Is MediaWiki a Good Choice for an ESL Writing Classroom?

As we talked about last week, Web 2.0 tools such as blogs and wikis have moved L2 writing instruction to a new era. Thanks to these social tools, students can find more personal voices in their writing and share ideas through collaboration. In this blog entry, I would like to investigate a wiki tool, named MediaWiki, in regards to whether it is a good technological choice for an ESL writing class.

MediaWiki is a major tool that has been designed to serve the popular website Wikipedia. The homepage provides lots of technical information on how to configure, download, install, and use MediaWiki, and a complete instructional manual can be located via this link: Manual

1. Technical Preview: As someone who considers herself relatively tech-savvy, I still have to say that MediaWiki does not have a user-friendly interface. The downloaded software was not able to install successfully on my PC, and overall configuration had been a long and strenuous journey. 

2. Operational Description: Searching on MediaWiki works pretty much the same as in other websites. One can type in a key phrase in the search box and browse the results that are listed on the website. I have to say that I am surprised that the results were quite limited in number and scope when I searched in English. Since I will be teaching a sample essay on the fall of Soviet Union this week to demonstrate the genre of cause and effect, I typed in the key phrase "Soviet Union" via the search box. Major search results can be viewed as below--I am very disappointed with what I can find here; only maps and pictures of the flag do not help a lot with the pre-reading and pre-writing instruction I wanted to carry out. 

3. Teacher Fit: MediaWiki is not designed for pedagogical purposes from the starting point. It is a high-end collaborative writing and editing tool used by professionals who are wiki writers and editors. Unfortunately, the main purpose of the majority of ESL teachers is not to train themselves and their students become professional wiki writers and editors. However, this could be an interesting tool to conduct further exploration if one is interested in the history and development of Wikipedia and would like to utilize them in making lesson plans. If this is the case for you, check out the technology blog from MediaWiki to know more about the updates and past of Wikipedia: https://blog.wikimedia.org/c/technology/

4. Student Fit: MediaWiki is not suitable for ESL students to use as a general searching or writing tool due to its complicated set-up. However, students who are into web engineering might be interested to conduct independent study projects. Despite its difficulty to be implemented in general classrooms, MediaWiki might have potential in a Writing-Across-Curriculum (WAC) programs for computer science and web design majors. 

5. Implementation Schemes: From downloading, installing to configuring, MediaWiki could be a whole-semester course to learn just by itself. The whole implementation scheme is too complicated to be described here and would not make into a useful lesson for an ESL writing class. I have included the link to the complete installation guide here for anyone who's interested in learning about it: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Installation_guide

6. Appropriateness Judgments: I am quite surprised and feel disappointed that MediaWiki is actually listed as one of the useful resources at the end of Elola & Oskoz's (2012) article on "Writing Between the Lines: Acquiring the Presentational Mode Through Social Tools". It is perhaps indeed a great wiki writing tool for professionals who know what they are doing; however, for regular ESL teachers and students, I would suggest staying away from MediaWiki and use some other wiki tools that are more user friendly, such as Google Site or Wikispace. 

Using Wordle in ESL Reading & Vocabulary Classes

Have you seen a beautiful word cloud like this and wondered what it could be used for?

Wordle started to catch the public attention only a few years ago, especially among people who are in academia. Since we are living in a world full of printed words, why can't we make them more fun to read and add a little creativity and randomness? Created by Jonanthan Feinberg, Worldle satisfies people's artistic needs of seeing all words appear on one page based on frequency information from a text they provide.

It has been a long time since I wanted to integrate Wordle into my ESL classes, and thanks to some wonderful ideas offered by Nik Peachey in his Learning Technology blog, I now finally get a chance to write an evaluation on the application of Wordle in ESL reading & vocabulary classes.

The following evaluation is based on Hubbard's (2012) Methodological Framework. In this evaluation, I have also proposed a specific activity one can use in a content-based reading class.

1. Technical preview: Wordle can be run on either Windows or iOS system with updated Java. It could be a bit tricky to get it work at first place in a computer lab, especially if students are using different browsers without Java update. My recommendation, learning from trail and error, is to check with the lab assistant first and have Java updated on all computers before using Wordle in the computer lab.

