doga's education blog

[dogaseducationblog]

and "farewell," they cried, "wherever you fare till your eyries receive you at the journey's end!"

hi, tumblr's lovely people,

as we come to the end of another semester my dear hobbits (and I am Gandalf the Grey and White in this case), I am saddened to inform you that this is the end of our great journey (but don't believe me, whatever I say is over is just the beginning of another exciting adventure). welcome to the last post where I can talk to you about the pearl of our time, technology, and Disney.

I am sincerely happy that I was able to take the Current Issues course. I found it really useful in the way that the approach the course aims to take pushes the limits of teachers' creativity while at the same time expanding the boundaries of what we can do in and out of school. my favorite tasks were definitely the AI-integrated teaching materials and the flipped classroom assignment. these tasks emphasized creativity while showing the integration of AI in language education and also gave us the space to make our dreams come true, which, as usual, was to include Disney animations in our assignments. there was not a task that I didn't quite enjoy because I was able to find a way to combine them all with things that I loved, so I think that all future teachers should be enthusiastic about this approach where they can engage with things that they love.

as we part our ways, as Gandalf the White said at the end of the greatest trilogy ever written: well, here at last, dear friends, on the shores of the sea comes the end of our fellowship in Middle-earth. go in peace! I will not say: do not weep for not all tears are evil.

thank you so much for being with me until the end. I always say "I wouldn't probably", but for the first (and probably the last) time I will say I definitely would. I will always be one virtual step away. farewell!

until next time,

with love... and obviously education, doğa

[dogaseducationblog]

welcome to the web of dimensions

Amazingly Simple Graphic Design Software – Canva

my partner was Şevval Yılmaz.

[dogaseducationblog]

buckle up your seatbelts, we're flying to Tokyo: the city of tradition and future

hi, tumblr's lovely people

your favorite teacher goddess is here with a new assignment which is preparing an AR/VR handout. once again my beloved friend Şevval Yılmaz (check her blog here and now, she's a gem) and I teamed up and from the two options that our teacher gave us, we decided to do a city exploration and fly you to Tokyo. but how are you going to do it, I hear you say? would you believe me if I told you that you can visit treasured sights, taste delicious foods, and explore the culture of Tokyo just by scanning QR codes on your phone? I'm sure you would shout no. then let me surprise you a little more. what if I told you that you can do all this for free? no, again? ah, good morning dear teacher candidates, and welcome to the universe of endless possibilities of AR/VR teaching materials!

we prepared 4 separate sections for the handout we prepared. in the 1st section, we took our students (and you if you're interested in flying with us) to visit two important places in Tokyo, Tokyo Tower, and Sensei Temple, and added QR codes to our task so that they could take a 360 VR tour. in the 2nd section, thinking that it is not only necessary to see new places but also to taste new flavors, we added QR codes of a video where they can learn the history of Japan's famous food ramen in a short and fun way and 6 easy ramen recipes with top secret tricks. in our 3rd section, we chose to include the culture and traditions of Tokyo. our 4th and last section was dedicated to the homework we would give to the students at the end of this experience.

as our homework, we asked our students to write down what they think about this experience. we also provided a link to an app called FutureMe and asked them to write down how they think they will be able to visit Tokyo or any other city 15 years from now in a different way than today, how they think technology will develop according to them, and to lock their writing until the date 15 years from now. we think this idea is genius, because if we can visit cities virtually, why not have a virtual time capsule, right?

since using Canva is now easy peasy lemon squeezy for us, we didn't face a big challenge during the making process. but I can say that we thought a lot about the design of the assignment. here's a little tip, when preparing a handout, finding the best shade of purple and pink is the most important part of the job.

if you're interested, I'll be sharing the link to our Tokyo tour. tickets are free of charge and your participation is welcome. you are also unlikely to experience phone jet lag.

thank you for reading until the end. as Ursula the Sea Witch from The Little Mermaid said, "I'm a very busy woman and I haven't got all day.", so I wouldn't probably. I appreciate your support.

until next time,

with love... and obviously education, Doğa.

