Class Four: Radio, Podcasts, Webcasts and Audio

Radio, Podcasts, Webcasts and other Audio files on the internet

Radio is not dead!! On the internet because you can listen to radio stations from around the world and for any topic. You can find very specific programs or very general programs with a world audience. Radio is certainly not just for music anymore!

Objectives: To introduce you to some very useful audio/radio resources on the WWW so that you can improve your listening comprehension. Use these sites to listen to different accents and learn a different point of view from news stories or audio documents from other cultures. Some radio sites also have learning sections with transcripts of programs and/or vocabulary and comprehension exercises to help you improve your English.

ATTENTION! If you cannot download these shows (server full, software stuck…), go on to the next question.

National Public Radio http://www.npr.org/ is America’s oldest and most respected public news radio. (20 minutes)
==> What are the top stories?
==> Listen to a few minutes of the 5 minute Hourly newscast. (Do you understand everything?)
==> At the bottom right of the homepage, find out what general topic of news comes with free transcripts.
(What does transcript mean? if you don’t know go to Google and write in define: transcripts). Listen to one of these stories and read the transcript simultaneously.
==> Find a news item about the immigration debate in the USA.
==> What is the Story Corps: America Talks? Listen to one of the stories.

BBC Radio: Go to the BBC Radio Homepage (20 minutes)

==> Listen to the World News Bulletin (use Windows Media Player)
==> Go to Radio 4 ==> The Today Programme. You can listen to today’s programs or the Listen Again archives. Listen to one of the news items.

==> Go back to the BBC Radio Homepage and click on World Service. At the bottom of the page on the right, click on the Learning English Section.

==> Also on the World Service homepage, choose a Podcast or Videocast to subscribe to or try the Download and Podcast Trial (http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/downloadtrial/). Try one from Radio Ulster or Radio Wales for different accents.

Voice of America: http://www.voanews.com/english/portal.cfm (10 minutes)

==> Go to the VOA English section (in the menu bar at the top of the page) ==> American Life (in the left column menu) ==> Wordmaster: Analysis of American English (yellow icon at the bottom of the page) ==> Choose any report to listen to and read the transcript as you listen.

Another feature of American Life is Immigration in the Special Reports column (on the right of the screen). You can listen to stories told by New American Voices (icon at the bottom of the page) or read articles about the immigration debate.

==> Webcasts: in the left hand column, click on Webcasts. For the language choose English==> Special English TV. (or click on any program. Special English News is read slowly and is easy to understand)

MORE RADIO ON THE INTERNET If you have the time….

(These following sites are to give you an idea of the variety of radio on the internet)

College Radio is a tradition in the USA. Find out on the Wikipedia site what this is. Go to the bottom of the description and find some links to College Radio Stations or Indie radio stations.

What is Assistive Media? http://www.assistivemedia.org/current-features.html
- In your own words, explain the history and purpose of this site.
- Take a few minutes to listen to one of the documents. Is it easy to understand? As an LEA student, by the end of the second year, you should have no problems understanding these programs.

Studio 360 is another alternative Radio project. http://www.wnyc.org/studio360/about.html
- What is its main focus?
- Go to the American Icons section. What are the three items presented? Do you know them?
- In the first of the three, who are some of the artists who participated in the project?
- Listen to some of the music by Mme Anderson.

Canadian Broadcasting Corporation: http://www.cbc.ca/programguide/radio// (you can also find videos on this site)

HOMEWORK: Think of 5 questions to put on a questionnaire for the Irish students about travelling to a foreign country, interesting cultural experiences abroad, favourite destinations and cultural differences… The questions should include two “yes-or-no” questions, two multiple choice questions, and one open ended question. Try to be creative.
Write these questions on a piece of paper that you will give to the instructor.

Extra information:

Alternative Media:
Alternative voices in the USA can be heard thanks to the internet: http://www.michaelmoore.com/
http://www.truthout.org/
Satirical voices : the Onion has "funny", sarcastic information. Can you understand why it is funny? (this is a real test of your language skills in English) http://www.theonion.com/content/index

LIBRARY SEARCHES

LIBRARY SEARCHES

This class is divided into four main sections. Work quickly and divide your time as you need to for maximum efficiency.

