Virtual=Real: Five Flashcard makers online
Thanks to Elizabeth Hansen-Smith reporting on a posting by Larry Ferlazzo.
This is a list of online flashcard makers. For many reasons, I would say, "why bother?" It seems that this is just a prime example of needlessly taking the physical and putting it online.
However, like many online services, the benefit is largely in the portability of the "cards". I, for one, have hundreds of Korean flashcards (traditional notecards). The problem is that I couldn't possibly carry these around with me. However, I have a computer connected to the Internet just about everywhere I go. Faced with a little free time, online flashcards would be a great, productive way to fill that time.
Some of these allow sharing (i.e., Web 2.0), which would be beneficial both for sharing your lists and for viewing what others are studying.
Dan
Saturday, June 9, 2007
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I agree with you that many online applications have absolutely no advantage over what I call "pen on paper, paper on classroom wall" projects, and I point that out on my blog and with my students.
ReplyDeleteThough, as you've written, these online flash card sites don't necessarily fall into that category, I still use the ones that do with my English Language Learners periodically. They function as a little bit of a change of pace, and students can, depending on the application, develop some computer skills.
You might be interested in an article I've written that will appear in Language Magazine in August. It includes a bit of a critique about how computers are sometimes misused in the classroom. I'd be interested in getting any feedback:
http://www.bayworld.net/ferlazzo/relationships.html
Hi Larry,
ReplyDeleteThanks for chiming in. I agree. These can be a good change of pace and the simple act of putting them online not only works on keyboarding skills, but also is likely more motivating (in the short term) than the paper-based flashcards.
I use a desktop application for flashcards called JMemorize for my personal use. I supports just about any character set you need. I use mine for Korean.
I appreciated your paper. I like the project that you're working on. That sounds really interesting. I do, however, disagree with your assertion that people need face-to-face relationships and not computer-mediated ones. These computer-mediated relationships can be just as deep and meaningful as face-to-face ones. While you might not understand this, and quite frankly neither do I, this is surely the case. To further overuse the term, we are digital immigrants and in so many ways we cannot fathom the relationship that digital natives have with computers (or other communication devices).
Given your interest on providing content, check out this posting. Individualized content delivery. It's something that I've been playing with for a while.