My experience using blogging…

 

Assalamualaikum and hi to all the viewers. Welcome back!! I wish that all you lead a very happy life. This is my 6^th posting and also my final posting this course. First and for most, I would like to thank Datin Dr. Norizan Abd. Razak, for all of her guidance and support towards me for all this while and also for introducing me to blogging activity.I really had a fun learning time with you.

 

I have been learning about blogging and I found that it is useful to me because it helped me to reflect on what I had learned. Blog is like an online diary where we can express our ideas, thought, and feelings in it. In blog, I can express my opinion freely without any obstacle or worry that people will correct my mistakes on the spot. Blogging gives an opportunity for those who do not have confident to speak up their ideas during face to face discussion to express and share their thoughts freely and confidently in online.

 

Based on my experience in blogging, I can say that blogging activities really help me to improve and develop my writing skills, especially in vocabulary and grammatical aspect. When I do my activities, I write all my ideas and thought in blog while computer assisted me by checking my grammar, spelling and sentence structures. So, I can do correction about it about it on the spot. Through that, I will improve my writing skills and also build up my self confidence. Besides, in order to produce a good writing, editing is also one of a process that a writer should do. Therefore, by blogging I edit my writing work repeatedly to make it better. Blogging also help to develop my thinking skills as I need to analyze, summarize and evaluate all the reading materials that I have read when doing the blogging activity.

 

Blogging give me an enjoyable experience especially when readers leave their comment and give feedback. In this way, I know in which aspect I should improve. A part from that, it is also practical because blogging is emerging in today world and has its own influence. It will be useful if we want to be a blogger and make blogging as one of our income sources in the future.

 

Meanwhile, during my blogging times, I do face some problems. But it is not a big problem anyway. This problem happened because I was not really used to it at the first time I create my blog. However, after asked my friends and try to explore it by myself more often, I managed to settle the problems.

 

Truly, I enjoy blogging and will continue blogging even after the SKBP is over. I will also recommend my friends to start blogging especially for those who wish to improve their writing skills and develop their thinking skills. Lastly, once again I would like to express my gratitude to Assc. Prof. Datin. Dr. Norizan Abd. Razak and Pn. Zaini Ahmad, for all of their guidance and support. Thank you very much and may ALLAH bless you both always..

 

 

                                      

                                    

                             

 

 

Electronic Malaysian English Competency Test – Reading Test (Set 1)

Score: 23 out of 35  - 66%

Time Taken: 61m 12s

 

Online Quiz Results

Top of Form   Results Summary         Online Quiz Results :: Kemahiran Asas ICT Your Score : 24/30   Online Quiz Results Summary   Your #Attempts : 1 Total Class #Attempts : 567 Your Quiz Score : 24/30 Your Highest Score Ever : 24 Note: This may not be your final marks. Due to some of the subjective and semi-objective questions (short essay and fill in the blank).   Bottom of Form

My experience taking online test

Assalamualaikum and hello to everyone!! We meet again..

How are you guys? Hopefully all of you are in the pink of health..insyaALLAH. Today, I would like to share with you about my experience in online tests.

 

 

During the tutorial class this week, my classmates and I had been taken two online tests. The first test is Electronic Malaysian English Competency Test and the another test is UJI ICT online Test that posted in e-warga UKM. We are required to complete answering the test based on the time given. The first test contains four passages and 35 multiple choice questions while the second test was testing us on our skills and knowledge in computer application and software. It is also multiple choice questions.

 

 

This is my first experience in online test and it is really give me a wonderful experience. After going through the test, I found that taking online test is easier than offline test. This is why because, we do not need to write or circle the answers on the paper but just need to click at the space provided for the answer. Although it looks easy, but actually it depends on our knowledge and the way we tackle the questions. It also depends on how we manage the time because the time given for us to answer the test is also limited.

 

 

So, we need to answer the questions as quick as we can. Meanwhile, taking an online test also has its own risk. For example, if the Internet server is down, all the unsaved data will also lost. When this happens, this is means that we have to answer the whole questions over again and it is really depressing and frustrated. But overall, I enjoy taking online test and it was interesting and at the same time it was also challenging.

 

 

However, compared to offline test, the online test gives us more convenient because it gives an immediate feedback and we will know our result right after we complete the test. Besides, this online test also provided with a privacy and security system as we need to enter our password. It is a wise step to protect our privacy.

 

 

After going through the test, I think I had gain more experience and knowledge on online test. It is really a tremendous experience for me indeed.  

 

CONCORDANCE

Assalamualaikum..Hello and have a nice day to everyone…how are you guys? I hope that you are always in the pink of health..

This is my fourth posting.For this time, I have been given a task on concordance. To be honest, it is quite interesting and very new to me. For this posting, I need to read the article about the application of concordance from the OTL in ELT book and summarize the article. Then, I also need to find application of the concordance based on the topic given.

According to Brittannica Encyclopedia, concordance is define as literally agreement, harmony, hence derivatively a citation of parallel passages, and specifically an alphabetic arrangement of the words contained in a book with citations of the passages in which they occur.