[dogaseducationblog]

WE’RE FLIPPING THE CLASSROOM JUST TO SATISFY OUR DISNEY-OBSESSED SELVES (joking, joking it’s for education purpose only)

hi tumblr’s lovely people,

your favorite teacher candidate is back again with another assignment which is making a flipped classroom video. I can hear the endless questions in your mind. what is flipped classrom?

in its simplest form, flipped classroom is a teaching method that allows students to complete the learning process at home with videos or various materials provided by the teacher and to carry out activities and tasks by using the knowledge they have learned at home during their time at school. awesome, right? it also creates a very positive impact on the learning process as it makes it easier to check what the students have learned and increases their engagement as they cannot perform the tasks without watching the videos.

for this task, obviously my beloved friend Şevval Yılmaz and I teamed up and we decided to teach vocabulary related to the movies unit from the book provided to us by our beloved teacher. (you know, books and movies are our forte.) then, we decided on the site we will be using. the moment we saw that award ceremony template on Powtoon, we knew it was what we were looking for because we thought it would be a great and creative idea to teach words and sort them into categories of nomineess. we chose three animation characters for each word and to make the video more engaging for the students, we chose songs from those animations as our background music. (actually, I am so lying. we only did it to satisfy ourselves.) I was incredibly happy to use "Belle", the soundtrack of Beauty and the Beast, which is my favorite animation, as well as The Little Mermaid’s, Mulan’s, Frozen’s and many other animations’ soundtrack that we love. and of course, as you may remember from our podcast project, we also used our favorite animation music "Kingdom Dance" as the main background music. you can count on us, if there’s an assignment with music in it “Kingdom Dance” will always make an appearance because we are nothing without it.

as for the difficulties we faced (even us teacher goddesses sometimes have difficulties), we had a hard time downloading the video. since it was a premium template and we didn't want to pay that much for just one video, we solved this problem by simply screen recording it on the computer. another genius idea from us, I know.

if you thought that was it, it’s not over. of course, since we are great teachers, we prepared a small activity that students can work on with what they learned from the video to have a better understanding of the subject.

I believe this was an interesting and fun assignment, and working with Şevval was a great pleasure as always since she’s the only who truly gets and shares my obsession for animations. not to brag about it but I really think our final product is truly admirable and above average, no matter how difficult it was for us in the making process. I’ll leave the link to our video for you to check but I’m warning you again. do not steal our genius work.

thank you so much for baring with me until the end. you know I wouldn't probably. sending you virtual hugs and so much love.

until next time,

with love… and obviously education, doğa.

[dogaseducationblog]

like severus snape, james potter and harry potter once said... leviCORPUS!

hi, tumblr's lovely people,

I know, I know... you've missed me. I'm well aware that in my farewell post, I said this break won't take too long but oh, boy, wasn't I lying? but no worries, as Georgina Sparks says in Gossip Girl you can tell Jesus that the freak is back. aww, I can almost hear your virtual screams, didn't notice you love me that much. I love you too, fellow teacher candidates. anyway, a bit of seriousness now, please. we're still here for education and education only. it's not like you're following me to bore you to death about Taylor Swift, Gossip Girl, Harry Potter, etc.

speaking of Harry Potter, you must have been wondering what this post is all about and how it connects to a spell from a fictional world. well, actually it doesn't. I thought it was funny when I wrote it. however, even though this post has nothing to do with our Hogwarts houses, it does have a connection to the title. as you can see from the word I capitalized, we are gathered here to talk about our Corpus assignment. I won't trouble you by explaining what Corpus is, probably you already know. you're as much of a genius as I am, duh? although, I want to tell you all about our task.

for this assignment, we had to prepare a worksheet to teach and reinforce the topic we chose from the units in the book sent to us using Corpus tools. we were paired up with my classmate Ayşe (I'll tag her blog here, so you can check it out) and first, we started by choosing our topic. after deciding that the most effective unit to prepare the most effective work is Unit 3, where we can talk about our hobbies and free time activities and at the same time focus on likes and dislikes, we divided our process into four parts, taking into account the sample work our teacher posted on Google Classroom. afterward, we started to brainstorm and develop our activities step by step, considering whether they met the requirements in the checklist sent to us beforehand.

