Thinkfinity Free Online Courses: Another Great Site

Thinkfinity Literacy Network's free online courses guide educators, program managers, students and volunteers in the best literacy instruction and lifelong learning habits. Search by audience, or use the Thinkfinity Literacy Network Course Catalog or Suggested Content Clusters to receive targeted, effective, easy-to-use online training.

Access it  at  http://literacynetwork.verizon.org/TLN/courses

Virtual Tutor/Teacher Trainings

FLC is offering TWO virtual tutor/teacher trainings this month.  These trainings are free; participants need to have telephone and internet access simultaneously to participate.  Click here to read the presenters’ bios. These training sessions are specifically designed to assist literacy tutors and teachers.
TRAINING 1

• Training Topic: Strategic Reading Instruction to Improve Comprehension for Struggling Reader
• Date: June 22
• Time: 6:30 – 8:00 p.m. 
• Instructor: Iris Strunc, Northwest Florida State College
• Description: Although many school hours are devoted to reading instruction, many students simply do not understand what they read.  This training will explain how strategic analysis of text can help focus struggling readers on the text and task in front of them.  Participants will be shown specific comprehension strategies using highlighters, post-it notes and index cards to assist ineffective readers to analyze and comprehend text better.  

 TRAINING 2

• Training Topic: Effective Vocabulary Instruction for the Struggling Adult Learner
• Date: June 30
• Time: 12:00-1:30 p.m.
• Instructor: Cecilia A. Hicks, Florida State College at Jacksonville
• Description: Many adult learners struggle with reading for a variety of reasons. This workshop will explore several of these reasons and offer instructors  research-  and evidence-based solutions to this literacy dilemma. The primary focus of this training will be on vocabulary development. Participants will leave with proven strategies and activities designed to foster vocabulary development in the adult learner.

HOW IT WORKS
Participate from the comfort of your own home or office.  All you need is a telephone and access to the Internet. We will send you a toll-free number and web address (URL) when you register. On the evening of the workshop, you simply join the conference call and go to the web site which will allow you to access the slide show.
Register today!
Questions?  Contact Yari Payne at payney@floridaliteracy.org or (407) 246-7110 ext. 203. 

These trainings are collaborative learning events brought to you by the Florida Adult Literacy Resource Center, a program of the Florida Literacy Coalition. These trainings are made possible through the support of the Florida Department of Education, Division of Career and Adult Education.   

10 Resources for ESL & Foreign Language Students

Tutors: Check these out! There's sure to be something you can use with your students. Thanks to the Florida Literacy Coalition for posting this on their Facebook page. If you need help with any of this, contact Lauretta at the LCMC office 746-8197. Please leave comments on this page about the sites you reviewed.

From the site Free Technology for Teachers posted by Mr. Byrne

website: http://www.freetech4teachers.com/2010/05/10-resources-for-esl-and-foreign.html

While writing about LangMedia yesterday I realized that I've reviewed a lot of resources for foreign language and ESL/EFL students and teachers over the last couple of years. Here are ten of the better free resources for foreign language and ESL/EFL students.

Smart.fm is a free service designed to help you learn languages, mathematics, and history independently. At it's most basic, Smart.fm provides a flashcard-like service for learning languages, learning formulas, and learning facts. You can hear the flashcards read to you, read the flashcards, and play games based upon the flashcards you're studying. Smart.fm takes the flashcard concept a step farther by offering a personalized repetition schedule based upon what you've learned and what you haven't yet learned. The schedule adjusts each time you revisit your account.

Vocabulix provides numerous free tools for learning Spanish, German, or English. Vocabulix can be used to create quizzes or take quizzes online. Vocabulix provides dozens of drills and activities designed to help students learn Spanish, German, or English. The verb conjugation chart can be used on the Vocabulix website. The verb conjugator code is freely available for use in third party blogs, wikis, or websites. As most new language learning websites do, Vocabulix has a social networking option that helps match native speakers with learners.

Forvo can best be described as an audio wiki for word pronunciations. One of the problems with learning to speak a language that is not phonetic is trying to figure out how to pronounce the words. Forvo hosts hundreds of recordings of word pronunciations by native speakers. Currently there are nearly 200 languages supported on Forvo. Along with word pronunciations, Forvo provides some basic demographic information about each language. Forvo's content is user supported and user generated so new pronunciations are added every day.

