Welcome to your Wikispace!

The main objective of this project will be to make students have direct contact with North-American culture. The teacher will provide students with Valle’s Class Blog in order to make them work with on-line supports (E-mails, RSS, Webquests, Wiki and Podcasts) through which students will collect and share information about the key topic of their project - the approach to the culture and traditions of USA – . So, students will be expected to create all together a travel guide in the wiki, containing every aspect they had worked with.

Students should obtain the information, which they will use for the making of their travel guide, from the activities proposed in the webquest, as well as from various additional on-line sources. They will put in common all the information they find and will work cooperatively with their mates by means of the wiki which will be their main support for their future travel guide. In addition, students could receive the latest pieces of news directly from the American newspaper ‘The New York Times’ into their PC (or any other journal to which they may subscribe) by means of the RSS system. They will practice their L2 - English – like a tool for communication with their Anglophone pen-friends with whom they will meet through the website proposed on the specific activity dealing with key-pals, and finally, they will also have at their disposal a series of podcasts to learn the fundamental aspects of American culture in a more interactive manner. Consequently, students will have to follow the next order to carry out the activities proposed:

1. Working with E-mails
2. Working with Webquests
3. Working with a Wiki
4. Working with RSS
5. Working with Podcasts and Films

For concluding, it is important to note that the second objective of this project will be to make students be able to use the wiki as a support where they will have to create their personal travel guide about USA in which they will have to include photos, comments, videos or whatever they consider interesting. However, students will use Valle’s Class Blog as the main platform where all students will comment and share their doubts with other students and the teacher. This travel guide will have to be necessarily composed of the following sessions: gastronomy, sports, music, lifestyle, touristic places, festivities, curiosities and press. Once the project had been over, this on-line travel guide will be available for all the members of their high school. Therefore, students will have to resort to their imagination in order to create their own poster through which they will announce their on-line magazine, which will be stuck around the high-school.

                                                      Randy Pausch  (The Last lecture)

With this video, students will be likely to promote their self-improvement, and to make them conscious of the importance of fighting for their dreams and aspirations at all costs. The video is subtitled in order to facilitate students the comprehension of the message of the lecture since the main aim of this sequence is to motivate students in whatever they had to face along their lifetime, and to show them that everything has a good side, nothing is bad at all.

Do you know USA?

The United States of America make up a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America with coastlines on the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. It includes the noncontiguous states of Alaska and Hawaii and various island territories in the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Ocean. The area now occupied by the contiguous 48 states was originally inhabited by numerous Native American individuals and was colonized beginning in the 16th century by Spain, France, the Netherlands, and England.

Great Britain eventually controlled most of the Atlantic coast and, after the French and Indian Wars (1754-1763), the Northwest Territory and Canada. The original Thirteen Colonies declared their independence from Great Britain in 1776 and formed a government under the Articles of Confederation in 1781, adopting (1787) a new constitution that went into effect after 1789.

 The nation soon began to expand westward. Growing tensions over the issue of Black slavery divided the country along geographic lines, sparking the secession of the South and the Civil War (1861-1865). The remainder of the 19th century was marked by increased westward expansion, industrialization, and the influx of millions of immigrants. The United States entered World War II after the Japanese attack (1941) on Pearl Harbor and emerged after the war as a world power. Washington, D.C., is the capital and New York the largest city.

Step 1. Introduction

The first goal, which students will be expected to achieve, is to add their own comments in this entry - Introduction - in which they will have to post information about their interests, and what they hope to learn from the class or the topic. Accordingly, it will be possible to have a general view about teacher and students' expectations which will facilitate the total success of the objectives previously proposed. In this space of the blog, students could express their opinions about anything, as well as their suggestions for improvement addressed to the teacher, which will also foster the teacher’s labour.

Step 2. Working with E-mails

This session will introduce students in a multicultural atmosphere where they will be able to develop their L2 as a real system of communication, while they meet new people and open their minds to new experiences and cultures. It is due to the purpose of this project which will have to do with  introducing students in the North-American world.

Firstly, students will have to create their own mail account in this website - click here – in order to be allowed to work with Valle’s Class Blog and the Wiki. Their new mail accounts must maintain the structure given - namestudent.valleclassblog@gmail.com - (for instance: luis.valleclassblog@gmail.com) in order to ensure that all the users of this blog were members of the class, and to facilitate the communication between students and the teacher.

Secondly, once they have their mail account, they will have to look for a pen-friend in the following website -http://www.epals.com/ - in order to have direct access with different Anglophone students around the world, this process will make students foster their social relationships, fluency on using their L2 and motivation. Through e-mails, students will exchange experiences, photos or whatever they want of their countries with their pen-friends in order to know directly the Anglophone and Spanish cultures respectively. In consequence, they will also develop a multicultural approach to diverse cultures which will favor their cultural tolerance.


Finally; students will have to share each week, with their mates and teacher, in a debate in the classroom the main topics of the conversations with their pen-friends in order to ensure that students have carried out the activity properly.

* Goal of this activity: to make students communicate with native Anglophone people in a realistic and direct manner, use their second language as their only means of communication and open their minds to diverse cultures.

Step 3. Working with Webquests

Subsequently, students will have at their disposal the following Webquests to have direct access to information dealing with real aspects of the culture of the United States such as press, gastronomy, festivities, lifestyle, touristic attractions, etc; they must click here to gain access to the Webquests: http://trackstar.4teachers.org/trackstar/ts/viewTrack.do?number=420628 . Once they enter the website, they will have to click in View in Frames in order to see the content of the Webquests. Then, students will have to read all the sections of the page and do the activities proposed in order to create their own outline containing all the information that they extracted from this website.

