I 100% agree with the perspective that “stories can offer a valuable way of contextualizing and introducing new language, making it meaningful and memorable”. Teaching contents such as grammar, vocabulary and so on could bore students if they are imparted individually in sections like the way what Taiwanese English textbooks are used to being, including vocabulary, grammar and reading. Students will learn how to use the word instead of just remember the spelling of the word. Collocating with pictures could enhance the memory and make it easy to understand. It is more effective to arouse young learners interest by stories with abundant of pictures or even attract anime on the web than on the boring textbook with dead pictures. “This verbal information is commonly complemented with non-verbal information in the form of large pictures, which helps children reconstruct the storyline.” Through the design of interaction with the computer, learners might feel like play games rather than study so it may increase the ratio of exposure to the target language and decrease repulsion of studying English.
Computer-based technology is underutilized not only in the primary classroom but also in the middle school in Taiwan. Therefore, middle school teachers who would like to make use of internet-based teaching in Taiwan might encounter difficulties in non-universality of technology usage. For learners, at the beginning, sometimes it is indeed an uneasy task to deal with sophisticated technology no matter for elementary school students or college students so teachers’ instructions are indispensible to help students overcome tech difficulties.
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I totally agree with your point. Digital stories are effective listening materials for children to develop listening comprehension and literacy both in their first and foreign language
Actually, I found out that your anotation of this article is focus on the part of proper story selections. The author mentioned that many internet-based materials were designed by unprofessionals instead of professional English teachers. How do u think about it and how could we deal with it since you pay attention to the selection of online materials?
The different ways correspond with different kinds of students. We may choose the most suitable way for each student. For children, the way you mention in the article might be the good way. And it also can provide others who have interest in teaching English with reference.
I agree with you. Using digital stories will motivate students as well as arousing their interest. I will try to apply it in my future teaching.
Using stories is a good way but since young students are not really engaged in computer-mediated learning, at first,it would be an uneasy task for them to learn by themselves online without teachers’ instructions.
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