A concordance’s function is basically to bring together, in other words, to ‘concord’ passages of text which show the use of a word. It’s a type of index arrangement, working in a similar way to the verbal index found at the back of textbooks, in other words, it searches for instances of a word or phrase and comes up with each case of it. Whereas an index in the back of a book will show words in alphabetical order but only refer to them, the concordance will show each instance of each word together in the context from which it came.

The term ‘concordance’ is usually applied to literary and linguistic studies, but it is an extremely useful tool which enables students to access a piece of text non-sequentially or to study the ways in which it uses language. Concordances are not only used for literary purposes, but also as cross-reference systems for computer programmers, which enable teams of programmers working together to keep track of all references to, for example, a variable name, across all the files which make up a project.

A concordance is particularly useful for studying a piece of literature when thinking in terms of a particular word, phrase or theme. It will show exactly how often a word occurs, or even if it does not occur and so can be extremely helpful in building up some idea of how different themes recur within a poem and how they relate to the rest of the poem. So if a question is asked about a certain theme or the use of certain words in a poem and what their place is within the poem, it is easy to see how often they come up by looking at the concordance. This is particularly easy when it comes to computer concordances, all you have to do is click on the relevant letter of the alphabet, a list of words will come up and it is easy to scroll down until you find the right one. From there, you can find out all occurrences of that word in the poem in question.

So, a concordance is a bit like a computer; it will find things for you, but it will not do the thinking, you have to do that. What it will do is to get you on the right track when, in this case, it comes to deeper analysis of a piece of text. Most useful are interactive concordances, such as the one here in English. An interactive concordance will also find answers to specific queries and produce lists of all instances of words or phrases, but the advantage is the speed and the fact the concordance will find all words, not necessarily possible in textual concordancing.

Summarizing Article

 

The article “Beyond Concordance Lines: Using Concordance To Investigate Language Development written by Arshad Abd. Samad  was written regarding to the EMAS corpus by

researchers from University Putra Malaysia (UPM). The corpus was compiled in the year 2002 and it is an unedited corpus that contains written data in the form of 3 essays written by 800 students from 3 different educational levels which are Primary 5, Form 1 and Form 4 students. The main purpose of this article is to present the relevance of corpus data in investigating language development without having to analyze concordance lines.

Through this article it is obvious that different ages have different types of writing. In this article, the writer has differentiated all 3 groups of students writing into 3 main aspects. The first aspect is the language productivity. In this context, language productivity is defined as to how many sentences and words each group of students have used in their essays. Thus the results showed that there was an increase on the amount of words and sentences used by each level as they became older. This was probably due to the fact that as students become older they become more matured hence providing them the ability to expand ideas and thoughts.

The second aspect taken under study was the range of vocabulary by these 3 different educational levels, and yet again it showed an increase from the Primary 5 students till the Form 4 ones. It showed that the Primary 5 students used a common group of words proving that their vocabulary was narrow compared to the Form 1 and Form 4 students. This could also be due to the topic given because the Primary 5 students got a essay topic based on a few pictures given.

The last aspect was the sophistication of vocabulary used by all 3 levels. In this case. The Form 4 students had a wider range of vocabulary, the Form 1 students had an average level of vocabulary and the Primary 5 students had a common vocabulary.

To sum up, Corpus data can be analyzed to inform language educators on the language development besides improving language production as well as expand vocabulary range.

 

Using concordance for content analysis

Software for content analysis- A rewiew

Will Lowe

wlowe@latte.harvard.edu

 

Introduction

 

Software for content analysis divides, according to its intended function, into three major categories. The first set of programs perform dictionary-based content analysis. They have the ‘basic handful’ of text analysis functions, involving word counting, sorting, and simple statistical tests. The basic handful are described in the next section. The second set contains development environments. These programs are designed to partially automate the construction of dictionaries, grammars, and other text analysis tools, rather than being analyzers themselves. Development environments are more similar to high-level text-specific programming languages than to freestanding content analysis packages. The third category contains annotation aids. While an annotation aid can often perform some automatic content analysis, it is intended more as an electronic version of the set of marginal notes, cross-references and notepad jottings that a researcgenerate when analyzing a set of texts by hand. The next section describes the basic handful of text analysis functions, and the rest of the paper provides brief descriptions of twenty-one content analysis programs. Some recommendations are made in the conclusion.

 

1.1 The Basic Handful

 

The basic handful of functions consists of word frequency counts and analysis, category frequency counts and analysis, and visualization Word Frequency Analysis

 Word frequency analysis provides a list of all the words that occur in a text and the number of times they occur. More sophisticated methods split the text into subparts, e.g. chapters, and create frequency lists for each part. Lists can be compared either visually, or using a statistical test such as _2, to see if they are significantly more mentions of particular words in one part than another. Another common use for the subpart procedure is to compare different sources addressing the same substantive question to measure how different their treatment of it is on the basis of the sorts of words they use. Statistically this procedure can sometimes be reasonable because the counts from one source are compared with the total counts for all words over all the sources; significant differences may then track differences of emphasis across sources1. Some packages make use of synonym lists or lemmatize before the analysis in order to merge word counts. Lemmatization removes the grammatical structure from the surface form of a word, leaving only the stem; words are then counted as identical when they share a stem. For example, a lemmatizing frequency count would treat ‘steal’ and ‘stole’ as the same word. Lists of lemma and synonyms are naturally language specific.Word frequency analysis is the simplest form of content analysis. In fact most operating systems (e.g. Unix/Linux, Mac OSX, and recent versions of Windows) have utilities to perform basic word counting and sorting built in.