to tell you the truth, I (as always) loved the outcome and was very proud of us. there were aspects of the assignment that were really challenging and difficult to understand, but we overcame them by keeping in mind the elements of the task that gave us the capacity for creativity and a deeper understanding of the needs of a new generation of learners. it was also a new experience for me to prepare activities and to combine them with an educational tool like Corpus, which I didn't know before, and I'm so glad that our assignment gave us this space where we can be challenged sweetly, but in return, we can acquire a different teaching skill. besides, how can you not love an assignment that gives you a reason to combine its name with a Harry Potter universe spell?

well, I'll go now before I talk more and turn this post into a 7-book series. if you're curious about our work, you can check the link. also, that sweet little pink and lilac-designed worksheet has my blood, sweat, and tears on it. if you try to steal our ideas, I'll know and I'll make sure the teachers' guardian angels haunt you for the rest of your life. so, beware.

thank you so much for tolerating me and reading until the end. you know I wouldn't probably. sending you virtual hugs and so much love.

until next time,

with love... and obviously education, Doğa.

oh, and also... LEVICORPUS! 🪄

[dogaseducationblog]

public service announcement: I'm too du- no, sorry, SAVE ANIMALS!

hi, tumblr's lovely people

your favorite teacher candidate is here, once again, with a new assignment which was digital storytelling. our lecturer gave us 3 options such as HOW TO projects, fictional stories, and public service announcements. at first, Şevval and I wanted to create a fictional story because you know, we are the bookish girlies but since we felt like it was so hard to even for us geniuses to understand we gave up on this idea. then as you can see from the headline me and my friends Servet Zayif and Şevval Yılmaz decided to go with the public service announcement option.

after we decided to create a public service announcement video we chose the topic which was animals since we all are a little bit obsessed with them. together we wrote a text, then after the video is ready we recorded our voices. to be %100 honest I must say that I have no idea which tool was used for the making of the video because thank God, Servet handled that part. I want to thank him again from here, he saved and changed lives with his courage to take this part of the project because it was too hard.

overall, even though I like the idea of this project and kinda enjoyed it I still didn't want to do it and found it more challenging than the other tasks we've done so far. I think it's the first time that I'll say I probably wouldn't give this task to my students as a teacher but still it was okay. I guess...

if you're interested, I'll be sharing the link to our public service announcement. we truly hope that it affects people's opinions.

until next time,

with love... and obviously education, Doğa.

[dogaseducationblog]

let's get out of here... at least for a while

hi, tumblr's lovely people,

the day has come. the day that I finally leave you...

haha. you're too naive, I've tricked you. I'll be just taking a break because the first term of my second year has finally come to an end but don't worry, your sunshine, your reason to wake up, your source of energy will be here, better than ever, on the next semester. so this might be my final post for a while but it won't take too long.

so, yeah... I'll get emotional. we've been together for almost four months now and even if I had times that I wanted to kill myself just because I didn't want to write a post, this class was -don't tell this to my lecturer, I hate to admit it- kinda enjoyable and interesting. also, I really liked to have a voice to share my experiences and a personal space where only my opinions matter. until this term, I've never had to use technology this much for anything actually so creating all of those things was exciting, new, and in the most positive way, very challenging for me. not just learning about the web 2.0 tools but also creating our own works with those tools was so intriguing and beneficial. we’ve experienced that if you explore your own creativity and push its limits, there are many ways to integrate language learning with technology in a better way.

my favorite task to do among the ones we did was probably creating a podcast just because we had the chance to use the song "kingdom dance" from tangled the animation as our background music which was AWESOME. you already know we're geniuses but THIS. this was beyond genius. using that sound as a part of some of our projects was a dream of mine and Şevval's so it'll stay in my mind as one of the most fulfilling moments of my university life.

the least favorite one though was probably the one we made a padlet chart. there was nothing wrong or hard about that task actually but it was overall boring to do and since the topic of our padlet wall was bullying I was kinda buried in my past traumas. even your sunshine girlie has a depressive side, you know. I'm a Taylor Swift girlie, duh?

this class was very nice if we don't count the times that I wanted to cut my head off because I live in Gebze which means one hour ride to my school. we had a lot of choices in each assignment which was so nice. the freedom to choose what to do and to have interesting options made the lesson so much more interesting. so, it turns out I don't have anything negative to say about this class and it means I have to say goodbye for now. I know you'll miss me.

thank you for reading my confused ideas and being here for me. I'll miss you too.

as Woody the Cowboy said in Toy Story 3... so long, my partner. (you know it's not forever, I'm just making it dramatic)

virtual hugs.

until next time,

with love... and obviously education, Doğa.

