ARMY POLYTECHNIC SCHOOL

1. ARMY POLYTECHNIC SCHOOL DEPARTMENT OF LANGUAGES APPLIED LINGUISTICS IN ENGLISH CAREER - DISTANCE LEARNING EDUCATION VIRTUAL CLASSROOMS AS A STRATEGY TO IMPROVE THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE ACQUISITION OF STUDENTS OF THE COMPUTING FACULTY BELONGING TO “UNIVERSIDAD CATÓLICA DE CUENCA” DURING THE TERM OCTOBER – DECEMBER 2010 BY: Jenny Karina Vizñay Durán

2. ProblematicSituation Part I

3. IDENTIFICATION OF THE PROBLEM Students are notabletocommunicate in English Resources Techniques Methods Strategies Reduced Interaction Between Students A poor English Language Acquisition

4. VARIABLES WORKING OUT Independent Variable Dependent Variable Virtual Classrooms as a Strategy Englishacquisitionimprovement

5. OBJECTIVES To demonstrate that the use of technological teaching methods as Virtual Classrooms assist the students to improve their English language acquisition. GENERAL • To promote the use of Virtual Classrooms to practice the target language. • To show that the use of this technology influences on the English learning in a better way. • To explain how to use Virtual Classrooms for the teaching-learning purpose. SPECIFIC

6. JUSTIFICATION English is the key language to communicate with people all over the world. In fact, this language is a necessary tool for everyone in every fields of work and studies. Even though its importance, many people are not interested in learning it maybe due to a lack of using the appropriate tools for teaching English, by teachers, in order to grab the student’s attention and interest.

7. Theoretical Framework Part II

8. CHAPTER I Theoretical and Conceptual Focus T E A C H I N G L E A R N I N G P R O C E S S

9. CHAPTER II English LanguageTeachingMethodology Affective Linguistic Cognitive CONSTRUCTIONISM CONSTRUCTIVISM

10. CHAPTER III Technological Tools as a Complement in Education VIRTUAL SPACES REAL VIRTUAL HOMOGENIZER synthetic reality

11. VIRTUAL CLASSROOMS NO GEOGRAPHIC LIMITS ALL YOUR SENSES WORKING NO TIME EASY ACCESS

12. Methodologies of Virtual Classrooms Asynchronic Synchronic Polarizing

13. CHAPTER IV New Trendstoimprove English LanguageAcquisition Methodology ExperimentingwithMethodology

14. ResearchProcedure Part III

15. Population 230 Sample 29

16. HypothesisAnalysis & Interpretation of results Part IV

17. Hypothesis System

18. ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION OF RESULTS

21. GRAPHICAL INTERPRETATION OF THE MEAN VALUE IN THE EXPERIMENTAL GROUP (PRE & POST TEST)

22. CONCLUSION • The use of Virtual Classrooms as a Strategytoimprove English LanguageAcquisitionhad positive results.

23. RECOMMENDATION • Suggest to English teachers and train them in the use of technological tools like Virtual Classrooms as a complement in the English Language Acquisition, because it was demonstrated this strategy allows you to grab the students’ attention to work in an interactive way and learn in a funny way.

24. PROPOSAL Technical guide to use BUSUU VIRTUAL CLASSROOM Part V

25. GENERAL OBJECTIVES To develop a technical guide for helping students to create an account in: www.busuu.com for learning English in a funnier way. SPECIFIC OBJECTIVES To persuade students to create his/her own account to have access to this virtual classroom (virtual community) for learning English. DEVELOPMENT  In this technical guide students will learn how to: Create an account in busuu Use busuu for learning grammar, listening, speaking, writing and chat sessions.

26. 1. Create an account in busuu 2. Use busuu for learning grammar, listening, speaking, writing and chat sessions.

28. Conclusion of thisResearch Project * Eg have improved their English Language Acquistion with the help of virtual classrooms. * Students are happy with the use of this Strategy as a complement in their education. * Virtual Classrooms help to teachers in their classes. * Virtual Classrooms can be considered as an assistant to teachers.