Corey Stevens
Leadership in Educational Technology
12/10/12
Defining the problem
Acquiring a foreign language is different than learning a foreign language. Stephen Krashen (1983)
differentiated between the two terms. He defined learning as a formal instruction in language that
focuses more on grammar and use while acquisition is much more subconscious, focusing on meaning
rather than form. Learning is much easier to achieve in a classroom, though it is significantly less
effective than acquisition. Acquisition requires a significant amount of meaningful interaction in the
target language and that is a difficult state to achieve inside of the school system. Many other linguists
have speculated that language is acquired through a more subconscious process that is built into the
brain rather than through hard work and overt methodology (Chomsky 1965, Chomsky and Lasnik 1993).
Language acquisition should be the goal of a classroom, but the problem classroom language teachers
face is how to give meaningful interaction with the language that helps facilitate acquisition while stuck
within the constraints of a classroom system. Hopefully this can be facilitated through intelligent
applications of technology designed specifically for a set of students in mind.
Essentially, to acquire language rather than just to learn facts about a language, students need constant
meaningful interaction with the target language. They are unable to get that from classes that meet one
hour a day and five days a week. Besides the meaningfulness, the constancy of interaction with
language is important as well. It takes a student 5-16 times reading or listening to a word to understand
it in context (Nation, 1990). It takes many more experiences listening to or reading the word to be able
to use it. Within the context of a foreign language classroom it is difficult to see or hear one word that
many times, however it is almost impossible to see or hear the hundreds of words necessary to acquire
a language.
This repetition is important, and facilitated via language immersion. Immersion is a term used to
describe language students who are immersed in language learning situations for a long period of time.
These are people who travel or live in other countries for a while and have the opportunity to be
surrounded by language and culture for most of the day. Most language acquisition happens in
immersion settings and our brain tends to be more ready to learn language while completely
surrounded by and constantly engaging with the language. Creating an immersion-like atmosphere in
the foreign language classroom is one of the most difficult problems that language teachers face. Good
teachers would rather their students engage in more authentic acquisition activities rather than spend
their time engaging in learning activities that typically happen in the classroom. They want to immerse
their students in the language rather than teach them disparate and ultimately boring facts about the
language.
However, immersion within the classroom is difficult for a number of reasons. First of all, as mentioned
earlier, time within a classroom is limited to mere hours every week. Immersion is considered to be
something that happens 24 hours a day for an extended period of time and part of that time
commitment is what makes language acquisition happen. The most difficult part of language immersion
in the classroom however is the stress it puts on the students. Acquiring a language is difficult under
normal circumstances, but it is next to impossible in a traditional classroom setting. Pushing them into a
full immersion setting for five or so hours a week would make them shut down rather than learn. Stress
has been shown to hinder language acquisition (Krashen, 1982), and this amount of stress might do long
term damage to a student's motivation to learn a second language.
Creating a Solution via Technology
The classroom isn't a perfect avenue for language instruction, but intelligent use of the proper
technology could change that. The end product would have to solve all or many of the problems
associated with language acquisition in the classroom. It would have to be accessible whenever the
student wants to access it so that the student doesn't only learn in the classroom and it has to be
repeatable to facilitate repetition. It also has to cause a low amount of stress and it has to be
interactive to facilitate engagement with the language. Further, it would have to be engaging and
entertaining so that language students would be motivated to use it. It would also need to have an
emphasis on equity, accessibility, and follow technological standards (such as the NETS standards).
There have been some attempts to create material that would solve these problems. Textbooks, for
example, are an important part of educational technology and have been used for a long time to try and
teach students foreign language skills. Unfortunately they fall short of their intended purpose because
while there is much engagement with the language in many textbook activities, it does not provide an
immersive language learning atmosphere nor are they interesting for the students. Many textbook
companies have tried to put digital material online as well. Publishers like Prentice Hall
(http://phschool.com/) have many language acquisition resources on their website. The material is very
good and includes videos and songs, but is not accessible by everyone. Students are required to input
codes from their textbooks to get to the material, but it cannot be accessed by everybody. Other
companies, such as Rosetta Stone or Pimsleur make products that claim to help with language
acquisition, but are prohibitively expensive.
The best vehicle to implement these technological changes would be a website. A website could host
videos, games, written instructions and audible lectures. Using HTML, Adobe Flash or Adobe Captivate,
interactive quizzes and videos could be added as well. A website is easy to organize and could arrange
the content sequentially. The material would need to remain free and open to everybody who wanted
to use the material but could still be easily protected by creative commons licenses.
The material hosted on the website would be best developed by teachers who are going to use it in their
classrooms. That way the material is relevant, addresses the practical needs of the students and follows
along with a pattern that is useful to the instructors themselves. Materials developed by third parties
could very easily be distant from the needs of the classroom and the teaching style of the instructors. If
there were third parties involved, they would need to work closely with the instructor.
There are still problems that a website with interactive material would have. Studies show that students
who are faced with a difficult task procrastinate (Pychyl, Lee & Thibodeau, 2000). Even when there is a
website involved, the task of acquiring a second language is difficult. Using interactive games and videos
does not increase motivation no matter how well the products are created. While this project addresses
many of the issues that come from trying to acquire a language in the classroom, its weakness is that it
may still not be entertaining nor increase student motivation.
Refining The Solution
Another weakness in this plan is that keeping up with this large of a project would be very difficult for
one or two teachers. Making new material, aligning it with newer standards or adjusting the material to
better fit the needs of the current students would take a lot of time and not be maintained very well by
one person. If it were just the job of one person, most likely it would be poorly maintained and
eventually forgotten.
To combat that potential problem it is essential that this resource be shared amongst everyone who
wants it. Rather than just be controlled by one person, people who use this material would be
encouraged to contribute to the project as well. The internet offers the ability for like minded educators
and material producers to network socially and combine digital resources. Message boards and allowing
limited access to the website and materials would encourage people to communicate and create. The
focus of the website and the material produced would have to be structured and specific.
Encouraging multiple people work on this increases the reliability of the project, decreases the work
load and ensures that it can function at a high level for as many students as possible. Having it be more
open sourced and accessed by many people would also serve as a means to legitimize the project more
as there will be less errors and a higher value of ideas and information. While one producer might not
make fun and interesting material for students, several producers and thinkers might. Lastly, it could
also serve as a vehicle for research into second language acquisition within the classroom and add quite
a bit of knowledge for the next round of language teachers. The most difficult part of this project will be
making the connections necessary to keep it going, not producing the videos or the material. However,
that will be the most important part.
References
Chomsky, Noam (1965). Aspects of the Theory of Syntax. MIT Press.
Chomsky, N. and Lasnik, H. (1993) Principles and Parameters Theory, in Syntax: An International
Handbook of Contemporary Research, Berlin: de Gruyter.
Krashen, S. (1982). Principles and practice in second language acquisition. Oxford: Pergamon Press
Krashen, S.D.; Terrell, T.D. (1983), The Natural Approach: Language Acquisition in the Classroom, San
Francisco: The Alemany Press, pp. 191
Nation, I. S. P. (1990). Teaching and learning vocabulary. Boston, Mass.: Heinle & Heinle Publishers.
Prentice Hall. (n.d.). Prentice hall bridge page. Retrieved from http://phschool.com/
Pychyl, T., Lee, J., & Thibodeau, R. (2000). Five days of emotion: An experience sampling study of
undergraduate student procrastination. Journal of Social Behavior & Personality;2000 Special
Issue, 15(5), 239.