Marie-Noëlle Lamy

Online Communication in Language Learning and Teaching

This book deals with research and practice in online communication and communication technologies of language learning and teaching. These include all forms of computerized media using text, graphics, audio and video, with a particular focus on multimodal teaching and learning. As part of the project the authors describe well-structured action research projects which have transferable features and which can inspire readers wanting to undertake their own projects.

Oral conversations online: Redefining oral competence in synchronous environments

In this article the focus is on methodology for analysing learner-learner oral conversations mediated by computers. With the increasing availability of synchronous voice-based groupware and the additional facilities offered by audio-graphic tools, language learners have opportunities for collaborating on oral tasks, supported by visual and textual stimuli via computer-conferencing. Used synchronously with real-time voice-based work, these tools present learners with the challenge of learning a new type of oral interaction, and researchers with the need for developing methodologies for redefining L2 oral competence in these environments. In this paper we address the latter. We examine approaches from the interactionist branch of Second Language Acquisition research, and we question the ability of this model of language learning to fully account for the processes that take place when learners are interacting with machines while talking to each other. To complement the socio-cognitive insights of that school, we look to interactional linguistics and to social semiotics. Building on findings from these fields, we offer a qualitative discussion of the discourses evidenced in conversational data from two distance-learning projects that use synchronous voice in conjunction with other stimuli, in an intermediate French programme at the UK Open University. We then present detailed conclusions about the methodological challenges involved in analysing the oral competence of students who use these tools.

Assessing learners’ writing using lexical frequency

In this work we set out to investigate the feasibility of applying measures of lexical frequency to the assessment of the writing of learners of French. A system developed for analysing the lexical knowledge of learners, according to their productive use of high and low frequency words (Laufer and Nation 1995), was adapted for French and used to analyse learners’ texts from an Open University French course. Whilst we found that this analysis could not be said to reflect the state of the learners’ vocabulary knowledge in the same way that Laufer and Nation’s study did, elements of the system’s output did correlate significantly with scores awarded by human markers for vocabulary use in these texts. This suggests that the approach could be used for self-assessment. However, the feedback that can be given to learners on the basis of the current analysis is very limited. Nevertheless, the approach has the potential for refinement and when enhanced with information derived from successive cohorts of learners performing similar writing tasks, could be a first step in the development of a viable aid for learners evaluating their own writing.

Click if You Want to Speak: Reframing CA for Research into Multimodal Conversations in Online Learning.

This paper addresses the lack of formalised methodology for analysing learner interaction data created in conversations on audiographic platforms. First the author shows the importance of conversations in language learning and the need for researchers to understand how users learn from these interactions. Then the author establishes that appropriate methodologies for investigating interaction data collected from online platforms have as yet emerged neither from the field of computer-assisted language learning nor from conversation analysis CA. Three brief multimodal conversations involving language learners in platform-based tutorials are analysed. The author shows that linguistic means of communication are only one way in which to achieve learning aims and other communication modes are identified. The author concludes that the analysis and interpretation of such exchanges can be improved by a crossdisciplinary approach which consists of augmenting constructs drawn from CA with selected constructs from social semiotics.

Learning to learn a language – at home and on the Web

This paper reports on work at the Open Universitys Centre for Modern Languages (CML) and Institute of Educational Technology (IET), on the use of technology to support language learners working at home and in virtual groups via the Internet. We describe the Lexica On-Line project, which created a learning environment for Open University students of French, incorporating computer-based lexical tools to De used at home, an on-line discussion forum, and guided access to the Francophone Web. We report on some of the outcomes of this project, and discuss the effectiveness of such a configuration for the promotion of reflective language-learning practices.

Social media-based language learning: insights from research and practice

This chapter brings a synoptic perspective to the volume and draws out questions that emerge from the work as being important for future research into online networking and language education. In the chapter we approach these first from a research perspective (types of research, themes explored and data collection issues), then from the perspective of design and pedagogy (mediation revisited, types of networking and community building, forms of interaction and genres and finally formal and informal learning).

Using Combinations of Video, Audio, and Print to Teach French at a Distance: A Case Study of the Formative Evaluative Cycle

The materials, procedures and findings of an evaluation of initial approaches to the use of audio visual media in a course teaching the French language to distance learners are reported as a case study of a formative evaluation. The study illustrates the design-research-revision stages of the formative evaluation cycle. Innovative features of the course were the pivotal role played by audiovisual (videocassette and audiocassette) media in providing resource material for teaching and learning, the use of short sequences for intensive study and the high degree of integration between the audiovisual media and the print. Key teaching design features of the draft audiovisual and print packages were identified and evaluated in terms of students’ reactions to them. Central issues of teaching design are discussed in relation to revisions made to the course materials in the light of the evaluation.

Online reading groups and network dynamics

The considerable increase in membership of an international Online Reading Group (ORG) for professionals in English Language Teaching (ELT) and its boundary-crossing into other networking sites and tools has prompted this study. Our research is also inspired by a reflection on the historical context of non-online reading groups as well as by recent work on the role of online networking in learning and teaching. After discussing aspects of the pre-online reading group movement we introduce the ORG under study. We then specify what we understand by online networking, state our research questions and construct a case study from the ORG’s origins as a forum, in 2007, to its role as the core of a professional online network today. In this way we aim to contribute to the exploration of online social networking in its relationship to offline activity and online activity in networked spaces that may function alongside the ‘social media’ (as this phrase is understood in the bulk of the present collection).

Some Possible Practitioner Research Projects

So far in Part III we have discussed the nature and structure of practitioner research projects as well as the practical conditions under which such projects should take place (relating to participants and to data). In this chapter, we bring this information together to create six templates for small-scale practitioner research projects about CMCL. We have designed these so that you can run the projects with as limited an outlay of resources as possible, either on your own or with a very small team. The six projects respond to several of the issues discussed in the book. Thus each one: · tackles a research context signalled in Part II as needing further probing; · uses methods and tools identified in chapter 14; · requires some of the ethical precautions advocated in chapter 15; · involves some of the technical procedures outlined in chapter 16.

Multiple Object-oriented Environments

MOOs (multiple object-oriented environments; see Quote 10.1 for examples of ‘objects’) have characteristics in common with synchronous text-based systems such as chat, which they combine with asynchronous written systems such as fora, but also have distinctive features, as Peterson (2004) explains.