes it seemed to me that they made mistakes purposely to see how the incorrect verb is spitted out, which might be slightly counterproductive and confusing for weaker pupils. I had to calm them down a bit. Generally the activity worked very well, pupils felt comfortable and found the activity enjoyable. During this activity both me and pupils could have a prompt feedback.
Teaching object 9
This is a manual for the "Memory game". Children can easily see it and understand it.
They say the sentences one by one and add more and more ideas. They speak about everyday activities. The bank of activities that they can use is on the next page.
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Teaching object 10
Activity in use
I introduced the “Memory game”. First we had to revise the vocabulary required.
I revealed the pictures, say the words and covered them again to be ready for a game. Pupils already knew this game from Czech lessons, so it was not difficult to explain the rules at all.
We sat in front of the board in a horseshoe shape facing the board. I was gradually revealing pictures and pupils formed the sentences in present simple tense. Pupils had to say all the sentences that have been said before and add one more. Pictures on the board helped him. If there was a longer pause I lit the dynamite. When the dynamite exploded and the pupil said nothing, he was out of the game. Finally three pupils who didn´t make any mistake won.
Although I was a little afraid of this activity, I thought it might be too difficult, I was pleasantly surprised. Children were very good and even when they were out of the game, they
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listened to their classmates. The large role in this sub-succes I ascribe to the IWB, especiall the tool called “firecracker”. This tool made the boring activity very exciting. The greatest succes, however, was that pupils made grammatically correct sentences in present simple tense. At the end of the lesson I asked pupils to evaluate the lesson using a scale from one to five – one is the best, five is the worst mark. Almost all the pupils showed me “one”. I noticed that pupils took pleasure in the lesson.
Lesson 3 – Present Simple Negative
Teaching object – 11
Activity in use
This lesson was devoted to the use of a negative in present simple tense. At the beginning of the lesson, we repeated the rule of formation of negative sentences. That was something what pupils already known. Pupils chose their representatives at the board who completed the sentences with the correct verb form and not. All the pupils checked the accuracy together in the form of debate. When I made sure that pupils are familiar with that, we could go on the next activity.
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Teaching object 12
Activity in use
This activity was designed for practicing negatives. The chart appeared on the board.
The chart contains images of six people, seven different activities and hidden fields. I read aloud examples of the sentences and clearly showed the way of making sentences. Then I read the names of people and activities, pupils repeated after me so that they became familiar with them. Pupils went closer to the board. One after another came to choose a covered box and uncovered it. If the cross appeared, I invited him to make a negative sentence. If the check mark appeared I asked him to make a positive sentence. Initially, this activity seemed to be difficult and I had to help the children a lot. They had more problems with negative sentences.
Gradually, due to the drill, they started to make correct sentences without my help. During this activity also talented children help weaker children. The target was met, almost all of the children be aware of making both positive and negative sentences. This kind of activity also developed pupils´ sence for curiosity and imagination. Before one of pupils uncover particular part of the chart, others tried to guess what is hidden behind. After the lesson it occured to me, that this chart can be also used for short answers practice. Pupils liked it because it supported their imagination.
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Teaching object 13
Activity in use
For this activity pupils were given a worksheet. They made the positive sentences negative. They wrote the sentences down both on the board and their worksheets. Some of them worked just on their own without looking at the bord, weaker pupils worked alongside pupils that wrote sentences on the board. Finally they checked their work by uncovering the correct sentences on the board. Each evaluated himself on his worksheet. Together we justified that students made in the sentences. Five pupils made no mistakes, others had an average of two sentences wrong. During this activity some pupils were involved more, some less. They worked more individually, what is also very important due to the fakt that pupils must be encouraged to take responsibility for themselves.
Teaching object 14
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Activity in use
This activity – the last one of this lesson was for pupils much more exciting than the previous one. They went to the board and spun two rotating wheels. They made negative sentences from the words. This activity was very motivating and enjoyble. If someone did not say the sentence correctly, other pupils helped a lot. In terms of functionality (practicing grammatical structure) of this interactive activity, we made the most.