[dogaseducationblog]

movie poster makers are GODS.

hi, tumblr's lovely people,

how are you? thanks for asking, I'm fabulous just like Sharpay Evans said in the High School Musical movies.

I'm here with another assignment to talk about and which was creating a digital poster. There were two options: making a movie poster of a book we like, or a magazine cover. hey, what a coincidence that I mentioned movies just a second ago, right? as you can understand from the headline and movie reference, I chose the movie poster option.

I admit I was pretty impatient for this task because I'm a sucker for books and I couldn't wait. So, for days I imagined what I could do, which tool I could use, which font to choose... and the list goes on just like this. But when I turned back to reality, I sadly realized that I'm too dumb for this level of creativity yet I didn't give up because Lord knows, I'm a very stubborn Capricorn. Then, after a long thinking process, I decided to go on with the one book that I'll love until the end of time which was Outlander written by a fellow Capricorn Diana Gabaldon, and since it has a perfectly casted TV show I wanted to use those actors' photos. Therefore, I found one of the show's promo photos on Pinterest which was involving a major plot element, and after I choose Canva as my tool I finished the task by writing the actors' names, the date, quotes, etc.

to be honest, when I finally decided what I'm gonna do I started to really enjoy the task but at first, it was so hard. therefore, from now on movie poster maker people are GODS for me and I'll worship them for the rest of my life as they deserve. as for my opinion about the final product, I think it's pretty good. okay, maybe not too professional, okay. but it's pretty good and if I ever become a teacher I would probably give this assignment to my students. I really think it would help them to improve their creativity and while they're creating they also can have the opportunity to deal with something they love.

if you are interested enough, here's the final work. I'm obviously not a professional so please, be gentle. thank you for reading until the end, you know as a successful and busy Capricorn, I wouldn't probably. anyways, bye. virtual hugs.

until next time,

with love... and obviously education, Doğa.

[dogaseducationblog]

actually, podcasting is really hard...

hi, tumblr's lovely people,

missed me? I know you did.

I didn't want to keep you waiting so here I am again with another assignment which was podcasting.

we had to create a podcast as a pair or as individuals and our teacher gave us four options to choose between. so my friend Şevval (I'll tag her blog, you can check it out) and I decided to work as a pair and create a vox-pop which is basically a form of a podcast where we seek to gauge public opinion around one central question. not that you don't know what it means. of course, you know, duh? sometimes I forgot you're smarter than me. then we had to decide what we'll ask which was easy peasy lemon squeezy because we're both obsessed with fiction. so we asked our friends which fictional character they would bring to life if they had the chance. hearing their answers was a lot of fun and we laughed so much while we were making it.

but I have to be real with you, at first I thought it would be the easiest thing on the planet. yeah, how hard can it be to create a podcast? then, when it took me a lifetime to figure out what we'll do, I realized that people who are creating podcasts constantly are doing God's work. finding people who are willing to answer the question and put together the records were really challenging. however, we had no trouble while we were searching for the perfect music match. because come on, which song could be a better background song than kingdom dance from tangled the animation?

so, long story short, it was a challenging but fun task for us. when i become a teacher, i would probably give this assignment to my students because not only it is entertaining but also it requires students to socialize, explore and be creative which are necessary skills in our age.

i guess, now is the time for me to stop so that you can listen to our podcast before I bore you to death with details. (you know from the earlier posts that I have that kind of power on people) I'll add the podcast link here for you to enjoy. please, don't make fun of us or the guardian angels of the teachers will come and haunt you.

until next time,

with love... and obviously education, Doğa.

