STUDY STACK

I think motivating students to study vocabulary is one of the many challenges we face nowadays. They just don’t enjoy sitting at home to memorise it, they don’t know how, they don’t follow our advice, they may not even see the point of doing so. Actually, one of the problems is that we think our students should study vocabulary the way we did, not realizing that they live in a completely different world from the one we lived in when we ourselves were students and that their learning styles and needs have changed. I think we have to reconsider who our learners are. That’s why I got really interested in this tool when one of the participants in the Enhancing Lessons session made us all aware of it (Thanks Margaret)
Robert Squires, a teacher from Montana, USA, has been using Study Stack with his students for some time. What follows is just an example of what he has used it for:

’I had students pre-teach themselves the vocabulary in a Unit on Art and Culture by identifying words that they did not know. They looked the words up in a dictionary and then created their own flashcards. They then embedded the flashcards in their blogs We did this on a Friday and viewed the flashcards on the blogs on Monday when we started the unit. It was a nice way to see what words the other students needed to learn as well. Some of the key words of the unit were quickly identified as well.
Here is an example:
http://narumihorikawa.blogspot.com/
The student was between the beginner and low-intermediate level.’

Well, but what is Study Stack? It is a site to help students learn facts, study for tests or review information in a variety of subject areas. It can help our students learn, memorize, review and/or practise vocabulary in a fun way.

Now have a look at this example to practise the different parts of a verb:
http://www.studystack.com/studystack-118122

The interesting thing is that either you or your students can enter the descriptions for the vocabulary items. Then the software generates different ways in which to practise the vocabulary in order to memorize it (eg. flashcards, hangman, scrabble, crossword, matching, etc)
This is an example
http://www.studystack.com/flashcard-119709

Of course we can use the stacks already created, but in my opinion the strength of this tool lies in the fact that we or our students can create the stacks, thus personalizing learning and helping our students become independent learners.

So now the instructions for building a stack:

http://www.ehow.com/how_2258071_make-digital-flashcards-study-stack.html