This lesson was full of interesting activities, that children enjoyed most. They were very motivating for them so it wasn´t difficult to meet the lesson targets.
Lesson 4 – There is / There are
Teaching object 15
Activity in use
In this lesson we were practicing very important grammar structure “there is/there are”. The picture appeared on the board. I tried to choose a picture which is as pleasant for children as possible. It was a picture of a sea coast with some objects that children can find funny, especially on the seacoast. They started to laugh straight away it has appeared on the board and started to name objects individually. It was the best introduction into the grammar structure “there is/there are”. First we reviewed the vocabulary needed. I pointed at objects on the board and pupils say them in English. Pupils were familiar with almost all of the
58
words. During this activity we practiced a plural that is necessary. After the vocabulary review pupils were given one minute to remember all the things in the picture.
I turned on
the stopwatch at the bottom of the slide. This is one of the things that I would do differently next time. Pupils constantly monitored the stopwatch and didn´t concentrated at the picture as they should. Then I presented the picture of man who is thinking about something – about what was in the picture. I read aloud what he says and explained that they are also going to remember the picture and say what is there. In order to describe the picture properly they need to use the grammar structure “there is/there are”, as every English speaking person would use it. Through examples on the board we reviewed when they use they use”there is” and when they use “there are”. Then I asked pupils to divide into two groups, they are probably used to do it, so there was no problem. They divided immediately. Each group said one sentences about the picture. Children were talking in groups together about the picture and if somebody´s idea was wrong, they agreed what is right. If the group said the correct sentence, it got a point. But children were very good and as they could agree among themselves. So the activity finished with a difference of only one point. I praised all the pupils and announced both teams winners, as they all tried to do their best.
Teaching object 16
Activity in use
Pupils chose one representative who went to the board. He read the sentence with some missing words in the beginning. The pupils voted if “there is” or “there are” is right for the sentence. The winning structure was added to the empty box and immediately assessed by the “board”. Pupils had immediate feedback if they did a right or a bad decision. Pupils
59
enjoyed the activity, they were all very active and involved, felt responsibility for their decision and their vote, which could affect the outcome of the whole group.
Teaching object 17
Activity in use
In next activity pupils came back to the introductory picture. Shortly, using the examples on the board, we reviewed the rule of making positive and negative short answers.
Pupils were divided into two groups again. Pupils from each group were going to the board alternately. They chose the question, read it aloud and said the answer. Then they clicked on the question and the correct answer appeared. If their previous answer was same with the correct answer on the board, the group got a point. At the beginning of this activity they were choosing the answer for which they knew the answer securely. However, this activity was also very balanced, so it didn´t depressed pupils and they enjoyed it. For pupils was this kind of activity very motivating, everyone was involved, nobody won, nobody lost.
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Teaching object 18
Activity in use
The very last activity of the lesson was “What is in the picture”. From my experience
I know, that children love it, it is very mysterious and funny activity, and there is never enough prepared pictures. This activity was difficult for them from the grammatical point of view. I think it was rather caused by the fact that they are not too accustomed to this form of exercise and their attention was dispersed between the picture and the grammatical structure.
However, they still wanted more and more pictures and as I revealed more and more pictures they became more familiar with the grammatical structure. This activity is a good kind of drill, children repeat the same structures again and again so that they finally become familiar with them.
Lesson 5 and 6
Teaching object 19
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Activity in use
For the last two lessons I decided to teach present continuous tense. On the basis of agreement with a colleague – an English teacher found out that this grammar is for pupils new. For presenting a new grammar I chose “The monkey song”. Here I made the most of the IWB from the perspective of what children really love – songs. This song is also very cheerful and funny and attracted pupils´attention maximally.
In the beginning of the lesson I familiarized pupils with the fact that we are going to learn something new that is sure to be very funny. I told them that I am going to play a song about animals and they have to guess what animals they are and I mimed it. As I am a very good pretender, pupils knew immediately, that it is going to be a song about monkeys.
