Teacher’s guide to creating lesson material
The time has come for teachers to start preparing their material to be uploaded on their new courses at Myngle.com. From our previous posting you saw how easy it is for teachers to register and create their place on Myngle. Now lets see how you can create your material to be ready for our beta launch!
Live lessons will be carried out on our virtual classroom which has: Myngle’s own online whiteboard integrated with Skype. Similar to the whiteboard used in regular classrooms, our online whiteboard will allow teachers to show written information or images to the student. The whiteboard will be the main tool used to transmit any visual content to the student.
The whiteboard will enable teachers to display their lesson content in slides. These slides will be equivalent to the textbook normally use inside the classroom. Please design each slide thinking about this.
Transfer all of the content displayed on your course books in print and any other written extra materials you have (picture books, graphs, special illustrations, etc.) to slides created in MS Powerpoint or the free OpenOffice Impress.
Once the slides are uploaded on the lesson page, they will be automatically be transfered to the whiteboard during the live lesson. Each slide will be shown on a sequence that only the teacher will control. During the lesson, teachers will be able to click on top of any area to highlight something specific to draw the student’s attention.
Here are a few tips for you to edit your lesson slides:
1) Outline content: Plan the design of your lesson slides beforehand. Pick carefully what you will be showing on your lesson slides as the online whiteboard may not be too flexible for changes during the lesson. Make sure content is well distributed and there is enough information displayed on each slide.
Teacher’s tip: Begin each lesson by making some form of introduction to the content and end the lesson with a small review.
2) Avoid too much text on one slide: adding a lot of text per slide will create a heavy slide and the text font will usually be smaller. If you have a lot of text, try to spread it on different slides.
3) Colors (on background and text): using color on your slides is nice to make it more appealing and fun. However, avoid using strong or very bright colors (bright red, yellow, neon pink, etc.) or images as the background. Make sure the background is soft and not too distracting.
Teacher’s tip: You can emphasize certain words or phrases with a key color or even indicate when its the student’s time to talk by assigning a color to his or her written dialogue. Please use light color tones or carefully pick contrasting colors since some bright colors can actually hinder reading.
4) Use illustrations: Scan the images from your textbook, have a special designer draw them or use images from one of the stock image websites. Images add to the richness of the lesson and can make it more appealing for students. The internet can give you a wide range of pictures to use but careful not to use copyright content. Search the internet for “Stock Images” or “Creative Commons” and you’ll find many websites that allow you to use images for free or for a low fee. Please try to stay away from regular Clip Art images on your computer since these may not look professional.
- Creative Commons: www..creativecommons.org
- Stock images: www.sxc.hu, www.istockphoto.com, www.shutterstock.com.
Teacher’s tip: images can be very effective to illustrate the meaning of a word or language expression. Always try to add images to make the meaning more clear.
5) Font style and size: sized 20 or above, clear font type such as Times New Roman or Arial. This will make the text easier to read for tutors and teachers. Because of different screen sizes, it is difficult to know how big your slides will appear on the student’s monitor so it is always best to help designing slides that are easy for students and teachers to read.
6) Number of slides per lesson: this will be up to you, each one of your lessons can have 10 or 50 slides depending on how your content is distributed. Plan enough content for a 45 minute lesson with one student or two students.
7) Lesson slides should guide students and teachers: make it simple for teachers to use your lesson slides. Please remember that on Myngle you can share your course so other teachers can use under your supervision. Thus, create your slides to make it simple for other teachers to follow, any special instructions should be noted on the slides.
8 )Cultural awareness: always try to use very famous characters, holidays and locations that will be easily identifiable for students. Please remember not to use any content that might offend people from different cultures or religions.
9) Audio and video embedded on the slides: video, audio and animations on the internet will require more bandwidth to download and could possibly slow the lesson loading time. So, we encourage you to use this type of content outside of the lesson slides, on podcasts or videos to be used as homework exercises.
10) KIS (Keep It Simple): place only the necessary content on your lesson slides. When preparing your slides, try to avoid adding too much extra characters or words. Since learning a new language is complicated, make sure to gradually add new content to your slides so the lesson is challenging for the students but not too challenging to frighten them. When typing, also make sure add correct punctuation marks.
Explore posts in the same categories: Myngle News, Teaching a language, Tech
November 10th, 2007 at 11:45 am
This is very handy stips. Thank you very much for providing as good as these things.
