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Editor's Choice
The Editor's Choice column has been suspended, but enjoy the "gems" I
selected between September 1995 and November 1996.
November 1996 Editor's Choice
- New Annual Prize for Language Teaching Authors
[An excellent initiative and worthy of note! Editor's comment]
The BEN WARREN - INTERNATIONAL HOUSE TRUST PRIZE, launched in September
1996, is a new annual book prize of 2,000 pounds sterling to be awarded
each year to the author or authors of the most outstanding work in the
field of language teacher education.
The prize is awarded by the Ben Warren - International House Trust, set
up as a memorial to the life and work of Ben Warren, who was tragically
killed while attending the International House Directors' Conference in
May 1991. He was the founder of the IH schools in Eastern Spain and one
of the key figures in the growth and development of the International
House organisation. The Trust has been funded by contributions from his
friends, colleagues and admirers around the world.
Authors of works in the field of language teacher education are invited
to submit their work - which need not necessarily have been published -
by 31 December each year. The annual winner will be announced by the end
of March, and the prize will be presented in May.
October 1996 Editor's Choice
- "Talking from 9 to 5 -- Women and Men at Work: Language,
Sex and Power" by Deborah Tannen. ISBN 1-86049-200-2. Deborah
Tannen has also written "You Just Don't Understand: Women and Men in Conversation".
I don't know if this book or Ms Tannen's other books have been on the
"best seller" lists -- but they should be.
September 1996 Editor's Choice
- Ethnologue
Languages of the World, Twelfth Edition, Barbara F. Grimes, Editor,
Consulting Editors: Richard S. Pittman and Joseph E. Grimes. A fascinating
site with languages I think many of us have never ever heard of -- explore
any country in the world or start with France
and see languages spoken from Alsatian and Armenian to Shuadit, Spanish and Zarphatic! Of interest as well, the
data includes population and blind population and deaf institutions in the country.
Hats off to Ethnologue.
August 1996 Editor's Choice
- Wired Women, Gender and New Realities in Cyberspace by Lynn Cherny and
Elizabeth Reba Weise, Editors. Seal Press ISNB 1-878067-73-7. I ordered this
book on the Web after seeing an announcement on NETEACH -- the power of Internet! There are 15 fascinating
contributions -- great summer reading.
July 1996 Editor's Choice
- Magellan Internet Guide awards Volterre-Fr 3 Stars, in
Education: International Education. As a cyberspace "thank you" to Magellan and The McKinley Group,
I have selected their extraordinary Web site for July 1996.
From their review: "Volterre-Fr is a 3-Star Site as designated by the McKinley Review editorial team. This rating is a mark of achievement in
"Magellan," McKinley's comprehensive Internet
directory of nearly 2 million sites and 40,000 reviews. Volterre-Fr excelled in 3 primary factors: depth of content, ease of exploration and Net appeal."
June 1996 Editor's Choice
- Volterre-Fr bids farewell and good luck to Tom Miller from USIS who is
leaving France later this summer. The EFL community in France will dearly miss him.
Best of luck, Tom.
- Volterre-Fr also bids farefwell and good luck to Roger Budd from the British Council who has
left for a posting to Senegal.
The EFL community in France will miss Roger as well. Best of luck Roger.
[Editor's note: English teachers in France are faced with a void. Both USIS and
the British Council have had to make severe cutbacks in personnel and services to the
English teaching community. Tom and Roger have contributed immensely with training, funding, resources,
and unending energy to support teachers of English in France. Thank you both.]
- No comment: CD-ROM will be included in the next edition of the French Academy's dictionary as
Cédérom -- that's le CD-ROM for your reference.
May 1996 Editor's Choice
In April 1998 this site appeared to no longer be available>
- http://en-garde.com/kidpub/when-i-am-mother.html
Tilla Keiner, now 10 years old,
has two lovely poems and a story on KidPub Central. Writing published on the Web which touched me.
May many other young people do the same.
- Seen on edufrancais (sent on 1 April 1996 -- do we believe this or not?)