I played the song, pupils were watching and listening with noticeable interest. Then I asked them to say some words that they could hear in the song. Pupils named the words monkey, doctor, bed, mother, jumping. Then pupils read the questions on the board (with my help), we explained their meaning. I played the song again and the task was to find answers for the questions. All the responses were available on the board. After listening, the first pupil with his hand up went to the board and pulled the first answer to the question. His action was immediately checked by the “board” like the correct answer. I praised the pupil and let him to choose one of his classmates to answer next question. The pupils answered all the questions correctly. Then I wrote the answers on the board and pupils underlined all verbs in them.
They quickly discovered that there are more verbs in each sentence. They marked the verb “to be” with a red colour and we reviewed all the forms of the verb “to be”. I was saing various nouns and pronouns and pupils were saying proper forms of the verb “to be”. Then we marked the verbs in –ing form with a green colour. We deduced the rule of making sentences in present continuous tense and I pointed out that we use it if we want to say that something is happening right now.
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Teaching object 20
Activity in use
Through this activity pupils practised the grammar structure. On the board there were three verbs in three columns and the pupils were supposed to assign them to the correct subject. They were going to the blackboard and were moving the words from the bottom of the board into the columns. Then we checked the work together and found out one mistake.
Finally also the “board” checked pupils´work, everything was alright. Whenever pupils´ work was checked by the “board” they enjoyed so much and applauded themselves.
Teaching object 21
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Activity in use
Another activity was an interactive image. First I illustratively showed pupils, how to work with the picture. I chose the object on the picture, clicked on it and some words connected to the object I have chosen appeared on the board. I made a sentence from these words in present continuous tense, wrote it down a checked it by revealing the rectangle, the correct sentence appeared. I pointed out again the structure of the sentence. I came back to the picture. One of the pupils went to the board and did the same like me before – chose an object, wrote a sentence and said it. This pupil chose another pupil for next sentence. If somebody started to make the sentence incorrectly, others helped immediately. Their cooperation was really great. All together pupils created all the sentences correctly and it was clear that they understood the grammar structure very well.
Finally we spent the time by practicing. Six images with its subjects and verbs appeared on the board. I asked the most talented pupil to choose a picture and make a sentence. Then other five volunteers made the sentences with help of others.
Because there were a few more minutes to the end of the lesson I asked children to make two groups. The taks was to mime an activity for the second group that tried to describe the activity using the present continuous tense. Pupils had a great fun and most importantly, at the end of the lesson they tried to make sentences in present continuous tense without bigger problems. The very end of these lessons I tried to evaluate previous six lessons. I asked pupils how they like the lessons with IWB and if they like the interactive grammar book that we used in these lessons. The response was very pleasant. Pupils praised this way of learning and said that they would like to have interactive books in more English lessons and in other subjects. They said that were not even aware that they learn. They were also surprised how much they have learnt. Finally I thank them for a great cooperation.
8.3 Evaluation of the lessons
Overall, I have a very good feeling about the lessons with teaching materials that
I have designed. I can say that pupils liked the lessons. These pupils, as I said before, never
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had the opportunity to work with the IWB, so these six lessons were naturally an amazing experience for them. Probably, if they had opportunities to learn with the IWB more, their interest would be on a completely different level. Since they enjoyed the learning, we changed activities all the time, they could work individually and in groups, they could help each other, for those reasons they had no problem staying focused. They were motivated to work by a new technical tool and probably also by me – a new teacher. I think that the goals and expected outcomes were met. Pupils learnt new grammatical structures with fun and everyone was involved.
I have been working for several years as a teacher. I had opportunities to change teaching in grades of primary and secondary school. At the time when I started teaching, no
IWB was used. Pupils were forced to learn but also using different teaching resources and methods. I know from my experience that preparing for these lessons was much more demanding if the teacher wanted his students to learn as much as possible. Today´s teaching resources give teachers more opportunities to make their teaching varied and more interesting for pupils. When compared teaching with conventional resources such as textbooks, blackboard and white chalk and teaching with the IWB, I can say for itself that teaching using
IWB gives much better results and therefore it is desirable in our schools.