November 10th, 2007 at 10:36 pm
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November 11th, 2007 at 9:55 am
We are glad to help! Hope to see you soon on our beta release!
December 6th, 2007 at 1:18 pm
Above you wrote:
quote
Transfer all of the content displayed on your course books
unquote
I have a doubt: aren’t there any problems of infringing copyrights?
December 6th, 2007 at 11:20 pm
Hello Claudia,
Indeed, teachers must never use any copyrighted materials they do not own, on their courses. Which means images, lesson plans, and course material.
On the paragraph you mentioned, I wrote: “transfer all the content displayed on *your* course books”.
Which means that you can copy the contents of the course material YOU have designed previously for offline instruction.
December 15th, 2007 at 10:50 am
very interesting, but I don’t agree with you
Idetrorce
January 8th, 2008 at 6:21 am
Hi im sorry but I cant find where the instructions for uploading a lesson are. could you please send a a link because laste meail you said under demo teacher (which I cant find anywhere)
Thanks
January 21st, 2008 at 2:51 pm
Hi ,
I am new here and to be honest I have no idea where to start ! I have created a profile but am not sure what to do next ?
All the talk of ” virtual classrooms and whiteboards , slide shows etc ” hasme a little worried !
Help
Craig
January 21st, 2008 at 9:05 pm
Greetins Craig,
First, don’t be worried, our tools are extremely simple to use and very user-friendly. Please watch our video tour for teachers at http://www.myngle.com/video/display/tutorial/teacher
After you’ve created your profile, just decided on what you want to use to teach with, a shared course or a course created by yourself. All of the lesson materials are in slide format, just a normal Powerpoint document. There are several shared courses available that you can use to teach any student.
Lessons are live through a whiteboard and Skype. That means that you can share a book-like material which are the slides as you are speaking with your student. Just like an offline class, with a regular textbook!
For more info, check our our Help section http://www.myngle.com/help/faq or our Forum http://www.myngle.com/default/forum
Have fun teaching!
January 23rd, 2008 at 7:42 pm
I think there is a fundamental flaw in the approach to learn languages on myngle and that is that it doesn’t exploit the full power of computers in language teaching. In my experience, the best method to learn a language, would be to have media in the form of pictures, text and audio, similar to a language course like rosetta stone, but also a very dynamic and flexible way to interface this material. In particular being able to alternate between passive and active learning and being able to shuffle custom selections of material with some kind of feedback mechanism which allows you to rate the material according to how difficult you find it, so the computer will employ this feedback to allow you to focus your energy on the things you find most difficult and avoid wasting any time on things you already comprehend.
January 24th, 2008 at 7:53 am
Great thoughts Niek! I’m happy to say that many of the things you mentioned are already in place in Myngle as we speak or will be developed soon.
We have media in the form of pictures and audio inside the virtual classroom with the whiteboard and Skype VoIP. We can also have text with Skype itself and we’ll soon add a chat feature inside the virtual classroom. Also in the pipeline are homework exercises and podcasting for asynchronous learning.
A rating system for the material is also in place already and flexibility is there where the student can pick whatever lesson he wants to learn with and explain to his/her teacher if there is any further instructions or requests relevant for the lesson.
One important thing to note though is that Myngle focuses on synchronous online lessons, where the teacher is having a live class with the student. Many of the other websites around FL education, including the one you mentioned, are focused on asynchronous learning where the student is left all alone to guide his own learning.
Enjoy Myngle to teach and learn languages, you’ll find great teachers on board and be sure we’re placing a heavy emphasis on all tech needed to support a great learning environment.
February 14th, 2008 at 2:32 am
On this, my second day of Myngling, I have only scratched the surface of its possibilities.
Information such as the above is very helpful. It is obvious that Myngle has a dedicated staff which believes in the project.
For such an early version, Myngle has already come a long way. I see great things ahead on this site!
One person wrote they are confused about how to proceed. That is understandable in any new technology or endeavor. An idea which I will pursue and may work for others is to find one person who wants to learn the language you are teaching, tell them it is a beta project and ask them to go through the process with you, they as student and you as teacher. They could even be a friend, who takes the free lesson, right? I am sure things will then become clearer.
Can the lessons be shockwave flash instead of powerpoint?
