Veronica's planet blog

Updating my PLE

2008-06-11T04:01:00.000-07:00

My Personal Learning Environment (updated)

At the end of the first semester we were asked to think about the way we learn and develop a mindmap of our PLE (Personal Learning Environment). I remember that it took me a lot of time thinking about my PLE and how to arrange it. When I showed and explained my PLE to Sarah and the my peers, I noticed that it was quite different from the others. Now that I have to update my PLE I prefer keeping the same structure and simply adding new parts.
First of all, I added ‘Using Skype’ and ‘Wikipages’ in the section ‘Gathering Information in Informal Context’ since in this second semester we had the opportunity to use Skype and speak with American peers. I think it has been a wonderful experience, even if I spoke only twice with Michelle. Wikipages have proved to be useful as sources for gathering information since I read the wikipages of my peers and that of the course. Wikipages have been a helpful way to store information while doing our group project and so I added this tool in the ‘Storing and Organizing information’ section. They have been an interesting means to practice formal writing since the final project consisted in creating a group wikipage about a topic related to culture in US and in Italy.
I decided to be more specific in the section regarding ‘Formulating and Expressing Information’ and I added the people with whom I often speak English: peers, professors, foreign people and my American peer (Michelle). As far as the writing skill is concerned, I specified that I prefer using paper to take notes, while I use the computer to write blog posts, my part of the wikipage, comments in blogs and in the forum about Culture 'Confronti' and to give feedbacks to my peers. I also use the computer to write papers and essays, to chat and send e-mails to my peers and to Michelle. The computer has been useful also to write my thesis during the third year of university and to do some exercises to improve my knowledge of foreign languages.
Finally, I added a new branch to my PLE: ‘Self-Assessment of my Intercultural Competence’. During this second semester I learned that assessing my Intercultural competence is very important and the only person who can do this effectively is myself. During the last years of university, I had already filled in other questionnaires regarding my language and intercultural competence, such as the European Language Portfolio. However, it was during this last months that I had to consider thoroughly my intercultural competence and describe and explain it in details. The mid- term paper, the YOGA form and the ICC questionnaire forced me to think about my intercultural competence and improvements in language and constituted the starting points to write blog posts and prepare oral presentations about these topics.

That’s all for now!

Veronica

My experience of the exchange: evaluating my Intercultural Competence.

2008-05-11T07:25:00.000-07:00

photo by Bluejeff

This week I would like to speak about my experience of the Skype exchange with Americans and of my improvements in language and intercultural competence.
First of all, I have to admit that I liked skyping with a student from the other side of the world. I never used Skype before and I was very enthusiastic of this new and exciting experience. I skyped with Michelle only three times, but the first we had big technical problems and so I could not speak with her for more than 3 minutes. However, in the other two times we spoke a lot about immigration, education, health care system, political candidates and political situation and the situation of young adults (especially as far as the choice of buying or renting a house is concerned) both in USA as well as in Italy.
I was very surprised to hear that she did not know much about Italian political candidates but that she had an idea about who would win the elections. She said that Berlusconi would win because Italians preferred economic stability in a period of economic crisis. I was happy to answer to her questions and talk about several interesting topics. I never felt uncomfortable because we tried to be polite and friendly and we never asked for very private information. Perhaps she felt uncomfortable only once when one of my peers asked her which candidate she would vote in the next political elections; she explained that it would be the first time she could vote and had not got a clear idea yet. She said she would vote for the party her family preferred.

Thank to this exchange I had the possibility to improve my knowledge of American culture. Even before skyping with Michelle I knew that university in Us is very expensive and that parents try to save money since their child is born so that to afford paying university fees; however, Michelle gave me a real example: more or less 46,000 dollars per year! She said also that even if the US are a country immigrants, there still is discrimination against foreigners, especially against Latinos. She was very interested in having information about the situation in Italy as far as the health care system, immigration and education are concerned.
There were not misunderstandings or problems during the exchange. Sometimes I asked her more precise information about my part of my final project and I had to work out my answers. I think I was able to communicate in a different language with a different culture; Michelle said that my English was good. I tried to be polite and friendly and to avoid expressing value judgements about her personal choices or considerations, for example as far as her political preference is concerned.
I think I have improved my intercultural competence because I learned some new facts about the American culture, both about the dominant culture and about a minor social groups. Michelle and I spoke a lot about health care system, education, politics and immigration and she explained me the situation of immigrants from South and Central America, who she considered as the most discriminated.
I also managed to understand another culture by seeing things from a different point of view and by looking at my culture from another perspective. As far as the choice of renting vs. buying a house, I learned that Americans prefer renting than buying and I tried to see this fact from the point of view of an American. They tend to leave their families relatively early for several reasons, for example to go to college, and it is comprehensible that they prefer renting than buying since they have not economic stability and often they cannot afford buying a house. Moreover, they often move to another state to change job, to go to university or for personal reasons and so they do not want to apply for a long-term loan. After having analyzed the situation in Us, I noticed how different the situation in Italy is. Italians prefer stability and tend to buy a house rather than to rent it.
As far as language learning is concerned, I can say that in this second semester I improved my English. As in the first semester, I improved my reading, writing and listening skills and I learned new words. I had to read a lot of articles, dossiers, reports and my peers’ wikis in order to write posts on my blog, to give my contribution in the wiki about the elections, to write my part of the final project and to provide peer feedbacks. I improved my writing skill especially because I had to summarize a lot of information and data in few lines and I had to post coherent and cohesive texts which could be interesting and easy to be read. I learned new words concerning elections, politics and buying a house. Thanks to lessons and to the Skype exchange, during the second semester I also improved my listening skill, my pronunciation and intonation. Michelle had a different accent from that of my professors and spoke quite quickly; at the beginning I could not understand all words, but then I managed to understand her. We seldom spoke Italian, because she did not know it very well; she said she studied it only for some months. However, she said that she understood what I said and so I tried to speak faster.

