Course Evaluation

     Hi everyone, in this post i'll briefly talk about my opinions/suggestions about Technology & Materials Design course whose instructor is Dr. Gökçe Kurt in ELT Department in Marmara University.

    My general view of the course is highly positive as i believe i will realize its contributions in the near future in my department or in the field. I really liked every material that we went through and i promised myself to use them with my future students. My only suggestion arises from my curiosity. We've tried everything by ourselves and it was highly beneficial but what if we tried these tools with actual young learners? I know we'll have the chance to try them in the future but i think practice makes everything perfect. I think it would also encourage those who don't agree to use these materials in their language classrooms. 

A Creative Tool for Young Learners: "Makebeliefscomix"

     Hi everyone, in this post i'll talk about a tool which i think you'll find as a useful resource in helping young learners to express themselves and communicate. Of course, the site is also for people of all ages who like to play and explore.

     The creator of the site, Bill Zimmerman says ‘’By giving you a choice of characters with different moods and the chance to write words and thoughts for them, you will tap into your creativity and explore new possibilities. After all, there is no greater force in life than the power of the imagination to free us from our immediate problems.’’

     www.makebeliefscomix.com is a really creative site where you can make your own comic strips, find over 500 interesting printables, search for different ideas or reach some fun free-time activities. 

     There is also a Special Needs section where you can reach feedbacks of parents or teachers who use the site with students who have a wide array of disabilities. You can find comic characters with physical disabilities to reflect the diversity of users, including those with special needs.

     How to use it?
     First you should click "create comix". Then you'll see the page where you'll be working on. You are given different panel choices right at the bottom, pick one to start. You can scroll to view characters and don't forget, most characters have different moods displaying emotions! You can also pick animated characters. You have again various options for backgrounds, objects and words. If you want a plain background you have the chance to choose colors. The talk/thought balloons with different sizes are given down in the middle. There are also panel prompts such as "the next day", "suddenly", "to be continued" etc. to make your comics like an actual comic strip. On the left side there are some tools to edit your comic and they include; move, scale (enables you to change the size for anything), bring to front, flip and delete. To use them, first click on the tool you need, then click on the object in your panel for the action to occur. Once you're finished you can review, print & save or email it. 
Here is an instructions page that we created for Turkish users:

We've also created our own comic strips outcome about "Travelling":

We have a student task about "Feelings" for young learners too:

     I think makebeliefs comix is an amazing site because it opens a whole new world for youngsters. It is so much fun for them. There are wide range of characters and real-life like backgrounds such as a street in Paris or Egyptian pyramids. I think teachers can give the situation like we did and let students fill in the speech bubbles themselves. Another task can be finding common favourite topics and making the students create a comic strip about that topic in pairs or in groups.

     The site deserves a chance so please give it a try and i'm sure you'll love the outcome as much as the kids do :)