Moodle in High School: Targetting vocabulary
I am a High School teacher of English as a Foreign Language, and find that Moodle is very good for pre-teaching, teaching and post-teaching vocabulary.
Moodle enables pupil engagement. Personally engaging pupils by dealing with ideas, concepts, or people that are relevant to their lives is a good way to get them involved. Moreover, using Moodle for Blended Learning to develop the four essential skills (Listening, Speaking, Reading and Writing), and targeting on vocabulary, can help pupils improve their command of English so that they use it in real life.
Dr. Tziona Levi, Chief Inspector of English in the State of Israel, Ministry of Education has written that the “main focus this year will be becoming acquainted with and looking for ways to implement the English curriculum 2020 (…) The revised curriculum follows international standards, mainly the CEFR, adopting an action-oriented approach to the description of communicative proficiency. The curriculum perceives the learners of English as language users who perform in real-life tasks. This perspective is translated into “can-do” descriptors that define what English language learners can do with language in different situations, for different purposes, at each level along the journey toward English language proficiency. To this end, vocabulary and grammar are targeted and specified to be taught in the context of the “can-do” descriptors.” (Bulletin for the Chief Inspector of English, July 2019)
I would like to present just one example (out of many!) of how using Moodle for Blended can help implement the English curriculum 2020. In fact, it would do the same for any curriculum that “perceives the learners of English as language users who perform in real-life tasks”.
One topic that engages High School pupils is driving. Another one is texting (using their phones to connect). While “texting while driving”, a form of distracted driving, may not be a topic that engages pupils right away, the topic is relevant to would-be drivers and … There is so much English to teach and learn when dealing with it! Moodle can serve as the glue, that is to say, used for bonding or sticking resources and activities together to help pupils learn. Incidentally, Malcolm Beasley used the expression “Moodle as a glue” in his Why Moodle for Secondary Schools talk (Moodle Moot Australia 2019)
The video clip Targetting Vocabulary on Moodle that I prepared to show what I mean presents just one of the ways teachers can use Moodle to engage pupils with the topic of Distracted Driving, and pre-teach and teach Vocabulary. Post-teaching has not been included because I will leave that for another post. By the way, there are, I am sure, creative teachers who will come up with other examples, too.
Married to Susy, with two daughters: Gabriela and Maia, and three granddaughters (Sol, Dor, and Eliana), Eduardo is teaching English at school.
Having completed with HRDNZ both MoodleBites for Teachers and the six MEC courses, Eduardo is a Moodle Certified Educator.
He is a Certified Israel Ministry of Education Teachers’ teacher.
He has developed and facilitated several Israel Ministry of Education’s Spanish and English as a Foreign Language online workshops.
- Giving access to high-quality educational experiences with Moodle – 28th January 2023
- Enhance K-12 English Foreign Language Skills with Moodle – 28th September 2022
- Dig into Digital: Focus on H5P – 28th August 2022
Great example Eduardo, thanks for sharing!