Week2-Activity 4: OER Scavenger Hunt

The two resources below are selected if I would need to create online ESL courses.

The first OER: 

Khan Academy: a brief introduction to grammar

Learning outcome: by the end of this course, students should be able to demonstrate an understanding of basic grammatical structures in English conversation and discussions.

Teaching grammar is fundamental in any language course. This resource can be used for many students at different levels. They use engaging graphics and simple drawings with easy-to-understand stories to explain complicated English grammar rules in the instructional videos. It is worth studying, especially for beginners. I might use it as a supplementary resource or to introduce the grammar rules.

The pros of using the resource:

1. It is free and accessible.
2. The content is easy to follow and understand.
3. Each video is short (1-3minutes), and each course contains only one grammar rule to be learned. 
4. It is engaging to watch, and it only requires little cognitive capacity from students.

The cons of using the resource: 

1. It is not possible for students who have no access to the internet and computers.
2. Some examples and stories chosen in the video are generally based on western backgrounds (e.g., dragons and wizards), which might not be appropriate for students from another culture. 

The second OER: 

saraschroeder3: podcasts

Learning outcome: by finishing each section of the course, students will be able to identify main ideas from supporting details and distinguish relevant information from irrelevant ones.

This website has a variety of topics for practicing English listening skills. Distinguished from simply listening to podcasts online, the author of this website has created a worksheet and answers for each selected podcast. It helps students focus on specific questions and practice targeted abilities. The general length of each podcast is around 15 minutes. The resources could be also used as supplementary listening material. Comparing to the listening exercises in the textbooks, they are more trendy and relevant to real-world issues. 

The pros of using the resource:

1. The website is easy to navigate.
2. Different topics are available and free for choosing.
3. The worksheet and answer sheets are well-designed and can be directly used in class.

The cons of using the resource:

1. The total number of podcasts is limited. (the author could not constantly update)
2. The website is created via Wix, and the author didn’t buy the domain name, so if used in class, Wix’s logo and commercial slogan will be visible.

References

https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/grammar

https://saraschroeder3.wixsite.com/podcasts