INTERNET POUR 700 ETABLISSEMENTS SCOLAIRES FRANÇAIS.(source: le bulletin
Micro Bulletin du CNRS)
M. François Fillon, ministre de la Poste, des Télécommunications et de
l'Espace, prévoit de connecter sur Internet près de 700 établissements
scolaires afin de combler rapidement le retard de la France en matière
d'informatique et d'utilisation d'Internet. Les établissements choisis
" vont bénéficier d'une mise en réseau de leurs micro-ordinateurs sur
"Rénater", le réseau des universités", explique le ministre. Par ailleurs,
France Télécom, va proposer son réseau Numéris aux collèges et lycées
français pour qu'ils puissent se connecter à Internet au même prix que le
téléphone normal. Cela devrait permettre à l'ensemble des établissements
scolaires de se connecter à Internet à un coût extrêmement bas. Le plan
prévoit également de stimuler le marché des ordinateurs individuels dans
les entreprises, au travers d'une réduction, de six à deux ans, des délais
d'amortissements des PC. Enfin, les administrations devraient aussi se
mettre à l'heure d'Internet car chaque ministère devra être doté avant la
fin 1997 d'un serveur Internet, accessible sous la dénomination "gouv. Fr".
Cette mesure permettra aux particuliers et aux entreprises d'accéder
facilement à l'ensemble de textes réglementaires et législatifs français
européens". (AFP 26 mars)
April 1996 Editor's Choice
- Internet 1996 World Exposition is a
World's Fair for the Information Age. An excellent initiative and just full
of wonderful sites. Take your students (or teacher) on a world tour! You will also find the
Château de Ranton, hosted on
WebFrance International's server in the Pavilion France.
- My Virtual Reference Desk by Bob Drudge is outstanding!
He writes, "MVRD has three goals: (1) fast access, (2) intuitive and easy navigation and (3) comprehensive
content, rationally indexed. The prevailing philosophy here is: simplicity. "Simplicity is the natural
result of profound thought." And, very difficult to achieve."
But it sure looks like Bob has gotten close to doing it in My
Virtual Reference Desk!
- Message tiré de la liste RESCOL-FR [Editor's Comment:
Just waiting for something similar from the French government! But do note: not one email or URL mentioned
in the press release, sigh!]
Date: Tue, 26 March 1996
Un partenariat permet au Canada de devenir le premier pays au monde a
relier tous ses etudiants a l'autoroute de l'information.
OTTAWA, Le 26 mars 1996 - Les 6,5 millions d'etudiants canadiens du
primaire et du secondaire, de meme que 16 500 ecoles ont ete lances
aujourd'hui sur l'autoroute electronique, au moyen d'un
partenariat entre le gouvernement et les 11 compagnies
telephoniques regionales du Canada.
Stentor, l'alliance des principales compagnies de telephone du
Canada, doit collaborer avec le Rescol et d'autres partenaires afin
d'accelerer la mise en place dans toutes les ecoles canadiennes d'un
acces peu dispendieux et rapide a l'Internet d'ici la fin de l'annee
scolaire 1996-1997.
March 1996 Editor's Choice
- I pay tribute to "Sterling" Mr Dave Sperling for his innovative Web
pages and projects. Start with Dave Sperling's ESL Cafe
and surf from there. An absolute delight.
- Castles on the Web A most delightful Web site,
for the pure pleasure of the Web! You've always wanted to visit
a castle, n'est-ce pas? Here's your chance. Thank you Ted.
February 1996 Editor's Choice
- Multiculturalism in the Language Classroom by Karin L. Blair.
WebFrance International is pleased to announce this web site. I hope you'll enjoy reading Karin's book,
drop her a note and, of course, buy the book!
January 1996 Editor's Choice
Interactive Internet Project
The Mind's Eye: The Monster Exchange Project
http://www.csnet.net/minds-eye/
Brian Maguire has a stunning Internet Project for children. The Monster Gallery is outstanding and the project curriculum and lesson plans
are clear and concise. This interactive email and WWW project involved children in the USA and Australia in grades 2, 3 and 4.
