Project Description

The educational use of ICT in teacher education and
distance language learning - opportunities,
challenges and ways forward - Project 1.3.2

Project Coordinator
Daphne Goodfellow, France

Expert Team
Gunther Abuja (Austria), Anne-Brit Fenner (Norway), Cecilia Garrido, (UK), Daphne Goodfellow (France), Zoltan Poor (Hungary), Danièle Geffroy Konstacky (Czech Republic), Seppo Tella (Finland)

1. CONTEXT
A Think Tank was held from May 31 to June 2, 2001 to identify areas of priority in the integration of Information and Communication Technologies into Distance Language Learning (DLL) in the coming years.

Six major problem areas were identified during the 3-day Think Tank:

1) The disparity between material writers and computer experts;
2) The lack of objective criteria to assess the efficiency of a given ICT tool to achieve specific learning objectives;
3) The lack of objective evaluation of what exactly is learned with the help of ICT tools. Learning outcomes need to be formulated and recognised by all the stakeholders to reflect new modes of learning;
4) The isolation of teachers, teacher educators, material writers and curriculum/course designers in this new sector. This does not allow them to profit from sharing their successes and failures;
5) The lack of tried and tested teacher- educator courses for ICT in distance language learning;
6) The lack of provision for speaking practice and socialising (the latter is needed to prevent a drop in learner motivation over time) between individual learners in distance language learning programs in general. This may be even more pronounced when ICTs are the primary learning tools and environments.

2. AIMS AND OBJECTIVES / EXPECTED OUTCOMES OF THE PROJECT

Five areas of activity were proposed by the ECML for the ongoing project, based on ideas put forward by Think Tank participants. These activities will be initiated in the upcoming workshop and continued during the remainder of the project:

1) Collection of selected bibliography and webography on ICT in distance language learning;
2) Collection and presentation of case studies on the integration of ICT in distance and other types of language learning and in teacher education;
3) Evaluation of existing tools for ICT in (distance) language learning;
4) Design, development and piloting of a teacher education course module for the use of ICT in teacher education and (distance) language learning;
5) The use of an interactive platform (Basic Support for Collaborative Work, BSCW) for the exchange of ideas and experience, and the sharing of resources between teacher educators in different European countries.

The anticipated benefits
This project will draw on the experience of participants from a wide variety of backgrounds, who together will contribute to the development of avenues that will help achieve the full potential of the use of ICT in distance language learning and teacher education.

3. PROFILE OF PARTICIPANTS / PEOPLE INVOLVED

The Central workshop will welcome the participation of teachers and teacher educators with special interest, knowledge and/or experience in the use of ICT for distance language learning and/or teacher education. They should be prepared and in a position to actively participate in and contribute to the ongoing project, which begins with the workshop in June 2002 and ends in August 2003.

Prior to the nomination of participants it would be helpful if nominating authorities and subsequently potential participants could ask themselves the following questions:

1. The participant as a representative of his/her country:

• How well does he/she know the situation with respect to ICT in DLL and/or teacher education in his/her country?
• Will he/she be able to contribute information for discussion and exchange during the workshop?
• Will he/she be able to disseminate the information gathered at the workshop to others in his/her country?

2. The participant as an individual:

• What is my experience in this field? What will I be able to share with other participants? What do I want to learn from this experience?
• Am I committed to actively participating in the project after the workshop?

NB In the specific field of ICT in Distance Learning, two questions arise:

• Is it indispensable that the participant has considerable previous experience of using ICT in the classroom or in teacher training?
  The answer is no, but if the participant has no previous experience, he or she will feel disadvantaged given the limited length of the workshop and how much ground will be covered.
• Must the institution concerned already possess adequate facilities?
  The answer is yes, at least to a limited extent: if the knowledge acquired during the workshop is not put into practice immediately, it will inevitably be lost. Successful networking depends on access to ICT.

4. ACTION PLAN
25/27 January 2002
First meeting of the expert group
- to discuss the project set-up (project description, action plan, etc)
- to plan in detail the following steps: preparation for workshop, structure of platform, details for each of the four strands, etc.

5/6 April 2002
Preparatory meeting for the workshop in June

4 - 8 June 2002
Central Workshop
The workshop will present the objectives and the work plan and be dedicated to the preparation of the subsequent phases; there will be a strong element of hands-on preparation for the work, i.e. learning to use the interactive platform (BSCW) and other ICT tools.

November 2002
1st midterm project-evaluation meeting.

April 2003
2nd midterm project-evaluation meeting.

April to August 2003
Preparation of outcomes for presentation (e.g. publication, CD-ROM, BSCW) for the final conference in October 2003.

5. WORKING LANGUAGES

The working languages of the project will be English and French. At the workshop simultaneous interpretation will be provided between these two languages.

Participants must have an active competence in one of the two working languages (oral contributions to the debates, writing texts.) A passive knowledge of the other language (reading, analysis of documents) would be an advantage in sharing ideas and experience. German is another possible language of communication between workshop participants and coordinators.