If you want to know something more about this topic, please visit my ICC questionnaire.

Veronica

Skyping with Americans...

2008-04-17T04:09:00.000-07:00

Few days ago I had the fantastic opportunity to use Skype and speak with an American girl: Michelle. I had never used Skype before and I have to admit that it's a fantastic tool! You can talk in real time with people all around the world and with more than one person at the same time! I think I will install this programme also at home and I will use it to chatter with my friends.

After having decided the topic of our final project, the members of my group and me spoke with Michelle about immigration. I think that Italians tend to consider the immigrants from a powerful country more welcome than those who come from a poor country. We asked her if the same situation is present in America too; she answered that it would be a paradox for a country which is composed of immigrants from throughout the world to have bias against the people of a particular nationality. However, this phenomenon is present in America too; some Americans tend to have prejudices against Latinos. A great number of people from the Central and South America move and settle in the USA and a lot of them try to immigrate illegally. Once arrived in the USA they work illegally or if they found legal jobs, they are underpaid. I think that the same situation is sometimes present also in Italy.

Michelle then said that his father is Italian and was born in a village near Naples; he told her that when he arrived in the USA he was very discriminated because he was a foreigner. However, she as the daughter of an immigrant doesn't feel discriminated. We concluded than that it's more difficult to integrate in a foreign country if you don't know the language. I know a family of immigrants from Albania; the daughter was my best friend at high school and speaks very well Italian. She feels totally integrated in Italy, while her parents have some problems because they don't know Italian very well.

We spoke then about the health care sistem in the two countries. Michelle said that in the USA everyone must have a health insurance in order to receive medical cares. This insurance is very expensive, as well as medicines in general. I explained her how is the situation in Italy and she was very surprised and curious. We focused then again on immigration and she said that in the USA immigrants who don't have a health insurance have the right to receive the first aid cares anyway. The cost of these medical cares is then payed by the American citizens and this fact is considered a controversial issue by many Americans. I explained her that in Italy too there is the legal duty to give emergency cares to ill or injured people.

Immigration in Italy

2008-04-13T03:23:00.000-07:00

photo by carf

Italy has long been a country of emigration; for centuries Italians went abroad to escape from poverty and hunger. Then, from the Seventies onwards, Italy has become a country of immigration. People throughout the world come in Italy to escape from wars and/or to search for better living conditions. I think that the Italian government wasn’t prepared to such a change of tendency and continued to consider immigration a temporary phenomenon; for this reason, it didn’t take the suitable measures in order to regulate immigration. In recent years, however, the Italian government has become aware of the importance of this fact and has begun to realize that this is a permanent state of things and an increasing phenomenon. According to the Caritas Dossier about immigration, in 2006 there were more or less 3,690,000 immigrants in Italy, 21.6% more than the previous year.
On the Web there are several websites that explain the Italian rules governing immigration, as for example: how to achieve the permit of stay, the citizenship, the asylum, health care. In the website of the Ministry of the Internal Affairs you can find useful information about immigration; there are also several links to Italian laws and decrees and to certain Web pages where immigrants can fill in some documents online. These websites are good starting points to communicate with immigrants in a simple and easy way and to make a bit more clearer the complex Italian bureaucracy.
However, a lot should still be done to effectively regulate immigration in Italy and the integration of immigrants. They are sometimes considered only a work force that contribute to the growth of our economy; they often do humble job that Italians don’t want to do and this often doesn’t reflect their choice, but it’s due to the fact that their educational qualifications aren’t valid in Italy. Immigrants are also important because they contribute to the growth of birth-rate; in Italy there is a higher percentage of elderly people than of young people. Some Italians, however, don’t recognize the importance of immigrants and fear that they could change the present state of things and ‘steal’ job and resources. They consider all immigrants as criminals and dishonest people, while in fact they represent only a minor part of them. These Italians citizens are probably exasperated by the increase of crime and of illegal immigrants.

Veronica

An aspect of culture that I would like to analyze

2008-04-12T02:29:00.000-07:00

This week we were asked to think about an aspect of the American and of the Italian culture that we would like to explore further. I think this isn’t an easy task since there are several different topics that I would like to analyze and discuss with my peers: education, health care, food, public holidays. All of them are very interesting and they would be good talking points. Since I have to choose only one of them, I would like to focus on public holidays. I would like to know exactly which are the national holidays during which Americans don’t work and compare them to the Italian holidays. It would be interesting to analyze differences and similarities among the nature and origins of such holidays, what people do during these holidays and the importance they give to them. I think that there are some differences between Italian and American cultures and this final project could be a good way to explore them.

