ICT CD COMPARISON

ICT IN LANGUAGE TEACHING
Lecturer : Hartoyo, Ph.D
Writer : Jasmansyah

COMMENT ON 4 CD PROGRAMS:
THE STRENGHTS AND THE WEAKNESSES OF CD PROGRAMS
IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING.
In this writing I’d like to give some comments and compare four CD programs in English language teaching. After watching the whole of CD’s, I got the result of comparing for four programs. They are:
1. CD 1: EASY TO SING
1. The strengths:
 It is good for preschooler
 It is fun and enjoyable
 The students can sing together because it is completed with the text
 It can drill the students’ pronunciations
 It can drill the students’ listening skill
 It can be an alternative media in teaching
2. The weaknesses:
 The setting is only indoor
 It will be boring if the song is played more than three times
 The background pictures/slides and the person who sing is not matched.
2. CD 2: SPEAK ENGLISH
1. The strengths:
 It is effective for elementary students because it is full color and simple to operate.
 It has many varieties of topics in many situations and conditions ( the alphabet, greeting, at the restaurant, shopping, getting around, at the hotel, on the phone, emergencies, leisure and business)
 It is good in organizing the steps because it is started with the example, speaking practice, speaking recording, dialogue practice, dialogue recording and follow up giving the games.
 The conversation is for secondary students
 It has many varieties of games (easy games and hard games)
 The result can be printed out
2. The weaknesses:
 The picture is not ‘alive’ (movable) and the topics are only the things
 There is not character alive
 There are long sentences which are hard to understand for elementary students
3. CD 3: LEARN ENGLISH
1. The strengths
 It is good for elementary school
 It is interesting because colorful and easy to use (the instruction is clear enough)
 It has many topics especially in daily life ( shopping, country, the first word, color, time, body etc) so the students can learn and understand easily
 The pronunciation is clear enough
 It is well organizing the steps because it is started with practice, recording, and follow up giving the games
 The games are in levels (easy games and hard games)
 The result can be printed out
2. The weaknesses:
 The character is not alive so, sometimes it is boring
 There is no “surprise” in this program (no song for finishing the term)
4. CD D: ISSUES IN ENGLISH
1. The strengths:
 It is effective for senior high school
 It is clear instruction so easy to use
 It is complete (this program is created to four skills: listening, speaking, reading and writing, vocabularies, grammar and there is also syllabus of teaching)
 There are several people who come from many countries with different information and pronunciation for telling the story
 There are a vary of topics such as animal rights, discrimination, euthanasia, growing old, gambling, public transportation
 It can be operated in Winamp
 There is reward for the students who get the right answer
 It is attractive for the students
2. The weaknesses:
 The characters are not movable widely, we only see their faces and gesture
 It is no colorful (just grey)
 There are many menus so the students can get tired to study
In conclusion, I think all of CDS are good and useful for teaching English because they have more advantages than disadvantages and they will become our challenge to repair and develop. They can help teachers and also students in English learning class. So, the teachers will be easier and more enjoyable in teaching English, and students can learn more enjoyable, and the material will be more interesting for learners. As a result, the material that teachers convey to the students will be more understandable by students.