“Games, Simulations, and
Virtual Environments”
BrainPop’s URL: http://www.brainpop.com/english/seeall/.
5 Minute English URL: http://www.5minuteenglish.com/grammar.htm.
Fun Brain’s URL: http://www.funbrain.com/cgi-bin/gg.cgi?A1=m&A2=0&A3=0&AFUNCT=1&ALEVEL=1
The two web-based, virtual environments that I chose to talk about for this week’s blog post is called “Brainpop.” “Brainpop English language-learning program” uses lively, engaging content to teach English to speakers of other languages and native speakers of English. This program is loaded with content, games, movies, words and their usage. The audience for this virtual learning environment are for all academic levels and disciplines such as science, math, social studies, health, engineering & tech, and English. This site host loads of information for the teacher such as lesson plans, a free BrainPop educators section with Common Core Standards for every subject for all fifty USA states. The interface has animated, lively colors, large font, and appears to be user friendly and easy to navigate. The part that really passions me is Brainpop ESL/ELL. The downside of this site is every character is an animated cartoon, which my irate some adult learners.
Brainpop’s ESL/ELL virtual learning environment is built around animated movies and supporting features, it is an excellent resource for adult learners, because it reinforces vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation, reading comprehension, and writing skills. It can certainly make a difference in the learning of all ESL/ELL students! It also features all conceivable learning style, such as aural, visual, and tactile. Laureate’s week five video report, “We’ve seen people learn so much through games!” I agree that BrainPop has really created mathematics, English, etc. that kids, as well as adults can learn from and love to play.
The Minnesota Literacy Council has its own website that offers a plethora of instructor material resources and aids for computer education and ABE grammar skills development and for the building of basic computer literacy for adult learners living in Minnesota. These virtual programs found on this site are prepared by members of Minnesota’s CTEP (Community Technology Empowerment Project).
I would incorporate BrainPop virtual interactive ESL, literacy, and reading content, movies, and games into my English language arts literacy-writing course via hyperlinks that connect learners to my subscription. These virtual environments will enhance and reinforce the skills that I know that adult learners of literacy writing need to excel in their educational achievement, economic success, positive health outcomes, and civic engagement responsibilities to themselves, their families, and the community. For example, students will improve their reading and writing, speaking, spelling, word recognition, word identification and pronunciations, parts of speech such as nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, and etc.to become proficient communicators and writers through the visual, aural, and interactive built in elements that BrainPop offers. As for the Minnesota Literacy Council’s website, most activities are offer limited English speaker demographics, as well as native English speakers. Another feature of BrainPop is students’ growth from being gamers to game designers.
Both environments offer students opportunities that inculcate passion and motivation for learning Standard American English. Both sites are available anytime and from anywhere students have the technology, broadband, and/or Wi-Fi to access it. Best Education website also offers numerous resources of multiple academic disciplines for adult learning via games and learning activities. This site can be accessed in one spot by downloading the Homework Simplified Toolbar.
Squire (2011) posits identifying students’ passions and using them as advantage for relating academic content should be something that skilled teachers can do regardless of technology. Squire’s narrative suggest gaming is a great way to build meaningful relations that forge friendships built around common interests that can help address academic matters related to things of interest or just by calling upon the goodwill teacher and student develop via interest and gaming (p. 46). By building relationships with others of like interest, students learn to hang out in forums, which are an excellent source for learning.
Moreover, Squire (2011) suggest there’s a coupling effect between the students’ interests and academic ones via a degree of reciprocal indoctrination involved in getting students to care about the same kinds of things teachers care about (p. 47). In my profession of teaching adult learners, I have observed that some students may not have the necessary computing experience for Online learning to play games for learning. Hyperlinks that direct such students to online content can be a welcoming sight for many older learners; hence, I use them to help guide my students along their internet browsing experiences. It would also behoove the instructor/teacher to administer the VARK, keyboarding and surfing skills tests along with the ELSA skills tests to ensure students are able and ready to engage and participate in online courses and learning.
References
The two web-based, virtual environments that I chose to talk about for this week’s blog post is called “Brainpop.” “Brainpop English language-learning program” uses lively, engaging content to teach English to speakers of other languages and native speakers of English. This program is loaded with content, games, movies, words and their usage. The audience for this virtual learning environment are for all academic levels and disciplines such as science, math, social studies, health, engineering & tech, and English. This site host loads of information for the teacher such as lesson plans, a free BrainPop educators section with Common Core Standards for every subject for all fifty USA states. The interface has animated, lively colors, large font, and appears to be user friendly and easy to navigate. The part that really passions me is Brainpop ESL/ELL. The downside of this site is every character is an animated cartoon, which my irate some adult learners.
