Group 2 - Proposal in Developing a Class Website

We are members of Group 2 namely Alice Wat, Charlotte Chan, Shirley Li and Kelvin Fu. Appended below please find our proposal in developing a class website for teaching purposes.

1. Background

We are English teachers in primary and secondary schools. In view of the need to strengthen student’s interest in English learning, whilst avoiding the traditional classroom setting, we propose to develop a class website with computer assisted programmes in quizzes, matches, cloze etc. to facilitate students to learn English in class or at home. The content of the website will contain English related matters but of interesting nature to attract students’ attention.

The target learners are senior primary to junior secondary students and their English proficiency is intermediate. For students, the website can provide them an additional means to practise reading and writing English skills in the context of Western festivals. After having a better understanding of the festivals, it is hoped that students will learn and appreciate the Western culture and accordingly develop their interest in learning English.

For teachers, the website can provide additional resources in teaching materials and ideas. The class website will be used as a supplementary tool in English teaching, in particular for students who can gain access to internet at home. This is because there is limited teaching hours in school whilst students enjoy using computers, so that a class website will be a suitable means for English learning at home.

2. Content of the class website

There are 6 main sections in the website which are described as follows:

(i) About this website – to introduce the objective of the website and the target groups;

(ii) Festivals - some brief description of Western Festivals such as Valentine’s Day, Easters, Halloweens and the Christmas. Powerpoints will be provided to introduce the origin, customs, interesting information etc. including introduction of vocabularies and ;writing topics (e.g. to write about individual learner’s favourite festival or to create one’s own festival, write a poem or a recipe etc.);

(iii) Resources – lessons plans, songs, chants etc.,

(iv) Hyperlinks – links to other relevant websites about the festivals with more detailed information for eager learners/students;

(v) Online exercises - quizzes, gap-filling, cross-matches, jumbled sentences etc. from “Hot Potatoes” and other computer tools; and

(vi) Blogs - after going through the class website, students can express their feeling and posted on blog. Also, students may be asked to choose some interested topics and write something on the blog. This allows students to feedback and to facilitate communication between fellow students, and to encourage interaction between students and the teacher.

3. Needs of students and benefits from the webpage

Students often feel that traditional learning in classroom is boring as the teaching is usually confined to textbooks. But in the internet environment, the learning is more interesting and comfortable, as students can have more control and flexibility in learning. Since the scheduled teaching hours in classroom lessons may not be sufficient for students who are slow in English learning, an interesting and flexible supplementary learning media can assist these students to catch up the learning.

A class website can be used both as class activities and student’s self-learning at home. If in school, teacher can go through the powerpoints with students and then have a class discussion to arouse their interest in leaning English and Western festivals. If at home, students can do the online quizzes and gap-filling exercises at a convenient time, and then post their writing on the blog and communicate with others. In this way, students can enrich their knowledge in Western festivals and learn more English vocabularies.

4. Computer skills

Generally, there is no particular computer skills required from the target students in using the class website, provided they have a computer at home that can gain access to the internet. The online games provided in the website page are self-explanatory and it is easy to follow simple instructions to do the exercises. Once the exercises are completed, students can get instant feedback from the website to know their scores obtained, so as to increase their incentive in English learning.

5. Integration into Syllabus

In the website, the content will focus on introducing English terms and vocabularies relating to the 4 major Western festivals to students, to enhance their knowledge in vocabularies and related history, songs, customs and food etc.

According to the syllabus, the required vocabularies will be presented in the website so that when students go through the website, they will go through the vocabularies at the same time and learn English in a pleasant way. Although the website is supposed to be used by students largely at home, lesson plan will be prepared to tally with the syllabus requirement and the website content for easy reference.

6. Technologies to facilitate interaction

The computer technologies to be adopted in developing the website are “Dreamweaver” (or alternatively “NVU”), “Hot Potatoes” which are available from CityU’s licensed softwares. The various proposed quizzes, cloze, gap filling and cross-matches will be neatly presented on the webpage, so that students can do the exercise easily and to enhance efficiency in English learning.

In addition to providing a platform for English learning at home, the website can also provide a means for students to express their comments in learning, and to communicate with the outside world. The website acts like a gateway for students to explore the internet world which contains lots of information and resources to arouse their interest in English learning. The blog will serve as a communication channel between fellow students and the teacher, for mutual understanding and improvement in English teaching and learning.