Elections '08

2008-03-30T04:52:00.000-07:00

photo by smallcaps

photo by LEOtm

Even this week my post deals with one important current news: the elections in the USA and in Italy. I watched some videos and I read some articles in the websites that I had already visited in the past weeks and found particularly reliable: the online newspapers The New York Times, BBC News and La Repubblica, and the official websites of the candidates of the left wing: Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and Walter Veltroni.

As far as the Italian situation is concerned, I noticed that in these days both La Repubblica and the official website of the PD dealt with the problem of Southern Italy. In all Veltroni’s public speeches of the last few days in the southern regions of Italy, he repeated that one of the main points of his political program is to solve the major problem of Southern Italy, that is, poverty, the inadequacy of infrastructures and the Mafia. He asserted that if he win, he will purpose a draft bill to the Council of Ministers containing some measures such as: the development of transport (especially the railway); the improvement of the communication network that will allow the use of broadband to the whole Southern Italy; the increase and refinement of educational and professional offerings for young people; incentives and special measures for the development of small enterprises; the fight against the Mafia. According to Veltroni, solving these problems means creating the necessary conditions for the South to develop and contribute to the national growth.
Another article of La Repubblica that caught my attention concerns a study research of the “Osservatorio Universitario Mediamonitor”, which showed a certain trend among Italians voters. The research displays that there is a great number of people that don’t know who they will vote and IF they will vote. A high percentage of Italian voters isn’t interested in politics and doesn’t actively participate to political manifestations. Many voters are confused and don’t feel represented by the candidates; they are disillusioned about the political situation in Italy and don’t trust in a positive change after the elections. The alarming fact is that this percentage is increased compared to the last political elections.

As far as the American elections are concerned, I noticed that news mainly deals with the race between the two Democrats Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton and concerns several aspects of their campaign. The newspapers agree that this race is becoming more closer and bitter than expected.
The New York Times and the BBC News reported the fact that Clinton acknowledged her mistake when she affirmed that she came under sniper fire on a trip to Bosnia 1996; she attempted to justify herself saying that every human being makes mistakes and apologized for her behaviour. She then tried to change the subject and criticised Obama since in last weeks he didn’t leave his Church and disown his former pastor Rev. J. Wright, after his inflammatory sermon.
The newspapers then focussed on the fact that Senator Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont and other Obama’s supporters suggested Clinton to quit the race, because by continuing her campaign she would help the Republican party. They said that Obama leaded in delegates and total votes and the uphill race between the two candidates would hurt the Democratic party’s chances to win the elections in November. Mrs. Clinton, however, firmly refused to quit the race, unless she loses the race in Pennsylvania on April 22; even Obama supported her choice and declared that she should continue her campaign as long as she is willing or able.
Another matter of discussion is the ‘transparency’ of the candidates. Obama recently released copies of his tax returns covering the last seven years and his aides invited Clinton to do the same before the elections in Pennsylvania. Clinton replied that she would provide as soon as possible. The aides of one candidate constantly tried to disrepute the clearness of the other candidate’s personal finances in order to get votes and public approval.
Another clear signal of fierce competition between the two candidates is how they try to gain public approval. In their official websites, for example, each candidate tries to underline that important public figures support them and their ideas. In Clinton’s website there is a link to a video showing Rep. John Murtha praising her qualities and ideas, while in Obama’s website there is an article dealing with the fact that Bob Casey, Senator of Pennsylvania, endorsed him to be the next president.

Veronica

Comparing the news regarding the elections

2008-03-15T08:44:00.000-07:00

photo by Mezzoblue

This week we were asked to analyze three online sources from three different countries for few days and see how the news dealing with the political elections in Italy and in the United States was presented. I chose to read three online newspapers that I considered important and trustworthy: the American New York Times, the British BBC News and the Italian La Repubblica. Perhaps the last one is a bit partial and ‘left oriented’; however, I chose it since I sometimes read it (together with other Italian newspapers) when I surf the Net and because I decided to analyze the news regarding the candidates of the left wing: the American Democrats Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton and the Italian leader of the PD Walter Veltroni.

As far as The New York Times is concerned, I noticed that every day in the home page there was an article with a big attention-getting title dealing with political elections. Other pertinent links were situated at the bottom of the page mainly under the topic ‘Politics’. I read through some articles regarding the two Democratic candidates and I noticed that they were all very long and detailed. There were plenty of quotations from the candidates’ speeches and from other important public figures in America. Throughout each article there were several links to other Web sites or to the personal descriptions of the candidates; other links to correlated articles were also present on the margins of the page. There were always one or two photos of the people who were the subjects of the articles and under each image there was a clear caption. Ot the left side of the page there was also a link that allowed you to join a blog and express your opinion about elections.
Journalists spoke a lot about the political race between the two candidates of the left wing and several specific events or quotations that can affect their public image. An article, for example, dealt with the case of the inflammatory statements of Rev. Wright, who has been the Pastor of the Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago. Obama was asked to express his opinion about what Rev. Wright said, since he had been his Pastor; Obama strongly criticized him and clarified that those ideas had nothing in common with his ideals and his campaign. In other articles, Obama was described as a leader that uplift national unity, whose personality is more proper to the office of president. Clinton was described as more competent, but she was criticized because she often questions Obama’s experience and thinks that he can only be a vice president.
In The New York Times it was very difficult to find news dealing with Italian political elections. They weren’t present in the home page or under the section ‘World’. If you typed the name of Italian candidates in the search bar you find few old articles, which dealt with the main political events of the past months; you could find also some short quotations or agency news, but there were no photos.