 

Category Frequency Analysis

 

Content analysis programs almost all allow the user to specify a dictionary. ‘Dictionary’ in this context means a mapping a set of words or phrases to one word; the one word is the label of a substantive category and the set describes the words or phrases that indicate the tokening of the category in text. As an example, the Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC) dictionary maps the word set {ashes, burial*, buried, bury, casket*, cemet*, coffin*, cremat*, dead death*, decay*, decease*, deteriorat*, die,died, dies, drown*, dying fatal, funeral*, grave*, grief, griev*, kill*, mortal*, mourn*, murder* suicid*, terminat*} to LIWC category 59, death. The asterisks are ‘wild-card’ characters telling the program to treat ‘cremating’, ‘cremated’ and ‘cremate’, as all matching cremat*, and thus all mapping to category 59. Category counts allow a slightly more sophisticated analysis because they allow the user to provide a more explicit model of latent content in text. The implicit model of text generation is that the author of the text has some message expressed in terms of categories, and that this message is ‘coded’ into English when she writes. Coding entails picking any one of a set of English words that represent that concept, perhaps constrained by grammatical or pragmatic criteria. If the content analyst can recover or construct the word set used by the author, it can be placed in a dictionary and used to decode other texts. According to the LIWC scheme the sentence “Her suicide caused him to consider his own mortality” refers to the categories of ‘death’ and ‘metaphysics’ twice, ‘social’ three times, and ‘causation’ once: Her–SOCIAL suicide–DEATH/METAPH caused–CAUSE him–SOCIAL to consider–COGMECH his–SOCIAL own mortality DEATH/METAPH.But according to the implicit model of LIWC, “He thought of his own death only because she killed herself” is an equally good instantiation of the underlying content because it tokens the same categories the same number of times. Of course many other sentences them these categories too, and many of the are quite unrelated in meaning. When a text is reduced to its category tokens with respect to some dictionary the same statistical analysis can be performed as with word counts. For most applications of automated content analysis, a word is reduced to a vector of category counts. Different texts can be compared either across within each category, or more usefully, by looking at high-dimensional distance measures between the complete vectors associated with each text. Most information retrieval programs, e.g. Google, will make use of a similar vector representation of texts – each query is converted into a sparse category vector by coding it as if it were a very short text, and this vector is compared geometrically to all available other vectors to find the nearest, that is, most relevant text to the query.

 

Visualization

 

When a text has been reduced to vector form, either by counting words or categories, it can be visualized. Two standard methods provided by most content analysis programs are clustering and multidimensional scaling. Cluster analysis is no doubt familiar, but the multidimensional scaling bears some discussion. It appears that most scaling procedures packaged for content analysis perform metric rather than non-metric multidimensional scaling. This means that the programs are looking for the linear mapping (for visualization purposes it will be a plane) that passes through the vectors and captures most variation in their positions when they are projected onto it. Metric methods therefore enforce linear structure, which may or may noreasonable. More computationally intensive methods are non-metric, and consider not the positions of the vectors but their distance ranking to one another. Non-metric methods attempt to preserve ranked distances in their mapping to the plane, and thus allow more non-linear structure to appear in the final visualization. Why does this difference matter? It might appear that visualization functions are an advantage in a content analysis program, and this is may be true for preliminary data exploration. But researchers will most likely end up putting their data into a regular statistics package at some point, perhaps to get a more sophisticated statistical analysis. Since most modern statistics packages have very sophisticated visualization functions, the visualization will almost certainly be better performed then. This will also be desirable in the case where the content analysis package does not (or will not) document the exact clustering or visualization routine being performed.

 

Other Basic Functions

 

Several programs can generate concordances, sometimes described as KWIC (’key word in context’) analysis. The table below is a selection of lines from a small window full concordance for the word ‘content’ in the paragraphs preceding this one.

 

 

—         —            Software      for	content	analysis     divides     according     to
can      perform   dictionary    based	content	analysis      They           have         the
often   perform      some         automatic	content	analysis         it                is         intended

 

Although computing concordances is not really a method of automated content analysis, it can be a very fruitful way to examine the data in the process of designing a content analysis; one example use for concordance analysis would be to quickly discover, without having to read the entire text, that the presence of a particular word occurs only in a subset of its possible substantive roles, even when we might expect it to be more broadly distributed on purely linguistic grounds (e.g. that taxes are only mentioned when the text is talking about lowering them.)

Concordances are also useful representation for discovering sets of words that co-occur reliably with the keyword, and thus might be natural choices for dictionary word sets.

