1. What does the application attempt to ‘teach’?
When I checked out the content for this site, I was sure that this website is a good ESL website. I said that because I think this website has an organized pages, links and it is user friendly. There are many ESL aspects included in this site including pronunciation, dictionaries, reading, writing, quizzes and so forth. Basically it has all the crucial component of learning ESL. IT attempts to teach the visitor by including all aspects of ESL which has a variety of examples, activities and tutorial. It also attempt to make learning ESL fun by providing a lot of links to other interesting website. Hence visitors are well exposed to ESL not only by the content of the website itself, but also by other ESL website because links are provided.
2. What sorts of things is the application user expected to do with regards to learning the content?
If users are students, they probably expect something that can help them in learning ESL and gain information with ease. The wide content in this website is suitable for users to gain information without having to repeat the same procedure in searching for information. Organized links, a step by step learning for all level of proficiencies are presented in this site. For students and teacher, they will surely love the way this website help them in searching for information. In my humble opinion, visitors want to see the effort of the creator in publishing the site and how sincere he/she is to share good, free and accessible content. For me I think the owner of this website has reached the expectation of users.
3. What sorts of computer skill is the application users expected to have in order to operate/access/use the application?
No advance computer skills needed to use this application. This site is user friendly and easy to access. Basically, user who knows how to use the computer shouldn't have problem in using the application. If user knows how to open the I.E and how to use the copy & paste function, I think it would be enough since the application require only basic skills. In addition, the information provided b this site is 100% free, no subscription needed and no email requires in order to use the information. If to compare to older application which requires a lot of knowledge of computer, registration or money, I think this website is far better.
4. While you are 'playing'/'accessing'/'assessing' the application, does it remind you of anything you do in a classroom, or with a teacher, or with a fellow classmate or in self-study?
As far as I can remember, my English teacher always came to class with some interesting activity he got from the internet. There was one of his classes I remembered when he brought his laptop and projector and showed the class an interesting activity: finishing a lyric by the Beatles. He showed us the Beatles video clip, provided us with handouts and fill the missing lyrics as the video played. We had a great learning session that day. I can relate this application to his teaching style since he also used technology to teach. If we look at this website, it has a lot of links to teaching activity including using lyrics to learn English. For self study, I used to play a lot of game when I was younger including some English game such as Scrabble, Hang man, Bookworms and so on. This type of application is not only fun but educational as well. So for those who don't know about this, playing games aren't always a waste of time.
5. Can you pinpoint some theories of language learning and/or teaching underlying the application?
In this website, I can see drills are the most frequent techniques used whereby the main activity is the uses of flash games for learning. For learners, they can play the chosen activity again and again until they can master it; it is absolutely free, no tokens needed so therefore we can play it for hours because there are no credit limits. The most known word challenge game: hangman also delivered in this website. (Users have to install the Java plug-in to play this game, that's it). Take a look at this - http://www.manythings.org/ac/ac.html. This game is supposedly to be matching two picture together but here we can see that pictures are changed to sound, how creative is that? Users can use this application to enhance their ability to listen for the right pronunciation over and over again. In addition, users can enhance their learning ability in their own, they determine what they want to learn, where and when is the time to learn without having to depend on other people. So no matter how bad they are in learning, they can gradually learn on their own.
6. How well is the constructivist theory of learning applied to the chosen website?
From my understanding, the constructivists theory by Jean Piaget is about knowledge by experience, learning also can be more affective if we learn by our own. To relate this to my chosen website, the constructivist has been well applied. There are many categories in this website which users can choose by their own. The step by step learning process is very suitable for learners to learn their own. The variety of options available in this site is suitable for most individual who uses the website.
7. In 1980s and early 1990s, there was a major debate on ‘whether the computer was “master” of or “slave” to the learning process’ (Higgins and Johns, 1984). In relation to your evaluation, - was the computer a replacement for teachers or merely an obedient servant to students?
For the time being, I don't think that computer can replace teachers. The main reason is because computers don't have feelings. If to compare a computer to a human, for sure computer is 100 times or more clever than human, but if we take a look at the different side of the learning process, a human actually is very important. a teacher learn how to interact with student, how to control them and more importantly, a teacher can motivate students and sometimes become their role-model, therefore we still need a real human to teach the students. On the other hand, the computers can be a very effective tools to help the teachers and students to boost their performance. Maybe someday the computers can replace the teachers but I hope it won't happen, too many unemployed people nowadays.
8. Would you like to use the application yourself in your future work?
We need a variety in our life, students need it too. Hence, I will use this website as a reference in my future work. The information, activities and other great things provided by this site can be an avenue for me to teach students. Teachers nowadays are also supposedly to apply a variety of techniques in their teaching activities so that student may able to enjoy the learning in class.
Suggestion/ Recommendation
For this website, I think it would be catchier if more color or bright colors are applied. Also the content has to clear with normal font. Subscription may be a good thing to consider by the owner so that daily updates can be sent through e-mail.
8.6/10