Top 3 EFL blogs in my mind!

Let me introduce you to my favorite three EFL weblogs!

★ kidding Me
Among all the EFL blogs that I’ve paid a visit to before, this one is my favorite. Though this blog is not completely related to English learning (Febie also uses this blog to record things in daily life), as an English learner, I think this blog has great attraction to me. My own definition of a good weblog is that it has to make people “feel close” to it. I can not give you a specific reason why I think kidding me has such charm for me, maybe that’s because I like the style and the manner Febie organized this blog. Febie clearly classified the blog into several sections, such as “recent posts”, “recent comments”, “photo albums”, “other English teachers’ blogs”, etc. And also, she used various labels to make every section in order. Searching for the links the meet my needs is not difficult at all. Febie not only shares her teaching reflections but also her unique hand-made teaching aids to us through both pictures and words. From my point of view, it’s important to match the pictures and words well because that would make the posting attractive and persuasive. By the way, I love those teaching aids so much because they are full of creativity and they are actually quite delicate! How I wish I can also come up some special ideas to make fascinating teaching aids!

*Presentation: It uses sections to classify the blog and each section brings learners to different topic/theme they want. Besides, it uses labels to make the postings clear to learners. The format and the organization of the blog are friendly to learners.

*Appropriateness: This blog is not really designed for the students who want to “learn English”. Instead, this blog is more beneficial to English teachers, or people who intend to know more about English teaching. So, for English learners, this blog is not so useful.

*Outcomes: Learners have more opportunities and access to communicate and share their experiences with other English teachers.

*Notes: this blog gives people a concept that making teaching aids is fun and helpful for young learners. Oh~I want to try it by myself!

★

Penny ABC
The link I provide here is a website, not a weblog. But there are many links in this website, including penny’s blogs. From Penny’s website and weblogs, we can know that Penny teaches in cram school and she has collected considerably rich teaching and learning. I believe that both instructors and learners can benefit a lot from the database. In Penny’s blogs, she recorded her student’s learning with words and pictures. From her postings, we can know Penny really cares about whether students learned something from each activity. Besides, we can see some visual and audio clips made by Penny from her website and blogs. And this feature makes Penny’s blogs much more interesting and beneficial to learners!

*Presentation: It uses clear instructions and links to lead the lerners to the sections they want, such as the links to other blogs which also run by Penny.

*Appropriateness: From the blog/website, we can know how students learn, and the different ways which Penny applies to her teaching. I think the blog/website are designed for both the instructors and learners. So, I recommend teachers and students to pay the blog/website a visit!

*Outcomes: both teachers and students can obtain some knowledge they want, and also share the teaching/learning experiences.

*Notes: I think this blog really “digitalize” English learning. It sets a good example for English teachers who want to set this kind of database.

★ Cindy 魔法ABC
The style of this blog is quite like Kidding Me which I’ve introduced before, but this one looks not as complicated as Kidding Me. This blog was also organized well with clear sections and labels. Besides, different from Febie, Cindy tends to find some actual materials in life, instead of making her own teaching aids. I am amazed and surprised to see how Cindy turned those ordinary objects to magical teaching aids. But it’s pity that there are not many posting in the blog. And most posting do not have lots of words to explain the pictures. I think it would be better if Cindy can share more her reflections or her ways of teaching.

*Presentation: The style of this blog is quite similar to kidding me. It uses sections to classify the blog and each section brings learners to different topic/theme they want. Besides, it uses labels to make the postings clear to learners. The format and the organization of the blog are friendly to learners.

*Appropriateness: This blog focus more on sharing the teaching experiences rather than proving some new ideas about teaching and learning. So, this blog actually does not give teachers definite thoughts about the ways of teaching.

*Outcomes: the content of the postings are not much. Mostly, we have to get the meanings of the postings from the pictures Cindy provided.

*Notes: if Cindy can try to write more in her postings, I think it would be much better for us to the reason/motivation of using those teaching aids.

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After seriously thinking about why I like the three EFL weblog so much, I find out that sometimes it’s hard to use the criteria and principles to judge whether you like this blog or not. Somehow, you just like, but you cannot figure a definite reason to account for that. And I wonder that does everybody have the same feeling or just me? Ha, maybe I am not that kind of “rational” person. :)