Brian C. Maguire, 102635.1732@compuserve.com
Take a look at the complete list of Volterre-Fr's Internet Projects
December 1995 Editor's Choice
Internet Innovator
Thanks and recognition to Karla Frizler
frizzy@sfsu.edu for putting her thesis,
"The Internet as an Educational Tool in ESOL Writing
Instruction" on the Web at http://thecity.sfsu.edu/~funweb/thesis.htm
Karla wrote in a post to NETEACH and TESLCA-L:
"It's available for your reading and/or downloading
pleasure. I welcome any comments, especially if they're positive! :))) Seriously,
if you find any inconsistencies, or flat-out errors (e.g. your name
spelled incorrectly!), please let me know. I can't do much about the
original, which is being bound at the moment, but I *can* revise what
appears on the Web page. Also, if you're listed in my reference
section and you'd like me to add a link to your personal or professional
home page, just let me know.
Many thanks to those of you who contributed your time, energy and
ideas throughout my 14 months of research. Your support has been
invaluable to me."
I hope we will see more excellent work like this on the Web!
Encyclopedia
The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language by David Crystal, ISBN 0-521-40179-8
should be on your or gift giving or getting list. Beautifully illustrated, fascinating
to read and a valuable reference as well. Nearly 500 pages for about 30 Pounds Sterling.
November 1995 Editor's Choice
Opinion
Daniel Shanahan, Chair of the English Department at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes
Commercial in Jouy-en-Josas, France wrote an excellent article called "Dear
Bob Dole: America Needs More Foreign Languages", published in the International
Herald Tribune, 18 October 1995. Mr Shanahan writes, "No, senator, what we ought to be
debating, and with the greatest of urgency, is how early we begin teaching second
languages to all our children, how many languages we require for a college
degree, how to take the millions of speakers of other languages in American schools
and make them resources for those impoverished tens of millions who only
speak English." Bravo Mr Shanahan.
Film: The Net
This was a major disappointment. My suggestion is to save your money
and wait for it to show on television, or just forget it!
October 1995 Editor's Choice
Global Cooperation on the Web
You'll find it listed in Internet Projects, but you should
visit Ruth Vilmi's
Web site for inspiration. It all
looks so simple on the Web, but behind it all is hours
of work and cooperation around the globe. Stop off
at the Helsinki University of Technology to see what's
happening in innovative language learning projects.
Special greetings to all the HUT Project teachers
from around the world.
Internet Thrillers
If you haven't read it, go out and find it --
The Cuckoo's Egg by Clifford Stroll, billed as
"Tracking a spy through the maze of computer
espionage" is a page turner! Published by
Doubleday, 1989, ISBN 0-385-24946-2, it will keep
you awake all night. This book almost falls
in the category of "oldies, but goodies" given
how the Internet has changed since 1989. It is
definitely more than a good read for me.
September 1995 Editor's Choice
This first Editor's Choice is dedicated to Pierre Nagel, who has
more patience than any person I know. It is also dedicated
to Anthea Tillyer and Ruth Vilmi for having encouraged, helped,
taught and shared with me so much about the Internet. And, it
is dedicated to Michel Perdreau, who spent hours showing me the wonders
of email and gophers many "Internet Years" ago. Thank you all.
A Good Read
Being Digital
Nicholas Negroponte
Alfred A. Knopf, Publisher, New York, 1995
ISBN 0-679-43919-6
"Computing is not about computing any more. It is about
living," writes Negroponte. His book reads almost like a thriller.
I couldn't put it down. Don't miss this book.
Textbook Choice
Thresholds in Reading
Martha Grace Low
Heinle & Heinle Publishers, Boston, Massachusetts, 1995
ISBN: 0-8384-5336-8
Thresholds in Reading is from the Tapestry Program, edited
by Rebecca L. Oxford and Robin C. Scarcella. It is a high-
intermediate reading book which I have not seen in France nor
in the major French bookshop catalogs. If you're looking for fresh
reading materials, take a look at Martha Grace Low's book.
The selections on the Editor's choice are my own. I hope
you enjoy them. Linda Thalman
thalman@wfi.fr
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Email: linda@wfi.fr
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