Infonews n°193 du 21/09/2003

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This week, discover a new, unusual site for kids, based on
audio files. Don't forget that tomorrow, September 21th is International
Day of Peace, and find some sites who suggest ideas to present it to your
students, including a lesson plan to work on violence in football. To go on
with sports, you can also work on biographies on famous people, for example
famous Australian rugby players. You can find here ideas for a class work,
and then autonomous activities. Then discover two sites for secondary
school, several dictionaries and other sites of reference online, four
sites from colleagues, one for primary school, one about teaching practice
and a site of cliparts to illustrate your pages.
Have a nice week!
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A la Une
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SparkTop.org (from Ellen Hoffenberg-Serfaty on Etni)
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In the news : International Day of Peace
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Official UN site
UNESCO "Peace is in our hands"
Nonviolence.org
Peace One Day in England (sponsored by Stella Mc Cartney)
We The people ("Every day can be a Peace Day when building Cultures of Peace.")
Classroom activity
Call for Peace in Football in England
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Biographies
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Gallery of achievement
Lesson plan from rugby.com.au ( whole class activity)
Class activity from Infonews (autonomous)
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Resources for secondary school
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Days of Infamy: December 7 and 9/11 ( from [LIIWEEK] September 18)
Smithsonian American Art Museum (from The Scout Report -- September 12)
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References
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Dictionaries (from Library Hot Five #194 )
Grammar (from The Scout Report -- September 12)
Writing Handsouts (from Riverdeep's Classroom Flyer, September 19th)
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Sites from colleagues
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English Bag (from Laurence Theixans)
Soundguide (from Rodolphe Maurel)
ac-creteil (from Jean-François Morel)
ac-montpelliers (from Darren Rigby)
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Resources for Primary school
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The Internet Picture Dictionary (from Library Hot Five #194 )
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Teaching practice
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Problem Solving Techniques with preschoolers (from Riverdeep's Classroom
Flyer, September 15th)
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Internet Tools
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Cliparts for teachers (from Riverdeep's Classroom Flyer,September 17th)

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A la Une
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SparkTop.org (from Ellen Hoffenberg-Serfaty on Etni)
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See this new, different site, based on audio files and flash. It is aimed
directly at children, and offers interesting feature.
http://www.sparktop.org/home.html
SchwabLearning's new children's site is targeted for children age 8-12 who
have learning disabilities. The site claims:
"...where no two brain spark alike...a place where kids who learn
differently can create awesome stuff...play great games...connect with
other kids...and discover new ways to succeed in school and life."
Kids have to register to gain full access to all the features of the site,
and there is an on-line adult consent process (including teacher consent);
but there is plenty to do without registering.
To get an overview of the site, go to
http://www.sparktop.org/adult/info.html
This is definitely what is promised--a multi-media, interactive site, with
plenty of chances for kids to meet other kids around the world. We
especially enjoyed "The Last Bell" where you can play video and audio with
children talking about what they like to do "after the last bell" of
school, i.e. hobbies. BTW--this is an interesting feature for EFL students
since they can get some good "listening comprehension" time in:-)

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In the news : International Day of Peace
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September 21st has been declared by the UN International Day of Peace. Here
are some sites who can help you present the event to your students:

Official UN site
http://www.un.org/events/peaceday/2003/
with activities in many countries (but not France). The site is also in
French, Russian and Spanish.

UNESCO "Peace is in our hands"
http://www3.unesco.org/iycp/uk/uk_sum_idp.htm

Nonviolence.org
http://www.nonviolence.org/articles/cat_culture_of_peace.php

Peace One Day in England (sponsored by Stella Mc Cartney)
http://www.peaceoneday.org/page/homeindex

We The people ("Every day can be a Peace Day when building Cultures of Peace.")
http://www.wethepeoples.org/intl_day_peace.php

Classroom activity
http://www.readwritethink.org/calendar/calendar_day.asp?id=296
ideas to reflect about conflicts in the world, why they started and how we
can stop them.