As far as the BBC News is concerned, I noticed that the US elections news was presented in the front page even if only as a small link under the topic ‘World’, ‘Other Top Stories’ or ‘America’, with no photos to catch the attention. If you clicked on the link, however, there were long and detailed articles, complete with some photos of the candidates and several related links on the right side of the Web page. As The New York Times, the British online newspaper dealt with Obama’s contempt for Rev. Wright remarks; however, the style was different. The BBC News articles were shorter than the American ones and gave a more general overview of the situation in the USA; sometimes they focussed on the racial issue, that is, the percentage of African-American or of ‘white’ that voted Obama and Clinton. I noticed other differences between the American articles and the British ones: the latter always began with a short period in bold that summed up the content of the news and than the articles were subdivided in various parts with different subtitles. As The New York Times, there were many quotations, but they weren’t always followed by comments. For all these reasons, I found the BBC News articles more easy and pleasant to read than those of The New York Times.
As far as the Italian situation is concerned, I noticed that even in the BBC News was difficult to find updated news about this topic. The only difference was that in the few articles that I found in the British newspaper there were some photos of the Italian candidates and some links to the Italian Government Website and to the Italian Parliament Website.

As far as La Repubblica is concerned, I noticed that the topic of the elections in Italy had always a space in the front page. Under the section ‘Politics’ there were a number of links to articles dealing with the political situation ordered from the more recent to the older ones. On both sides of the page there were always other hourly updated links to related articles. If you clicked on the link “Tracce dei Candidati” from the main page, you entered in a Web site entirely dedicated to the elections; here you could find a geographical map of Italy and see when and where the next public speech of the different candidates will take place. For each candidate there was also a short personal description and a list of links of articles dealing with him/her. You could find the list of candidates for the parliament and the Senate from each Region and several graphics, polls, and also a ‘popularity chart’ daily updated.
I read through some articles dealing with Veltroni and I saw that there were always a subtitle that summed the main points of the content and then the text was often subdivided in sections according to the different aspects of the news. Photos were not always present; however, they represented either Veltroni and his main opponent, Berlusconi. A detail caught my attention and made me think that this newspaper is a bit partial: in some articles, on the left side of the page, there was a big blinking image that suggested you to vote the left wing.
Generally speaking, the news dealt with the main problems of the country: the national security, the relationships with other countries, the way our troops in Afghanistan and Lebanon should be employed, the issue of the short-term jobs, the proposal of a minimum salary and of a reduction of taxes.
Unlike The New York Times and the BBC News, in which the news dealing with the Italian political situations were hard to find, in La Repubblica there was link in the front page dealing with the elections in the US. If you clicked on the link you entered a Web page which was entirely dedicated to the American elections. There was a big photo of Obama, perhaps because the political program of the Italian left wing (Veltroni) is similar to that of the Democrat Obama. On the left side there were the photos of the American candidates, their personal description, the good and weak points of their campaign. At the bottom of the page there were also the main themes of the American campaign (health care, abortion, immigration, climatic changes, Iraq, Iran) and you could read what the various candidates think about them. On the left side there were other links that allowed you to deepen your knowledge about the political situation in the US. Some articles dealing with the American elections were present also in the section ‘Esteri’.

Veronica

Political elections in the United States and in Italy

2008-03-08T05:35:00.000-08:00

Photo by MotherPie

Photo by MaDDaLoSka

This week we were asked to visit some Web sites that Sarah chose for us and saved in Del.icio.us. These resources concerned the elections, both in the U.S.A. and Italy, and contained text files and videos. We were asked to visit these sites and analyze the language used by the candidates on the left or on the right. I chose to work on the left wing; for this reason, I visited some Web sites related to the American Democrats Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton and the Italian candidate for the PD (Partito Democratico), Walter Veltroni.

I enjoyed paying attention to how they addressed to their audience: of course, a political candidate always tries to come across as efficient and self-confident; however, I noticed some differences.
Hillary Clinton is almost always smiling and very enthusiastic; nonetheless, she seems very determined and fighting. I think she wants to convey a positive and strong image of herself: a woman who experienced difficult and challenging moments in her life and was able to overcome them; a woman that is "ready, able and willing" to fight and solve the main political, social and economic problems of the USA. In one of her speeches she said that her personal problems were nothing compared to those of many other American citizens and she wanted to support poor and weak people. She often remarks her experience in the political field, as she had been the First lady for several years and sometimes she attacks Obama's approach to the country's problems. She stresses the importance of avoiding discrimination of gender, race, religion and in her campaign she relies on the fact that she is a woman. Among the several issues she cares, she aims to some improvements in the field of health care, new measures for the integration of immigrants and the end of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan.

As far as Barack Obama is concerned, I noticed that he is more serious. As Hillary, he is very resolute and you can see his determination in his voice and in his eyes. He is a very charismatic leader and relies on the fact that he is African-American and has multicultural background. His economic approach is more aggressive than that of Senator Clinton and aims to an economic growth. Among the other issues, he wants to make improvements in the fields of infrastructures and instruction. Like Clinton, he aims to new measures regarding immigration, health care and the end of the war. He aims to a ‘change’ and for this reason he often repeat the adjective ‘new’: for example, he spoke of a new chapter in the USA story and of a new leadership. He stresses the importance of believing in the ability to bring real change in America and, in fact, the slogan of his campaign is ‘Yes, we can’.