Although IWB is an excellent teaching technical tool that brings excellent results, it´s importance in teaching in generall can not be overestimated. There are many and many ways of teaching, that can be equally beneficial and entertaining for pupils. Even the best technical tool does not do all the work. The most important is the personality of the teacher who knows the pupils best, how he organizes work, how he can react on the particular situation, how he leads his lessons. No matter if he uses the IWB or not if he can make the most of his lessons.
I prefer teaching with the IWB but I know that there are excellent teachers who never used it and never will and I respect them.
I have designed set of teaching objects to teach English grammar in the fifth grade of primary school (see appendix 1). These objects are designed to teach Present Simple, Present
Continuous and a phrase “there is/there are”. Young children have great ability to absorb language through games, stories, songs and other activities. I tried to design the teaching objects according to the rules that should be respected especially when we teach young
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children. The focus is on a language as a mean of communication and not on the grammar. I tried to set tasks in which learners discover for themselves simple grammatical rules. I also tried to design the objects to learn the grammar structures in context. It means that they do not just learn the rules superficially, but put them into practice in order to communicate. So, to be my teaching objects enjoyable and effective for children so that they make the most of them, I used plenty of pictures, songs, chants, stories and animations. The most important is to get children involved and that is what the IWB enables very well. Interactive applications which I used in designed objects arrange particular stages of the lesson. They include motivation, presentation, explanation and practice. All these stages are very important in teaching and all have their place in the lesson. IWB can be very useful for all the stages of the lesson if it used properly. But I think IWB is especially good for practice. There is infinite number of interactive applications when pupil gets immediate feedback in both sound and graphical form. 8.4 Criteria for designing interactive teaching materials
As IWB teachers still produce their own materials and as it is noticeable that not all of these materials are of a good quality, I have defined criteria for designing teaching objects for
IWBs. In the process of identifying the criteria I followed the experience I gained when creating my own materials for teaching with IWB and the didactic principles. (Skalková, J.,
1999)
Basic starting point for creating IWB teaching object is the choice of the topic that can be originally processed and interactively used in classroom.
Quality of treatment is
undoubtedly the criterion which should be directed. As regards the objects are designed for teaching, you need to keep the teaching principles. When you keep these principles you can achieve the maximum of efficiency and clarity. Some of the principles are:
-
principal of clarity
Clarity is one of the oldest didactic principles. Visual effect of interactive teaching materials can be visual or auditory.
66
-
principle of awareness and activity
It is based on theories of motivation. It is necessary to get pupils so that they embrace the learning objectives and develop activity to meet these objectives. The activities should be simple enough for pupils to understand what is expected of them.
-
principle of theory and practice
Pupils have to know that they can use what they learn in everyday life.
Pupils have to be able to transfer their knowledge to enable them to be built on in next stage of their education.
-
principal of adequacy
The task should be within their abilities, it has to be achievable and stimulating for them to feel satisfied with their work.
-
principle of permanence
This is a very important principle which is based on the fact that the human brain forgot very quickly. Under this principle we should place great emphasis on presenting new curriculum and struggle against forgetting – revision. -
principle of consistency
The curriculum should be taught in context, particular teaching objects should follow the previous ones.
-
principle of individuality
This principle is based on the fact that each pupil is different and unique from others and it is necessary to treat him or her on the basis of this principle.
-
principle of feedback
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Based on the feedback you can get information about how the pupil achieves the set objectives. You can also diagnose faults that are a natural part of the learning process and explain where the mistake is. (Skalková, J., 1999)
The principles set out above are those that should be followed when creating any kind of teaching object. Now I set those that are important when designing IWB teaching materials. You have to follow specific rules:
-
Before starting to design teaching material, you should find time to become familiar with the board, discover what it can do and what you can do with the board and software.