Call for Peace in Football in England
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/main.jhtml?xml=/sport/2003/09/20/sfnwhi20.xml&sSheet=/sport/2003/09/20/ixfooty.html
Read this article from the Telegraph, and reflect about violence in
football with those articles about Roy Keane and Pelé's site : noviolence.com
http://perso.wanadoo.fr/infonews/themes/Violence%20in%20football.htm

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Biographies
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Gallery of achievement
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http://www.achievement.org/autodoc/page/tel0int-1
Discover biographies and interviews of the greatest achievers. To select
one, visit the halls of art, business, public service (presidents,
journalists), science and exploration,or sports. For each person, you can
read a short profile, a biography and an interview, with video and sound
clips plus transcripts.

Lesson plan from rugby.com.au ( whole class activity)
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http://www.rugby.com.au/verve/resources/Ella_bros.pdf
Brigitte Baudet on e-teach found this interesting page about rugby. It
works from the biography of the Ella Brothers, rugby legends, to reflect
about what a biography is and what it takes to write an efficient bio.
For upper intermediate students : the text is rather long.
But the process, with a brainstorming, is very interesting and can be
adapted to any class. This is the first step to the next activity, which
provides the students with the tools they need to go on autonomously with
their work.

Class activity from Infonews (autonomous)
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Biographies are very useful to encourage students to study in depth a
subject they are personally interested in, and report it, either in a
written report, or orally, to the class, or if they feel shy, to the
teacher in a private interview or to the assistant if there is one
available in your school.
I have organised this activity in several classes ( see lesson plans in
previous Infonews) and it always works very well : some brilliant students
made stunning videos or power-point presentations to the class, and average
or weak students managed to talk for 10 minutes to me or the assistant in a
very understandable manner, whereas I had never heard their voice in class!
Here is the page I made for my students to work from, with many links to
various biographies online:
http://perso.wanadoo.fr/infonews/themes/biographies.htm
They can also go on Google ( http://www.google.com) and look for the person
they are interested in. In that case, remind them to always add "biography"
to their search words, to reduce the choice of sites they get to only those
they can really use.
Note : I also had biographies of "special" people, like Marilyn Manson.
There you must be very cautious, make sure that you can trust the student,
and tell him that the aim is not to show all the bad ( but attractive)
sides of the character, but make people understand why he finds him better
than most people think. It works well, but you must be prepared to stop the
research or the presentation as soon as you feel it is going the wrong way.

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Resources for secondary school
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Days of Infamy: December 7 and 9/11 ( from [LIIWEEK] September 18)
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This intriguing site compares and contrasts two very similar projects
separated by 60 years: "man in the street" audio recordings made in the
days immediately following the attack on Pearl Harbor and after the
September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Includes audio of the interviews,
discussions,
transcripts, and additional interviews with "prominent, thoughtful
Americans who've lived through both attacks," including folk musician Pete
Seeger and U.S. Senator Daniel Inouye. From Minnesota Public Radio.
http://www.americanradioworks.org/features/daysofinfamy/
[ including audio files with transcripts, and various documents. Very
useful for the themes "violence" and "conflicts" en première.
You can find other resources about 9-11 in the Scout Report from sept 12th,
in 'In the news' at the end of the page:
http://scout.wisc.edu/Reports/ScoutReport/2003/scout-030912.php ]

Smithsonian American Art Museum (from The Scout Report -- September 12)
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http://americanart.si.edu/tours/index.html
several pictures are shown and commented upon by the director of the
gallery. The comments are on quicktime for oral work, and a short written
comment appears on the page with the picture. This could be used for TPE or
IDD including arts and English.

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References
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Dictionaries (from Library Hot Five #194 )
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Acronym Finder
http://www.acronymfinder.com/
Tech-Along Technology Glossary
http://www.4teachers.org/techalong/glossary/
Merriam-Webster (dictionary and quotations)
http://www.m-w.com
Merriam-Webster Word Central (for younger children, with your own dictionary)
http://www.wordcentral.com/
OneLook Dictionaries (more than 287 dictionaries and glossaries)
http://www.onelook.com/

Grammar (from The Scout Report -- September 12)
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Two on Grammar, Style, and Diction
The American Heritage Book of English Usage
http://www.bartleby.com/64/
Webgrammar's Free Tips
http://www.webgrammar.com/
[ for teachers, researchers, or students who plan to write and publish
articles.]

Writing Handsouts (from Riverdeep's Classroom Flyer, September 19th)
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http://www.uis.edu/ctl/handouts.htm
For students, researchers and anyone who has to write a text or an article
in English. You will find there the rules for punctuation, writing a thesis
or a resumé, from the university of Illinois at Springfield, US.

