I had wanted to take a course like this for about two years, but I didn’t know which one, where or how. I’ve been actively teaching English for almost 28 years and I like to be updated. Now I think I deserve to work out less and more from my home, so I decided to use the Internet for such purpose. I’ve been designing and evaluating course materials lately via Internet. I want to teach in-company courses in the morning and work from home in the afternoons. From a friend’s mail, I read about EVO and Baw2010 and decided to sign up. I must admit I was a little lost at the beginning, but I continued working and gained more confidence each day with a little help from my new friends, looking at the work of other bawers, and the guidance of our splendid team of moderators I gained more insight of the course.
These last six weeks were intense and very rich at the same time. I tried to finish on time, always catching up and feeling tired but happy at the end of the day. I didn’t imagine I would share with so many nice people from around the world. I felt the support of fellow bawers as well of moderators. The presenters were very well prepared and their live sessions very informative. I feel I have finally found the course I had wanted to take for the last two years. Now, it’s time for completing pending tasks, reviewing my own work as well as others’, and continuing trying tools and applications. I didn’t really see all bawers’ creations, but I’ll have time to do that little by little. I didn’t do all the tasks, but I’ll do that eventually. It is good to know we can continue accessing Baw2010 pages throughout the year. I’m going to put into practice what I learned and make my classes more interactive with blended learning. I’m going to explore all platforms presented in deep and start using Google apps. I want to keep in contact with all the wonderful people I met during this workshop and hope we meet again in future Baw events. Despite the hard work and short time, I liked everything and have no suggestion but to encourage Bawers to spread the word and continue with this fantastic project. I’m very happy to have signed up for this course and want to join the Webheads in Action. I’m looking forward to Baw2011 and will invite some of my colleagues to join me in this joyful ride.
I met people from many countries I was not familiar with. It was not hard work all the time, so I also had time to socialize a little and created accounts at I want to thank all Bawers for their contact, but I want to acknowledge Chaouki, Anne Sue, Arja and Maria Lujano's support. I also want to congratulate and thank all moderators (Week 1: Anisoara and Elizabeth, Week 2: Jose Antonio, Larissa, Week 3: Sharon and Mbarek, Week 4: Evelyn and Katya, Week 5: Fernanda and Helen, Week 6: Hala and Maru), for always being there. I also want to congratulate and thank Dafne and Teresa for their good job and support. I am grateful to Baw2010 organizers and EVO.
I couldn’t finish without thanking you readers and followers. I hope you have enjoyed reading about my ride on Baw2010 and join us next year as participants, moderators or lurkers. I’d also appreciate your having a look at my activities, quizzes and surveys. I’ll be looking forward to your comments!
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Baw2010: Week 6
Here's the account of my activities during the last week of the workshop: Week 6.
I completed some Week 5 tasks during this last week. Among them, I edited the “Is English a crazy language” quiz and added a third HotPotatoes quiz, which is a matching exercise. I joined in and enjoyed Rita Zeinstejer’s live. I answered the questions of the week. I read and commented on two of the Week 6 readings. I posted a Venezuelan recipe at the International Recipe Book, which you can visit at
http://baw2010participants.pbworks.com/International-Recipe-Book. Last, but not least, I created a survey which you can take if you visit http://www.zoomerang.com/Survey/?p=WEB22A9GGLL7P7.
We also had to reflect on and write a short text about our overall impressions of this 6-week workshop, what we've achieved and what we plan to do with our newly-acquired know-how. I posted my thoughts on the Final Reflections page, which you'll be able to read in my next post. I didn’t complete the final survey since it was the same I answered during the first week of the workshop.
To finish the course, I attended the BaW 2010 Graduation ceremony and shared with many friends. I commented on the fantastic work done by Teresa on the graduation page, complimented some fellow bawers and thanked each of the moderators that led us through this fantastic trip. I also participated in a poll to choose a word for the tenth candle of the graduation cake. The chosen word was Friendship. I finally thanked all the community of Baw10 for a well done job and promised to join again in 2011. You can hava a look at the graduation page at http://baw2010.pbworks.com/Graduation.
Now, I am allowed to use the Baw badge in all the activities and articles I publish. I received a certificate too. You can have a look at the graduation page at .I will soon join the Webheads in Action and graduate as a Webhead in Action!
