A talk on self-access language learning at 11am on December 3.
UNIVERSITY LANGUAGE SUPPORT FLEXIBLE DELIVERY FOR AUTONOMOUS LEARNING
In this talk Dr. Reinders will consider the importance of language support as a complement and sometimes alternative to language teaching. As an example, he will demonstrate the system for language support set up at the University of Auckland in New Zealand. This combines diagnostic procedures with workshops, language counseling services, and crucially, an electronic monitoring system that supports students in their language studies and that encourages autonomous language learning. The system was designed to offer support that is tightly linked with the students' needs and that tracks their progress over time. The system also proactively offers students help, recommendations and referrals to support staff, based on their profile and their out-of-class language learning. Dr. Reinders will conclude with a number of practical suggestions for tertiary teachers for implementing language support in their own institutions.
Monday, December 17, 2007
Prof. Tseng's speech on December 13
Speech Outline
Theresa Jiin-ling Tseng
ttseng@thu.edu.tw
December 13, 2007
The Role of Error in Second Language Acquisition: A Historical Perspective (1890s-2000s)
I. Defining Error? Depends on different perspectives:
A. Pedagogical:
1. “an utterance, form, or structure that a particular L teacher deems unacceptable because of its inappropriate use or its absence in real-life discourse” (Hendrickson, 1978, p. 387).
2. “unsuccessful use or usage of a target language” (Tseng, 2006, p. 8).
B. Sociolinguistic Perspective:
1. Variation, change
2. A dialect that is counterpart of a particular standard language
C. Language Acquisition/Learning:
1. “Flawed side of learner speech or writing” (Dulay, Burt, & Krashen, 1982)
2. Part and parcel of learner language development
II. The Role of Error in Second Language Acquisition
A. 1890s-1920s (the emergence of modern linguistics, associationism)
B. 1930s-1960s (structuralism and behaviorism)
C. Late 1960s-1970s (Chomsky’s influence: generative grammar/psycholinguistics, innatism)
D. 1970s-1980s (coexistence of cognitive & socio-cultural aspects)
E. 1980s-2000s (cognitive approaches to SLA: perceptual saliency)
F. Some recent topics: ultimate attainment, optionality, fossilization v. stablization
Theresa Jiin-ling Tseng
ttseng@thu.edu.tw
December 13, 2007
The Role of Error in Second Language Acquisition: A Historical Perspective (1890s-2000s)
I. Defining Error? Depends on different perspectives:
A. Pedagogical:
1. “an utterance, form, or structure that a particular L teacher deems unacceptable because of its inappropriate use or its absence in real-life discourse” (Hendrickson, 1978, p. 387).
2. “unsuccessful use or usage of a target language” (Tseng, 2006, p. 8).
B. Sociolinguistic Perspective:
1. Variation, change
2. A dialect that is counterpart of a particular standard language
C. Language Acquisition/Learning:
1. “Flawed side of learner speech or writing” (Dulay, Burt, & Krashen, 1982)
2. Part and parcel of learner language development
II. The Role of Error in Second Language Acquisition
A. 1890s-1920s (the emergence of modern linguistics, associationism)
B. 1930s-1960s (structuralism and behaviorism)
C. Late 1960s-1970s (Chomsky’s influence: generative grammar/psycholinguistics, innatism)
D. 1970s-1980s (coexistence of cognitive & socio-cultural aspects)
E. 1980s-2000s (cognitive approaches to SLA: perceptual saliency)
F. Some recent topics: ultimate attainment, optionality, fossilization v. stablization
Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Calling for a review meeting
Dear all,
Thank you for participating in the SCT seminar. Many of you said it was a fulfilling experience, and I could not agree more. I will put together a report at the weekend for those who cannot be there. There will be photos and video recordings too when I can get the materials from differnt people.
I was wondering if we can get together for a review meeting some time soon.
Agenda
1. Our learning: What do we think about the SCT seminar and what did we learn?
2. Logistically, what did we do well for the seminar? What can be improved?
3. What are some ways to continue our learning and collaboration as a learning community?
Would you let Susan know (using the center's email account ccstudy@ncuu.edu.tw) which date is better for you: November 30 (Friday)? December 3rd (Monday)? or others?
For people who cannot physically be at the review meeting, I am sure we can set up a video conferencing session with the help of Prof. Chang at the National Chia-Tung University. Please indicate you can attend through the video (you need a computer, the internet, a headset, and a webcam.)