-
Play with the board, explore the software options, gallery, activities, tools and other things that help you to make your materials being as most interactive, funny and enjoyable as possible.
-
Look for inspiration on websites of the IWB producers, you can find interesting tips and already made lesson plans for IWBs and last but not least animation tutorials that show you how to design objects step by step.
-
When designing particular objects make sure, that the background is not white.
White background is not pleasant for the eyes at all. It could affect the length of pupils’ concentration.
-
Keep in mind that learning objects have to be interactive both for teacher and pupils. -
Do not design IWB materials too complex. Pupils have to be comfortable with them, understand them and need to know what is expected of them.
-
Remember that the materials don´t have to be finally finished. Let the space for adding extra materials and activities or just for changes that can be necessary if you find out the current material inappropriate or out of order.
-
Make the materials to be beneficial for everyone. IWBs offer a variety of activities suitable for plenty of learning styles. Remember designing the objects so that each pupil can benefit from them.
-
When designing teaching object there are some formalities that should not be missed out such as title page, contents and list of symbols used.
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-
When making contents it is very suitable to make individual parts as links to the relevant pages. Then it is easy to get the page you want immediately with a single click. On each page you can put a button which returns you to home page with a single click.
-
Good teaching materials have symbols for particular activities. To let users be comfortable with these symbols the list of these symbols is required. It is much easier for users to become familiar with the activities included. The symbols are a part of the gallery of the software or you can create your own symbols using a variety of pictures.
-
Each teaching object should consist of methodological notes where it is set how to work with the object. It can be beneficial for you in the case of using the material after long time and forgetting the objects and goals. But above all it is necessary if you provide the materials for other users. If there are no methodological notes, other users can have difficulties in understanding the tasks and lesson objectives. Then they can use them inappropriately and cannot get maximum of them. Software for designing interactive materials includes special pages for these notes.
-
You have to write down the list of resources used. If you used any pictures, songs, videos and anything what is not the part of the software, you have to put in resources list. If you just use the gallery, activities and tools of the IWB software it is also good to mention it.
-
If there are some words or longer texts, use a font that is easily readable and of appropriate size, it is always better to use the font bigger than smaller.
If IWB is used in the classroom it is also good to think about following things:
-
Think about arrangement of the classroom and your classroom location when using the board. In contrast to using classic black board there is a disadvantage of using IWB – it throws a shadow that can keep pupils from seeing the objects on the board. The best desks arrangement is a horseshoe because everyone can see the board well and has an easy access to the board. Avoid having obstacles between pupils and the board.
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-
When using IWB in lesson, avoid dominating the board the lesson. If you let the board do all the work in lesson, pupils would not benefit from it as much as if you react on situations that occur by giving extra questions, encouraging discussion among pupils on problems occurred and other situations that you do not expect.
I think it is very important to follow the basic criteria for creating teaching materials and using IWB in the classroom at all. The criteria I have established are the barest minimum what everyone should follow. It is possible to build on them and make the lessons with IWB better and better.
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Conclusion
The aim of my thesis is a summary of theoretical aspects that are necessary for successful educational process. The emphasis is put on motivation, learning styles of pupils’ and requirements of the Framework Educational Programme, on which basis I check whether there are possibilities to improve English grammar teaching at primary schools using
Interactive Whiteboard.
I have chosen the topic for my thesis due to the findings that although schools are now well equipped with tools of information and communication technology, these tools are still not used as much as they could be. For this reason I feel that my thesis could be motivation for using information and communication technology at schools, especially Interactive
Whiteboard.
The Interactive Whiteboard is a relatively new technological tool. More and more teachers use this tool in their lessons. Based on the market research I have found out, that there is not a wide range of interactive teaching materials for grammar teaching available.
Although the Interactive Whiteboards are in the classroom today mostly used, teachers do not have these teaching materials available at schools. After studying theoretical basis, I designed a set of teaching objects for grammar teaching in primary school. My work itself can be both material that teachers can use in their classes and subject to designing their own teaching materials. I can also see the benefits of my thesis in the practical use of designed objects in classes. I have confirmed my belief that the objects that I had designed fulfil its function.