Finally, with the addition of some minor annotation capability the researcher may manually code each instance as being of a particular category, either as part of a ‘training set’ for subsequent automated analysis, or simply as quick confirmation that, say 75% of mentions are of a particular type. The principle advantage of concordances in all these roles is that they lighten the reading burden of the researcher, so she can work with a larger volume of text.

 

2 Content Analysis Programs

 

This section describes twenty-one content analysis packages. They are divided into dictionary-based programs and development environments. A final section describes the two most popular annotation aids. Where possible each section states the platforms that the software runs on, the licensing scheme, the accessibility of the code-base and whether it is able to work with non-English language text.

Licensing cost has been distinguished from the accessibility of the code-base because although many packages are free to use, their code is not available. Being able to see the code is useful if one needs to know exactly what is going on when the program performs more complex analysis. In this respect the software is effectively proprietary. However, since there is no tradition among Windows and Mac users to make their

code available even when the software is written to be given away, it may only be convention that makes the code-base inaccessible. That is, individual authors of free software may happily provide code details on request. This will certainly not be the case for the commercial packages.

 

2.1 Dictionary-based Content Analysis

CATPAC

—Homepage: http://www.terraresearch.com/catpac.cfm

—Operating Systems: Windows

—License:

Commercial $595

Academic $295

Student $49

—Code base: Proprietary (executable only)

—Languages: English (ASCII only)

Despite the bold claims of the manufacturer:

“CATPAC is an intelligent program that can read any text and summarize its main ideas. It needs no pre-coding and makes no linguistic assumptions.”

CATAC performs only the basic handful of functions. Visualization involves cluster analysis and multidimensional scaling. Cluster analysis can be interactive. CATPAC also apparently allows three dimensional visualizations with appropriately colored glasses.

CATPAC seems adequate to the basic handful. However the user interface is weak and the http: //www.galileoco.com/pdf/catman.pdf is atrocious.

 

Computer Programs for Text Analysis

—Homepage: http://www.dsu.edu/˜johnsone/ericpgms.html

—Operating Systems: MS-DOS

—License: Freeware

—Codebase: Proprietary (executable only)

—Languages: English (ASCII only)

 

These are a set of utility programs run from the DOS command line. They cover the basic handful except for

visualization, and are designed primarily for literary analysis.

Concordance

—Homepage: http://www.rjcw.freeserve.co.uk

—Operating Systems: Windows

—License: $89 + $10 handling fee. $40 per subsequent license.

—Codebase: Proprietary (executable only)

—Languages: English, Chinese (See http: //deall.ohio-state.edu/chan.9/conc/concordance. htm)

 

Concordance is marketed as a way of producing and publishing concordances for literary texts (See for example http://www.dundee.ac.uk/english/wics/wics.htm) However the program also performs a superset of the basic handful of word analysis and category analysis functions, including regular expressions and lemmatization. (Lemmatization involves reducing all instances of a word to its stem.) There appears to be no visualization option. The most appealing aspect of Concordance is its potential for processing text in languages other than English

(see http://deall.ohio-state.edu/chan.9/conc/concordance.htm for more detail).

It is not clear from the manufacturer’s information whether reason Concordance can deal with Chinese is because it processes all text in Unicode, or because it has been specifically designed for Chinese scripts. If the underlying processing model uses Unicode then it is reasonable to expect support for other languages. If, on the other hand, it is an ad-hoc extension then Concordance is likely to be less generally useful.

 

Diction

—Homepage: http://www.sagepub.com

—Operating Systems: Windows

—License:

Commercial $189

Academic $129

—Codebase: Proprietary (executable only)

—Languages: English (ASCII only)

 

Diction uses built -in dictionaries to code for:

“Certainty - Language indicating resoluteness, inflexibility, and completeness and a tendency to speak ex-cathedra. Activity - Language featuring movement, change, the implementation of ideas and the avoidance of inertia, Optimism - Language endorsing some person, group, concept or event or highlighting their positive entailments, Commonality - Language highlighting the agreed-upon values of a group and rejecting idiosyncratic modes of engagement, Realism - Language describing tangible, immediate, recognizable matters that affect people’s everyday

lives.” Category counts using built-in dictionaries are apparently ‘standardized’. However it is not possible to say what this means since the dictionaries and standardization procedure appear to be proprietary. Custom dictionary construction is possible.

 

General Inquirer

—Homepage: http://www.wjh.harvard.edu/˜inquirer/

—Operating Systems: Any (Java program)

—License: Free for academic use

—Codebase: Proprietary(?)

—Languages: English (ASCII only)

 

The General Inquirer performs the basic handful of functions, without visualization. The program has 182

built-in categories that are the result of merging several existing content analysis dictionaries (See http: //www.wjh.harvard.edu/˜inquirer/homecat.htm for details). Some dictionaries are reduced in detail inside the program. For example original Osgood semantic differentials are real valued factor loadings, whereas the versions in Inquirer have only 0-1 variables for each factor. Custom dictionary construction is not possible, but not straightforward. The Inquirer’s author has recommended against it (pers. comm.).