Talk to you soon.
- Chin-chi
Thank you for participating in the SCT seminar. Many of you said it was a fulfilling experience, and I could not agree more. I will put together a report at the weekend for those who cannot be there. There will be photos and video recordings too when I can get the materials from differnt people.
I was wondering if we can get together for a review meeting some time soon.
Agenda
1. Our learning: What do we think about the SCT seminar and what did we learn?
2. Logistically, what did we do well for the seminar? What can be improved?
3. What are some ways to continue our learning and collaboration as a learning community?
Would you let Susan know (using the center's email account ccstudy@ncuu.edu.tw) which date is better for you: November 30 (Friday)? December 3rd (Monday)? or others?
For people who cannot physically be at the review meeting, I am sure we can set up a video conferencing session with the help of Prof. Chang at the National Chia-Tung University. Please indicate you can attend through the video (you need a computer, the internet, a headset, and a webcam.)
Talk to you soon.
- Chin-chi
Monday, November 26, 2007
Lude: intercultural and cross-cultural communication
Hi, dear all:
It seems that we are all interested in but confused with the difference between “intercultural communication” and “cross-cultural communication”. I checked the book Culture learning: the fifth dimension in the language classroom written by Louise Damen in1987, one of the books included in the reading list of the intimidating comprehensive exam in this PhD program, and found the following definitions for your reference.
Intercultural communication: acts of communication undertaken by individuals identified with groups exhibiting intergroup variation in shared social and cultural patterns. (These shared patterns, individually expressed, are the major variables in the purpose, the manner, the mode, and the means by which the communicative process is affected.)
Cross-cultural awareness: understanding of similarities and differences in cultural patterns of other than native culture.
I also checked the Longman dictionary of language teaching & applied linguistics (3rd edition 2002) and found the definitions of these two terms as follows:
Intercultural communication, also interdiscourse communication//intercultural discourse: an interdisciplinary field of research that studies how people communicate and understand each other across group boundaries or discourse systems of various sorts including national, geographical, linguistic, ethnic, occupation, class or gender-related boundaries and how such boundaries affect language use. This could include the study of a corporate culture, a professional group, a gender discourse system, or a generational discourse system.
Cross-cultural communication: And exchange of ideas, information, etc., between persons from different cultural backgrounds. There are often more problems in cross-cultural communication than in communication between people of the same cultural background. Each participant may interpret the other’s speech according to his or her own cultural conventions and expectations. If the cultural conventions of the speakers are widely different, misinterpretations and misunderstandings can easily arise, even resulting in a total breakdown of communication. This has been shown by research into real-life situations, such as job interviews, doctor-patient encounters and legal communication.
It seems that my previous interpretation of these two terms at the study group was kind of misleading, though not totally wrong. The difference between “intercultural” and “cross-cultural” seems to lie in their different foci rather than locations (within or not within a common geographical nation). “Intercultural communication” focuses on the skills, conduction, and problems of communication by people from different cultural backgrounds. For example, Damen mentions in his book:“intercultural communication can entail ‘error’ in social perception brought about by cultural variations that affect the perceptual process”. Besides, the different cultural backgrounds can refer to not only ethnic but national, geographical, linguistic, or occupation backgrounds, as the Longman dictionary says.
On the other hand, “cross-cultural” seems to address the awareness of the similarities and differences between other cultures and one’s native cultures. In fact, the term ”cross-cultural communication’ is kind of obsolete. It used to be one of the equivalences of “intercultural communication”. Now “cross-cultural” is often juxtaposed with the terms “awareness”, “research”, or “training”, emphasizing the comparison between two or more different cultural groups. Here are some examples from Damen’s book for you:
“The first cross-cultural training manual only appeared in 1970 in the United States for Peace Corps volunteers.
Cross-cultural research should not be carried out with methods and instruments developed in monocultural contexts.
That is my short research about the definitions of the two terms. Hope they’re helpful to you. Meanwhile, I’d like to thank all of you for inspiring me at the study group. I really enjoyed it and I’ve learned a lot from you. Special thank goes to Ruth. It is very sweet of you to make the certificates for us. You have really warmed my heart. Thank you very much.
Lude (Christine)
It seems that we are all interested in but confused with the difference between “intercultural communication” and “cross-cultural communication”. I checked the book Culture learning: the fifth dimension in the language classroom written by Louise Damen in1987, one of the books included in the reading list of the intimidating comprehensive exam in this PhD program, and found the following definitions for your reference.