Teaching using the interactive objects met the expectations in the field of pupils’ motivation and effectivity of the educational process.
Despite the fact that the preparation for lessons with use of Interactive Whiteboard is challenging, I believe that my thesis will be useful for teachers who already work with
Interactive Whiteboard but also for those that are going to use it and do not have much experience with it. I hope that the teaching material I have designed will be available to the general public through educational materials and training database. I also hope that it will be a good manual for working with the Interactive Whiteboard as a great technical tool.
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Appendix
1
Interactive teaching objects designed - CD
2
Expected outcomes of stage 1, period 1 and 2 according to the FEP
RECEPTIVE, PRODUCTIVE AND INTERACTIVE LANGUAGE SKILLS
Expected outcomes – Period 1 pupils will
pronounce and read correctly in terms of phonetics an appropriate vocabulary range
understand simple instructions and sentences and respond appropriately
distinguish between the written and spoken form of a word
understand the content and meaning of a simple, slow and carefully pronounced conversation between two people, provided there is enough time for understanding
use an alphabetical glossary in a textbook
RECEPTIVE LANGUAGE SKILLS
Expected outcomes – Period 2 pupils will
understand familiar words and simple sentences related to the topics being covered
understand the content and meaning of simple authentic materials (magazines, pictorial and listening materials) and use them in their activities
read a simple text aloud containing familiar vocabulary; reading is fluent and phonetically correct find necessary information in a simple text and formulate an answer to a question
use a bilingual dictionary
PRODUCTIVE LANGUAGE SKILLS
Expected outcomes – Period 2 pupils will
form a simple written message, short text and response to a message that is correct in terms of both grammar and form; fill in a form with their personal data
reproduce, both orally and in writing, the content of a text and simple conversation of appropriate difficulty
modify short texts while adhering to their meaning
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3
Interactive materials available – overview
Publisher
Primary Course Books Supplementary
Interactive Materials primary Interactive materials Oxford
Chit Chat 1,2
University Press Family and Friends 1-6
Happy
Earth
New
Edition 1,2
Happy
House
New
Edition 1,2
Happy
Street
New
Edition 1,2
New Chatterbox Starter,
1, 2
Super Surprise 1-6
Treetops 1-4
Incredible English 1-6
Macmillan
Way Ahead 1-6
The Busy Board 1-3
Animal Explorers
Fraus
Start with Click 1,2
Cambridge
Kid´s Box 1-6
University Press
Leda
Longman
Terasoft
Langmaster
Language focus all language skills – reading, writing, listening, speaking, clear grammar focus skills across the curriculum, games and activities
all language skills, vocabulary, grammar all language skills all language skills, syllabus for the Cambridge
Young
Learners English tests
Tell me More Kids listening, speaking
1-3
Longman Children´s vocabulary
Picture Dictionary
Angličtina
pro vocabulary, školáky 1-2 pronunciation, listening, reading with understanding, grammar practise
Zak´s Wordgames vocabulary 75
4
Websites overview
www.interakceprozkolu.kvalitne.cz
-
Quantity of materials – About 60 materials sorted by grades 3-5, about 70 materials sorted by topic
-
Language skills developed
– vocabulary practise, grammar practise, text
understanding, some materials are rather designed for individual work on computer
-
Quality of materials – these materials are of a very good quality
-
Websites clarity – well arranged, materials are arranged by grades or by topics
www.vyukovematerialy.eu
-
Quantity of materials – 30 links to another websites
-
Language skills developed – for practise of all language skills, large variety of materials -
Quality of materials – some of the materials are of good quality, some of poor
-
Websites clarity – the page is too clear, I miss arrangement by topics, age, groups etc.
www.veskole.cz
-
Quantity of materials – 187 materials for primary schools that are then sorted by type
(169 materials designed in Smart Notebook software and
18 links to another -
websites)
-
Language skills developed – all skills through large variety of activities
-
Quality of materials – there are lot of materials of very good quality. Some of designed materials consist of everything what a good material should – goals, key words, sources used, methodological teacher´s notes etc.
