For many instructors (and students), “remote learning” is synonymous with “Zoom meeting” (or a similar video-conferencing platform) and a web-based LMS such as Canvas or Blackboard. Everyone is familiar with “Zoom fatigue” (Blum 2020) and we all know that staring at a computer screen can be frustratingly unproductive and unsatisfying.
But there are other options. Language educators are exploring “Mobile-Assisted Language Learning” (MALL), where students and instructors make use of cell phone apps to create and share a wide range of L2 content.
We know that cell phones are used more or less constantly as tools for communication. Why not deploy them in the service of communicative L2 instruction? In addition to familiar apps such as Duolingo or Quizlet, mobile devices offer an increasing array of options to “connect language learners (a) to their own environments and (b) to a much more diverse set of people, stories, and environments” (Guillén et al, p. 322).
Pegrum (2014), summarized in Guillén et al, suggests that MALL can be used for
- Content: learners can access authentic L2 materials from a variety of digital platforms.
- Creation: learners can produce language for the instructor and each other.
- Communication: learners can solve problems — info-gap tasks, communication puzzles, etc. — while using the L2.
A few suggestions:
- Have students follow Twitter or Instagram accounts of L2 native speakers.
- Use the word-search functions of Twitter to find examples of recently learned lexical and syntactic features.
- Make use of level-appropriate podcasts: Lupa, News-in-Slow-[Spanish/French/German].
- Create an Instagram account, with level-appropriate assignments involving the students’ environments, doing short interviews, or creating short stories.
- Have students create short videos on assigned topics using a platform such as StoryCorps or Flipgrid.
- Use WhatsApp for messaging and doing assignments involving the entire class, and as a repository for images, stories, questions and discussions in the L2.
- Encourage students to join HelloTalk, a Language Learning Social Network with more than 18 million language learners (Vollmer Rivera).
- Direct students towards platforms that pair them with pedagogically trained speaking partners, such as TalkAbroad and Conversifi.
References & Resources
Guillén, G., Sawin, T. and Avineri, N. (2020). Zooming out of the crisis: Language and human collaboration. Foreign Language Annals, 53, 320-328.
Blum, S. (2020, April 22). Why We're Exhausted by Zoom. Inside Higher Ed. Retrieved from https://www.insidehighered.com/advice/2020/04/22/professor‐explores‐why‐zoom‐classes‐deplete‐her‐energy‐opinion
O'Dowd, R., & O'Rourke, B. (2019). New developments in virtual exchange for foreign language education. Language Learning & Technology, 23(3), 1–7.
Pegrum, M. (2014). Mobile learning: Language, Literacies and Culture. Basingstoke, England: Palgrave Macmillan.
Vollmer Rivera, A. (2017). HelloTalk. Calico Journal, 34(30), 394-392.