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M: This is Education Show. Thank you for tuning in. Today, we invite Ms. Stanley, the coordinator of ESL Journal, to join us. Good morning, Ms. Stanley. Welcome to our program.
W: Good morning. It’s my pleasure. I’m glad to have a chance telling people about ESL Journal.
M: We all know that ESL refers to English as a Second Language. What kind of people may find your ESL Journal useful?
W: Well, first, ESL teachers often find sharing their experience, either successful or helpful in their future teaching. ESL Journal is one of the websites where they can talk on the forum, check ESL teaching journals, or download some teaching materials. (1) Also, English learners can have communication with their peers, learning from each other and when they hope to get instruction from experienced teachers, ESL Journal is always there.
M: Now, Ms. Stanley, can you tell us how this ESL Journal came into being?
W: (2) ESL Journal has grown from a classroom project that began in 1998, when Community College ESL teacher Susan Clark of Seattle put about a dozen student essays and poems into an earlier version of the magazine.
M: So it is just this one lady who started all this.
W: Exactly. Here I have some words from Mrs. Clark. That was soon after she started the project. She said, "My ESL Journal site supports several ESL courses I teach in the Seattle area. My first classroom project on the website began in 1998 when I put about a dozen student essays and poems. We soon had nearly 40, 000 page views and lost count of comments on those few original articles. Some of the comments came from students or teachers in dozens of countries. Nearly all were positive and encouraging. I find that peer review and the knowledge that the world will read the result are sufficient incentive to pursue the project as far as the student’s current skills allow, while accepting that this is indeed the second language and that a desire to communicate, not spelling or grammatical perfection, is the key to effective use of English in the home and workplace. "
M: I agree. I remember when I began to learn Spanish, I was baffled by the pronunciation and grammatical rules. But after practicing, I gradually could use the language to communicate. Talking about communication, what kind of material do you have most? Listening and speaking?
W: Well. (3) The ESL Journal system has been used successfully in intermediate and advanced writing courses. Each student prepares a written work in English, which is submitted via the class web log. The student can add a photograph and link to external resources. The final product is not corrected by the teacher; the student decides when the work is finished. Some work is part of the grading process for a course, but mainly the resource is available to encourage continuous writing.
M: I see. As computers and Internet access are becoming more and more widely used, I am sure more students can get help from your website.
W: Yes. In the future as keyboard time becomes easier to obtain and as more students acquire typing skills, an entire course might migrate to the web, with students actually composing their work online and receiving peer comments through the web.
M: How do students feel about this way of learning?
W: Many students have expressed pleasure at the opportunity to experiment with this new medium, and some have said that their friends and relatives have indeed seen their work in their home countries.
M: That’s great. But building the website and getting the journal published means cost. How do you get the money?
W: (4) We do get a lot of donation from supporters. If someone donates to support us, his business or personal link will appear in our sponsor directory for a full year, and for a small additional donation their banner ad plus optional complimentary coupon and full page ad will appear on the site. All donors’ sites are linked from the directory listing or banner.
M: Hmm. Sponsorship. How much do you accept as the minimum amount of donation?
W: There is no bottom line. We do have a lot of students who want to keep this website on as they themselves have benefited a lot from it.
M: Now, if I want to use the ESL Journal website, do I get to pay a membership fee, or something like that?
W: We have different policies. For some of the services, users can enjoy them for free. But for some of other types of service, as we need to pay for the cost ourselves, we have to charge a certain amount of money. (5) But for all the users of our website, they do need to register to get an online identity. Hope our listeners don’t worry, as we can protect their personal information very well.
M: I am sure you will. We have talked a lot about how students can use your website, what about teachers?
W: We have a lot of ESL teachers who contribute to our website. (5) Anyone who want to submit their articles to be considered for publication, please, first, to become a registered user, then, to sign in, third, to paste your article into the form as plain text. Leave your contact information and wait for our notice. Articles may describe experience, experiments, activities, etc. Length is variable, but in general the upper limit is about 10, 000 characters without prior consultation.
M: I assume you only accept articles in English?
W: Yes.
M: All right, as time is running out, I should say "Thank you" again, Ms. Stanley. Thank you for coming and talking here.
W: You are welcome.