Reviews

Speaking the same language
Educational Computing and Technology April 2002

Judith Stansfield reports on how ICT is helping to speed up the learning process for non-English speaking students, whatever their backgrounds, and ease the pressure in other areas of their lives.

"In the UK's multicultural society, many children have English as a second or other language (ESOL) for a variety of reasons."
… "How can ICT help?
All the children with ESOL need lots of ways of hearing, speaking, reading and writing their new language. …

The computer can be a very useful tool with suitable support software to provide practical solutions. A talking word processor, supported by on-screen grids as with Clicker 4 allows immediate interaction with the written and spoken word. Activities can be set up for learning social vocabulary or accessing curricular information.

The built-in computer-speak will provide spoken English in the word processor but the grids can have real speech that can be listened to before being selected. It is even possible to have a particular cell having a picture or English word or phrase on the grid, but when the right button is clicked the child can hear that spoken in their own language before selecting it to send it to the word processor in English. Such activities will need to be customised to the child's spoken language, but a wide range of ready-made curricular support materials can be downloaded from www.cricksoft.com/cgfl"

…"A program used with young children to develop reading and spelling skills, Crick's All my Words would be helpful and supportive for young learners and the content could be adapted to support older learners wishing to increase their language."

… "Older children, who have acquired some English but are still not very fluent, especially in subject specific words, can be helped by using Wordbar from Crick with subject grids which can be downloaded from www.cricksoft.com or developed or adapted in school."

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