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Sites from colleagues
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You offer resources that other colleagues could use? Write to Infonews and
tell us about it!

English Bag (from Laurence Theixans)
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http://perso.wanadoo.fr/theixans/
Un site de liens à explorer, classés par thèmes. Pour chaque thème, vous
arriverez à une page de bannières et de titres de sites. Pas de
commentaire, mais une bonne collection de sites utiles pour préparer vos
cours.
[ People who don't speak French can also use this precious list of addresses! ]

Soundguide (from Rodolphe Maurel)
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http://perso.wanadoo.fr/soundguide/
Le site Soundguide a été conçu pour l'utilisation en espace-langues. Le
site inclut maintenant un service de chat qui permet également les
conversations privées. Possibilités d'activités pédagogiques diverses, jeux
de rôles, partage et compte-rendu d'informations... A essayer
[ most of the explanations are in French, which is more convenient for our
French pupils, but EFL students from other languages can also use this
site. The idea is based on dictations from native speakers that the student
has to understand and write down. He first hears the sentence, then writes
it and checks his answer, or chooses to ask for hints and help. What is
really useful is that everyone can do it at his or her own pace....]

ac-creteil (from Jean-François Morel)
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Jean-François nous signale la mise en ligne de la nouvelle base de
ressources académiques disciplinaires sur le site de Académie de
Créteil.Cette base recense les ressources qui présentent un intérêt
particulier ou original dans le cadre de l'enseignement de l'anglais avec
les TIC. Elle comprend plus de 500 liens et on peut la consulter par
académie, ou par thèmes.
http://www.ac-creteil.fr/anglais/RessourcesDisciplinairesAnglais.htm

ac-montpelliers (from Darren Rigby)
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http://www.ac-montpellier.fr/Pedagogie/Disciplines/anglais/index.htm
Darren est un des webmestres du site anglais de l'académie de Montpellier.
Il nous signale les dernières nouveautés mises en ligne:
- une webquest sur l'Australie
- la chanson "The Grave" from Georges Mickael avec des exercices de
compréhension et des pistes sur l'étude sdes "anti-war" songs.
- des fichiers de polices phonétiques à télécharger.

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Resources for Primary school
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The Internet Picture Dictionary (from Library Hot Five #194 )
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http://www.pdictionary.com/
This picture dictionary is for ESL students and beginning English, French,
German, Spanish and Italian language learners. Browse by category: Animals,
Appliances, Body, Clothing, Colors, Fruits, Garden, Kitchen, Musical
Instruments, Numbers, School, Sports, Tools, Transportation, and Vegetables.
[ note : for some reason, I couldn't find the words "fille", "boy" and
"girl" (but it offers you "garlic" or "giraffe" instead!!!!!)
it also offers exercises:
- where students can learn : when you move the mouse on the picture it
shows the word.
- where they can practice : students must write the word under the picture
- and so on..... ]
[ don't forget the picture dictionary from Enchanted Learning, which is
about the same, but with links behind many of the words, and without the
exercises:
http://www.enchantedlearning.com/Dictionary.html ]

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Teaching practice
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Problem Solving Techniques with preschoolers (from Riverdeep's Classroom
Flyer, September 15th)
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http://www.kidsource.com/kidsource/products/I.want.my.way/I.Want.It.My.Way.html
"It's inevitable--there will be a few conflicts in your preschool classroom
to handle this year. To help minimize conflicts and power struggles, try
the steps and tips offered here by an experienced facilitator." (comment
from Riverdeep's Classroom Flyer, September 15th)
[ read those step by step advices to get out of a power struggle, and you
will soon find out that they can be transfered to lots of other situations
than just conflicts with pre-schoolers.]

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Internet Tools
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Cliparts for teachers (from Riverdeep's Classroom Flyer,September 17th)
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http://serp.la.asu.edu/clipart_dir/clipartidx.html
Choose from several categories collected at this site to cover many
occasions and topics--including education. [ lots of drawings to make your
webpages or publications more lively....]

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Une compilation réalisée par :
Christine Reymond
lycée Blaise Pascal, Rouen, France
E-Mail: Christine.Reymond@ac-rouen.fr
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