ESL Independent Study Lab
Introduction
ESL Independent Study Lab is the first website Megan chose to evaluate. This online ESL lab, created by Michael Krauss at the Institute for the Study of
American Language and Culture at Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Oregon,
is an excellent resource for ESL students.
Content
The site�s homepage is simply laid out: a colorful grid containing a number of
different links that take the visitor to various exercises and games. As
far as content goes, this site is very thorough. It covers every essential aspect of learning English as a second
language. While the site does not give
specific lessons, it does provide its visitors with an easy-to-navigate vault
of resources for practice and fun.
The exercises and games cover a large area
of content. Games and quizzes give the
visitor practice in areas such as listening, pronunciation, vocabulary,
reading, grammar, and writing. Every exercise and game is categorized by skill level on a scale of 100 to 400 (100
being the beginner levels and progressing in difficulty with the 200, 300, and
400 levels.)
The site includes games such as hangman, flash cards, matching games, and even has
links to other related sites including magic tricks, mysteries hosted by PBS,
and interactive music games sponsored by the San Fransisco Symphony to give
visitors fun practice with the language.
Every page within the ESL Study Lab website contains a link to a dictionary to help visitors still learning vocabulary.
The dictionary is easy to use: the link takes the visitor directly to a page where
they can easily type in the word in question, press the search button, and read
the definition(s) of the word. I would
imagine this would come in handy since the site contains many links that may
use a variety of new vocabulary words.
Aside
from help for students, the site also offers a number of teacher resources,
especially focused in the area of incorporating the internet into the ESL
curriculum.
Navigation
The
only reduction I took in assessing this website was the initial
navigability. While it was relatively
easy to navigate once in the site, finding the site in the first place was a
bit of a challenge. It did not show up
within the first page of results when I searched �ESL� on google.com. I only found it when I searched �ESL lab� on
google. Even then, it was within the
first page of results, but it was about half way down the page. In addition to its difficulties associated
with the search engine, the site has a long, clumsy URL. It is not an address that could be easily
memorized by a native English speaker, let alone a student of the
language. Thus, getting to the site in
the first place is hardly a piece of cake. Once on the site, though, visitors should be sufficiently satisfied.
Summary
Overall the site was very good, but because of some problems I had navigating through the site I took one plate away from a perfect rating.
Rating
4 out of 5 Spinning Plates
Home page