-
Websites clarity – home page is very clear, you can simply choose the material you want by type of school. You can also simply search materials by author, school or source name.
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www.activucitel.cz
-
Quantity of materials – about 300 materials for teaching English in primary school
-
Language skills developed – all language skills, mainly vocabulary and grammar
-
Quality of materials – these materials are of medium quality. Some are better, some are worse. They mostly lack good methodological notes. It can be quite difficult to know how to work with them and make the most of them.
-
Website clarity – the main page is very clear, it´s easy to find material what you just need. You can find the material simply by keyword or by type of school and subject.
www.exchange.smarttech.com
This is an external source of professional lessons, images, web pages and other tools.
-
Quantity of materials – only two materials designed for primary English teaching.
-
Language skills developed – vocabulary
-
Quality of designed materials – these materials are rather of poor quality
-
Website clarity – the main page is very clever, it´s easy to find anything, you can search by keywords, subjects and grades.
www.avmedia.cz
-
Quantity of materials – this webpage consists only small amount of materials for
Smart Boards and also some links to the other web pages, for example those that consist sources for Smart Boards or school webs with sources for interactive teaching.
-
Quality of materials – materials that I found on these websites are of poor quality
-
Website clarity – this website is not very clear, it is not easy to search for material which you would like.
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www.prometheanplanet.com
-
Quantity of materials – international websites with a very big amount of lesson plans teaching with ActivBoard. They can be very good for teaching other subjects through
English.
-
Language skills developed – you can find a variety of materials developing all language skills.
-
Quality of materials - the lesson plans are of a good quality with methodological notes. -
Websites clarity – the websites are very clear, you can find the lesson plan by keywords, language, age range, subject area, file format and other criteria.
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5
Questionnaire
Letter to primary teachers
Vážený kolego/kolegyně!
Za účelem výzkumu ve své diplomové práci na téma „Teaching grammar to young learners using Interactive Whiteboard“ si Vás dovoluji požádat o pomoc a vyplnění dotazníku na téma interaktivní tabule.
Náplní dotazníku jsou otázky týkající se interaktivní tabule a výukových materiálů na interaktivní tabuli. Cílem je zjistit, zda ve škole, kde pracujete, je interaktivní tabule, zda ji využíváte, jaké interaktivní výukové materiály využíváte a zda si tvoříte výukové materiály sami. Interaktivní tabule dnes vstupuje do našich škol a zaujímá své místo ve vyučování a já bych chtěla zjistit, jaká je skutečnost, jestli a jak ji Vy používáte ve svých hodinách.
Dotazník obsahuje 13 otázek. U některých otázek naleznete možné odpovědi v závorkách, zvolenou odpověď napište pod otázku. Některé otázky jsou otevřené, napište prosím svoji odpověď taktéž pod danou otázku. V tabulce vepište křížek tam, kde bude odpovídající. Zodpovězený dotazník prosím pošlete na adresu a.verna@seznam.cz.
Předem Vám děkuji za ochotu a čas věnovaný vyplnění dotazníku. Budete-li mít zájem, s radostí Vám pošlu závěry plynoucí z mého výzkumu jakožto i výukové materiály pro výuku gramatiky na interaktivní tabuli, které jsem pro účely své diplomové práce navrhla.
