ACTFL Research SIG
Business Meeting Minutes
November 21, 2014
1:15–2:15 CST
In attendance: Current and newly elected Research SIG leaders (Bill VanPatten
[BVP], Victoria Russell, Heather Olson-Beal, Jason Martel, Silvia Peart, and Justin
White), audience members
1. Welcome and introductions (BVP)
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Introduction of current Research SIG members
Introduction newly elected Research SIG members
2. Webinars (BVP)
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Restatement of purpose of webinars
The first webinar was open to all ACTFL members, not just Research SIG
members
The first webinar had 50 registered participants, but 100+ were actually in
attendance since several participants watched with their classes present
Ideally there would be two webinars in the spring and two in the fall
Attendees brainstorm future webinar topics/people in small groups and
submit ideas to BVP
3. Featured speaker (Sue Gass [SG], introduced by BVP)
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Presentation title: Where research meets practice: Interaction in the
classroom—who benefits and why?
o definition of interaction hypothesis/interaction approach
o construct definition: output, negotiation of meaning, feedback
(including recasts), reporting on various study results
o discussion on how to investigate effects of interaction on learning,
connecting with constructs such as attention, working memory, and
inhibition, reporting on various study results
o summing up of findings of interaction research
o discussion of aims of current research
Audience members pose questions to SG
4. Newsletters (BVP)
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Announcement of papers in the following research SIG sessions
Attendees brainstorm in small groups: 1) why aren’t we receiving news from
members for newsletter and 2) what kinds of information would members
like to see in the newsletters. They share ideas:
o a summary about a research article coming out
o recent publications that people haven’t had time to read/don’t know
are available
o send favorite research article you think people should read
o graduate students send summaries of dissertation research
o have people send in bibliography entries/annotated bibliographies –
call for topic and ask references for
o sometimes people don’t know what to submit – a theme or call for
favorite article might be more encouraging
o research spotlight
o collaboration corner for people looking for opportunities to
collaborate, since SLA departments are all over the place
5. Announcements (BVP)
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The way to submit for Research SIG panels will be different next year; there
will be a tab on the general submission website called “Other” where you
indicate that you want your paper to be reviewed by a particular SIG