What type of learner am I? (2)

I've found another type of test which categorizes learners in four categories, which are not incompatible with the previous tests...
Adventurous learner (do it my own way), practical learner (down to earth with a "hands-on" approach), social learner (enjoy sharing the journey with others), and conceptual learner (intense thinkers seeking deep understanding).
http://linkup.tafesa.edu.au/learning_styles_evaluation.html
My results:
Adventurous: 8
Practical: 7
Social: 22
Conceptual: 20

That's no big news to me but it proves to be accurate and interesting.

What type of learner am I?

Everybody has their own method of learning.
It seems to me that knowing my learning style (or language learning style) would be beneficial to me. It is in my own interest (it actually is in everyone's interest) to know what works best for me so I won't be wasting time trying to learn something in a way that doesn't suit me.

There are three learning styles: visual, auditory and kinaesthetic.

I'm actually wondering what type of learner I am. I thought this would be easy to guess as per my methods of learning, but I find myself stuck in terms of ideas.
I may be a bit of each, as I need to hear, see and do things to remember them best.
I have a really bad memory anyway! But now I wonder if this is because I don't use the right methods to learn.

I have searched the web for efficient tests and came accross two articles (yes, wandering around, the web is so distracting!) that could be useful in terms of tips and learning suggestions for different learning styles: http://www.newkerala.com/self-help/Articles/That-Type-of-Learner-Are-You.html and http://homeworktips.about.com/od/homeworkhelp/a/learningstyle.html (I found this one particularly interesting), and it seems to me (now that I've read the articles) that I am more visual and auditory.

So here I am, about to start a test I've just found on About.com (good website I use for my language learning and language teaching):
http://homeworktips.about.com/od/homeworkhelp/a/lstyleqz.htm
I don't know if it is a good one, as it is free, but I know the website and think it is quite serious so I'm gonna give it a go...
Test finished! There were 9 questions. I didn't know what to answer to 3 or 4 of them (I had no clue of what works best for me), but I tried my best!

And the result is "You are a very visual learner", which is quite surprising, as I thought I didn't have a particular learning style... Should I do another test? I'll do another one later, just to make sure this one was accurate... If it is, I'll probably change my learning method...


Ok, second test done (on YouThink.com)... same result. So I guess that I actually am a visual learner...

LI4113 Lab Week 4

TASK 1

This week we assessed the writing style of some blogs.

We looked at two English teachers' blogs on Edublogs.org:

Blog 1: Intrepid Teacher

Blog 2: Mr Czekner's Third grade class blog



Writing style:



B 1:

This blog uses a very descriptive and high level of English writing. The writing style is constant throughout the blog.

The blogger uses this writing style to sound professionnal, to show that he knows what he is talking about, to appeal to other teachers who are in the same situation, to highlight his personal feelings as he navigates the world of teaching.

He basically writes in a linear fashion and gives his opinion.

The writing style is a bit intimidating and at first very sophisticated, but quickly develops into a one-sided rant, which is veru off-putting.



B 2:

This blog is an interactive blog where the teacher, who, most of the time, writes in a formal style, communicates with his pupils, they answer with their own English, give their opinion on the readings and homework. I'd say they find it fun to do their homework online.

Here, I think the teacher uses the formal style to use proper English forms, word order, etc... in order for her to show the pupils a good example, and to help them learn English.

The writing style is formal but yet friendly and easy to understand for a language learner.



Structure:

B 1:

The structure is linear, with random pieces of information and personnal opinions.



B 2:

The structure is linear as well, but it makes sense to use the same structure for classroom tasks and lesson plans, which vary from week to week.

The structure allows ease of use and interaction with the pupils as well as their parents.



Narrative style:

Because a blog's purpose is to convey information to its readers in a manner that they can understand. Pepople intend to read the blog like a newspaper or a book, although broken into smaller segments.

It conveys the personality of the readre vis-a-vis certain subject.
____________________________________________________________________

TASK 2


1) How does CALL facilitate the writing process and post-process?

Writing process:
On-line dictionaries, spell-check, layout and structure, takes less time.

Post-process:
Interaction is facilitated through web, possibility for publishing (e.g. wiki - comments as feedback), Blogger: rating on blogs (tick boxes to avoid being offensive, e.g. not relevant), faster feedback.

2) How exactly is the writing experience an active decision-making process?

Make decisions about language, structure, what info to use,..

3) With re-editing possibilities in micro-publishing, is the final product really finished? How might this affect the participants?

The product is never finished because you can always edit it (it has the effect of taking less care and being less thorough).
It might be less credible.
It hives the possibiliti to get an idea down on paper without paying much attenttion to detail (more risk taking possible).

4) What do you consider to be the main differences between writing for a blog and writing for a wiki?

Wiki: more collaborative, more factual
Blog: for own aims, more personal, write whenever you want to.

On wikipedia, one can't see the comments from other people on the main page, but on a blog one can see it immediately.

LI4113 Lab Week 2

End of Lab, week 2.

We were asked to give our opinions..... and here's what we agreed on:

1) The ideal multimedia language learning environment:

Need to have feedback on specific tasks,
Need for listening exercise: news extracts/oral gap-fill based on listening
Feature to show/hide text in listening exercise
Speaking exercises, examples of pronunciation
Webcam features, based on social networking sites, e.g. chat
Use of pictures, e.g. comic strips
Worksheets for visual-textula learners
Ability to download podcasts onto iPods for kinaesthetic learners (for mobile learning)

2) Multimedia CALL package wish-list:

Free CALL packages for LL
Clear progression with ability to move to different levels
Ability to slow down speech rate - listening exercise
Easy to use
Eyecatching but not flashy
Pronunciation exercises - listen to examples and get feedback on pronunciation
Karaoke: fun, exposure to chunks of languages, helps pronunciation
Personalized news, video, sport, etc... based on your particular interests.