Like Obama, Walter Veltroni appears to be very serious and determined in all the interactions with his audience. In my opinion, his public speeches are very long and sometimes it is difficult to follow the thread. He often uses high-sounding words and obvious remarks to catch his audience’s attention and approval. I noticed that Veltroni’s political program is partly similar to that of Obama. First of all, the slogan of his campaign ‘Si può fare’ can be considered a perfect translation of the American ‘Yes, we can’. Moreover, Veltroni aims to a significant change of the situation and to an economic growth. Like Obama, he repeats the term ‘new’: he wishes a ‘new’ force, a ‘new’ language in politics. Among the other goals, he attaches importance to social justice, the equality of rights, freedom, a stronger cooperation between northern and southern Italy and the protection of the environment. During one of his speeches he said that he aims to gain the 'trust' of Italian citizens and wants to simplify the situation in Italy.

I noticed that there are similarities in the programs of the left wing, perhaps because both American Democrats and the Italian PD feel the need for a change in order to improve the present state of things and they share some similar ideals.

Veronica

My personal learning environment

2007-12-08T07:04:00.000-08:00

This week we were asked to develop a mindmap of our Personal Learning Environment (PLE). Sarah quoted different definitions of it and explained us that there is no general agreement on a standard definition.
Generally speaking, a PLE indicates the way we learn, how and where we collect information and organize it.

It took me a lot to think about my PLE and how to arrange it. I decided to outline it using Word and then to scan it. I changed the layout and the type size in order to make it more readable once posted on this blog. I used also different colours for the lines of each branch to make my PLE clearer.

My Personal Leaning Environment has four branches, and the main categories are then sub-divided in several parts. First of all, I pointed out where I learn; I can find information and elaborate it on the Web or in the real world (that is, on paper, but also in everyday interactions with people).

Another branch is about how I gather information; this happens when I read, listen to or watch something. These activities can take place in a formal or an informal context of learning. The former is strictly connected with my university experience and refers to the tools that I consider expressly devoted to the language learning: textbooks, essays, dictionaries, grammars, courses at university, conferences and seminars. The second context refers to the tools that I use in my everyday life that contribute to my language learning, even if I don’t conceive them as official and conventional; they consist in songs, books that I read in my free time, TV programs, videos, newspaper articles and magazines, websites, podcasts, forums, blogs, chat rooms, e-mails, conversations with foreigners that can take place also when travelling abroad.

Another important branch of my PLE consists in the activity of storing and organizing information that I gathered. First of all, I try to keep in mind new words and grammatical rules; since it’s inevitable that I forget some pieces of information, I often make outlines, which I consider very helpful in order to improve my visual memory. When I attend lessons at university or when I read something interesting, I usually take notes to fix pieces of information and making them available when I need to read them again. For the same reason, I sometimes record TV programmes, songs, videos and podcasts, or I copy or photocopy some parts of texts. Thanks to Sarah, I recently learned how to store URLs on the Web using Bloglines and Del.icio.us. I think that feed aggregators and the activity of social bookmarking are really useful for my language learning, and in general to retrieve and save information.

The last branch of my PLE deals with the activity of formulating and expressing information, which is strictly tied up with the previous ones. It’s the last step of my learning process, and I consider it very useful since I’m forced to think about what I’ve previously learnt and then arrange and connect information. When I want to express some concept or my ideas, I deeply think about them and I communicate them by speaking or writing (using a computer or on paper).

I hope you enjoyed reading through my PLE. What about you?

Veronica

Judging online sources

2007-12-01T09:41:00.000-08:00

photo by Swiv

There is a huge number of sources you can use choose from when you have to write a text. You can decide to use paper sources (such as: books, reviews, journals, essays, reports, articles, pamphlets, etc.), or online ones (websites). Judging sources can be very difficult and time-demanding, but it’s indispensable if you want your text to be reliable.

When I started searching materials for my thesis I preferred using paper sources since I thought that they were more reliable than the online ones. Anyone can publish anything he/she wants to on the web and there is often no way of checking or verifying what has been divulged. However, I soon changed my mind since not all online material is bad; there are a lot of interesting and reliable sites on the web and I used them as sources of my paper.

I never stop to be amazed by the huge amount of websites and information available on the Web; you just have to write a word in the apposite bar and the search engine will find all the websites that contain that word. However, search engines like Google show both relevant and irrelevant sites. In order to narrow down you researches you can be more specific when writing the key words, or you can do advanced searches (in this way, you can find for examples many academic files by eminent professors). You can also use other useful online tools, such as Del.icio.us; after having registered to this website, you can look for sites and read how people commented them. As you can read in the tips from the University of Essex, you can use also meta-search engines (like Mamma) and specialized search engines (such as Google Scholbar), which can help you to quickly find what you are looking for.

Reading through the Pardue Online Writing Lab (OWL) and the San Diego State University websites, I noticed that there are several criteria to use in order to judge the sources of information, both online or not. I must admit that I’ve used them almost always, since my supervisor clearly explained them to me when I was writing my thesis.