 

HAMLET

—Homepage: http://www.apb.cwc.net/homepage.htm

—Operating Systems: MS-DOS

—License: Free “for personal use”

—Codebase: Proprietary (executable only)

—Languages: English (ASCII only)

 

HAMLET computes word co-occurrence counts, maps co-occurrences into similarity matrices and performs cluster analysis or multidimensional scaling on the result. This is a small subset of the basic handful of functions.

 

 

Understanding of Concordance as a Content Analysis

 

Concordance is the software that can be use to make a text analysis throughout variety kinds of text. Most of the purposes in doing an analysis are to find out the word order and what kind of sentence structure in each text. There are lots of software that can be order or can be download at online for free.

 

The uses of concordance nowadays are really important due to any aspects of uses. For example in the education sector, it is easy for the student to make an analysis in their assignments or in project paper; they doesn’t have to search manually just click at the search in concordance software and everything that is needed will come out in just a seconds. Same as in the other sector which might be use especially in the aspects of management and organize data.

 

-This task is doing in pair with Maisarah bt Abdul Latif

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Assalamualaikum and hi to everyone…welcome back!  I hope you will enjoy blogging..

This is my third posting and I have been given a task on online database and journals.

For this task, I  will write about the impact of using ICT/wireless technology in education..

 THE IMPACT OF USING ICT IN EDUCATION 

     Advancements in Information Communication Technology (ICT), have brought about positive and negative changes in many areas in our lives. The information highway, known as the Internet and ICT ,is an exciting revolution in communications and have a greater impact on many important areas of human activity, for example in education. There are those , too, who believes the Internet is already pointing the way for a change in people’s living styles.    

      As far as education is concerned, it has always been recognized that learning does not just rely on the supervision of teachers. The internet is already opening doors to new and enormously varied sources of information. This information can be instantly available to students enabling them to pursue special areas of interest and to discuss their findings with their teachers. Also, such ready sources of information will allows colour and variety to be built into lesson. Moreover, there are signs that learning like this is developing on a world wide scale encouraging international friendship. Oceans are proving no barrier to the internet and its information highway; materials from all over the world become readily accessible. Besides, ICT has also integrated students’ intellectual and social energies into a comprehensive education that will prepare them not only for a life of productive work but also for a life of productive creation and reflection. This will help them think critically and generate their own problem solving strategies.     

      However, some people fear that this technology will result in education being treated like a factory product. Information will be mass-produced, they say, and the human touch will disappear. Besides, this technology will not cater to the needs of individual classes or children. But, they overlook one thing. Though much of the material will be mass-produced, it can be tailored to fit the individual needs of classes and even of particular members. The guiding hands of teachers decide how to use the information provided by the computer for teaching.      

      The future education on the Internet and ICT is an exciting one. Teachers can look forward to share ideas with other teachers on its highway and with some of the best brains in the profession. While, the students will be encourage to explore classroom subject for themselves. The students ability to look for information on their own may develop their independent learning capabilities which in turn will make them mature students.        

     Clearly, Information Communication Technology (ICT) is a boon to us. It has been developed to serve us in almost every area of our lives. It has brought great changes and will lead to better progress of mankind in many areas. 

  

REFERENCES

 1. Effective Use of ICT   

      By Jenni Ingram    

      Mathematic Teaching; July 2007; 203     ProQuest Education Journal (page 23) 

2.  Education, ICT, and the Augmentation of Human Intellect   

     By Gardner Campbell    

     Change; sept/ Oct 2006; 38:5     ProQuest Education Journal (page 26) 

3.  Knowledge Transformation Through ICT in Science education   

     By Linda Baggott La Velle, Angela McFarlane, and Richard Brawn   

     British Journal  of Education Technology    Vol. 34 no 2; 2003 

4.  What Are We Really Doing With ICT in Education    

      By Andrew Thomas Gareth Stratton  

     British Journal of  Education Technology     Vol. 37 no 4 617-32 JI 2006

 5.  Investing in ICTs in Educational Institutions in Developing  Countries 

     By Padraig Wims and Mark Lawler    

     ProQuest International journal of Education     Vol. 3 ,Iss 1, page 5      March 2007

Computer Assisted Writing

Assalamualaikum and hi to viewers..glad to hear from you again.
Today, i would like to talk about online computer assisted writing and how we can improve our writing skills by using computer. Computer assisted writing is also known as computerized writing. In my point of view, computer assisted writing brings lots of  benefits to students. I say so because it helps student to develop ideas, organizing, outlinig , and also brainstorming. Moreover, templates provide a framework and reduce the physical effort that spent on writing so that students can pay their attention to organize their writing content. By using computerized writing, it can helps students to write effectively.

Here are some examples of computer assisted writing activities..

To know more about this story, please visit this website..

http://www.worldwideschool.org/library/books/youth/holidaystories/TheGiftoftheMagi/Chap1.html

I’ve Got the Literacy Blues 

In this lesson, students read “The Gift of the Magi” by O. Henry and explore the story’s themes using blues music, creative writing, and media study. Students research the history of the blues and create a graphic organizer to organize the information they find. They then make connections to their own lives by writing and performing blues poetry based on one of the themes from the story. Popular culture and the media are used to further explore the themes

Prepared by: Marjorie Simic

ERIC Clearinghouse on Reading, English, and Communication Digest #97

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Two factors contributing to the change in writing instruction have been the research investigating the way writing is taught and the computer. Research has found that most teachers are concerned with the final product of writing, but have little understanding of the process that successful writers use in creating that product ( Hansen, 1987; Harste et al., 1988). Traditionally, students have been asked to produce compositions on demand, with little guidance on how to work through the steps that quality writing requires.

