My School
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Melina Walker
07 November 2018, 3:32 AM
What I Want To Learn And Why It Is Important To Me
For this assignment I am wanting to learn how to speak Punjabi. I teach in a school located in the North East quadrant of Calgary, Alberta. The school is mostly populated with students who have immigrated, or are first generation Canadians, from India and Pakistan. By learning Punjabi I will be better able to communicate with the parents during face-to-face meetings and telephone conversations. In order to be successful I will have to use applications that are accessible at all times and on many interfaces.
Teaching students, who speak Punjabi as their first language, will be a useful resource when I am learning as they will be able to help me with pronunciation and to teach me important words for communicating with their parents. Another great resource is the high school by us as they offer a Punjabi language class and it may be possible to receive valuable resources from their instructor.
I am looking forward to finding resources and learning Punjabi and hopefully the resources I find will help the other teachers in my school who want to learn the Punjabi language.
References
Robinson, K (2013), Whats the best way to learn Punjabi? Retrieved from: https://www.quora.com/Whats-the-best-way-to-learn-Punjabi
Punjabi University (2017), Learning Resources, Retrieved From: http://learnpunjabi.org/
Simya Solutions Lts. (2017), Simply Learn Punjabi- Pakistan Travel Phrasebook, iPhone Application.
Critique of CIA/Mobile Applications
Computer Assisted instruction (CIA), and other applications for your mobile device, are slowly becoming more diverse and can help with many aspects of learning. The greatest part about wanting to use an application to learn a language is that they have so many different languages within one application.
Having the ability to learn languages on the go, anytime and anywhere, is a great asset for any learner who wants to be able to take their learning with them. The learner may be in another country and could be in need of assistance, using an application that is on their phone/mobile device will be helpful and will encourage them to try speaking the language and if that is not effective they could show their device to the other party and communicate that way.
CAI/Mobile App Software I Chose
The application I have chosen to easily learn basic/travel amounts of Punjabi is "Simply Learn". The application has other languages that can be downloaded in their own application, languages such as Spanish, French and Chinese. Some languages that are not as common but are offered by this application are Tagalog and Khmer. I think it is very useful to have this diversity in similar layouts so learners can navigate the application with ease, feel comfortable and engaged in their learning.
Critique of Applications
- Language Learning and Progressions
- I really enjoyed how the application was laid out, having the ability to switch between beginner, advanced and travel language learning activities. The beginner learning area's are; Basic Conversation, Greetings and Numbers. All the areas that would be necessary to start a conversation and have some understanding of where the conversations are going. Traveler basics has some key words and phrases that would be helpful and whats really amazing is that the application shows the words in three ways; English, Arabic and the English translation of Arabic and in the same area you can play the phrase and hear the spoken version.
- Immediate Gratification of Learning
- In the quiz section the answers are listed in a multiple choice layout with the Arabic and English type written in the question and the English translations are the answers. The quiz also gives you the correct answer if you answer wrong which is really great when trying to learn something new. Knowing if you need to practice more or if you have mastered a part of the skill you are learning is very important.
- Time
- I found the application easy to manage my time around. I could spend ten minutes or an hour on the application and feel as though I was learning every time. The amount of learning was up to my time available and the space I had. As long as I had access to my mobile device I could learn as much as I wanted in the time I had.
- Activities
- The application did not have many activities, the only activities they had were quizzes and studying. Though these are really great if the learner is studious I think the application needs to have an element of fun and excitement. If there were games such as cross words or matching then the learner engagement would be higher and the learner would find themselves wanting to "play" and learn their language daily.
- Motivation
- When under the "study" setting the application shows just the phrase along with the ability to play it, then you can guess the answer and immediately show yourself the correct answer. If it is easy then you can ask the application to re-ask the question in 4 days, if you think it was moderately hard then in one day and if you really need to practice it more then you can select the option to have it come up every time you enter the study area.
- Mobility
- The ability to have this application on any Macintosh device, laptop, phone, iPod and more will allow the learner to interact with the application on any device at anytime. Having this as an option will greatly influence the learners ability to practice more often and at anytime.
- Usability
- I thought it was easy to navigate and did not have to spend a lot of time learning how to use the application which meant I was able to learn immediately and not learn how to use the application and then learn the language.
- Face-to-Face benefits
- The only part that this application is lacking is the audio feedback portion. The ability to speak to the application and get a correct or incorrect answer to how the word(s) is/are pronounced would be very beneficial. I found that by asking the students in my classes that spoke Punjabi if I was pronouncing everything right was really helpful. Might be a way to enhance the application for future updates.
Final Summary of My Learning
Overall I found my experience with the Simply Learn Application to be positive. I really enjoyed that I was able to learn on the go between work, baby and extra curricular activities. I used my new language with my students and they were shocked that I could understand some of the words they were saying and have a short conversation with them. My pronunciation needs some work and it would be better if the application could listen to the speaker and inform them if they were correct or incorrect in the pronunciation of each word.