Brainpop’s ESL/ELL virtual learning environment is built around animated movies and supporting features, it is an excellent resource for adult learners, because it reinforces vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation, reading comprehension, and writing skills. It can certainly make a difference in the learning of all ESL/ELL students! It also features all conceivable learning style, such as aural, visual, and tactile. Laureate’s week five video report, “We’ve seen people learn so much through games!” I agree that BrainPop has really created mathematics, English, etc. that kids, as well as adults can learn from and love to play.
The Minnesota Literacy Council has its own website that offers a plethora of instructor material resources and aids for computer education and ABE grammar skills development and for the building of basic computer literacy for adult learners living in Minnesota. These virtual programs found on this site are prepared by members of Minnesota’s CTEP (Community Technology Empowerment Project).
I would incorporate BrainPop virtual interactive ESL, literacy, and reading content, movies, and games into my English language arts literacy-writing course via hyperlinks that connect learners to my subscription. These virtual environments will enhance and reinforce the skills that I know that adult learners of literacy writing need to excel in their educational achievement, economic success, positive health outcomes, and civic engagement responsibilities to themselves, their families, and the community. For example, students will improve their reading and writing, speaking, spelling, word recognition, word identification and pronunciations, parts of speech such as nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, and etc.to become proficient communicators and writers through the visual, aural, and interactive built in elements that BrainPop offers. As for the Minnesota Literacy Council’s website, most activities are offer limited English speaker demographics, as well as native English speakers. Another feature of BrainPop is students’ growth from being gamers to game designers.
Both environments offer students opportunities that inculcate passion and motivation for learning Standard American English. Both sites are available anytime and from anywhere students have the technology, broadband, and/or Wi-Fi to access it. Best Education website also offers numerous resources of multiple academic disciplines for adult learning via games and learning activities. This site can be accessed in one spot by downloading the Homework Simplified Toolbar.
Squire (2011) posits identifying students’ passions and using them as advantage for relating academic content should be something that skilled teachers can do regardless of technology. Squire’s narrative suggest gaming is a great way to build meaningful relations that forge friendships built around common interests that can help address academic matters related to things of interest or just by calling upon the goodwill teacher and student develop via interest and gaming (p. 46). By building relationships with others of like interest, students learn to hang out in forums, which are an excellent source for learning.
Moreover, Squire (2011) suggest there’s a coupling effect between the students’ interests and academic ones via a degree of reciprocal indoctrination involved in getting students to care about the same kinds of things teachers care about (p. 47). In my profession of teaching adult learners, I have observed that some students may not have the necessary computing experience for Online learning to play games for learning. Hyperlinks that direct such students to online content can be a welcoming sight for many older learners; hence, I use them to help guide my students along their internet browsing experiences. It would also behoove the instructor/teacher to administer the VARK, keyboarding and surfing skills tests along with the ELSA skills tests to ensure students are able and ready to engage and participate in online courses and learning.
References
Best Education.
(n.d.). Language arts sites. Retrieved from http://www.bestedsites.com/Languageartslinks.html.
BrainPop. (1999 –
2014). Retrieved from http://www.brainpop.com/.
BrainPop. (n.d.).
Retrieved from http://www.brainpopjr.com/readingandwriting/word/adjectivesandadverbs/preview.weml.
BrainPop. (n.d.).
Retrieved from http://www.brainpopjr.com/games/readingandwriting/.
BrainPop.
(n.d.). Writing a Paragraph. Retrieved from http://www.brainpopjr.com/readingandwriting/writing/writingaparagraph/preview.weml.
Fun Brain.com
(n.d.). Grammar gorillas. Retrieved from http://www.funbrain.com/cgi-bin/gg.cgi?A1=m&A2=0&A3=0&AFUNCT=1&ALEVEL=1.
HomeworkSimplified
Toolbar. (n.d.). You can now enjoy
one-click access to the latest movie reviews, film trailers, entertainment news
and more in one convenient spot!
Retrieved from http://www.homeworksimplified.com/alreadyInstalled.jhtml.
Laureate
Education, Inc. (Producer). (2010). Learning
through games [Video webcast]. Retrieved from http://www.courseurl.com.
Minnesota
Literacy Council. (n.d.). Retrieved from
http://www.mnliteracy.org/.
Minnesota
Literacy Council. (n.d.). Instructor
notes and resources. Retrieved from http://www.mnliteracy.org/educators/adult/technology/computer-skills.
Squire, K.
(2011). Video games and learning: Teaching and participatory culture in the
digital age. New York, NY: Teachers College Press.
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