Part ONE: When you connect to a site, look at its address (this section should take 5 minutes maximum) Specifically answer the questions in red which are preceded by an arrow.

==>What is a “domain name” for a WWW address?

This site http://www.hyperdictionary.com/ can help you find a very simple definition.

Otherwise, write « define : domain name » in your Google search bar (hint: Internet is a network based on TCP/IP)

You can also look up the definition on http://www.dictionary.com/ which will also give you some good links to dictionaries such as the American Heritage Dictionary.

En dernier recours, utilisez un site de traduction, par exemple BabelFish http://babelfish.altavista.com/ pour trouver la définition d’un mot que vous ne connaissez pas. Attention !! : Les sites de traduction ne donnent pas toujours la bonne définition et il faut vérifier le sens dans un autre dictionnaire unilangue.

==> Give some examples of international domain names for example for Spain, or a company in the USA, a company in Britain.

Part TWO: Now, open the University of Cergy Pontoise site (http://www.u-cergy.fr/ ) (10 minutes)

Find the link to the library. Now look in the documents section and go to the general catalogue (research de documents, recherché par catalogue).

==> Find an internet Guide/book available at the UCP library. (Where is it located? Is it available now?)
Remember that the UCP library is programmed in French, so use French keywords, not English like you would if you were looking for pages in English. You may have to use several different combinations of keywords to find something useful. Don’t settle for the first book you see / ne pas se contenter avec le premier titre sur la liste. (This advice counts for ALL of your searches)

Go back to the Library’s introduction page and click on the Electronic Resources section -> Sciences Humaines -> Economie.

==>Now find The Journal of World Business Notice how many different journals are available online.

Part THREE: Go to the US Library of Congress site (do a search on a search engine to get to the home page). (20-25 minutes)

==> What are some of the “highlights” of this website?

==> Click on the Catalogue menu. What kind of searches can you do? What are some other online catalogues that they have presented here?

==> Look up a Photo reference. Find a portrait that you like. Describe it and give the reference to the web page and the number of the photograph.

==> Go to the Resources for …. Kids & Families section (top left on the screen). Choose the America’s Library section. Explore. Can you describe what you do and what you can learn from a site like this?

==> Go to the Webcasts from the Library section. Then go to the Science & Technology section and find a webcast about Renewing American Culture. How long does the video last? What is the topic of the book presented? (Don’t spend too much time watching the videos here. You can do this at home, on your own time.).

(when you finish the following section of today’s lesson you can come back and look around some more in different categories)

Part FOUR: Investigate the British National Library site (10-15 minutes)

==> Find out the opening hours for the British National Library (at St Pancras). What do you need to have in order to use the library and its reading rooms?

From the main page, go to the Learning Area. What are some of the subtopics you can look at?
==> Culture & Knowledge and then click on the Disinformation movie (choose to watch the film WITH subtitles). Watch one section, but not the whole movie. Describe what you can learn from a section like this. (For more discussion, look at the Activities section when you are at home).

==> From the BNL home page, go to the catalogues section. What are some of the catalogues you can find at the BNL? In the Main (integrated) Catalogue, how many entries are there for Mark Twain’s book The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn?

==> Go to the What’s On section found in the top menu (What does “what’s on” mean? Give a French translation). What event is being given this week?

Continue to explore the site and other things you can find on the BNL site until the end of class.

HOMEWORK: What is a Podcast? Learn how to download podcasts

Go to the Wikipedia site and find the history of podcasting and how to use it. (The UCP has a strict firewall that will not allow you to download software at the UCP. However, you should do this from home, without the firewalls.)

Read: Podcasts Go Mainstream, PC World, p 28.

OPTIONAL: At home, look at the French BNF site (especially look at the Signets section in particular to find information about how to use the internet more effectively!!). You will see that there is a wealth of information online from Public sites like these.

REVIEW OF READING from homework:

Chapter 1: Where does the Internet come from? When was it created? What is the difference between the world wide web and the internet? What is hypertext?

How Google Works: Cf. worksheet

SEARCH ENGINES

Class Objectives: Compare different search engines and discover what resources are made available through them. There are many different types or search engine often with different audiences in mind, or different ways of searching. The important thing is to be able to use more than just Google, Voila or Yahoo.

