another good talk...

I love this! I laughed a lot while listening to it. I have read some of Isabel Allende's work which I would recommend if you get the chance and she has a very interesting life story. 

TED Talk- an unexpected place of healing

I looked at some very inspiring talks on Ted this lady's story however, I think is an inspiration. She described the experience of being re-educated and rebuilding her life following a road traffic accident. she talks about being left blind and her mobility was severely impaired among other injuries. The ordeal was still to this day difficult to deal with as shown by how emotional she got as she spoke. Where most people might have given up hope she was inspired and helped by those around her including the group of pensioners in the home she goes to. There are some very funny incidents she describes including being taught to swear as her speech recovered - you can imagine the group of men finding it hilarious!
So it is overall a lighthearted and uplifting account as she does not dwell on the obviously painful and traumatic road to recovery. she tells us instead how through reeducation and the pensioners pooling their varied skills and experience she was able to reach the point she is at today. i think her approach and the collaborative effort she describes are a lesson  and inspiration to us all. If only more of us could take this attitude and be willing to be this selfless in helping others.  

going mobile....

We were set the task this week to evaluate and explore some mobile technology.
Personally I have used an ipod touch both in my teaching and day to day. I have also used a kindle fire on a couple of occasions but despite this experience I still found it eye-opening to look at and have a go at using a different tablet - a lenovo thinkpad. With a preference for smaller handheld devices I tend to find tablets a little cumbersome. call me a little old fashioned but for any substantial typing or computing I would rather a laptop or desktop. Having said that I can see the place that this technology has and that this is the direction the technology is moving in. I think it is a case of what you are comfortable with- I'm sure that people who's first use of computing is with one of these devices would find it challenging to change to a larger screen and separate keyboard to name but one challenge. As I am used to being 'guided' with some sort of indicator such as 'slide to unlock' on touch screens it took a rather ridiculously long time to unlock the screen on this tablet. Having managed this, many of the features were recognizable and user friendly as it uses windows. The various levels you need to exit through to sign out and shut down took a bit of getting used to as well as a slightly mysterious red button which i concluded would be something to do with the camera.
In terms of teaching a foreign language, from very early on in my lessons I found mobile technology a very user friendly and logical way to access and store audio material to playback in class.
As in language teaching this is something that is frequently used for listening practice, I found it much quicker and easier than carting around CDs! I also discovered some useful podcasts to use in my lessons and also some audio material on Itunes U to use. So it has been really refreshing to just save everything on one device and have the option to playback  as long as there is a dock available or you can bring your own portable speaker. It is also useful to record spoken practice- the student themselves and the teacher are able to listen back to it and give feedback. Recording speaking for assessment purposes is also an option.