CAPL, Culturally Authentic Pictorial Lexicon, is a project developed by Dr. Michael Shaughnessy at Washington & Jefferson College. The purpose of CAPL is to provide images that demonstrate the true meaning and intention of the words in a language. CAPL currently has collections of images for teaching and learning English (North American), German, French, Chinese, and Spanish. CAPL also has images for Japanese, Russian, and Ukranian. All of the images in the collection are licensed under a Creative Commons license that allows for re-use and manipulation for non-commercial purposes.

The Story Place is a children's digital library produced by the Public Library of Charlotte and Mecklenburg counties in North Carolina. The Story Place features digital stories in English and Spanish for students of pre-school age through elementary school. The digital stories are arranged by age group and by theme. I looked at the pre-school story about firefighters and thought it that it is the type of story I would share with my pre-school aged child, if I had kids. Along with the digital stories are activity guides for parents.

Verbs Online provides foreign language students with a good selection of activities for practicing verb conjugations. Practice activities are available in English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, and Portuguese. The practice activities deal with the past, present, and future tenses of regular and irregular verbs. Students can choose to do the activities in sets of ten through fifty practice items.

WordSteps is a resource for learning the vocabulary of your choice of nine languages. To start learning vocabulary with WordSteps select the language you are trying to learn then choose a set of vocabulary words in that language. WordSteps provides six types of practice activities for each set of vocabulary words. The sets of vocabulary words are called dictionaries by WordSteps. You can use the dictionaries made by other WordSteps users or create your own dictionary. WordSteps can be used without creating an account, but in order to create your own dictionary you must create an account.
Kindersay is designed for use by pre-K students. The user interface is easy to navigate using clear, kid-friendly icons. There are more than 500 activities that students can use. There is not any distracting advertising on Kindersay.

ESL Basics is a site that provides short video vocabulary lessons for beginning and advanced ESL students. For teachers, ESL Basics has a small collection of suggestions and ideas for teaching ESL. ESL Basics is adding new content on a regular basis.

Make Beliefs is a free comic strip creation tool that provides students with a variety of templates, characters, and prompts for building their own comic strips. Make Beliefs provides students with a pre-drawn characters and dialogue boxes which they can insert into each box of their comic strip. The editing options allow users the flexibility to alter the size of each character and dialogue bubble, bring elements forward within each box, and alter the sequence of each box in the comic strip. Students that have trouble starting a story can access writing prompts through make beliefs. Most impressively, Make Beliefs allows users to write their comic strip's dialogue in English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Portugese, or Latin.

An Online Training Opportunity!

EL/Civics Online is a unique professional development opportunity for ESL instructors and volunteers who wish to incorporate EL/Civics content into their adult ESL classrooms. 

This series of online courses will assist teachers in creating interesting, effective ESL lessons in these areas:


 Get started now by going to:
http://www.elcivicsonline.org/

SAVE THE DATE!!!

Literacy Council of Manatee County/Rotary Club of Palmetto

4th Annual Adult Spelling Bee

6 p.m. — Saturday, August 21, 2010

Bradenton City Auditorium, 1005 Barcarrota Blvd.

For tickets or more information, call Lori Johnson (746-8197)or e-mail: manateeliteracy@yahoo.com

Bee Objective: The purpose of the Spelling Bee is to have fun, be entertained and raise funds to benefit the Adult Literacy Program of the Literacy Council of Manatee County.

“Bee” a Part of It!

Queen Bee—Title Sponsor: $3000

Title sponsor receives “naming rights” for the Bee, plus your choice of team entrance fee or a table for eight (8). Also includes logo on decorative tile presented to all team participants, display of your banner at the Bee, plus name/logo in program and all publicity, and on t-shirts presented to all Bee spellers and guests.

Honey Bee Sponsor: $1000

Includes recognition in program and publicity and on t-shirts presented to all Bee spellers and guests.

Team—Speller Sponsor: $500
Includes team entrance fee and dinner tickets for three (3) spellers, plus one Spellagain card, recognition in program and publicity and on t-shirts presented to all Bee spellers and guests.

