Software/Website Evaluation #2: English 4 IT

Software/Website Title:English 4 IT

Website URL: http://www.english4it.com/  

Grade/Age Level: High School - University students

Language & Content:

English 4 IT is designed to complement a series of books on English for Information and Technology (IT), that can be found by clicking the Bookstore button. It is intended to be used individually by students attending ESP reading class, particularly that of English for IT. Students may use this website to prepare themselves before class or to reinforce their vocabulary and reading skills after class. However, other users, those who do not attending the class and do not have the course book may also use the website for self-study. The latter type of users will only obtained less benefits from the website compared to former ones because the second type of users do not have partners or group to discuss the reading passages and the comprehension questions that follow.

This website contains of 21 reading topics and each topic is divided into four activities: Reading Activity, Multiple Choice, Fill in the Blanks, and Listening Comprehension. Basically the last three activities are designed mainly for vocabulary building. The website has external documents related to creating a class for teachers and enroll in a class for students. That is the only external document that the website has.
  

The website is interesting for the target audience probably because it provides various topics (although not many) and vocabulary specifically related to IT and each word in the dictionary has audio version, example of usage in a sentence, and short explanation related to prat of speech.


I think the website is useful for building user's vocabulary, specifically related to IT. The activities are focused on vocabulary exercises through linking technical vocabulary in the reading passage to the dictionary, providing multiple choice exercises related to the definition of IT-related words or phrases, fill in the blanks with again word or phrases for a given definition, and listening exercises which is actually word or phrase dictation.

Besides practices, the website provides assessment and feedback. In each activity, except reading, there will direct feedback to verify whether a user's answer is right or wrong. There is also an option of "I don't know" in each exercise. If a user click this option, it will direct the user to the explanation on the word or phrase, which is part of the dictionary. At the end of an exercise there will be report on how many right answers that a user has made.

I found that the website is easy to use because basically it only has 4 sections related to core content. The layout is simple and clear. It is also easy to navigate from one part to another. As I mentioned earlier, the strength of the website is in providing different kinds of vocabulary exercises. It is good for students of vocational schools or freshmen, whose majors are related to IT, who want to build their technology-related vocabulary. It will be much better for the website to add the number of topics and reading passages and provide more reading comprehension exercises for users.

Corpus Based Language Learning: Johns, T (1994) and Richards, J & Rogers, T (2001)

John, T. 1994. From printout to handout: grammar and vocabulary teaching in the context of data-driven learning. In T. Odlin (Ed), Perspectives on Pedagogical Grammar (pp.293-313). Cambridge University Press.

The purpose of the chapter is to describe and illustrate the synthesis of traditional and more innovative language teaching approaches. In particular, Johns describes an on going-work taking place at a program called English for Overseas Students Unit at the University of Birmingham. The program was intended for English for Specific Purposes (ESP) and second language (L2) adult learners and built based on the notion of the relationship between form and function in language. Johns posits that a concern with language form and function is always followed by the need of an extremely extensive use of authentic and unmodified data found in original texts. However, such concern results in a question of "how such data are to be obtained and made available to the learner in such a way that they do not overload his or her linguistic and learning resources" (p 294).

Processing raw data taken from authentic materials such as scientific journal or other reading materials designed for native speakers using Data-driven Learning (DDL) to create teachable and learnable ESL materials is the answer for the "how question" in page 294. Johns explains in detail how DDL approach was applied to the Remedial Grammar and Vocabulary Studies classes, which were originally designed to accommodate individual student's needs. DDL is employed because it is technologically and methodologically innovative. By using a concordancer, Johns and his team were able to create ready-made corpora taken from authentic texts to provide their students' questions through a form of linguistic research done both by students and teachers. Johns posits that DDL approach  have been proven so powerful to design materials that are closer to authentic language use. Johns provides various examples of using extracts from the available teaching materials to address some linguistic points, particularly those emerged from a close study of weekly journal the New Scientist. DDL approach had made unique inquiry collaboration between students and teacher possible through completing a huge amount of concordance-based linguistic tasks related to synonymy, antonymy, and hyponymy in more meaningful ways compared to similar tasks previously designed without the aid of a concordancer. 