Once students had read all the sessions of the Webquests and had done the activities which are presented in relation to each specific topic (festivities, gastronomy, sports, newspapers, etc), they will have to expose in the session of the blog corresponding to –Working with Webquests- their own conclusions about the aspects which they liked the most by means of a comment  (by using the mail account that they previously created). Later on, their comments will be debated in the classroom so that students will communicate among them, which will improve their friendship and speaking skills.

Another Webquest about Valentine's Day here: http://zunal.com/webquest.php?w=186325

* Goal of the activity:  to make students familiarize with Webquests and learn in a very dynamic way much more information about USA, which will foster their cultural knowledge, tolerance and their desire for learning.

Step 4. Working with our Wiki

Students will have to click here to accede to the wiki: http://visitingusa.pbworks.com/. Taking the wiki as basis, students will be expected to share information about the most relevant and interesting aspects for them, which will have to be related to our topic 'Visiting USA'. Therefore, through the wiki, they will solve cooperatively all their doubts with the teacher's help, they will edit their mates' contributions, and they will put on common their interests and curiosities since all students will have access to the wiki.

Firstly, they will have to click in Log in in order to have permission to work with the wiki. Subsequently, students will have to collaborate and include their personal contributions on various entries of the wiki, just clicking in Edit in the session they wanted to edit, keeping in mind the different sections of the Webquests in order to make the information of their wiki more complete. The wiki will be the main virtual support where students will be expected to create their personal travel guide about USA which must contain photos, comments, videos or whatever they consider interesting. This travel guide will have to be obligatorily composed of the following sessions: gastronomy, sports, music, lifestyle, touristic places, festivities, curiosities, popular games and press.



-Note: students will have to add their own photos, videos, complementary information and curiosities to this wiki. They will have just to click on the specific session of the index of the wiki where they want to comment (sports, doubts-questions, music, etc), and then, they will have to click on edit in order to add their contributions.

*Goal of this activity: to foster students' empathy and a cooperative learning since all students will have to collaborate in order to complete the information of their wiki about USA.

Step 5. Working with RSS

On the left side of the blog, students will have at their disposal the most important pieces of news related to travels taken from The New York Times newspaper, which will be updated automatically.

Students will have to subscribe to the RSS of this blog on the right side of the screen in order to receive directly in their PC the new entries published here. They may subscribe to other journals of USA by means of the RSS system, taking into consideration the newspaper session from the Webquests. Lastly, students with the teacher as mediator will comment in the classroom the most interesting articles they have found, so that they will be in direct contact with the current events and news of The United States.

*Goal of this activity: to make students familiarize with the most recent situation of the North-American culture, and make them be able to comment articles from newspapers all together in a professional way.

Step 6. Working with Podcasts and Films

WORKING WITH PODCASTS

A podcast is a series of digital media files (either audio or video) which are released episodically and downloaded through web syndication. These videos can be listened and viewed from students' mobile devices such as, iPod or iPhone; as consequence, students will take their classes everywhere in a more interactive and funny manner.

They can also take these classes from their personal computers through the programme iTune. Students who have Windows as Operative System must download the programme iTune here  http://appldnld.apple.com/iTunes10/061-9992.20110127.WdzxP/iTunesSetup.exe to gain access to these podcasts.

Once students have at their disposal this programme, they will have to work with the following podcasts which will have to do with American issues, and complete their wiki with the information they had extracted from the videos proposed. If they want to be allowed to see the videos, students must subscribe to this podcast clicking here: http://itunes.apple.com/podcast/finding-america-hd-720p-video/id257308378. On this website, students will find a series of videos related to North-American states. They will have to select the most interesting videos for them and share their conclusions and opinions with their mates, through the correspondant section of the wiki depending on the information that they had chosen from these videos (Lifestyle, touristic attractions, curiosities,etc). Thus, students will work with the topics which called most their attention about North-America by using new technologies, which are indispensable nowadays. 

*To sum up:    

1. Download the programme iTune.

2. Subscribe to the podcast.

3. Extract information from the videos proposed.

 - Note: In addition, students may just click in the following link if they want to listen the latest pieces of news from the podcasts of The New York Times: http://itunes.apple.com/es/artist/the-new-york-times/id121664449

WORKING WITH FILMS

In this case, a series of trailers from films occurring in North-American cities will be proposed to students in order to make them familiarize with many aspects about the lifestyle and traditions of USA, at the same time that they work with their L2 since they will see the original version of these films. Accordingly,  it will not be regarded as a theoretical learning of American customs but a direct exposure to audiovisual resources  which will reflect it perfectly; in other words, they will take into account a task-based approach to learn. In addition, students will have to put their comments on this entry about films where they will propose more movies related to North-American history or lifestyle, their opinions about the films, they will have to specify what aspects of the way of life of USA they extracted from the films, and in what fragments of the movies  these aspects can be seen.

1. Phone Booth

2. Don't say a word

3. Chicago

4. The Hangover

 

5. Autumn in New York

6. Spiderman

7. Fantastic Four I

8. The Devil wears Prada

9. Independence Day

10. P.S. I love You

-Note: if students like most TV series, they may also see American Dad, a satirical American cartoon series about the everyday life of an American family composed of very peculiar characters. CSI New York  or CSI Miami, two American police procedural television series which follow the investigations of a team of NYPD forensic scientists and police officers working with mysterious and unusual deaths, as well as other crimes. More American series are Friends, which revolves around a group of friends in the borough of Manhattan; and Sex in the City, an American series which focuses on four white American women who had multiple continuing storylines and tackled socially relevant issues such as sexually transmitted diseases, safe sex, and promiscuity.