2. Operational description: There are two ways to obtain a word cloud via Wordle, as shown in the screenshot below.

One way is to directly copy and paste texts into the text-box. Different from most online corpora tools, Wordle can take copied information directly from website, PDF files, and Word documents, in addition to txt files. The other way is to enter the URL of any social network with an Atom or RSS feed. Once a word cloud is generated, one can also change the scheme of it to make it more visually appealing. I have input my Advanced CALL blog URL into this search box, and the following word cloud was the one I have chosen to show to others:

The words in bigger font are associated with higher frequency words in my blog. It's interesting to see these words closely represent the nature of my blog as an informal and educational blog, with some words (e.g., students, American, ESL, & language) reflecting the targeted learner population and other words revealing popular content (e.g., wondering, WebCorp, & Listening).


3. Teacher fit: Different from most educational applications/softwares, Wordle is designed more for artistic expression and entertainment than for classroom-use purposes. However, this should not discourage teachers from using it. The open-ended design of Wordle makes it fit for all kinds of learners and classroom settings. In a computer lab setting, teachers can lead students to generate word clouds together using their own texts or assigned readings. In a traditional classroom with or without a podium computer, teachers can either show an already-made word cloud via the projector, present it as a handout, or post it on the wall.


4. Learner fit: How learners react to Wordle may differ depending on their preferred learning styles. On one hand, some learners, especially visual learners, would be thrilled to explore it and fascinated by the artistic elements it brings. On the other hand, some learners would be confused by the randomness of the words and frustrated by activities designed based on Wordle. This difference in learning style places a caution on introducing Wordle in different ESL classrooms: Depending on how comfortable their learners feel towards using word clouds, teachers may decide whether to use it as a major input, a visual aid, or just as a supplementary materials.


5. Implementation schemes: There are a variety of ways to use Wordle in an L2 reading & vocabulary classroom. I am going to introduce one pre-reading activity using Wordle in an advanced-level content-based Core computer-lab classroom. Since Astronomy is such a fascinating topic, I am going to use it as the content area focused in this Core class, using the word cloud I presented at the beginning of this blog entry.


1) The students will first be asked to study the words in this cloud following the frequency order. For words that they are not sure of, teachers can encourage the students to check them out via an online corpus, like COCA.

2) After knowing all the words, students will be asked to form into pairs/small groups and discuss the possible topics generated from this word cloud. As an alternative, a writing activity can be designed in which students write down complete sentences or research questions based on the word cloud.

3) After guessing the topics, students will then be directed to do a search on Google using high frequency words from the word cloud as keywords. Students will be asked to share their findings and save the readings they have located.

4) An extra-class work can be assigned to all students based on their search results. They can be asked to write a short summary of the article they decide to read and report to class the next day.


6. Appropriateness judgments: Wordle is an interesting tool that can be easily adapted to different kinds of ESL classes, given the condition that learners are not opposed to the idea of learning words in a random and visual way. It has zero cost to the teacher and the students, and they can actually own the word clouds generated from the website. I would strongly recommend teachers to try it out to use it as an alternative way of introducing reading and vocabulary activities.

"The American Life": Evaluation & Application in ESL Listening& Speaking Classes

The American Life is one of the most popular public radio show in the United States, produced by Chicago Public Media. Thanks to Web 2.0 technology, now the entire show is freely available online via http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives. The theme of this show is on the life of everyday people from all walks of life, including a range of topics as listed below:

This entry provides an evaluation based on Hubbard's (2012) Methodological Framework on The American Life in regards to its adaptability in ESL listening & speaking classes. 

1. Technical preview: The show can be directly listened to or downloaded on different devices. According to the homepage of The American Life, the show can be listened to for free from the stream radio archive episodes. As an alternative, one can subscribe to the free weekly podcast and download the old episodes for $0.99 on iTunes or other podcasting tools on a computer or smartphone.  For ESL students who are practicing listening and speaking skills in the United States, it is convenient for them to access this show anywhere as long as they have internet connections.  Even if they don't have internet connections, they can still access the show in the old-fashioned way by listening to its radio station (click to see a list of radio stations in different state broadcasting this show) 

2. Operational description: The simplest way of accessing the show online is by directly going to its radio archives: http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives. One can simply click on one of the shows and listen to it. To select listening materials, students can be directed to the "ways to explore" box on the right side of the screen, which looks like this: 

Among the four sorting options listed here, students can choose one that interests them the most. For example, exploring "by tag" provides a list of topics covered in all weekly shows, as shown at the beginning of this blog. Students can then pick any topic that interests them and only listen to shows on that topic. One click on the topic "Business" results shows like the following: 

It is worthwhile to notice that the above selections of shows all have multiple tags, which means students are likely to encounter them again in searching under a different topic. 