Johns concludes that the results of processing extracts using a concordancer are encouraging and indicate that DDL approach may result in teachable and learnable materials that were impossible before Johns and his team applied the approach. However, at the end of the chapter, Johns states that there is a wide open research opportunity towards investigating the effectiveness of DDL, particularly with beginners or near beginners. He also recommends four research questions related to the trainability and transferability of language learning strategies and individual differences  between language learners, in the context of comparing DDL and traditional teaching approaches.   


Richards, J., and Rogers, T. 2001. Approaches and methods in language teaching (pp. 132 - 140). Cambridge University Press.

Richards and Rogers explain that a lexical approach in language teaching refers to an approach "derived from the belief that the building blocks of language learning and communication are words and word combination" (p. 132). Lexical approaches in language teaching reflect a Chomskyan belief that "a lexicon is prime"; it is the center of language structure, second language learning, and language use. The role of lexical units has been emphasized in first and second language acquisition research. In addition, the availability of many lexically based texts and computer resources have made the organization and teaching the lexicon possible.

Referring to the lexical view Richards and Rogers state that basically the role of collocation is important in lexically based theories of language. Collocations as types of  lexical units are crucial in learning and communication. Studies on linguistic corpora have been done to examine patterns of phrases and clauses sequences in samples of various kinds of texts, including spoken samples. However, referring to Pawley and Syder's estimation about native speakers' lexical inventory, Krashen's suggestions related to language input, amd Bahns' suggestion on the emphasis of teaching lexical collocation to EFL learners, Lewis' and other experts' proposal for a lexis-based approach, Richards and Rogers conclude that "how a lexically based theory of language and language learning can be applied at the levels of design and procedure in language teaching still need to be continuously convincingly demonstrated.


I wish I read these two chapters when I was still teaching ESP reading in my home institution. Back then, I taught freshmen, sophomore, and senior undergraduate students having telecommunication, informatics, and industrial engineering as their major. My students have similar English learning experience background, in which mostly they learned grammar in their previous education, with those described in Johns' chapter. I would have tried DDL approach with my students if I knew about it. These two chapters have been published more than 10 years ago and ironically I've just read them this week. Well, one aspect that makes me like L 544 is that I have been exposed to language teaching and learning approaches new to me but have been practiced and scientifically proven.           

Reflection on Anderson's Article (2003)

Anderson, T. (2003). Getting the mix right again: an updated and theoretical rationale for interaction. The International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning. 4.(2), pp 1 - 25.

Anderson points out the debate on the importance of interaction in educational process to introduce his proposal of equivalency theorem. His objective in writing the article is to provide a theoretical rationale and guide of effective and efficient distance education systems.He begins the discussion by providing the definition of interaction and explaining the function and value of interaction in education.  He differentiates between interaction leading to learning in any informal context and types of interaction that take place in formal education context (p. 4).

When it comes to distance education, Anderson refers to his previous work with Garrison to describe common types of interaction between student-student, student-teacher, and student-content. He posits his equivalency theorem stating that "deep meaningful formal learning is supported as long as one of the three types of interaction is at high level" (p.7). This means that one type of interaction can be substituted with one of the other types with equivalent level. Anderson then proceeds to providing the implications of equivalency  theorem that involves student, teacher, and content.  

In the next part, Anderson gives various examples to describe the operation of the equivalency theorem in most common distance education. Web-based courses are more effective and efficient compared to traditional distance education via mail or electronic correspondence and audio and video conferencing because they are capable of providing high levels of deep and meaningful learning through high level of student-student interaction. At the end, Anderson describe his model of Online learning with learners and teachers as its main actors. The model facilitates the development of social skills, collaborative learning, and personal relationships amongst all participants. In short, Anderson's theorem  and model provide  examples of various types of effective distance education programming  based upon various types and mixes of interaction (p.20).

At first, I thought that the article would be theoretical and difficult to read. I was glad that the discussion actually provides practical examples and explanation about various types of interaction in distance education. Last semester, I took my first online class in IST department and L-544 is my second online class. My experiences in those two classes have made me easier in grasping the meaning of "reducing the amount of teacher-student interaction and substitute it with increased student-student and student-content interaction in e-learning environment".