I completed some Week 5 tasks during this last week. Among them, I edited the “Is English a crazy language” quiz and added a third HotPotatoes quiz, which is a matching exercise. I joined in and enjoyed Rita Zeinstejer’s live. I answered the questions of the week. I read and commented on two of the Week 6 readings. I posted a Venezuelan recipe at the International Recipe Book, which you can visit at
http://baw2010participants.pbworks.com/International-Recipe-Book. Last, but not least, I created a survey which you can take if you visit http://www.zoomerang.com/Survey/?p=WEB22A9GGLL7P7.
We also had to reflect on and write a short text about our overall impressions of this 6-week workshop, what we've achieved and what we plan to do with our newly-acquired know-how. I posted my thoughts on the Final Reflections page, which you'll be able to read in my next post. I didn’t complete the final survey since it was the same I answered during the first week of the workshop.
To finish the course, I attended the BaW 2010 Graduation ceremony and shared with many friends. I commented on the fantastic work done by Teresa on the graduation page, complimented some fellow bawers and thanked each of the moderators that led us through this fantastic trip. I also participated in a poll to choose a word for the tenth candle of the graduation cake. The chosen word was Friendship. I finally thanked all the community of Baw10 for a well done job and promised to join again in 2011. You can hava a look at the graduation page at http://baw2010.pbworks.com/Graduation.
Now, I am allowed to use the Baw badge in all the activities and articles I publish. I received a certificate too. You can have a look at the graduation page at .I will soon join the Webheads in Action and graduate as a Webhead in Action!
Baw2010: Week 5
I'm back and ready to share my experience during Week 5.
During this penultimate week, we were expected to explore some of the software available for creating online surveys, worksheets and interactive exercises. I created and share 3 online exercises using Propofs (Is English a crazy language?, a multiple choice quiz). I also used HotPotatoes (an application) to create a cloze test and a quiz on an introduction of an article about Paris, and a matching exercise on proverbs I haven’t uploaded yet. I recreated “Is English a crazy language?” multiple choice quiz using MyStudiyo, but I seem to have forgotten my password, and until today I haven’t been able to recover it. Mbarek suggested Google Docs for creating spreadsheets and quizzes, but I haven’t had time to try it. I commented on the selected reading (Creating Materials Online with Free Teacher Tools by María Isabel Pérez Torres). I attended Rubena St Louis´session on "Materials Creation" and prepared a question to ask her to answer during her presentation. Later, I shared my reflections on the session on Baw Blog. I also started my wiki page at Pbworks and added two of the HotPotatoes activities I created there.
If you want to take the quizzes, I created you can go to:
- http://www.proprofs.com/quiz-school/story.php?title=is-english-is-crazy-language
- http://www.mystudiyo.com/myquizzes
- http://www.teacherkiki.pbworks.com
During this penultimate week, we were expected to explore some of the software available for creating online surveys, worksheets and interactive exercises. I created and share 3 online exercises using Propofs (Is English a crazy language?, a multiple choice quiz). I also used HotPotatoes (an application) to create a cloze test and a quiz on an introduction of an article about Paris, and a matching exercise on proverbs I haven’t uploaded yet. I recreated “Is English a crazy language?” multiple choice quiz using MyStudiyo, but I seem to have forgotten my password, and until today I haven’t been able to recover it. Mbarek suggested Google Docs for creating spreadsheets and quizzes, but I haven’t had time to try it. I commented on the selected reading (Creating Materials Online with Free Teacher Tools by María Isabel Pérez Torres). I attended Rubena St Louis´session on "Materials Creation" and prepared a question to ask her to answer during her presentation. Later, I shared my reflections on the session on Baw Blog. I also started my wiki page at Pbworks and added two of the HotPotatoes activities I created there.
If you want to take the quizzes, I created you can go to:
- http://www.proprofs.com/quiz-school/story.php?title=is-english-is-crazy-language
- http://www.mystudiyo.com/myquizzes
- http://www.teacherkiki.pbworks.com
Baw2010: Week 4
It's been over a month since I finished Baw2010 workshop. It was a six-week course full of information, tips, activities and tasks. I'mm going to briefly relate what I did during WEEK 4.