Bumble Bee—T-Shirt Sponsor: $375

Includes name on t-shirts presented to all Bee spellers and guests.

Alphabet Letter Sponsor: $100

Promote your company or organization by “sponsoring” a letter to be displayed with your name in program.

Donate a Silent Auction Item

Recognition at event through auction materials.


Sponsor a “Lifeline”

Teams (or audience members) may purchase these “lifelines” for a team, prior to start of Bee.

· Bribe-the-Judge Card: $100.00 (one per team) Allows team to continue play as if they had spelled their word correctly.

· Phone-a-Friend Card: $50.00 (one per team) Allows team to call someone in the audience or at home to spell the word. Clock will be stopped while Phone-a-Friend is being used.

· Spellagain Card: $20.00 (three per team) Allows team to spell a word again or request a new word.





Everyone is Invited

Don’t Miss It!

Ticket (includes dinner): $30

Cash Bar Available

Join nearly 500 of your friends, family and neighbors who are expected to attend to cheer on their favorite teams, enjoy a delicious dinner and “Bee” entertained.

DID YOU KNOW?
More than 20% of adults in Manatee County function at the lowest level of literacy. They can’t fill out a job application, read road signs or understand prescription instructions. Your support of the 4th Annual Adult Spelling Bee will help provide a lifetime of better literacy opportunities for thousands of adults and families in our community.

Reserve your ticket today!

The Literacy Council of Manatee County is a 501(c)3 nonprofit corporation. Your donation is tax deductible in its entirety. Words are selected by the Manatee County Library staff without input from the Literacy Council or the Rotary Club of Palmetto.

COLLEGE FOR ADULTS- Making the Transition

The National College Transition Network, a good resource for ABE-to-college transitions, has launched a new adult-focused college planning website.

This site can be used independently by the student or as part of instruction.

The new site includes sections on career planning, the college application process, financial aid, academic skills, as well as a links and worksheets on transitioning to institutions of higher education.
http://www.collegeforadults.org/index.html

How can I get my students enthusiastic about reading?

This is a good question because students will naturally be more likely to succeed at something that they find exciting.

It’s also a good question because many tutors, in their zeal to improve reading skills, might forget the importance of promoting an interest in reading. I know that as a beginning tutor, I lost sight of this important goal and pushed students too hard and too fast--not a good way to build a love of reading!

Here’s what I recommend:

• Remember that your primary goal should be to foster enthusiasm for reading. Once we set this goal, it will naturally influence our actions.
• Remember that your student’s difficulties may have years of history, and that we can only do so much at a time. Your student is painfully aware that his or her reading ability is poor, and will not benefit from being pushed.
• Find engaging reading material. You and I don’t want to read books that don’t interest us, and your students are no different. They should be allowed freedom to choose what they want to read whenever possible.

Remember that you have the power to set the tone for your encounters. Here’s the attitude that I silently try to convey:

• "I’ve got some wonderful books that we can read together, and I can help you." "You are in good hands here, and I will support you as you slowly stretch your reading abilities. It may take time, but as we work together you will improve."
• "This is a safe place where you can get the help you need. I will not push you-- you will know when it’s time to move on to more demanding material."
• "I know that you want to learn (even if you pretend that you don’t) and we will work together so that you will achieve your goal."

Stay in the "Instructional Level". This is really important, so I will discuss it separately.

What is the "Instructional Level," and why does Ruth keep harping on it?

I would say that the "instructional level" is the most important concept that I’ve learned. It transformed my tutoring sessions into fast-moving and effective learning collaborations.

Basically, it means that students learn best with material that’s not too hard, and not too easy, but just right.

It’s not just somebody’s theory. Studies indicate that the most efficient learning takes place when we stretch ourselves just a little bit. If our material is too hard, we may not even be capable of digesting it. If it’s too easy, then obviously little growth can take place.

Staying within your student’s instructional level allows you to accomplish two things:

1. Your student will certainly have a more positive attitude toward working with you, and toward reading in general.
2. Your student will actually learn more--not less!

So, remember that "harder" reading material will not necessarily speed up your student’s progress, and might actually slow it down.

Information in this article is from Literacy Connections