First of all, I always need to have clear in mind what is the subject of my paper and what I need to search for; then I have to decide where I could find what I need. This criteria are clearly stated in the Pardue (Owl): “You will need to make decisions about what to search for, where to look, and once you've found material on your topic, whether to use it in your paper."

Then I pay attention to the author of the text; if I don’t know him/her, I try to find out what he/she wrote, his/her profession and career. Sometimes it may be a bit difficult and time-demanding to find the author of an online text. It is often very important to look at the publisher or the producer of the text.

Then I read the preface and the table of content, in order to find out why the author decided to write his/her work and to what audience he/she aimed to refer. The table of content gives also a quick overview of the main points discussed in the text.

When you are searching for a website the URL can be very important since the domain can inform you about the organization that hosts the website. If the URL ends in .org the organization is no-profit; if it ends in .com the site belongs to a commercial organization, while if it ends in .edu or .ac it concerns an educational authority.

I always check the publication date, especially when I search for online sources. I try to notice when the website was created and its last update, since it’s very important to use current information.

Finally, I read through the bibliography in order to see if the material the author used is valuable or not. In the bibliography I can find further sources that I can use to broaden my research.

I found particularly useful and interesting the following five questions published by the Monash University's online library tutorial:

-Who is responsible for the site - is there a name and contact address?

-What is its rationale - is it endorsing a particular viewpoint to the exclusion of other views?

-Is there a reference list or bibliography of corroborative evidence?

-Is there a date when the site was last updated - how long ago did this happen?

-Does the site seem to be permanent or part of a permanent organisation?

Veronica

Uno, dos, tres...

2007-11-24T05:13:00.000-08:00

Hi!

Would you like to know something more about me? Well... I decided to post a video that shows one of my passions: latin dance! I'm attending a course on Friday evenings and I think latin dance is simply fantastic! I chose this video since it shows a pair of dancers that dance cuban salsa and then give some pieces of advice as how to improve your style when dancing. Cool!

Besos

Veronica

Do you know YouTube?

2007-11-24T03:47:00.000-08:00

photo by manu contreras

According to Wikipedia, YouTube was created in 2005 and is “a video sharing website where users can upload, view and share video clips”. YouTube is free and very easy to use. You can search for every sort of videos just by tapping tags in the ‘search’ bar; most of the videos are available also for unregistered users. You can also see is the file you want to watch is worth attention by looking at its rating and reading though the several comments people wrote.

I think that YouTube is a fantastic tool since you can find videos dealing with every topic and for every purpose you want. I knew YouTube even before Sarah introduced it to us; I used it mainly to find funny videos, but I never thought about it as a learning tool! Thanks to Sarah, I discovered that in YouTube you can find interesting videos that can teach you how to do several things. I think that the next time I want to learn something more about how using computers I will look for a good YouTube video! LOL! Since many files are in English, you can also improve your English listening skill, your vocabulary, and your pronunciation. Great!

YouTube can be useful for teachers too; they can find interesting videos that can be used in order to teach in a different and more involving way some subjects that students often consider boring. In TeacherTube I found some good video files that deal with several topics, such as physics, mathematics, informatics, and that can be an effective support when teaching.

In YouTube you can find also funny videos; Sarah suggested us two files which I find brilliant! When I saw the one about the translator I couldn’t stop laughing! The second one was a satiric video that parodied Bush’s foreign policy and the sad situation in Iraq. I particularly appreciated the puns such as I-rack/Iraq and I-ran/Iran, or the double meaning of some words, such as ‘rack’.

YouTube, however, has also negative aspects. Since everyone can add his/her own video, you may find some files that aren’t good; information conveyed could be inexact, language can be used improperly, and both comment and videos can be full of grammatical mistakes or vulgar.

In conclusion, I think that YouTube is an excellent tool in order to find audio and video files dealing with several topics, but people should be aware that they can find both good and bad stuff. As a matter of fact, teachers should control the videos they want to employ as teaching material before using it.

What do you think?

Veronica

Let's podcast!

2007-11-15T10:53:00.000-08:00

photo by Astrangegirl

Two days ago Sarah introduced us to another very useful tool for improving English: podcasts. The term ‘podcast’ is a neologism derived by the fusion of two words: ‘broadcasting’ and ‘ipod’. The first word indicates the transmission of audio and video signals over the airwaves from radio or television; the second noun refers to a portable media player (Wikipedia). A podcast is then a multimedia video or audio file which can be freely downloaded on your computer or on your mp3. However, some files are accessible directly online.

I think that podcasts are an excellent way of improving your English; you can train your listening and comprehension skills and you can enrich your vocabulary, pronunciation, and style. They are completely free, so everyone can take advantage of this fantastic tool. Cool!

You can subscribe to podcasts syndication feeds, so that you can receive new and interesting video and audio files as soon as they are available on the Web. In this way, you have always recent material at your disposal.

As Sarah pointed out, another important advantage of podcasts is that they can be used whenever and wherever you want to. You can listen to or watch them not only on your computer, but also bring them with you on your mp3. Fantastic! I never thought to the possibility of listening to several English conversations and videos each week while traveling by bus!

I surfed the Net and I used del.icio.us to find some useful podcasts; I chose these three good podcasts about English learning.

- The British Council Podcast is a wonderful website where you can find many audio files about several topics. You can listen to them and then read the correspondent audio scripts by clicking the ‘script’ link. Here you can find also some exercises that can be useful to check your comprehension skill. The content of the website has been written by English teachers and educationalists. There are many links to interesting English websites.