I dare say this was the most overwhelming and productive week in terms of amount of information and creation. I downloaded two of the three virtual classrooms (Alado and Elluminated). I had already attended two live sessions at WiZiQ in 2009. I explored different features of each virtual classroom/online presentation platform (content pane, chat pane, mike and audio volume control, saving chatlog and slides). I attended the live presentation(s) on the topics of the week, Andrew’s (Alado) and Evelyn’s (WizIQ), but failed to attend Jonathan’s (ELLuminated at Learningtimes), but I could read and listen to the recording. I commented on Andy’s presentation, responded to the weekly questions posted in the discussion forum, and read and commented on reading 1. Making my voice heard, I set up accounts in two of the suggested tools: Voxopop and Voicethread. If you want to listen to my threads go to http://www.voxopop.com and http://voicethread.com/#u753202.
I dare say this was the most overwhelming and productive week in terms of amount of information and creation. I downloaded two of the three virtual classrooms (Alado and Elluminated). I had already attended two live sessions at WiZiQ in 2009. I explored different features of each virtual classroom/online presentation platform (content pane, chat pane, mike and audio volume control, saving chatlog and slides). I attended the live presentation(s) on the topics of the week, Andrew’s (Alado) and Evelyn’s (WizIQ), but failed to attend Jonathan’s (ELLuminated at Learningtimes), but I could read and listen to the recording. I commented on Andy’s presentation, responded to the weekly questions posted in the discussion forum, and read and commented on reading 1. Making my voice heard, I set up accounts in two of the suggested tools: Voxopop and Voicethread. If you want to listen to my threads go to http://www.voxopop.com and http://voicethread.com/#u753202.
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Baw2010: Week 3
I must start by apologizing for not having been able to update this blog. I've faced some trouble with my PC and had to be away, but for a short time.
I'd accomplished three more weeks before I remembered I had to update my blog. Well, it tells about how busy I've been reading, designing and learning intensively, but still falling behind. But it isn't as bad as it seems. The good news is that learning is a never ending process and there's no deadline for learning. We all have different learning styles and will eventually achieve our goals. As our moderators say, we have the rest of the year to catch up and we can always join future Baw events too. Well, I think I'd better start giving my account.
Week 3 was very interesting since we had a long list of the tasks I had to complete. Let's have a look at some of my accomplishments .
I'd accomplished three more weeks before I remembered I had to update my blog. Well, it tells about how busy I've been reading, designing and learning intensively, but still falling behind. But it isn't as bad as it seems. The good news is that learning is a never ending process and there's no deadline for learning. We all have different learning styles and will eventually achieve our goals. As our moderators say, we have the rest of the year to catch up and we can always join future Baw events too. Well, I think I'd better start giving my account.
Week 3 was very interesting since we had a long list of the tasks I had to complete. Let's have a look at some of my accomplishments .
- I learned about different blogs, wikis, podcast and Social Network providers and wrote my own definition of each tool besides describing their differences and similarities.
- I explored different features of blogs, wikis, Social Networks and podcasts.
- I had to create my own blog (which I did during week 1), wiki (which I did during week 5), and/or podcast (which I haven't done yet).
- I joined a Social Network (blogspodcastingandwikis.ning.com) and reactivated my Twitter account (sines2007 is my username).
- I partially attended Graham Stanley's live presentation on Twitter (the presentation of the week), but didn't comment on it.
- I answered some of the questions of the week.
- I read and commented on one of the Week 3 readings. You can find the reading at http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/think/articles/blogging-elt. This reading helped me understand the use of blogs better and gave me the necessary insight to answer question 1 of the week.
Well, I guess I'll have to hurry up to write about my experience during Week 4.
That's all for now.
Friday, February 12, 2010
Is English is a Crazy Language?
Thursday, January 28, 2010
Educator's Day
We recently celebrated Educator's Day in Venezuela. We celebrate it on the 15th of January every year.
I want to congratulate all my fellow colleagues at Baw2010 with this video clip.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=huNYR_RixqM&feature=related
Enjoy it!
I want to congratulate all my fellow colleagues at Baw2010 with this video clip.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=huNYR_RixqM&feature=related
Enjoy it!
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