About

Hi, I’m Bob Palmer, and this site was originally a teaching portal for my blended EFL/ESL classes. It has since expanded into a blogging platform for discussing issues related to teaching with technology. For more information about me, please check out my e-portfolio.
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Site Components

I built this site with WordPress and use this versatile program to manage blended classes such as Example 1 and Example 2. WordPress makes it easy to put online a course syllabus and weekly schedules rich with multimedia and downloadable materials. It also gives students a place to comment on various aspects of the course. To showcase student work, in writing classes I often have students set up and write weekly posts in their own WordPress blogs. You and your students can sign up for a free blog at WordPress.com or Edublogs.org.

Moodle, another key component, is a free, open-source course management system that I find extremely powerful for teaching and managing blended courses. Moodle makes it is easy to safeguard personal  information such as grades, ID numbers, and academic content through an elaborate authentication system that denies access to uninvited visitors. Students generally find Moodle intuitive and engaging, particularly the Forums feature.

While not free, Quia is well worth the $49 annual subscription. Why? Because of its sheer convenience. I rely on Quia when I need to create an activity or quiz yesterday, or when I want to give students practice in a variety of formats. Enter a set of vocabulary pairs, for example, and Quia will generate separate matching, flashcard, concentration, and word-list activities. Quia’s cloze option is particularly useful when making dictation or other listening exercises.