Intercultural communication: acts of communication undertaken by individuals identified with groups exhibiting intergroup variation in shared social and cultural patterns. (These shared patterns, individually expressed, are the major variables in the purpose, the manner, the mode, and the means by which the communicative process is affected.)
Cross-cultural awareness: understanding of similarities and differences in cultural patterns of other than native culture.
I also checked the Longman dictionary of language teaching & applied linguistics (3rd edition 2002) and found the definitions of these two terms as follows:
Intercultural communication, also interdiscourse communication//intercultural discourse: an interdisciplinary field of research that studies how people communicate and understand each other across group boundaries or discourse systems of various sorts including national, geographical, linguistic, ethnic, occupation, class or gender-related boundaries and how such boundaries affect language use. This could include the study of a corporate culture, a professional group, a gender discourse system, or a generational discourse system.
Cross-cultural communication: And exchange of ideas, information, etc., between persons from different cultural backgrounds. There are often more problems in cross-cultural communication than in communication between people of the same cultural background. Each participant may interpret the other’s speech according to his or her own cultural conventions and expectations. If the cultural conventions of the speakers are widely different, misinterpretations and misunderstandings can easily arise, even resulting in a total breakdown of communication. This has been shown by research into real-life situations, such as job interviews, doctor-patient encounters and legal communication.
It seems that my previous interpretation of these two terms at the study group was kind of misleading, though not totally wrong. The difference between “intercultural” and “cross-cultural” seems to lie in their different foci rather than locations (within or not within a common geographical nation). “Intercultural communication” focuses on the skills, conduction, and problems of communication by people from different cultural backgrounds. For example, Damen mentions in his book:“intercultural communication can entail ‘error’ in social perception brought about by cultural variations that affect the perceptual process”. Besides, the different cultural backgrounds can refer to not only ethnic but national, geographical, linguistic, or occupation backgrounds, as the Longman dictionary says.
On the other hand, “cross-cultural” seems to address the awareness of the similarities and differences between other cultures and one’s native cultures. In fact, the term ”cross-cultural communication’ is kind of obsolete. It used to be one of the equivalences of “intercultural communication”. Now “cross-cultural” is often juxtaposed with the terms “awareness”, “research”, or “training”, emphasizing the comparison between two or more different cultural groups. Here are some examples from Damen’s book for you:
“The first cross-cultural training manual only appeared in 1970 in the United States for Peace Corps volunteers.
Cross-cultural research should not be carried out with methods and instruments developed in monocultural contexts.
That is my short research about the definitions of the two terms. Hope they’re helpful to you. Meanwhile, I’d like to thank all of you for inspiring me at the study group. I really enjoyed it and I’ve learned a lot from you. Special thank goes to Ruth. It is very sweet of you to make the certificates for us. You have really warmed my heart. Thank you very much.
Lude (Christine)
Sunday, November 18, 2007
The 4th Study Group Meeting (第四次SCT讀書會紀錄)
Eight participants were in the fourth study group meeting, including two over the video conferencing website established by Prof. Chang from Chia-Tung U. for us. We did experience some technological glitches. If we can solve the problem soon, people who are not in Taipei can also have the chance to join us in our future activities. For this, we are excited and feel grateful to Prof. Chang's generous help and effort.
The 4th study group meeting started by listing everybody's issues for discussion, and we really had a lot to put on the board: 11 different topics. For easier processing, I try to put them into categories this way (if not appropriate please let me know):
Group A. Writing Issues
1. Is it all right to write like this?
Group B: Conceptual Muses (interesting ideas)
2. "Cultural rich point": teacher training, discourse analysis
3. Technology as social artifact and its limitations
6. The "contradiction" focus of activity theory
8. Forming new identities through intenet communication
Group C: Practical Concerns
5. How to coordinate with partner schools?
11. Conflicts in practice between the goal of developing communcative competence (general expectations) and the emphasis of intercultural competence (the latter was empasized by Thorne in the article)
10. Cultural stereotypes: there are many different cultures within the same country. Wouldn't it cause stereotypical thinking if we think of people only in terms of the country they are from?
Group D: Term confusion
What is the difference between --
7. telecollaboration projects and tandem projects?
4. ICFLE and other CMC projects?
9. interculture and cross-cultural communication?
We talked about all of these at the meeting, and the discussion helped clarify many concepts.
