The Fifth Reflective Journal (TLL)

Using technology to teach thinking skills

By

 Tri Okta Ervina

The using of technology cannot be separated with all the activities in this world. It uses for working, studying even teaching. Nowadays, teaching and learning process are almost using the high technology in the classroom. All of the kind of skills can be taught by using technology, those are speaking, listening, writing, reading, moreover thinking skill. How great it is for our education. In this case, I want to explain more about using technology to teach thinking skills because the technology to teach speaking, listening, writing and reading have already explained by me in the previous reflective journal.

Thinking skill is the skill which includes critical thinking abilities. Everyone has their thinking abilities but the level of it is different for each people. By existing the technology, everyone can be helped by it when doing everything, especially when they have difficulty in thinking of something. In the teaching and learning process, technology also helps the students to be creative for increasing their thinking abilities. As the high quality of teacher candidates, we have to know the good way to teach the students by using technology to support their thinking abilities.

Teacher is the important element in this case because the technology can be used to support thinking skills if the teacher allows some requirements. The requirements for making the classroom active in using technology to support the students thinking skills are setting some learning activities in the classroom by encouraging the student’s cognitive processes, selecting the technology tools that are appropriate for the students to support thinking and problem solving activities, and the last is the using of the tools in learning approach based on understanding of inquiry, problem based learning and language learning.

So the conclusion is the technology can help the students to support thinking skills if the students recognize, understand and apply the technology itself in appropriate manner. Beside that, the tools which are used have all the kinds of menus in helping them based on the students’ need. Selecting the tools is the important one for the teacher to help the students for increasing their thinking skills.

The fourth Reflective Journal (TLL)

Technology to Teach Writing

Writing is one of methods to express or deliver something besides speaking. Based on SLA, there are four major approaches to guide us in writing instruction; those are form-focused approach, process-focused approach, content-based approach and reader/audience-dominated approach. All the methods have different focus on their own approach. We can guess the approach easily from the name of approach itself. For example: form-focused approach focus on the form, so that’s why we are not confused to identify each approach. After knowing the focus by guessing the name, we can know deeper about the content of it.

The accuracy belongs to the form-focused approach because it focuses on grammatical and discourse structure. Emphasized on the pattern of the sentence, paragraph, topic in the sentence, and other kinds of pattern are the main focus on form in writing. The existence of technology helps the writer in writing for focusing the form by providing some website which is content of some grammatical and discourse structure guideline.

 If you focus on what’s your expression, your draft about something by using your brainstorming and communicate with authentic audience even you publish your writing, it means that you emphasis in the process of writing. It refers to what the writer writes, how the writer writes and the evaluation after writing. Accessing web database, electronic bibliography writes, composing with the word processor and networked peer response group are some of the example of using technology in process-focused approach.

Writing a science report or academic writing needs the high critical thinking. Of course it needs some literatures as the sources to make a good writing and rich of content. A good writing is supported by giving the data and proof to make sure that the writing is a valid writing. In this case, the technology supports the writer to look for some literatures because the internet connection can search the proof easily. Yet, there are so many data which is invalid. We have to be careful in looking at the proofs in the internet.

If a writer focuses on the readers, the result of the writing has to be the important thing for the writer. The readers are not only the individual person but also the community who has large number of members. Thus, the content and the form are very important. Publishing into media is a part of reader oriented. The media it self can be magazine, newspaper or through internet. So the technology really helps the writer in writing.

The third Reflective Journal (TLL)

The second Tutor for the Students

This is the third Reflective Journal in Technology and Language Learning. It is about technology for helping student in speaking and how to pronoun some words. It is really needed for making easy in the twenty first century students and teachers. Sometimes, we do not realize about that, but we usually and often use it in every daily activities. For example, when we listened to the music especially English song, we have learnt how to pronoun it well. We did it by imitating the voice.

In the classroom, the teacher teaches the students with showing them some videos which include some important lesson for the student. They should listen and give attention to the video, the teacher also asks to the student to retell what the video tells about. This activity means that the student should speak up in the classroom. The technology helps the student to acquire the second language; we can call it as the second tutor.

Based on Swain’s statement about the comprehensible output, the technology have been very helpful for us. We can know our mistakes when we are speaking by recording it and we can correct our speaking after playing it. The technology has shown the advantages that it can do human’s duty. Before the existing technology, the human’s duty can not be changed by anything, but when the technology exists in our life, everything was easy to do.

The students also can learn about their lesson by them selves, they do not need to come to the class because the technology is so easy to access. The teacher can send her/his lesson by email although it contents of video or others. So we are not wrong if we say the technology as the second tutor. It assists the main tutor (real teacher) to teach the students to speak up and pronounce the words well.

Technology and Language Learning

Digital Media

We live in the 21^st century now. Of course the use of technology is very important and needed, moreover in teaching and learning process. We can look at our ways to study language learning in the classroom. Most of the way use digital media. It is used by us because it can be an easy and very helpful. The digital media itself has many characteristics whether it is good or bad.

Computer is one of digital media. I am sure that we often use it to do our assignment and most of the kind of activities that associated with technology. For example, when we want to do assignment we use the computer to help us type that duty. If we use handwriting to do all the kind of assignment we will take a long time. We can not revise it easily, maybe we write down from the start again and again.

Nowadays, our lecturers always use power point to explain the material. It is the digital media that is interesting to be viewed by the student and easy for the lecturer. The student will not be boring because in that power point the lecturer can add some picture or other natural example so that easy to be understood by the student. Not only the teachers or lecturers who use it, but the students also use power point to help the material for their presentation.

The use of internet can not be separated from language learning, because it can help teacher or student to prove their opinion about everything. They can search something quickly to find the material than look for in the book. But not all of the resources are valid, for example we take it from a blog. It is not really valid because all of people can make a blog. So that’s way, our lecturer always says that we have to be careful in looking for something to prove scientific course. And also be careful in taking something because there is copyright issue.

We have changed our habit from the traditional way to the electronic communication. In twenty years ago maybe half of people use letter from handwriting to communicate with others in the long distance or use a love letter when somebody want to express their feeling to their sweetheart. But it has gone; only a formal situation use manual way. We often use electronic communication rather than the old ways.

Handwriting assessment takes a long time to get feedback. We could feel it when we had paper and pencil test exam. We can compare it with online exercise which directly gets feedback and the explanation of it. So the students prefer to use online exercise than manual way. It means that digital media is so important in learning and teaching process.

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technology in learning and teaching process

Something that helps us to do everything easier usually called technology. In 21^th century, technology is so helpful and needed for everyone. For example when we want to cook rice, we just cook it with magic com or when we know that our room is dark, we just switch on the lamp. Our life just like in our hands because everything use technology. Not only for making easy our life, technology also used for teaching and learning process. When I was young, my grand father always told story about his life and his parent’s life. He told me when he was child, his teacher taught him and his friends in front of his home. His teacher wrote something on the ground and then explained to them, no black board and no chalk. We are so lucky because when we studied at school we have used the blackboard. So, blackboard is one of technology. Technology is not only machine, but also everything that make easy for us to do everything. Long by long, teaching and learning process use the high technology, for example: we use computer and projector in the class. In the globalization era like now, technology helps education to save the environment. We do not need paper anymore to submit the assignment, but we just need type it in the computer and then submit it by the email. It means we have saved our environment because we don not need to cut the tree to make a paper. That is one of the advantages using technology in teaching and learning process, still so many kinds of advantages that have been felt by us. Technology also has two points of view; it doesn’t only have the advantages but also have the disadvantages.