1 / 18

USING VIRTUAL WORLDS IN LANGUAGE LEARNING

USING VIRTUAL WORLDS IN LANGUAGE LEARNING. Heidi Rontu, D. Phil., Director Taija Swanström, Coordinator in Swedish Language Aalto University, Finland. What is a Virtual World? - Second Life as an example. 3D world where you move around with an avatar

holden
Download Presentation

USING VIRTUAL WORLDS IN LANGUAGE LEARNING

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. USING VIRTUAL WORLDS IN LANGUAGE LEARNING Heidi Rontu, D. Phil., Director Taija Swanström, Coordinator in Swedish Language Aalto University, Finland

  2. What is a Virtual World?- Second Life as an example • 3D world where you move around with an avatar • Games, customer service, shops, culture, education etc. • Owned by Linden Lab, USA • Communication through chat or voice

  3. Dresden Gallery in Second Life

  4. The Use Virtual Worlds in the Teaching of Languages • Provides an authenticenvironment • Lowers the mentalthreshold for using the language • The use of an avatarprovides the students a safeplayground for using the language • Addsplayfulness to the learningprocess

  5. National Language Context in Finland • Finland’sofficialbilingualism - 2 national languagesFinnish and Swedish • Swedishpopulation5,8% • Swedishpopulationmostlybilingual (cf. Finnishmonolingual) • Swedishpopulation in the Western and Southern parts of Finland

  6. National Language Context in Finland • In highereducation • Mandatory for allFinnishstudents to show proficiency in the second national language at level B1 (minimum) • Level B1 • Proficiency as an independentlanguageuser • Elementaryproficiencywithinownarea of expertice

  7. Challenges in the Teaching of Swedish • Lowproficiencylevel • Lowmotivation, attitudinalproblems • The on-goingpoliticaldebate in society • Contact to authenticlanguageenvironmentsscarse • Use of Swedishoftenlimited to the classroomenvironment

  8. Second Life at Aalto University • Initiatedby a pilot of teachingSwedish for international students in cooperation with otheruniversities • Challenges • Lowlevel of technicalproficiencyamong international students • Access to properteachingfacilities in Second Life insufficient • No systematicacces to technicalsupport for teachers

  9. Second Life at Aalto University • Nextstep: development of the use of Second Life in the teaching of Swedish for Finnishstudents • Aalto Universityprovidesproperinfrastructure for Second Life (Aalto archipelagoincludingLabLife) • Technical support and pedagogicalteamwork with anotherdepartment at the universitydoingresearch on the use of Second Life • Language supportfromSwedishspeakingstudents in translatingmaterials to Swedish

  10. Second Life in practice • Different environments used: • Travelling in Second Life using chat • Role play in Aalto LabLife using voice • Test in a laboratory • The use of both speaking and writing • Simulation of real-life conversations

  11. Lab Life

  12. Traveling in Second Life

  13. Role play in Lab Life

  14. Test in a virtual laboratory

  15. Research in the teaching project Researchgroup at the department of industrialproduction (Palomäki & Nordbäck 2011) • Researchquestions: • Studentsexperiences in using Second Life • The development of languageproficiency • Methods: • Studentquestionaire • Vocabularytest with a controlgroup (notusing Second Life)

  16. Research in the teaching project The results • Studentexperienceoverallpositive • Learning experiencemorerelaxed, interactive and activating • Studentsmotivated to useforeignlanguagemorefreely and openly • Students’ ownreflection on theirimprovement in discussionskillspositive • Use of Second Life a positiveexperience; highlevel of willingness to useitagain • Proficiencylevelslightlybetterthan in the controlgroup

  17. Teacher experiences • Technical support faced problems • Centrally managed IT environment • Access to continuous technical support when using Second Life with the students • Pedagogical support needs development • The planning of the use of multimodality in teaching • The implimentation of multimodality, e.g. virtaul learning environments • Time allocation for the planning and implementation phases

  18. In Conclusion • When succesful the use of virtual learning environments is both fun and a great learning experience for the student and the teacher • A good tool for motivating the students and lowering attitudinal obstacles

More Related