QR Code Scramble: Using Smartphones for Good

Left to Right: Ali, Khalid and Mazi unscrambling a text, 21st century style

Everyday we have to tell our students to put their phones away. ARG! After all they distract them from learning!

Despite our best pleas and threats, our good-cop and bad-cop discussions, we can't win this struggle.

Technology is obviously omnipresent, and, in fact, it is so embedded in students' lives that they think about, learn about and understand their word through those pesky little devices that can drive us insane.

So why NOT use them instead of forbid them? Furthermore, while we obviously have to make sure they don't abuse the power they have in their palms, there are ways to incorporate them into our instruction while engaging our students. ...

Links and Resources for Increasing English Language Proficiency

Speaking/Pronunciation

Manythings.org provides pronunciation of commonly mispronounced words. Students work in pairs and quiz each other on their proficiency.

http://www.manythings.org/pp/

This Web site is a guide to help students pronounce English vowels and consonants. This site provides audio clips, video clips and descriptions of how to make proper English sounds.

http://www.uiowa.edu/~acadtech/phonetics/english/frameset.html

Merriam Webster provides this helpful resource that provides explanations and handy quizzes to help students with pronunciation and vowel and word stresses.

http://www.learners-dictionary.com/pronex/pronex.htm

More Resources after the jump!

Word Doc version
Research Tips sheet