- The BBC Radio Podcast: How to… is one of the several interesting podcasts that you can find in the BBC website. Here you can listen to English radio programs that deal with different everyday situations. Not only can you improve your listening skill, but also enrich your everyday English vocabulary since explanations of language choices are provided.

- The Business English Podcast is an excellent resource to improve your listening and comprehension skills; you can find audio files, the texts scripts and exercises to check what you’ve actually understood. Conversations concern mainly suggestions to improve your business English, your intonation, pronunciation and style in the working field. It’s very useful both for students and workers!

That’s all for now!

Veronica

It's really Del.icio.us!

2007-11-13T07:53:00.000-08:00

photo by crush with eyeliner

Before Wednesday, I usually used Google when I wanted to search for a website. The search engine shows all the websites (usually a huge number!) containing the words you searched for, with no distinction of their effective relevancy. What a waste of time!

If I found an interesting site and I wanted to save the URL, I could write it down on a piece of paper, or save it using the ‘Favorites’ button. If I lost the piece of paper or I used another computer, I had to search the URL again. What a pity!

Fortunately, Sarah taught us to use another useful tool that lets us save time: Del.icio.us. It is a social bookmarking website that allows you to save, store, and share your favourite websites online.
Del.icio.us is completely free and can be accessed from any computer; after having registered, you can start searching for the websites that interest you. You write one or more tags and Del.icio.us finds all sites that had been saved with those tags. You will find a relatively smaller number of sites than that retrieved using a searching engine, but these sites are surely more pertinent! It’s fantastic! You can also see how many people saved a certain website and what they wrote about it on their notes. Their comments can really make your search easier!
You have the possibility to create a list of your favourite websites; for each of them, you will be asked to write the URL, a short description, your notes and the tags. Your bookmarks are public; this means that everyone can read them. This activity, in fact, is called ‘social bookmarking’ since it’s a sort of mutual exchange: you can read and use others’ bookmarks and they can use yours. It’s wonderful!

Finally, you can create your network in Del.icio.us, by saving the usernames of the people you want and check their favourite websites. I added my peers on my network and I checked their ‘Favorites’; I liked very much the work they did and I chose to comment one bookmark for each peer.

- Silvia’s choice: Wordreference
“This website contains free online dictionaries. It can be very useful when you're translating! As a matter of fact, it contains both monolingual and bilingual dictionaries.” (Silvia)

I chose this bookmark, since I use it every time I had to translate a text. It’s really useful! It contains English, French, German, and Italian dictionaries and there is also a forum where people can discuss about their doubts when translating a word or a sentence into s foreign language. Cool!

- Marina’s choice: Web Concordance
“A useful tool when you need to know a collocation. You simply have to write a word and the concordancer will give you a list of examples from the corpus you have chosen.” (Marina)

I think this is a very useful tool, especially when you want to use a word, but you aren’t sure about its position and context. I had already used a similar tool when I wrote my paper and I found it fantastic! I had to search for the occurrences of several words and, without a specific programme of web concordance, it would have been impossible to do my searches!

- Elena’s choice: Randall’s ESL Cyber Listening Lab
“A free resource for ESL students who want to practice their listening skills. There are many listening quizzes (Pre-listening/Listening/Post-listening activities) dealing with several topics taken from everyday conversations, but also from interviews.” (Elena)

I found this website really interesting and useful; I immediately tried to practice my listening skills, and I think I will use this fantastic tool very often! I appreciated the fact that I could choose the level and the topic I preferred. Among my ‘Favorites’, I saved two websites that contain grammar exercises and listening quizzes!

- Camilla’s choice: How to use English Punctuation
“Small and useful guide to the use of English punctuation.” (Camilla)

I think that this is a concise, but very clear and useful guide to the correct use of English punctuation. I saved another website about this topic among my ‘Favorites’; I think that English punctuation is sometimes very different from the Italian one and many doubts can arise when translating a text into English. For this reason, an easy online guide can be really helpful!

- Martina’s choice: National Public Radio in US
“You can access hourly news summaries and 24-hours programme stream. It’s a US public radio.” (Martina)

I think that it is a useful website where you can find a large number of news regarding several topics. You can learn a lot about the world’s news and you can also listen them; in this way, you have the possibility to improve your listening ability.

That’s all for the moment! I hope you enjoyed reading my experience and my opinions about Del.icio.us!

Veronica

Four good reasons to celebrate Halloween!

2007-11-05T01:31:00.000-08:00

photo by Brit.

Hi!

Last week was the 31st October… Halloween! I saw some children go for trick-or-treating in my village, and this makes me happy! There are several reasons for celebrating Halloween also in Italy:

- First of all, Halloween is an occasion to meet people and stay together for a night. It is then a way of socializing and making the acquaintance of new people!

- At Halloween, people (especially children) have fun, since they can wear fancy dresses and go for trick-or-treating and eat a lot of sweets!

