Software/Website Evaluation #1

Software/Website Title: Learning Indonesian

Website URL: http://www.learningindonesian.com/

Grade/Age Level: teenage to adult

Learning Indonesian is an online Indonesian course that provides free program and paid products. I am evaluating the free program only. The program is designed to develop conversational fluency in the Indonesian language and it is intended for those who are casually interested to learn some basic Indonesian vocabularies and conversational skills. 

The content of the website is actually not about the course. It mainly introduce and explain about both free and paid programs. Clearly, the explanations are intended for promoting paid program, which is called Learning Indonesian Premium. The website has blogs about Indonesian language, food, and travel created by Cici and Shaun who are also the instructors of the course. Cici posted stories in Indonesian, but Shaun posted his in English. Some people interested with the stories commented in Indonesian, some in English, and some other in mixed English-Indonesian. Cici and Shaun replied to the comments in Indonesian and provided the English version of their replies. 

The course is presented in 48-session-audio lessons with additional two lessons from the paid program. All lessons are in MP3 files. The lessons are designed in graded level of difficulty of pronouncing Indonesian vocabularies, phrases, and sentences commonly used in everyday conversation. Each lesson is designed based on the previous ones. The lessons are actually listen and repeat exercises. Cici and Shaun articulate the instruction,examples, and short explanation, while learners have to repeat the examples. Lessons 1 - 48 contain English based instruction.   There will be pause after an example to give learners time to repeat the example. The lessons of the free program are actually the shorter versions edited out of the paid products.

The main external documents are: Important steps for new users, About us, Full program, Cici and Shaun's blogs, and Learning and community. These documents are effectively used to introduce and briefly explain both the free and paid programs. Other additional guides includes those for getting free study guides, member Log In, content news update, important pages and subscribe to Podcast. The "important pages" provides links to free audio lessons and recommended books.

Cici and Shaun introduce themselves and great their target audience briefly and warmly. They also provide simple explanation and provide sample lessons. In addition, the fact that Shaun is a native speaker of English and Cici is a native speaker of Indonesian has made the instruction, explanation, and examples clear and easy to understand. In my opinion, all those factors will make people visiting this website want to know more and download the audio lesson. Those who try the free versions and have particular plans related to Indonesia will also be interested in buying the Premium products for more practices. 

This audio lessons would be useful for teenage or adult learners who speak or know English and want to learn basic Indonesian conversational skills. Particularly, the lessons are useful for those who plan to travel to Indonesia and need to know how to communicate with Indonesians at some tourists destinations because not many Indonesians speak English well.

The website provides practice through the audio lessons, that is to repeat the examples of words, phrases, or sentences. There is no assessment and feedback. I think this is because the lessons are designed for casually interested learners. However, the website is easy to use. It is easy to navigate to different parts and it is also easy to download all free lessons available.

Because this website is intended for listening and  speaking practice, the strength of the programs is in the clarity of the instruction, simple explanation, clear pronunciation of each example. However, this website would be more interesting if Cici and Shaun provide speaking practice for the users. This can be done by making use of Skype.    

 

Reflection on Egbert (2005) and Warschauer (2010)

Egbert, J. (2005). CALL essentials: principles and practice in CALL classrooms. Alexandria, Virginia: TESOL Publication.

In her first chapter, Egbert provides both general and specific CALL definitions that help novice CALL practitioners to grasp the idea of what CALL is. She points out three key points of CALL in which it is focused on language learning, not on technology, it can be used in various contexts and diverse participants, and its pedagogy should be supported by the theory and practice of interdisciplinary fields. In addition, CALL practitioners might make the best use of CALL research results to effectively and efficiently integrate computers into their classroom.

Egbert also thoroughly explains the four fundamental principles of using technology to support language learning. First, CALL must be aimed to create optimal classroom language learning environments.  Second, CALL has to integrate ESL standards that the technology will support. In other words, computer technologies will assist learners toward the goal stated in the standards within environments that support their learning. The third principle is that CALL designers must refer to guidelines for using educational technology in language classroom. Basically the design must be based on the instructional goal and problems and must support effective learning. The fourth principle states that CALL must integrate the national educational standards in the design.

This chapter helps me, as novice CALL practitioner, to get to know CALL, its standards, conditions, and guidelines need to be considered in designing CALL activities. The explanation is easy to understand because it is so practical and followed by examples.

Then, in chapter 7 Egbert briefly discusses content-based instruction (CBI) which is beneficial for both language and content teachers. In her overview of CBI she emphasizes that content is purposeful and language is a tool for content learning. She also provides two important techniques in supporting content-based language instruction and tips for designing the instruction. The designed instruction incorporates measurable objectives that  address language, content, and use of technology. I like the final part, which present practical examples of using content, language, and technology objectives. I have never thought of some activities in the examples like using SimTown in content area of Mathematics. I particularly agree with the idea that language teachers should carefully plan how to use commercial software and Web sites intended for native speaking audiences. Otherwise, it would create problems in class and would not meet the instructional goals.


Warschauer, M. (2010). New paradigms in technology-Mediated Learning

Warschauer points out a trend showing that the numbers of English learners and speakers globally keeps on increasing. Today English becomes a global language. Another trend shows that the number of Internet users is also increasing. Meanwhile, global literacy needs one's mastery of English, information and technology tools, and communication skills to deploy English and information technology effectively. Thus, Warschauer conclude that  the use of information technology for international communication in English becomes an important strategies to develop global literacy. He then explain about situated learning in CALL from structural, cognitive, and sociocognitive point of view. He extensively discusses two types of computer mediated communicatin, e.g. Blogs and Wikis. Blogs is powerful for language learning because it bridges speech and writing , and genre. Wikis enable teachers to design interesting and engaging collaborative writing project. The example of a teacher creating Wiki for his/her class and assign collaborative writing projects is interesting to me. However, I wonder whether it is possible to design such activities for a large class of 40 - 50 students and how to assess the activity.

I particularly like this quote: "The blogosphere is a community that might produce a work, whereas a Wiki is a work that might produce a community " (Ward Cunningham). It really explains the role of Blogs and Wiki in education.