ANSWER THE QUESTIONS BELOW (You do not need to write out the answers to these questions to hand in at the end of class, but you must know the information for the final exam. You need to know how to search for specific information and how to describe general differences in search engines.So, I advise you to take notes and keep them for the end of the semester.)

You all know how to use Google, but do you know what is behind Google? Inside of the following site http://searchenginewatch.com/ there is a lot of useful information to help you find what you need faster.

1. What is a Boolean Command and how does it work?

To find out, choose from the main page of Search Engine Watch => in the left frame -> “Web Searching Tips”->”Search Engine Math” (or go to “Boolean Searching” which is the 8^th item on this list).

2. What is a spider or a web crawler? (this information is also in Chapter 5 of the handout, Browsing the World your reading homework for this week). To find the answer, you can look on the Search Engine Watch site through -> “Web Searching Tips”-> How search engines work.

Or go to www.hyperdictionary.com and type in Spider. Make sure to look for the Computing Dictionary by scrolling down the page.

3. Find some different Search Engines (other than Google or Yahoo). Look in the section “Web Searching Tips” and then click on Search Links: Search Engines Worldwide.

What audiences can be addressed? How can they be specialized? (At home, you can investigate further to get an idea of how they work especially Specialized Lists or Mailing Lists, for a later course).

4. Testing different search engines. Look up the word “plagiarism” on different search engines and meta-search engines (compare results from at least the top three and one meta-search engine). Are the results the same or different? How many HITS have been found for the word in each of these search engines? How can you describe the presentation of the results for each?

http://dmoz.org/
http://www.askjeeves.com
http://www.alltheweb.com/
http://www.gigablast.com/
http://www.google.com
http://www.metacrawler.com/perl/metaspy (meta search engine)

5. Google has an integrated dictionary. In the search bar (the white space) write in define: plagiarism. What does it tell you? How do you translate plagiarism into French?

6. How can AllTheWeb (Cf. question 4) be useful if you are looking for different formats (like audio or video)? What things do you get from Plagiarism when you select other formats?

7. Different Interface or page layout (if you don't know these words, look them up in the American Heritage Dictionary online): Look up these different search engines. How is the front page organized? What does it look like? Are there ads? Colors? Search bar? Options or tools? (answer these questions in a very general way)
http://www.aeiwi.com/
http://www.infogrid.com/
http://www.freepint.com/gary/direct.htm

8. Can you explain the difference between a traditional search engine and a meta-search engine? Here are some examples:

http://www.metacrawler.com/
http://www.dogpile.com/
http://www.mamma.com/

9. Go back to the Home page of Search Engine Watch. In the column on the left (or at the bottom in the Departments section), click on “Web Searching Tips” section. Then go to the “What People Search For” section.

- What are people searching for in Dogpile SearchSpy? (Take a few minutes to see how this works. Even click on some of the items if you want)
- What does the Google Trends site do?

10. Find the article called What's the Big Deal With Social Search? By Chris Sherman, August 15, 2006. Scroll (move the curser) down the page to the second section of the article: “A brief history of Social Search”.

Explain how long social search has existed. How does it work? Who or what does the searching?

11. It is sometimes useful to have a specific search engine to look for specific topics, like media, or international pages. Again in the left menu of the Search Engine Watch home page, look at the Search Engine Listings ==> Specialty Search Engines. What is the 6th category?

12. Find the Ratings and Statistics about search engines. What search engines does the company Nielsen (they have offices across the street from the UCP) identify as the most popular in July 2006?

NB: another helpful search engine index comes from England: http://www.search-engine-index.co.uk/

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HOMEWORK:

Read Chapters 5 “Browsing the World” & 6 “Searching for information”, Ivens, Faster Smarter Internet, Microsoft Publishing, 2003.

Write to Irish: Write two paragraphs, one in French and one in English (100 words Max for each), in which you treat the subject. It is best if you treat the same subject in both French and English. Next week, hand in a paper copy to your teacher and post online in the yahoo group (in the correct file) a copy for your classmates.

A) How are you representative of youth in France. (la culture jeune en France)

OR

B) Why and How YOU use the Internet.

