Padlet

AS A TOOL FOR LANGUAGE LEARNING

You can visit the site here!

This website is relevant for LL for many reasons. It gives students and teachers a platform to share ideas and answers freely so it works as a tool to complement the process of learning. One of the advantages of this page is that it is possible to record your own voice so students can improve their pronunciation skills by listening to themselves or sharing it with others. Furthermore, Padlet is a great platform to get peer feedback from other classmates, either active commentary and revision of the voice messages and text, or just by comparing their performance with their fellow peers' answers.  The approaches that can be used with Padlet are numerous, this is mainly because padlet can be used as a tool for a lesson or to guide the whole session, that being said, the many ways of using this app are student based.

Using it to foster language learning 

In the case of improving writing, Padlet can be a great source, since students can write anything they want in relation to a topic previously posted by the teacher. In this case, students can revise each other’s writings and give feedback while checking their own writing skills. It can also be used in other ways, such as posting words or phrases in a brainstorming activity to improve the vocabulary that students might use in their writing. While it might sound meaningless, students feel eager to use Padlet since they have the chance to customize their writings. For example, by changing the text color, changing the font or adding images, students might feel their writing is their personal production while still keeping in mind the purpose and formality of the writing activity. Finally, student’s writing can be improved by uploading previously made documents that the rest of the class can check and give feedback from, as well as upload exercises, so students can practice the different aspects of writing such as grammar and vocabulary.

Limitations when using this technology with the purposes of language learning 

Overall, Padlet is an excellent tool not only for writing as we’ve been discussing now, but also for vocabulary or speaking, for instance. It certainly motivates students and gives them the chance to respond whenever they like during the lesson.

However, this is not just about the positive aspects of this tool per se. One of the possible drawbacks could be that even if students can feel comfortable writing anonymously on boards, there could always be some others that would mock at the responses or write inappropriate things during the activity/assignment. 

Immediate supervision should be done in these cases if they happen.

Another flaw can be the late or non-existent feedback provided for the teacher. This means that whenever a teacher decides to use this tool for his/her activity, they should know how and when feedback will be given to students. If Padlet is not used as efficiently as it should be, this tool becomes a link or website in which students just have to complete an activity to continue with the lesson.

In order to close this entry, we would like to provide you with a tutorial on how to use Padlet

 If you enjoyed this article, share it with your friends and colleagues!