ELTchat summary: What web tools / sites are there that can benefit EAP students and teachers?

This was the evening #ELTChat on Wednesday 6th June 2012.
The discussion, about web tools and sites to help EAP teaching and learning, was proposed by @ShaunWilden who wanted help to find sites which could be used by himself and his colleagues.
It looked as if it was going to be a long list of useful sites- and so it proved:-)

First we needed a definition ;What is EAP? @sandymillin wanted to know how broad the definition was and what it covered. This is a good definition of English for Academic Purposes: http://www.uefap.com/articles/eap.htm
We began by looking at sites for exams such as the Cambridge suite or IELTS/TOEFL. These are often needed as entrance exams for university. The point was made that there needs to be careful selection of sites, as there is a great deal of  poor material on the internet. It is actually easy for students to find material themselves, but knowing what is useful is time-consuming.
The links offered were:
http://t.co/cu54n3Zd which is our very own @rliberni's blog, with great IELTS practice material.
@esolcourses: @rliberni's #IELTS scoop.it collection of links and resources: http://t.co/GfiNsSu8  Jason Renshaw's site for IELTS and TOEFL http://www.onlinenglish.net/IELTS.html
www.flo-joe.co.uk for Cambridge exam practice; from PET to CPE
http://t.co/jvZ2nQOk  @esolcourses offered her own exam practice material too.
http://t.co/8byX949w another good site for IELTS
@SueAnnan: Macmillan has a good academic section  http://t.co/pn8MqhUX as do the other academic publishers.

@timjulian60: PET Quiz (3) http://t.co/snwj80oi

@andivwhite: http://t.co/k8w94kfU has a lot,  some relating to IELTS, but also critical thinking, reading, listening : http://t.co/FmS1boeW

Shaun explained that he was particularly looking for post IELTS material ."Well I am thinking of things that students need to do like writing, researching, dealing with the academic word list... " @eannegrenoble reminded him that this was where the teaching and guidance had to become subject specific.
At this point, the links began flying thick and fast .

We had links to corpora:
A very useful Academic Word List http://t.co/WIEb4joc
@muranava :this video:  http://t.co/Fe328xdS talks about BAWE (British Academic Written English corpus)  for written work:  http://t.co/e9yDZQDr but you need to get approval to use it.
byu academic corpus:  http://t.co/oCxo5FJ4, used by Marisa with her translators and Delta candidates.
@lexicojules: Some good (free) academic corpora include BAWE & BASE - both good for checking NS student usage http://t.co/zighSuJW
A good spoken academic corpus - good source to demo discussion skills/language http://t.co/Gr6pbIWp

And links to tools for teachers and students:
Mind maps from mind tools  http://t.co/TcJEE1Qt
@CliveSir : Teaching EAP vocabulary: http://t.co/mXgAWAr1 and here  (PDF) http://t.co/4jYGTi6V
@Marisa_C: Searching the web - tutorial by Russell Stannard http://t.co/EfX52EcI
@Marisa_C:  The Plagiarism Checker http://t.co/aSLhGWKo
@andivwhite:  #IATEFL ESPsig has a lot of possibly useful links halfway down this page http://t.co/Iajdkcmg Academic skills resource from NSWU.
@lexicojules: I use AWL highlighters to pick useful vocabulary out of reading texts - techy Students love it too to put their essays through: AWL highlighters: http://t.co/nUw2TP27 Compleat Lexical Tutor
@Marisa: training in note taking and info transfer -include some graphic organisers & diagram making tools like mindomo http://t.co/OcpxfKcO
@lexicojules : http://t.co/Y1OkuXdJ  - an absolute goldmine for teachers and Students.
@SueAnnan : YouTube has some good EAP material too.
Make your own corpora, although this could be time consuming: http://t.co/DYjkbh9L
@muranava:  @Charlesrei1 shows one way to make your own corpora: http://t.co/bNPM7HeQ

