European Day of LanguagesIntroduction to SpeakApps

www.speakapps.org

15.15-15.30 Welcome by Sake Jager 15.30-16.30 David Singleton (Trinity College Dublin) ‘Life rather than age’

Interact through #speakappsEDL16.30-16.50 Coffee break16.50-17.45 Demonstration of the tools17.45-18.00 SpeakApps after 2012

www.speakapps.org

About SpeakApps

• Life Long Learning Project, 2011-2012• Partners:

• Universitat Oberta de Catalunya• Rijksuniversiteit Groningen• University of Jyväskylä• Jagiellonian University Krakow• Dublin City University

• Development of tools and tasks for oral production and spoken interaction• Open Educational Resources

Relevance for language teaching and learning

• Plurilingualism key objective in Europe• Strong demand for languages overall• Dwindling numbers of language students in traditional institutions• Institutions are facing the challenge of “reinventing themselves”• New methods of teaching and learning are needed• Internet technologies as facilitating tools

• SpeakApps tools:• Used with large numbers of students in UOC• Provide a way of offering students more and enhanced practice outside the

classroom• Based on task-based, communicative approaches to language learning• Compatible with language learning based on CEFR

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David Singleton, professor of Applied

Linguistics (Trinity College Dublin)

Video lecture: ‘Life rather than age’

Interact through #speakappsEDL5

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Introduction to SpeakApps

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Why this project?

Speaking is considered the most difficult skill when learning a second or

foreign language

•Especially grammar, vocabulary and fluency are difficult

•The learner tries to compensate these problems by using synonyms and general

knowledge, guessing and by asking for clarification

•Language learners learn to speak by

• Talking to other learners or preferably native speakers

• Listening to the radio, podcasts et cetera

• And by watching films / TV with subtitles in the target language

SpeakApps wants the learner to help practicing and improving their oral skills online

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3 online tools

Oral production: LANGblog

- asynchronous communication

- multimediablog with audio en video

Oral interaction: Tandem & Videochat

- synchronous communication

- ‘regulated’ and ‘self-regulated / autonomous’

- ‘open’ tasks

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Oral production

LANGblog

Blog in wordpress

Various tasks

Comment with text, audio, video

Through the website or from the computer

Practice

Spontaneous speech

Not too long

Give students a reason to listen to each other

Feedback

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Oral interaction

Tandem

Autonomous in pairs

With Skype, Adobe Connect, Elluminate and Videochat

A cms with an interface for the teacher and student

Different tasks like:

•Spot the difference

•Describe images / objects / direction

•Ranking

•Guessing

•Role-play

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Oral interaction

Videochat

•1-6 participants

•Integrated record and archive

•Written chat

•Mute and solo

•Link to Tandem

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Demonstration

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Results from pilots 2011-2012

Groningen

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Pilots 2011-2012

Rijksuniversiteit Groningen

•Approximately 120 students

•3 tasks in LANGblog

•1 / 2 tasks with Videochat

•Related to CEFR / course material

Eind

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Results Pilots 2011-2012

SpeakApps is…

Accessible and user-friendly

‘Active’ students improve their speaking skills significantly

Tasks with feedback are appreciated the most

Feedback from the teacher is preferred the most

Students appreciate the link between CEFR (http://erknederlands.org) and own recording in

Langblog!

More video than audio

Rather tasks that are related to the course material

Teacher-regulated is preferred

Practicing takes time

Voorbeeld: http://langblog.speakapps.org/speakapps-24/?p=10

Eind

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Teacher training

Online SpeakApps docententraining

Module 1 teaching / learning online

Module 2 oral production

Module 3 oral interaction

Module 4 pedagogical design

4 weeks (February 2012 online)

3 weeks (June-July 2012 Groningen)

4 weeks (October 2012 online Nt2 / NVT)

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5. Online community: delen en downloaden

- community voor taalleerders en taaldocenten

- kennis delen

- materiaal downloaden

- materiaal online gebruiken

- in Mahara

- laatste fase (september – december 2012)

On 31 December 2012

SpeakApps:

•Online platform with online ICT-applications and pedagogical framework

•Where language learners can practice their oral skills

•For language teachers and learners

Plugins for own LMS or

access to portal OUC

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Demonstration

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Try it yourself in Groningen Demo at

http://moodle.speakapps.org

Enrolment key: gdemo269

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