- People can also express their creativity and their immagination, since they have the chance to create their own fancy dresses (that, in my opinion, is better than buying them already made!), to put on bizarre make up…. And make their own jack-o’-lanterns! Personally, I never made my own carved pumpkin, even if I would like to. Since I was a child, I’ve always made carved oranges and mandarins! It’s very easy to make them and they are so cute and funny! I found this interesting website that explains how to make your own Halloween pumpkin! The website is clear and nice: instructions are accompanied by photos, which show different stages of preparation; in this way you can check your work step-by-step! You can find also many suggestions, alternative methods and useful links. This website will be surely useful next year, when I will try making my first jack-o’-lantern!

- Some people think that celebrating Halloween is a sort of ‘Americanization’, since this holiday is embraced mainly by Americans. I think that this is not true, since Halloween originated in Europe! According to Wikipedia, Halloween “has its origins in the Gaelic festival known as Samhain, […] which was a celebration of the end of the harvest season in Gaelic culture”. This holiday was then influenced by many Roman traditions, when the Romans occupied Celtic territory. Halloween was then imported to North America, when many Scottish and Irish people immigrated there in the 19th century. For these reasons, Halloween is not a new holiday introduced by Americans, but is a part of our European culture!

Happy Halloween!

Veronica

Bloglines

2007-11-03T09:05:00.000-07:00

photo by somefool (old school)

Hi!

Few days ago on the lab we learned what an aggregator is and how it works. Before Wednesday I never heard about this word and I did not know what it was. Sarah explained us that an aggregator is a useful tool that collects syndicated Web contents and organizes them in a very clear way, so that you could easily retrieve and read them on a Web page. After having downloaded or registered for an aggregator, you can subscribe to various websites and blogs and you can receive updates. I learned also that RSS (‘Really Simple Syndacation’) and XML are languages that are used to transfer the information on a site in a standard format.

On the lab we started using Bloglines aggregator; it is a very useful tool that allows you to check if the websites or blogs you are interested in have been updated; it makes you save time, since you do not need to type every time the URLs on the bar when you want to see whether there are news. However, if you want to have a look at the entire websites, not only the latest news, useful links are provided.

Bloglines is completely free and can be accessed from any computer. Moreover, it is very easy to use: when you create your own account, you are required to give only your e-mail address and your password. Then you have simply to subscribe to and add the URLs of the websites and blogs you are interested in using the ‘Feed’ button (For example, I added some websites about dogs, English learning, gossips and cooking recipes). If you are registered for many websites, you can also organize information creating playlists. Unlike your personal blog, your pages on Bloglines, as well as the way you organize them, are absolutely private and nobody can see them.

That’s all for now!

See you on Monday

Veronica

My first two weeks as a blogger

2007-10-25T08:27:00.000-07:00

Before attending this English course, I had no idea of how using a blog. I heard about people who usually read them and used them, but I had never visited one. The idea of using blogs and of creating my own blog excited me, but, at the same time, made me nervous. In fact, I can use some computer programmes, but it sometimes happens that something does not work or is completely new to me, and this makes me a bit upset. However, after the first lessons, I familiarized myself with this means of communication and now I find it fantastic! You can use a blog to write your opinions and thoughts about many topics; you can answer and comment on posts written by other people; you can share pictures and videos and suggest links. I like very much the idea that people can express and publish their opinions… and see what other persons (also from throughout the world) think about them!
In my group of English, there are many girls who share my passion for cooking… and, since we do not live in the same town, the blog could be a good way to exchange ideas and recipes, and to suggest each other useful links to cooking websites.

I think that blogs are very useful in order to improve the language learning, since one own work can be read and commented by other people. The practice of peer reviewing is helpful both for the person who corrects the work, and for the person who receives the criticisms; the first can edit the text and understand his/her mistakes, while the second can learn from others’ mistakes.
The activity of blogging is very similar to that of peer reviewing experienced during the third year of university. During English lessons students were divided in groups and they had to discuss about a topic, write and send some works using First Class, and edit the texts of their peers. I must admit that it had been a bit demanding, since every week we had to write a short text and edit our peers’ works. The same discourse can be said for the activity of blogging; I spent a lot of time searching for pictures in Flickr, thinking of what to write as my presentation and what to suggest to my peers. However, I think that blogging and peer reviewing are useful in order to improve my fluency, my ability to read and write colloquial English.

Veronica

welcome to my blog

2007-10-17T06:54:00.000-07:00

photo by unfocused mike

Hi! I'm an Italian girl of 24 and I'm studying foreign languages at the Univesity of Padua. Welcome to my blog!

This is a photo of a cute dog puppy. I've decided to post it since I really love dogs, with no distinction of size, breed or colour. Moreover, I think that this puppy is very lovely and incredibly looks like my dog Trudy. Even if she is nearly twelve years old, she still looks like a pup! She is very lively when we go for long walks, but when we come back home she sinks into sleep on her cushion. I like looking after her, and her thankful look makes me happy. My parents brought her home many years ago, saving her from the bad conditions of a dog pound. If I had the possibility I would like to rescue other stray dogs.

These are the websites that I often use.

Word Reference

Repubblica

Wikipedia

The first is a very useful website that I often use to check the meaning of foreign words that I do not know, or when I want to translate Italian words into foreign languages.
The second website is an Italian online newspaper, that I usually read in order to know what happens in Italy and throughout the world. It contains also many interesting links.
The other site is a sort of multilingual wiki that I use every time I want to know something about a topic that is new for me. I think is very useful and simple to use; in fact, there is a great number of links that you can use to satisfy your curiosity.

Have fun reading my blog!

Veronica