Translating Class Reports

I have just finished writing my student reports for parents. This was the first time I have ever had to do this, and I found it a difficult and unpleasant task. Writing individual reflections of learning for 26 students, including their strengths and needs for each one, made me realise I should take more anecdotal notes during the term to assist me. I have started a note book but am considering writing interim report comments weekly on different students to help break the task down, and also make the messages more relevant. I found remembering each and every students strengths and needs at the end of the term in one wild report writing frenzy, a stressful task.

Yet through this process I did find a light at the end of the tunnel that wasn't a train. It was Google Translate. Although many of the parents at my school seem reluctant to talk to the teachers about their child's learning, some want to but cannot. I have one student in my class who's parents do not speak English, only Thai. I have often felt frustrated that I could not share some of their child's classroom successes with them, until now. I recently discovered Google Translate and decided to try it out by translating this student's report into Thai. I had no idea how well it actually translated, but explained my intentions to my student, asking her to then pass this onto her parents. The next day she told me they were very happy that they could, for the first time, get feedback from the school that they could understand, although I still do not know how well it translated the grammar.

Free web software like this has the potential to assist schools in creating bridges of communication, with parents and family of students who are not English speakers. This can only help our students improve their learning, because as we know, parent involvement in student learning makes a huge difference. I imagine this could also be used with students in the classroom, assuming they are at the level of reading their home language.

How would you use a programme like Google Translate in your classroom?

คุณจะให้ใช้โปรแกรมเช่น Google แปลภาษาในชั้นเรียน? Hoe zou u gebruik maken van een programma als Google Translate in uw klas?

你將如何使用程序像谷歌翻譯成您的課堂？

¿Cómo utilizar un programa como Google Translate en el aula?

कैसे आप अपनी कक्षा में Google अनुवाद की तरह एक प्रोग्राम का प्रयोग करेंगे?

Comment pourriez-vous utiliser un programme comme Google Translate dans votre classe?

Image by by Randy Son Of Robert

Hot Potatoes a Hot Literacy Tool

If you haven't heard of Hot Potatoes you are in for a literacy treat. I discovered Hot Potatoes a few months back and have been trialing it in my reading programme this term. It is a suite of programmes which allow you to create interactive educational exercises such as gap-fill exercises, multiple-choice questions, crosswords, and matching /ordering quizzes, that are easily saved as a HTML file (web page) for online or offline use. To answer them all you need is a web browser (Safari, Firefox etc) , a net connection is not even necessary.

The programs included are:
JQuiz: multiple-choice, true-false, text-entry or short-answer
JCloze: gap-fill
JCross: crosswords
JMix: jumbled-sentence
JMatch: matching and ordering

Once you have downloaded Hot Potatoes you will find they are very easy to use. You do not need to know JavaScript or HTML in order to use any of these programmes, you just need to to enter your data into the spaces proved and press a button.

You will need to register Hot Potatoes to use it, as Hot Potatoes is not freeware, but it is free of charge for those working for non-profit-making educational institutions. It is available for Mac OS X, Windows and Linux.

Uses in the classroom: You can create follow-up activities for your reading programme using any text. You can type in a journal story and quickly create a cloze activity for any reading level targeting the grammar or vocabulary suited to that student with varying degrees of support. You can use it in so many ways, get creative and come back and share your successes.

I highly recommend that you give Hot Potatoes a try, it will add a new ICT component to your classroom (even with just a few computers with no web connection) that will enrich your literacy programme.

Some screenshots of Hot Potatoes in use.