Next week will be our last SCT study group meeting. We are going to brainstorm on questions to be raised when Thorne visits. Exciting!
For those who have not signed up for the seminar, please do so quickly. We need to prepare refreshment and handouts. Thank you.
The 4th study group meeting started by listing everybody's issues for discussion, and we really had a lot to put on the board: 11 different topics. For easier processing, I try to put them into categories this way (if not appropriate please let me know):
Group A. Writing Issues
1. Is it all right to write like this?
Group B: Conceptual Muses (interesting ideas)
2. "Cultural rich point": teacher training, discourse analysis
3. Technology as social artifact and its limitations
6. The "contradiction" focus of activity theory
8. Forming new identities through intenet communication
Group C: Practical Concerns
5. How to coordinate with partner schools?
11. Conflicts in practice between the goal of developing communcative competence (general expectations) and the emphasis of intercultural competence (the latter was empasized by Thorne in the article)
10. Cultural stereotypes: there are many different cultures within the same country. Wouldn't it cause stereotypical thinking if we think of people only in terms of the country they are from?
Group D: Term confusion
What is the difference between --
7. telecollaboration projects and tandem projects?
4. ICFLE and other CMC projects?
9. interculture and cross-cultural communication?
We talked about all of these at the meeting, and the discussion helped clarify many concepts.
Next week will be our last SCT study group meeting. We are going to brainstorm on questions to be raised when Thorne visits. Exciting!
For those who have not signed up for the seminar, please do so quickly. We need to prepare refreshment and handouts. Thank you.
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Dr. Carla Meskill's talk
-----Forwarded message-----
> Dear All,
>
> In case you do not konw, Dr. Carla Meskill will be speaking at the
> National Kaohsiung First University of Science & Technology at 12/7
> (Friday). See http://www.eng.nkfust.edu.tw/96conferences/12_7/keynote.htm.>
> Dr. Meskill is an expert in CMC research and CALL teacher education- a
> very good speaker, scholar, and definitely a very nice person. :-)
>
> Best,
>
> Diana
>
>
> =================
> Yu-Feng (Diana) Yang, Ph. D.
> Assistant Professor
> Department of Foreign Languages and Literature
> National Sun Yat-Sen University
> Kaohsiung, Taiwan
> Dear All,
>
> In case you do not konw, Dr. Carla Meskill will be speaking at the
> National Kaohsiung First University of Science & Technology at 12/7
> (Friday). See http://www.eng.nkfust.edu.tw/96conferences/12_7/keynote.htm.>
> Dr. Meskill is an expert in CMC research and CALL teacher education- a
> very good speaker, scholar, and definitely a very nice person. :-)
>
> Best,
>
> Diana
>
>
> =================
> Yu-Feng (Diana) Yang, Ph. D.
> Assistant Professor
> Department of Foreign Languages and Literature
> National Sun Yat-Sen University
> Kaohsiung, Taiwan
Monday, November 12, 2007
The Third Study Group (第三次讀書會紀錄 Nov. 9)
The third study group meeting had 8 participants, including those who showed up last week and a new comer: Prof. Cheng from Chia-tung U.
Instead of posting questions by me, we started the meeting by eliciting key issues members would like to talk about. The issues include:
1. the gap between teachers and students ("cross-generational" digital divide, culture of use for email and IM)
2. the net generation
3. how to research/plan about data collection
4. how feasible it is to use the technologies in our EFL environment
5. conversational agent
(Others? Can somebody help me remember?)
We think Thorne is a good writer. Although he uses many terms and formal words which are not familiar to us, his discussion is well organized and ideas interesting. The interact nature of SCT also makes us feel necessary to emphasize dialogues. A question raised at the meeting was what we want to dialogue with him about. We agreed to post our questions/issues/comments here. Let's use the "comments" function.
Instead of posting questions by me, we started the meeting by eliciting key issues members would like to talk about. The issues include:
1. the gap between teachers and students ("cross-generational" digital divide, culture of use for email and IM)
2. the net generation
3. how to research/plan about data collection
4. how feasible it is to use the technologies in our EFL environment
5. conversational agent
(Others? Can somebody help me remember?)
We think Thorne is a good writer. Although he uses many terms and formal words which are not familiar to us, his discussion is well organized and ideas interesting. The interact nature of SCT also makes us feel necessary to emphasize dialogues. A question raised at the meeting was what we want to dialogue with him about. We agreed to post our questions/issues/comments here. Let's use the "comments" function.
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