S pozdravem
Alexandra Povjakalová
DOTAZNÍK INTERAKTIVNÍ TABULE
1. Máte ve škole interaktivní tabuli? (ano – ne)
2. Pokud ano, jaký typ interaktivní tabule máte? (Activboard, Smart Board, Interwrite, jiný) 3. Máte interaktivní tabuli ve své třídě či učebně? (ano – ne)
79
4. Jak často využíváte interaktivní tabuli?
5. Vytváříte si výukové interaktivní materiály sami? (ano – ne)
6. Pokud ano, k rozvíjení jakých jazykových dovedností nejčastěji vytváříte své materiály? (slovní zásoba, gramatika, jiné – uveďte jaké)
7. Pokud si vytváříte vlastní materiály, poskytujete vytvořené materiály ostatním vyučujícím, např. na úložiště výukových materiálů apod. (ano – ne)
8. Znáte tyto výukové materiály jednotlivých nakladatelství? Využíváte je? (napište křížek - x)
Interaktivní materiál (k učebnici)
Znám
Využívám
Chit Chat iTools – Oxford University Press
(OUP)
Family and Friends iTools - OUP
Happy Earth New Edition iTools - OUP
Happy House New Edition iTools - OUP
Happy Street New Edition iTools - OUP
New Chatterbox iTools - OUP
Super Surprise iTools - OUP
Treetops iTools - OUP
Incredible English iTools - OUP
Way Ahead - Macmillan
The Busy Board – Macmillan
Start with Click – Fraus
Kid´s Box - Cambridge University Press
Tell me More Kids – Leda
Longman Children´s Picture Dictionary –
Longman
Angličtina pro školáky - Terasoft
Zak´s Wordgames - Langmaster
9. Používáte volně dostupné interaktivní materiály z webových stránek? (ano – ne)
10. Pokud ano, jaké stránky to jsou?
11. Jste muž – žena?
12. Do jaké věkové skupiny patříte? (20-29 let, 30-39 let, 40-49 let, 50-59 let, jiné)
80
6
Interactive materials included in school survey – overview
Chit Chat iTools – Oxford University Press (OUP)
Family and Friends iTools – OUP
Happy Earth New Edition iTools – OUP
Happy House New Edition iTools – OUP
Happy Street New Edition iTools – OUP
New Chatterbox iTools – OUP
Super Surprise iTools – OUP
Treetops iTools – OUP
Incredible English iTools – OUP
Way Ahead – Macmillan
The Busy Board – Macmillan
Start with Click – Fraus
Kid´s Box - Cambridge University Press
Tell me More Kids – Leda
Longman Children´s Picture Dictionary – Longman
Angličtina pro školáky – Terasoft
Zak´s Wordgames – Langmaster
81
7
Pictures
Pic. 1 Contents and links to the relevant page
Pic. 2 The overview of used symbols
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Bibliography: Cuthell J.P. 2003 Interactive Whiteboards: new tools, new pedagogies, new learning? Reflections from teachers Dictionary of Contemporary English. Harlow: Longman, 2001. 1668 p. ISBN 0-582-45630-4. DUDENEY, G., HOCKLY, N. How to teach English with technology. Harlow: Longman, 2007 Emerging Perspectives on Learning, Teaching, and Technology. [online] [12 Aug. 2011] Available on WorldWideWeb:˂http://projects.coe.uga.edu/epltt/index.php? title=Multiple_ HALLIWELL, S. Teaching English in the Primary Classroom. London: Longman, 1992. HARMER, J. Teaching and Learning Grammar. London: Longman, 1987. 71 p. ISBN 0582-74623-X 72 PETTY, G. Moderní vyučování. Praha: Portál, 2006. 380p. ISBN 8073671727. PHILLIPS, S. Young Learners. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993. 182 p. ISBN 019437195-6 . SCOTT, W. A., YTREBERG, L. H. Teaching English to Children. New York: Longman, 1990 SCRIVENER, J.: Teaching Grammar. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003. 65 p. ISBN 0-19442179-1. SEIFERT, M., VEDRALOVÁ A. Učební styly žáků - výzva pro české učitele? Rodina a škola, 2010, vol.57, no SKALKOVÁ, J. Obecná didaktika. Praha: Grada, 2008. 328 p. ISBN 978-80-247-1821-7. SLATTERY, M., WILLIS, J. English for Primary Teachers. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006 STARÝ, K. a kol. Učitelé učitelů. Praha: Portál, 2008. 112 p. ISBN 978-80-7367-513-4.
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