I am happy to freely share my simpler lesson plans with other teachers and appreciate being able to use the courses which others share. However, if I put a lot of time and effort into a language course for use on Myngle, I would appreciate a residual compensation from teachers who use it. It could be paid by teachers or by Myngle (after all, a qualiy course attracts more teachers and students.) I am thinking something like 15 percent of the fee paid by teachers to Myngle. Is the technology available for tracking such payments?
March 10th, 2008 at 11:51 am
Is it possible to do a PowerPoint presentation including sound in the virtual classroom?
March 11th, 2008 at 10:27 pm
Hello Margaretha! At this time the PowerPoint slides will be text and image based only (no video or sounds). This is most effective so we don’t use too much of the user’s internet bandwidth when the lesson is occurring. Audio and video can be exchanged later, as homework or extra practice exercises.
April 23rd, 2008 at 12:36 am
Hi - brilliant site with huge potential. I am interested in putting some lessons on line but actually dont want to share them for others to teach(:-( as they have taken me decades to develop. Can I safely put my own material on Myngle without it being downloaded or copied? I know it seems mean but this is my livelihood.
April 23rd, 2008 at 6:11 pm
Sure you can Marianne! You can control how much you share your material including keeping it private with no downloading options.
Many students are waiting for you in Myngle. Have fun teaching with us.
May 20th, 2008 at 11:52 am
I have “lost” the information which tells me how to upload a powerpoint presentation once I have designed it. Please help!
June 10th, 2008 at 3:55 pm
I know my course need some adjustments, but it’s too late also for use you wonderful informations! Tomorrow I’ll provide ti correct my plan…also using you nice help naturally
September 7th, 2008 at 12:40 am
Hello,
I got myself registered as a teacher on Myngle to teach initially “Pre-Intermediate level” of English. I have the course material ready - of 22 lessons. My method of teaching is quite different. I shall send my lessons one by one for the student to read and understand. At the actual class time, I will clarify any doubts the student may have. Then I shall ask the student to read out the lessons loudly so that I could check and correct his/her pronunciation. Thereafte, I shall ask questions pertaining to that lesson. If the student is happy, shall send the next lesson and continue the same sequence.
I don’t think sending slides will help in my case.
Is this all right from your side?
September 22nd, 2008 at 4:16 am
Hi,
Can someone please tell me how to avoid breaching copyright laws when I am using slides created by other people to teach using Myngle?
Thanks,
Hubert.
January 13th, 2009 at 7:37 am
HI,
I dont find how can I slides my courses , my create courses on powerpoint,
I know , its my courses , than I click create courses , write the title , and description about the new courses but after I dont know how can I slide my creates courses from powerpoint?
help!!!
January 13th, 2009 at 7:39 am
I create myself the courses in powerpoint! and dont find how can I slides this courses ??? what can i do after write the title , and describing of courses, and after?
help
March 1st, 2009 at 1:06 am
Ok, so for a start your video tutorial further up the page has been removed. Such things are quite usefull, is there a new location. I like to work within a highly interactive environment, and will I suspect I will end up using many resources outside of the scope of Myngle at this time.
March 6th, 2009 at 1:00 am
I have a question that is similar to the posting by Israel (Sept 7/08). I registrered to teach advanced English. I assumed this would include giving students writig assignments. I would want to receive the assignments and notate them with comments and suggestions. In other words, instead of putting up a powerpoint, which is rather one sided appoach to teaching, my student and I would be exchanging and building together. How is that possible?
March 6th, 2009 at 4:27 am
Gute Arbeit hier! Gute Inhalte.
March 27th, 2009 at 10:26 am
Hi, It’s really helpfull.I created this account but i really do not know how will it work?
September 4th, 2009 at 4:27 am
hi,
highly informative
October 5th, 2009 at 3:25 pm
Hi, this is my first day on Myngle and I have just completed my profile. What is happening next? Should I create/ upload a power point to illustrate the first lesson of each course I want to teach and wait for students to contact me after I ve set a timetable? In addition I’m also having some problem in uploading my JPEG picture, but maybe it’s just me. Many thanks for your help.
October 9th, 2009 at 2:59 am
I would like to join the teacher orientation programme please. For Mandarin text, does your platform read Mandarin characters filed in .ppt? Do we still have to use images to display Mandarin characters? I am sure we can type it in by the whiteboard, but it is quite cumbersome. Appreciate your response.
eteacher on Myngle
May 5th, 2010 at 1:05 pm
А у Вас текст без ошибок, в ворде печатали?