Teaching Better: Digg for Language Teachers

I've just came across this rather interesting new site for language teachers (any language , not just English) that looks like the language teachers version of the popular user generated news site Digg. It's called 'Teaching Better', though the second 't' is the other way around.

Any teacher can come and register on the site and write about interesting and relevant websites or web based news for teachers. Visitors to the site then read the stories, follow the links and can vote the story up or down depending on how useful they think it is.


I'm glad to see that one of my blogs 'Daily English Activities' has been listed and has 8 votes already (Okay one of them was from me).

This looks like a really useful resource for teachers of all languages. I hope that they are able to maintain the quality of the links and references as this is the kind of thing which can easily be taken over by spammers.

So far it looks good, has some useful links to quality sources and even has a useful RSS feed to subscribe to.

Hope you find it useful.

Related links:

• Creating a personal homepage
• Turn Feeds into a PDF Newsletter
• RSS and Personal Homepages for Teachers
• Create your own social network 7 steps
• Creating a Wiki
• Naming My Sources: Part 1
• Naming My Sources: Part 2

Best

Nik Peachey

Multimedia Vocabulary Website

Babbel is one of the few really effective vocabulary building websites that I've seen on the web. It's actually a social network and can help you to make friends for language exchange etc, but the core of the site is it's interactive multimedia vocabulary building exercises.
These work with words being presented along with images and the sounds of the words. The exercises then move on to recognition of the sounds of the words and then you have to spell out the words for the images as you see and hear them. I know this all sounds a bit PPP (Present, Practice, Produce) but for EFL or MFL students working alone, I still think there is some value in this.
The site isn't only for learners of English, but also has exercises in Italian, French, German and Spanish.

This is one of the great strengths of the site because it draws on students from more languages, it makes it possible for students to connect with and practice their language with users from the target language.

As always it would be wise to be careful with this and to protect your students' privacy etc, but there certainly is some potential here and I do like the design of the vocabulary building activities so for that alone, it's worth the free registration.

Hope you enjoy it.

Related links:

• Multi Player Vocabulary Revision
• Multimedia wordsearch
• Animating vocabulary
• Games With a Purpose and a Social NetworkImprove your Vocabulary and send Aid to Children

Best

Nik Peachey