Proponents of the various writing models endorse writing as an ongoing, multi-stage process, with equal emphasis given to each of the stages. But whether writing is taught by the process approach or by a traditional method, one of the barriers to producing good writers is that students must use pencil and paper to transcribe their thoughts and ideas. Many children are able to express thoughtful experiences, but have difficulty with handwriting; they labor over the first draft. To them, making revisions and recopying becomes an overwhelming burden. It is heartbreaking for a teacher to see a child, out of frustration and despair, tear up and throw away a composition because repeated erasures have made holes in the paper. The original enthusiasm the student had for the writing assignment may evaporate, and the student may approach the next assignment with anxiety and apprehension. Some writers, especially young writers, will make only those changes that do not require copying, regardless of how much the revision would improve their compositions.

Educational computing has undergone a change of focus regarding how the microcomputer should be used in language arts, and especially in writing (see Cochran-Smith, 1991). No longer are computers seen as tutors and drillers. Instead, educators now are realizing that the computer is a tool for handling information. A word processor can become the centerpiece for an effective writing curriculum, encouraging early language production and providing students with opportunities to connect reading and writing. When integrating advanced technology into any curriculum, the teacher must always be aware that it cannot “eliminate” problems. But with instruction and support from the teacher and peers, most students can experience success in writing through the use of a word processor (Bright, 1990).

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Revising

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As a tool for practice in writing, the word processor’s usefulness is unparalleled. Writing researchers have long advised that the key to fluent writing is to write as much as possible. The key to exact writing is to revise repeatedly.

Newman (1984) discusses two important issues: the first is the relationship of recent research on learning to write to word processing. Newman says writing improves more “by experimenting with many aspects of the process at the same time” than by mastering separate skills and blending them. Word processing allows rapid alteration and manipulation of the text, helping writers sustain the mental images they are trying to capture while experimenting with language. The search/replace capability encourages synonym substitution, and the immediate access to a clean copy stimulates further language play.

Newman’s second point is that there is a difference between using computers for drill and practice and using them for word processing. With drill and practice software, the computer is in charge–this software tells the user what to do and controls what is learned. With word processing, however, it is the learner who exerts control both in using the computer and learning to write.

The word processor was designed for revising and manipulating language. For inexperienced writers (who tend to make corrections at the word level), proofreading is easier on the computer. As writers become more experienced, they tend to make more complex changes. These “reorganizational” changes involve moving sentences and paragraphs around, reorganizing whole sections of articles, inserting new materials, and discarding writing that no longer fits or serves. Even a beginner can use the delete, strikeover, and insert functions to make simple changes. Later, with a brief period of practice, more complex changes, such as changing the order of the sections in a paper or adding passages written in another draft, can be made.

Ideally, freewriting also can be done at the computer. This would encourage students to engage in learning and self-discovery rather than to focus upon the mechanics of exact writing. The word processor can release the writer from restraints that inhibit the free flow of words and ideas. Students can feel free to take risks in their writing because they see that they can always change their minds.

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Classroom Problems

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Teachers can get around the typical problem of too few computers in the classroom by having children write on paper first. Then at the word processor, students can “fine-tune” their papers. Concepts presented in the first draft can be examined for clarity and sufficient elaboration. Additional information can be added, if necessary, to make ideas more concrete. Finally, the text can be checked for minor errors and punctuation.

Before word processing, this instructional model of writing was not implemented due to the amount of time involved in extensive rewriting or retyping. Most teachers and students were not convinced that the benefits of the revision process were worth the time-consuming mechanics of repeated writing. Students were often apprehensive of even beginning to put their thoughts down on paper because of the work and time involved in making corrections.

The word processor has helped realize the advantages offered in process writing. Rewriting and revising are allowed to be the cognitive processes they should be, rather than being dominated by the mechanical aspects of actually putting words down on paper. Students learn to approach their writing errors from a different point of view by struggling to understand what causes problem phrases, sentences, or paragraphs.

Besides revising and editing, another benefit of using a word processor is that multiple copies can be printed for reading in peer-editing groups. Final copies can be displayed on a writing bulletin board or in a collection of writings, without any student’s work showing to a disadvantage because of poor handwriting. And the additional benefit to the student is having an audience other than the teacher.

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Teacher Commitment

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The word processor offers great advantages but also makes great demands. For effective use of the word processor: (1) the school must make a commitment to its use; and (2) the classroom teacher must make an even stronger commitment, since the teacher must invest a great deal of time in teaching students how to use it. Additionally, teachers must become familiar with the word processor themselves before using it in the classroom. Teachers must also decide when and how to give word processing instruction to their students.

