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 Department
of Language EducationPracticum in Language X425/L525 Dr. Hope Elkins, Ph.D. |
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There are several instructional purposes for teaching learners of any age, to use a tape recorder: promotes self-expression and independence, is an enjoyable way to improve skills, is a practical approach to individualized study (learners love to hear their own voices), satisfies their natural fascination with mechanical things, offers the possibility of immediate response to those learning English as a second language, and can relieve a teacher from the need to be continually with a learner.
Practical Aspects of a Recorder
Before being left alone with a cassette recorder a learner must learn how to use It -- to plug it in, insert tape, set up a microphone (if the recorder's Is not self-contained), and use the various buttons: record, play, volume and tone controls, fast forward, rewind, and tape eject.
Points to consider Note. Remember that it is practical to make additions to some tapes from time to time. Thus, keep track on the tape of all information and, if possible, where each entry begins. If two cassette players are available, with an inexpensive patch cord, copies of a tape can be made -- perhaps for a learner who would like to have a copy to play at home.
Classroom Possibilities for a Tape Recorder 1. A teacher can prepare a tape to be placed in a listening/recording center. An assignment can be outlined for one or a group of learners to follow. Responses can be taped by the learner(s) which the teacher reviews later. Perhaps a learner has been asked to write a news story about a current event covered in social studies. The learner could write it up, record it, and then listen to see how clear it is in context and presentation. Or, learners, singly or together, could prepare a script that includes weather, sports, and other news reporting. This could be recorded and then played to the class like a radio broadcast. one feature might be an interview a learner prepares questions to ask another about, say, his or her trip to Washington, D.C. 2. Many learners, when expecting to read a play (or some other assignment) in performance, or reading group, like to practice with the recorder. In this way they become aware of any reading or writing patterns, use of expression, and other techniques. They also like having the final presentation preserved on tape. 3. Learners can put their language experience stories on tape for the teacher to transcribe at a later time. 4. A learner could record a story to go along with a series of pictures. 5. Another type of teacher-prepared tape is to give the answers to some assignment which the learners listen to after they have fulfilled the assignment. 6. Spelling-practice tapes can be very helpful. On the tape the teacher says the word, uses it in a sentence, and then pronounces the word again -the way it is done in spelling matches. After allowing time for the learner to write the word, the teacher could spell it. 7. Older learners sometimes enjoy making tapes for primary children to use. This, of course, becomes a learning process for the older as well as the younger learners. 8. A teacher could tape a story -- perhaps a little above the reading level of the learners -- which they could listen to and/or follow along with the printed page. Some learners might do the recording instead of the teacher. 9. Learners who have trouble organizing their thoughts in writing are sometimes helped by talking the ideas onto a tape which the learners can listen to over and over, each time capturing some point in writing and then organizing them. 10. There are many other uses for a listening/recording center besides the one mentioned in the first item above. Learners, for example, can be instructed to read freely on a subject or unit of study and record interesting points as they are discovered in the reading. The tape could then be used as a means of organizing a written report or played as is to the class.
Comments: disted@indiana.edu Copyright 1998, The Trustees of Indiana University
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