In this new post we will talk about the domain called News In Levels (www.newsinlevels.com) which is a website that publishes daily real news in English.
The interesting part of this page is that each news is offered with three levels of difficulty, from a basic level to an advanced level. So, the students can choose to read the news that interests them within a level in which they can work. We must also take into consideration that we could use such pieces of text in activities that were previously designed. And we could even agree with other teachers to apply the PBL strategy to bring such knowledge to students and make this process more meaningful for them. Therefore this site is an opportunity for students to acquire an L2.
As in the previous entry with Lyricstrainin, the audience will depend exclusively on the level, concerning EFL teaching as mentioned above could have difficulties if you do not use this tool correctly. Hence, by doing this activity with a meaningful approach such as project-based learning, students will be able to take better advantage of the content taught in such news by linking it to their daily lives or their particular tastes, thus promoting English as an L2 and at the same time encouraging self-learning through the search for topics that catch the students' attention.
This makes us re-emphasize the importance of the previous point, which describes the importance of the good use and planning of such activities because they could develop new learning habits in students. Let's continue presenting the possible problems when using this domain. One of the problems with this tool is the length of the news when changing levels. That could ultimately affect the activity when designing an exercise, such as a test item. In this case, we cannot use different levels. But this should not be considered only as something negative, but as a solution to other problems as well, because having different levels which not only reduce the length of the text but also change vocabulary, this tool can be used to level groups of students with different knowledge, so the flexibility when presenting the texts can also be helpful when creating activities for students.
Another thing to consider is the previous knowledge of students because not all of them might know or identify the structures of a news item or the vocabulary that may appear in it, which could hinder its practical use in the classroom. This leads us to think that this problem is not only related to English, this could also be related to the language curriculum so considering this we could say that News in Levels is not designed for any type of approach to an L2 but that this application could have an even greater impact on students if the PBL strategy is used.
In summary, we could say that news in levels is a very versatile tool when it comes to creating different exercises and leveling students' skills like reading, it has its weaknesses which depend on the context in which the tool is used.
We hope that after this small critique you will be able to think about whether or not it is suitable for use in the classroom. We wish you the best and see you in the next post.