[dogaseducationblog]

padlet, technology, bullying and all the things i've learned so far

hi, tumblr's lovely people,

long time no see, right?

but you already know I'm only here when I have an assignment to do and share with you. I'll tell you what we've been up to this time.

our teacher asked us to create a padlet wall where we would choose one of the specific topics given and share what we know, want to know, and learn about. me and my friends zeynep, şevval and ayşe decided to create a wall about bullying which is a topic that we are quite accustomed to in schools, and since padlet is very useful and accessible as an educational tool, I can't say it took us long to complete our task. or maybe we are too smart, who knows?

I don't know exactly how the speed of us completing this project has to do with our extraordinary intelligence, but I can definitely say that combining technology with education has greatly contributed to our 21st-century learning skills. since the usage of technology is necessary in our age to learn I really think this assignment improved our knowledge and gave us an opportunity to use technology as a platform to use both create and research which will help us a lot as future teachers, too.

so, long story short, I found our project very useful for our development and, if I have to admit, -don't tell our teacher- quite entertaining. if you would be interested enough to look at our page feel free to check the link. thanks for reading this far, you know I wouldn't probably. but anyways, thank you.

with love... and obviously education, Doğa

KWL Chart About Bullying

Bullying At Schools

[dogaseducationblog]

the topic of the week: 21st-century learning

hi, tumblr's lovely people!

let's begin with the first less-.

no just kidding. I'm not authorized enough to give lessons. especially with my 0 followers. but I'm free to share opinions, fortunately, and as for the topic of the week... drum rolls, please... we have 21st-century learning. I know you think that I must be a GENIUS because I chose a subject like this. and I hate to break it to you, but this topic was chosen by our lovely teacher, again. but don't worry. all of the opinions will be mine.

so... what's 21st-century learning? internet sites say "21st-century learning is a term used to describe a shift in education from the traditional methods of the past to a more modern approach." and I think they're right. uh-huh yes, sir. but it's too long to read and even longer to understand so I call it today's learning style which is more student-centered, goal-oriented, and last but not least supported by the jewel of our time. and the jewel is Taylor S- no, no... TECHNOLOGY.

as for my opinions about the effects of the learning style of our age on ELT, I must say it's the best thing that ever happened to our field and if more teachers apply it to the classroom it can work miracles. with this mindset and the usage of technology, it's easier to communicate. especially with native speakers because with the student-centered mindset they'll have the confidence to talk and the technology will provide the access. it's easier for teachers to give assignments to reinforce the knowledge, too by using technological devices. it'll give teachers more opportunities to assign and students more opportunities to create. also, it's easier to keep up with the culture of the language students are learning since it's a really huge factor. in addition, by using technology, teachers can provide the necessary skills that are required by our age which are critical thinking, global perspective, productivity, media literacy, etc.

to sum up all of my confused ideas, (I know they're confusing, made so much more sense in my brain I swear) I think a teacher's duty is to adopt and apply this mindset to their classes. in this way, they (maybe I must say we :) ) can be more effective and honestly, BETTER teachers in the 21st century.

with love... and obviously education, Doğa

[dogaseducationblog]

what's this all about?

hi, tumblr's lovely people!

if you haven't already read the "about me!" part let me repeat some basic things about myself. I'm Doğa. an english teacher to be. and that's all you have to know about me. (and again, I'm a Taylor Swift fan but we will not be talking about that.) and WELCOME TO MY BLOG YAYYY!!! so good to virtually see you here fellow teacher candidate! (I'm assuming you're a teacher candidate otherwise what are you doing here? if you're just here for the amazing sense of humor of mine please let me know down below.)

first of all, I would like to apologize to those who thought this post is about the world's mysteries or something. I know, I know it sounds like that, sorry. but actually, this post is about what's this, my blog, all about?

since it's a school project and we were assigned to blog about education I'll do as I'm told. this blog will be all about education. as you can see it in my username. I'll be posting my thoughts about certain learning and teaching ideas. sometimes it'll be a post like this and sometimes as a podcast. or maybe even audiobooks. who knows? ( I mean, tell me if you know because I don't. it's up to our lecturer who is a great one.) and since I love to talk, and I'm warning you I love to talk A LOT, I'll not shut up.

thank you for reading until the end. I wouldn't probably. virtual hugs.

with love... and obviously education, Doğa.