Class One: Begin to Search the Web

Lesson One : SEARCHING THE WEB

Objectives: Comparing different search engines and their results. You will learn the basics about how they function and what the difference in their results can mean. You will compare classic search engines to more specialized search engines and meta-search engines. Then you will do some library searching using internal search tools to find the catalogue and different available documents as well as further information to help with your research.

Research Techniques and Search Engines: Vocabulary to know: backbone, bookmark, copy, domain name, email account, FAQ sheet, file, firewall, hit, homepage, hub, hypertext, ISP (internet service provider), login, keyword, password, paste, protocol, research (undénombrable, singulier), to search for, search engine, server, tool bar, username, user-interface, webmail, website.

Part 1: Discussion (do not turn on the computers, this is the interactive part with the teacher)

1.What is the definition of a keyword?

It is also important to be VERY specific with the keywords you choose (don’t write in a whole sentence, for example, only the essential words. Try different combinations of words for different results.)

Exercise: What keyword or keywords would you use to find out:

The first president of the United States?

What is the definition of the word “mash”? What is its computer related definition?

Where can you find information about the city of Atlanta?

NOTE: if you want to find pages in English, the best way is to use English keywords. The same is true in Spanish or in German and also, of course, in French.

Part 2. Turn on the computers

Find out how Americans spend their time online:

http://www.pewinternet.org/pdfs/PIP_SearchData_1105.pdf

How many people used search engines each day in 2005? Approximately 30 million, 40 million, 50 million, 60 million or 70 million people?

What is the most common activity people engage in on Internet?

What are the 8 most common search engines?

Homework

Write a short paragraph in English (100 words) about how YOU use the Internet or why you use the internet.

Dans votre texte, expliquez comment vous utilisez l’internet ou votre ordinateur, le temps que vous passez par jour ou par semaine sur internet et si vous participez aux activités interactives en ligne. Cependant, un essai de 100 mots est très court. Vous n’êtes pas obligés de TOUT expliquer. Structurez votre rédaction avec une introduction, quelques arguments et une conclusion. N’oubliez pas des mots de liaison entre les phrases et paragraphes. Soignez bien votre anglais mais c’est un travail personnel avec vos propres idées.

Read

- Chapters 1: What’s the Internet (This handout is a reference guide for you for the semester)
- “How Google Works”, abridged from The Economist, 18 September 2004, Technology Quarterly p. 26. (www.economist.com):

Learn this vocabulary for next week: “Be a searcher not a surfer” site : http://www-chi.nearnorth.edu.on.ca/bttcourse/Course%20Instruction/Unit%204/Internet/Internet1.htm

OPTIONAL ARTICLE: Small sites boosted by search engines too, by Kurt Kleiner, NewScientist.com New Service, 7 August 2006.

Results of the Quiz

Quick English Placement Test: What your results mean

The results of this test fall into three major categories from VERY WEAK (<> 25) in English (no one got either 0 or 30). The vast majority of you are somewhere in between. Here is some advice I can give you.

0 – 09: Vous avez beaucoup de lacunes en grammaire anglaise. Pour rattraper ce retard, surtout en vue d’obtenir la licence en LEA, il faut revoir les bases (et les travailler très régulièrement) dès MAINTENANT. Sinon, il faut partir à l’étranger pour vous améliorer ou considérer un changement d’orientation vers une autre discipline.

10 – 15: Serious weakness also, but some basic concepts (present tense, who/what/which, basic word order for sentences, etc.) known, but lots of other relatively basic mistakes.

16 – 19: You’ll need to work to improve your level, but you still have a general understanding. You can definitely improve.

20 – 24: You have refining to do. Don’t get lazy and fall back into your bad habits. Keep working at writing and expressing yourself in writing.

25 – 30: Quite a good foundation, but there is still much to learn (because the test doesn’t cover everything). In particular, you should look into quantifiers (all, some, many,….), tenses (present perfect) and conditionals. Don’t give up or “rest on your laurels”. There is room for improvement.

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HELP!! For a simple grammar explanation and then exercises:
English Grammar in Use series (including for beginners Essential English in Use and for more advanced students Advanced English in Use) by Murphy at Cambridge University Press

Online Help

http://www.englishpage.com/

http://englishgrammar101.com/