If the entire class will use the word processor, the ideal situation would be to place the teacher at the front of a computer for whole-class instruction. However, a peer-tutoring system can also work. This requires a minimal investment of the teacher’s classroom time, and it can be just as efficient. A peer system can be set up by showing just one group how to use the word processing program. Then have each of these students teach at least one other student word processing. Teach the commands as the students need them. A small group of students can learn quickly from the teacher, or they can use the tutorial that comes with some word processing programs for back-up.

In any case, the key is as much “hands-on” activity as possible. One does not learn to word process by listening to the teacher talk about it; one learns by doing it. If composition by computer is to become as natural an act for children as composition by handwriting, they must be allowed sufficient time to develop proficiency with the keyboard and with the specific word processing commands.

Teachers may be concerned with the fact that only one student at a time can use the word processor and printer. Many activities can be structured so as to allow “advisers” to work with the person typing. Researchers have described this “sharing” process as central to writing instruction. Working in a group helps make writing an interactive activity. Children receive immediate feedback from others, making them aware of the need for clarity and for expressing their ideas so that they can be understood by others. This interactive feedback is extremely helpful to writers engaged in revision. It also provides each writer with experience in helping others revise their writings.

Composition teachers have recognized that word processing is revolutionizing writing. Revision, long advocated but ignored by both teachers and students as too mechanical and painful, is now possible by pressing a few keys. However, computers do not change the central role of the teacher. If writing and revision can be made easier through effective writing instruction and word processing, then, hopefully, students will begin to write because they enjoy it rather than because they are forced to do so.

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References

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Bright, T.L. (1990). Integrating Computers into the Language Arts Curriculum. Paper presented at the Indiana Fall Language Arts Conference. [ED 326 884]

Cochran-Smith, M. (1991). “Word Processing and Writing in Elementary Classrooms: A Critical Review of Related Literature.” Review of Educational Research, 61(1), 107-55. [EJ 425 124]

Hansen, J. (1987). When Writers Read. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann. [ED 282 226]

Harste, J., et al. (1988). Creating Classrooms for Authors. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann. [ED 320 168]

Newman, J. (1984). “Language Learning and Computers.” Language Arts, 61(5), 494-97. [EJ 304 044]

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HOW COMPUTER ASSISTED WRITING ASSIST STUDENT..       

   Computer assisted writing can help student with developing ideas, organizing, outlining, brainstorming, and minimizing the effort spent on writing so that student can focus to organization and content. For example, here, I would like to talk about word processors  and how it assist student in writing process.      Word processor is a computer programme that provides some programmes in writing. As examples, it provides grammar and spelling checker which can help student to identify misspelled words and will automatically correct words if the programme is set up. Besides, thesaurus offers students other words that have the similar meaning as the word they are using. By this way, student can adds variety in their writing and increase their vocabulary. Text-to-speech is a programme that allows students to hear what they have typed if it says what they wants it to say and it is good for editing. Moreover, word processors is also an excellent tools for students who find handwriting is tedious.Usually, students with disabilities have difficulty with all the requirement for writing process. They have trouble to organize their thoughts and then retaining the thoughts long enough to put them on paper. Their handwriting must be neat their spelling and grammar also should be correct enough to convey their message, task that they may find difficult. But, by using word processors, there is no need for students to rewrite the whole of their essay or writing tasks if there some mistakes in their writing. It can help student to speed up their writing process. In a nutshell, writing and revision can be made easier through computer assisted writing.

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NewsMiami styles for the world18/02/08

Yvonne Yoong

Once known as the “cradle of condominium civilisation”, Miami in Florida, the United States, is now producing blueprints for modern residential and commercial highrises and hotels that could determine the shape of things to come all over the world.Ever since the 1980s TV series Miami Vice shone the spotlight on Miami Beach’s pastel Art Deco rehabs, there has been a surge in demand for the city’s architectural styles that capitalise on lifestyle aspirations.“Miami has become a brand. It has a buzz,” said a recent news feature in the Miami Herald.“People have a strong image of Miami as cutting-edge … it’s almost like you’re prequalified if you’re from Miami.”With the trend leaning towards “snazzy Miami designs”, it said even Los Angeles in California is looking to put up Miami-style buildings in its skyline.That may be why the daily said its native architects are highly sought-after all over the world, with many saying they are “not limited anymore to being regional practitioners” and that they can now “explore all over”, thanks to the exposure they attained in the Sunshine State’s high-rise condo boom.The magic, said Miami Herald, can be attributed to the fact that the city’s unique architectural expression smacks highly of “understanding lifestyle”.“Our architecture, especially the residential, is about lifestyle … it’s been that way since the founding of the city,” the feature said.“It’s always been about this kind of allure; it’s Eden. It’s about pleasure and fulfilling desire.” 

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Analizing an Article 

READING FOR INFORMATION

        Reading comprehension can be defined as a process of  receive or take in the sense of (as letters or symbols) by scanning; to understand the meaning of written or printed matter; to learn from what one has seen or found in writing or printing. In the context of using reading comprehension for getting information, the reading materials must have character of explaining, reveals, and introduce new ideas. This article mentioned about the United States plans in producing blueprints for modern residential and commercial highrises and violets that could determine the shape of things to come all over the world. With the trend leaning towards “snazzy Miami designs”, recent news said even Los Angeles in California is looking to put up Miami-style buildings in its skyline. In conclusion, Miami styles for the world are all about pleasure and fulfilling desire.

