Review of Wordsift

Today's post will be about Wordsift, which is a useful tool to help learners with increasing their vocabulary bank.

What is Wordsift?

Wordsift is a web-based site that allows word clouds to be created from any text. This helps students and teachers to identify the most commonly used words in the text. The bigger the font in the word cloud, the more common the word in the text. Below is an example of the word cloud from Martin Luther King Jr's famous "I Have a Dream" speech. As can be seen by the size of the word, "freedom" appears most frequently in the text. 

Hovering over each word tells you how many times it appears in the text.

Clicking on it will enable you to see the word used in context within the text.

The other interesting feature is that it has WordNet embedded in the site. This allows for exposure to related words and phrases.

Hovering over each node in the diagram will give the definition of the word which shows how it is related to the other word(s) that branch out from the main word. The example provided is also useful for learners.

The other useful thing about Wordsift is that it calculates the readability level of the text, among other things, if you click on the "Text View" button at the top of the page.

From the screenshot, you can see that it provides quite a bit of statistical information about the text - like word count and lexical density - on top of the Readability Index and the Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level.

A note of caution about interpreting the different readability indexes - the numbers may not correspond to the actual readability of the text and is only a guide. A text that has a low Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level only means that it contains shorter sentences and words that have fewer syllables. It does not measure the pragmatics of the text. Hence, a text with a low Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level score can still be dealing with a topic that is not easily understood by students even though the words and sentences are short, thus making it difficult for students to comprehend.

Uses

Wordsift is especially useful for teachers when helping students comprehend a text on a particular topic or revolving around a certain theme. It does not work quite as well as with narrative text types, since words are unlikely to be repeated.

The visual representation of the text in the form of a word cloud helps students to see the gist of the text immediately, since the higher frequency words appear larger than other words, indicating what the text is about. This could then be used to activate students' schemata, which will help them with processing the text.

Words in the word cloud can also be sorted in alphabetical order or frequency, which can help teachers narrow the focus of what to look at.

The WordNet part will allow teachers to introduce new words and phrases that are related to certain words in the text. This could be the lead-in to another activity that is related to the topic.

Wordsift can even be used as a tool to encourage learner autonomy since students can input their own text and ascertain what words are most frequent. They can also look at the WordNet section, and discover new word associations or revise what they already know.

Advantages

The site is user-friendly and is a quick and simple way of helping learners figure out the main idea of the text in a way that is visually appealing as there is colour. The WordNet part also helps teachers extend students' learning beyond what is found in the text.

Disadvantages

The WordNet part is still a work in progress and hence, there may be some inaccuracies or might not contain as much information. However, the concept behind it is still innovative and useful for learners.

One major drawback is that if the teacher or student does not have the text in soft copy, it will have to be converted before it can be put into WordSift and that takes time.

In Singapore's Context

As the site is easily accessible, Singapore teachers will find it useful and be able to integrate it easily into the lesson. Wordsift is definitely useful in helping students break down the text and understand it better. The WordNet section is also a powerful tool to help students create word associations and expand their vocabulary.

Conclusion

Undoubtedly, WordSift is valuable as a resource for teachers and students to see a text being represented in a different manner, enabling students to see it from a different perspective and gain greater understanding of what they are reading.

Review of Simple English Videos

Today's review will be on Simple English Video (link embedded in name) and how it helps students become more autonomous in their learning.

Simple English Video is produced by an American husband-British wife team who speak English as their L1. Their credentials can be found here (link embedded).

Types of videos

As the name of the websites suggests, there are many different types of videos which help people learn English in a simple manner. When browsing, there are two ways in which the videos are organised: by difficulty level and by grammatical component or function.

Should the learner want to focus on a specific component, the videos are divided into 10 categories: Grammar, Vocabulary, Pronunciation, Everyday English, Songs & Stories, Speaking Practice, Hang out with us, Business English, British & American and How to learn faster.

Ways to use this website

The teacher can use this website as a teaching tool if he/she wants to focus on a specific component. For example, the teacher would like to introduce or draw students' attention to particular pronunciations in the English Language. Instead of having to plough through all the videos on YouTube, or look for resources, the teacher can use the videos found in this website. Although the videos uploaded are not exhaustive, but there are some useful materials that teachers can use in class.

Having said that, what I think would be a better use of this website is have students visit it on their own. This way, students have the autonomy to decide what they would like to learn or reinforce. The website has enough videos and content that students will be able to view and review at their own pace.

Pros

The presenters are conscious that their audience are learners of English, hence the speed at which they speak is slower than normal. There is even an accompanying transcript of what was said in the video. The content of the videos are also targeted at learners as detailed explanations are provided. This is possibly due to the presenters assuming that their learners are self-taught and do not have access to a teacher or someone whom they can ask for help. Hence, they try to make their materials as comprehensive as possible. The layout of the website is also clear and simple, which will help students navigate it with ease.

All these things aid students in becoming more autonomous (if they are not already), since information is easily accessible and readily available in one site.

Cons

The site is not meant to be interactive in the sense that students do not interact directly with the website like in LyricsTraining or TubeQuizzard, where learners can type their answers directly onto the site and get immediate feedback on their answers. The only sort of interaction available is during the pronunciation practice videos, where learners are left to be self-directed and have to be disciplined to practice pronunciation on their own when the presenters tell them to.

While the lack of interactivity is not a big disadvantage per se, but it can be off-putting for some students who like to have a more hands-on approach instead of being passive recipients of information.

In Singapore context

Depending on the students' competency level, teachers can either have them watch particular videos to reinforce learning or introduce it so they can be autonomous in learning new vocabulary or practising pronunciation, for example.

Teachers can also use the videos as trigger activities when introducing a particular vocabulary item or grammar component.

Conclusion

Regarding giving students the autonomy to learn, I would recommend that teachers also introduce the other two websites mentioned above so that students are not restricted to only SimpleEnglishVideos when it comes to learning, as some might like more interactivity. That is not to say that this website is less useful or that the content is not as good; rather these three websites serve different purpose. LyricsTraining and TubeQuizzard seemed to focus more on listening skills as students have to pay close attention to the audio to get the answer. There is no real teaching element involved, and seems to be more appropriate to reinforce learning in the classroom or to inject fun into learning. Thus, these three websites should be introduced together since SimpleEnglishVideos fills in that gap missing in the other two websites.

While it cannot and should not be used to replace the teacher in the classroom, SimpleEnglishVideos will be able to help its audience learn something new and gain autonomy.