If one is up to the idea of subscribe podcasts on mobile devices, The American Life also makes it easy for audience of all age groups, including senior citizens who are not familiar with technology. A video tutorial is provided in the following link on how to get a podcast: http://serialpodcast.org/how-to-listen

3. Teacher fit: From a teacher's point of view, this online show website is 100% authentic, which is designed by native speakers to deliver to native speakers. Because of this, language learning and pedagogical use are not taken into consideration from the content and design of the site. On the other hand, 100% authenticity does not necessarily mean that the show is hard to comprehend. Most shows, as a matter of fact, were recorded clearly in a normal speech rate.  Depending on the level of the students, teachers need to introduce this show with caution or do some selective listening in advance. 

4. Learner fit: The American Life would work the best as a supplementary listening material assigned to students as homework in an intermediate-advanced ESL listening & speaking class. It would work even better for courses taught within a content-based instruction curriculum, due to the wide range of themes it covers. One show typically lasts for around 50 minutes to an hour, which makes it a good choice as a weekly listening log assignment. 

5. Implementation schemes: Students first need to be directed to the website of the show and introduced to the different options they can use to listen to it. Depending on the theme of the class and the level of the students, teachers can either assign a topic for students to listen to or leave it open for them to explore by themselves. The students can be asked to do a short summary in either written (e.g., writing a blog entry) or spoken format (e.g., using Audioboo to record their summaries). Teachers can also ask one student to share his/her listening experiences in the first 5 minutes of class on a daily basis--this serves as an extrinsic motivation for students to complete the listening assignment. 

6. Appropriateness judgments: The American Life is a high-quality show that could benefit L2 students who are curious to know more about American culture from the points of view of civilians. However, students who are below the intermediate level English proficiency may find it too hard to understand this show, given the fact that minimum visual and textual support is provided. The most appropriate student group who can benefit the most from this show is intermediate-advanced ESL learners who are studying in a content-based curriculum or in learning about American culture. Different from news programs and other TV shows, The American Life helps to broaden the students' horizons in discovering and understanding the multifaceted details in everyday life of American people. 

Using WebCorp to Learn American Slang Terms and Idioms

WebCorp is a new tool being developed by a research team at Birmingham City University. I first encountered this tool last year and have fallen in love with it since then. WebCorp stands for The Web as a Corpus, which shows the design of this corpus--all information is directly from web resources.

Web language nowadays is probably one of the most diverse and fast-growing language in the world. New coinages appear on a daily basis through different types of internet media and soon become widespread. To most effectively utilize a powerful tool like WebCorp, I have designed the following two types of activities for intermediate-advanced ESL learners.

1. Using WebCorp to learn new terms/slang language:
    Many of my students are interested to learn some commonly used academic slang terms. WebCorp could be an ideal tool to realize this in an effective way. For example, when you hear your American classmates say "pull an all nighter", what does it mean? The following is a screenshot of the concordance lines containing this useful colloquial expression from different English websites:

It is worthwhile noting that like other popular online corpora (e.g., COCA, MICASE), WebCorp also has the function of expanding the context to more words. Therefore, if we are curious to see a more complete context of this phrase while in use, we can click one of the concordances and more context will reveal.

2. Using WebCorp to learn American idioms:
Idioms are probably the hardest part in learning any language. On the other hand, they are also the most interesting and useful to learn if one is interested in knowing about the target language culture. I know some ESL classes have a special focus on learning American idioms, and the following activity may help to shed some lights on how to realize the understanding and use of idioms among international students.

Example activity: You've discussed the idiom "The A to Z of something" in your class; however, the students still have trouble using this idiom and would like to see more contextual usages. Let's use WebCorp to solve this problem! First, type in "The A to Z of" into the search box, and choose the language as "English". Click search and you should be able to see some concordance lines like the following:

Now, the default setting from WebCorp is for the search results to show under each URL, which may take a while for all results to show. Once all results are shown, one can then choose to see only the concordance lines without the URLs. I personally prefer the ones without URLs because they are easier to use in figuring out a pattern. The following is an example of another idiom "play... ace" without URLs.

Overall, WebCorp is a fun tool to play with for intermediate-advanced learners in learning new coinages and idioms. A major downside of this tool is that the search result may take a while to appear and one has to patiently wait till all results appear to choose other research options (e.g., not showing URLs). Despite this, I would still strongly recommend teachers to introduce WebCorp as a helpful resource to learners who are ready and eager to explore the language world of the internet.