Teaching French Online
Language teachers have a hard time teaching online courses because it is near impossible to learn a language without interaction. Therefore, building an online community and making the course interactive online is essential to language learning.
Ideally, I would love the idea of having a virtual classroom online that is 3-D and where students can learn a language in the same way that they can play video games online. I have always imagined that the ideal online French language class should be created in an environment similar to Second Life where the character, or avatar, visits Paris in a 3-d world and learns French during his visit.
In reality, it is near impossible for me to create such a setting so I have to settle for the tools that will allow me to make my course as welcoming and interactive as possible. The tools I plan on using are the Wimba Voice Board and Vimba Presentation, VoiceThread, Discussion boards.
Students will create their own content by contributing to discussion boards, recording their voice, and presenting on a cultural topic related to French and Francophone countries. Even though my current class is face-to-face, I have asked students to join discussion board on Blackboard and tell me which French songs or movies they have seen and write a short description. I have really enjoyed my students’ input, I learn a lot about them in this way.
I am just learning to record my own voice and to use screencast websites. It will be a good idea for online instructors to have a resource page so that we can easily find tools and also see which tool worked for which instructor.
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