 This 1^st posting is completed by Maisarah Abdul latif (A118886), Syahirah Bt Said (A119613), and Azlin Hazreena bt Zahri (A119485).    

Reading Comprehension

 

Reading is the active search for answers!

Reading Is Important:

A 1993 investigation revealed that 40 to 44 million Americans had only the most basic reading and writing skills (Kirsch, Jungeblut, Jenkins, & Kolstad, 1993). Another 50 million Americans not only lacked the skills to function successfully in a literate society, but also were not aware of their inadequacies. These statistics make it obvious that we have to look for new approaches to prepare students for the millennium, especially in light of current job market trends.The job market now demands a workforce that is more highly educated than ever. For example, assembly line workers must interpret manuals in addition to operating machinery. These workers must be able to read, write, analyze, interpret, and synthesize information (Hay & Roberts, 1989).In summary, people just aren’t reading as much anymore and yet the need for reading, comprehension, and communication skills (verbal and written) has increased. The need is great for strengthening the following skills:

• Your ability to read a variety of materials (e.g. textbooks, novels, newspapers, magazines, instructional manuals).
• Your ability to understand and remember what you read.
• Your ability to effectively communicate what you’ve learned from your reading.

Motivation Is Necessary:

Engaged, active readers have deep-seated motivational goals, which include being committed to the subject matter, wanting to learn the content, believing in one’s own ability, and wanting to share understandings from learning. However, most people, children and adults, do not spend any significant portion of their free time reading. Without committing time to reading, no one can gain the reading skills or knowledge they need to succeed in school, at work, or in life in general. The best way to improve your reading efficiency is to read a lot.

What is Reading Comprehension?

According to Webster’s Dictionary, comprehension is “the capacity for understanding fully; the act or action of grasping with the intellect.” Webster also tells us that reading is “to receive or take in the sense of (as letters or symbols) by scanning; to understand the meaning of written or printed matter; to learn from what one has seen or found in writing or printing.

Comprehension = understanding!

Identifying words on a page does not make someone a successful reader. When the words are understood and transcend the pages to become thoughts and ideas then you are truly reading. Comprehension therefore is the capacity for understanding those thoughts and ideas. Applying what you have read and understood becomes the successful conclusion.When you comprehend what you read it is like taking a trip around the world, staying as long as you like, visiting all the places you wish, and you never even having to pack a suitcase! Reading can be an escape that takes you outside the bounds of your existence. Reading is your ticket to whatever you choose to do and become. Reading is your future as well as your past. Don’t be a reader who reads without thinking or who reads without a purpose.

Comprehension Regulation:

You can become an active, effective reader through comprehension regulation. This is a method for consciously controlling the reading process. Comprehension regulation involves the use of preplanned strategies to understand text. It is a plan for getting the most out of reading. It allows you to have an idea of what to expect from the text. Most importantly, it gives you techniques to use when you are experiencing difficulties.As an active reader, you can get an idea of what the writer is trying to communicate by:

• Setting goals based on your purpose for reading
• Previewing the text to make predictions
• Self-questioning
• Scanning
• Relating new information to old

Determining your Purpose:

There are many different purposes for reading. Sometimes you read a text to learn material, sometimes you read for pure pleasure, and sometimes you need to follow a set of directions. As a student, much of your reading will be to learn assigned material. You get information from everything you read and yet you don’t read everything for the same reason or in the same way or at the same rate. Each purpose or reason for reading requires a different reading approach. Two things that influence how fast and how well you read are the characteristics of the text and the characteristics of you, the reader.Characteristics of the text:

• Size and style of the type (font)
• Pictures and illustrations
• Author’s writing style and personal perspectives
• Difficulty of the ideas presented

Characteristics of the reader:

• Background knowledge (how much you already know about the material or related concepts)
• Reading ability – vocabulary and comprehension
• Interest
• Attitude

Skills for being an effective reader and for increasing comprehension are:

• Finding main ideas and supporting details/evidence
• Making inferences and drawing conclusions
• Recognizing a text’s patterns of organization
• Perceiving conceptual relationships
• Testing your knowledge and understanding of the material through application

When comprehension fails, or your understanding seems limited, you can use a plan that includes:

• Using structural analysis and contextual clues to identify unknown vocabulary words (e.g., look at roots, prefixes, suffixes). If this fails, keep a dictionary close by and look up words you don’t understand
• Reading more critically – ask questions while you read
• Summarizing or outlining main points and supporting details
• Rereading the material
• Do a “think aloud” and/or try to explain what you’ve read to someone else

Although, reading means different things to different people and skills vary with every individual, reading is a skill that can be improved. Students from various backgrounds are in reading courses for a variety of reasons. Weaknesses in vocabulary, comprehension, speed, or a combination of all three may be the result of ineffective reading habits. Active reading is engaged reading and can be achieved through comprehension regulation strategies.