Links to study skills:
Google Study Tips http://t.co/5wZclbHP
@andiwhite suggested http://t.co/IDQ44PGl a university site with useful links to study skills.
A nice study skills wiki from brunel uni  http://t.co/m2lgVv85
@Marisa_C: Top 50 bloggers for study skills from edutastic http://t.co/BUfVmVgu

@naomishema:  Great post on working on note taking skill (SS just copy slides) http://t.co/6EGUALmU 

@Marisa_C : The Dartmouth Academic Skills centre http://t.co/v3yOf3or includes Khan lectures & study skills training 

 @lexicojules 1 more good spoken academic corpus - good source to demo discussion skills/language http://t.co/YXdo3Esl
It was agreed that many universities had good study skills pages.

and bookmarking tools:
@esolcourses recommended backing up bookmarks at regular intervals, in case tools you use disappear or cease to become free. @Marisa_C says that's why she uses both Diigo and Delicious.
@esolcourses:  scoop.it is good for collecting/curating links
@Marisa: I have started Diigo groups for my different courses - can create grps
@SueAnnan:  google bookmarks. Can pick  up on my i-google homepage


 Links for teachers' resources:

@CliveSir: EULEAP: EUropean Lecturers of English for Academic Purposes http://t.co/ZH9QvE1x

 #EAPchat summaries http://t.co/eNoojEXg

TESL Canada session Customising web tools for EAP classrooms: http://t.co/pFkSvhi4

@Marisa_C: Here is a great post with a variety of useful tools for EAP http://t.co/jfCbS8w8

@seburnt hosted a #eapchat before and some rel tools listed here http://t.co/igM3uFPu

@lexicojules :  iTunes U is a good source of authentic lectures for listening - in class or as hwk tasks.

JoHart:   http://t.co/pLpWxX3uOWL

@andivwhite: Has anyone seen Prepare for Success?  Seems choc o bloc full of good stuff at first glance: http://t.co/Q8PHS7fa

@annehodg blog mentioning new EAP group: http://t.co/PXkoxPxc

And the ning network from @annehodg for EAP: http://t.co/HskKLcJv 

 Report writing, Blogging and Presentation tools:

@Marisa_C mentioned that she was having to support some syllabus writing asssignments for EAP more frequently, and asked for useful links.

@SueAnnan:   http://t.co/8QNqvkwb    report writing guides
@analiakandel  For presentation skills "5 Unusual Ways to Become a Better Speaker" http://t.co/M0EoIO8Y 
@andivwhite: Presentation skills books- Dynamic Presentation by Mark Powell and Bob Dignen's 50 Ways to Improve Your Presentation Skills
@muranava:  @seburnt has posted http://t.co/HyVD8zHI focus on reading with reference to using blogs.

Marisa suggested that today EAP should include how to develop a PLN and learning to use twitter and social networking tools. This struck a chord with many of us and we discussed the CELTA syllabus and whether trainers were guiding the candidates in this direction, something which  is already at the heart of Marisa's programme. She mentioned that Facebook was where the trainees felt comfortable at the beginning, and it was agreed that some academics tend to dismiss Facebook as serious, whether through snobbery or not. Shaun thought that it was increasing in professional use.
 
We were delighted to be able to make use of the experience of @lexicojules, who is an EAP specialist
http://t.co/uZTmQKhl. She wanted to know why none of the others from the EAP group were in evidence, although Shaun had invited them. We were invited to take part in  #EAPchat, which is held on  1st and 3rd Monday of the month, 6-7pm UK time, as Jules didn't think that there was enough online presence at the moment. She wanted to know whether any of us belonged to BALEAP, as she would be presenting a CPD session at an event soon.

On a final note : there is a lot of material out there. It isn't all user-friendly for non-tech-comfortable students and/or teachers. Check out the links before sharing them, particularly if you haven't made sure first that they are still live links:-)