LANGUAGE IN INDIA

Towards Meeting Global Challenge -
Cyber Based Instruction in Foreign Language Teaching

N. Jaishree, M.A., M.Phil., Ph.D. Candidate

Introduction

The purpose of this paper is to highlight the need for English teachers to introduce effective cyber-based instruction in their classes to nurture the perception quotient of the young learners. The paper also suggests useful websites to enhance ELT and construct communicative competency (See Appendix). It stresses the need to switch over from teacher-centered to student-centered language classroom to mould them to the current global challenges in business, education and technology, etc.

The History of CALL

Computers have been used for language teaching ever since the 1960's. According to Warschauer & Healey (1998), this 40-year period can be divided into three main stages:

1. Behaviorist CALL.
2. Communicative CALL.
3. Integrative CALL.

Each stage corresponds to a certain level of technology and certain pedagogical theories.

Behaviorist CALL

In the 1960's and 1970's the first form of computer-assisted Language Learning featured repetitive language drills, the so-called drill-and-practice method. It was based on the behaviorist learning model. The computer was viewed as little more than a mechanical tutor that never grew tired.

Behaviorist CALL was first designed and implemented in the era of the mainframe and the best-known tutorial system, PLATO, ran on its own special hardware. It was mainly used for extensive drills, explicit grammar instruction, and translation tests (Ahmad, et al., 1985).

Communicative CALL

Communicative CALL emerged in the 1970's and 1980's as a reaction to the behaviorist approach to language learning. Proponents of communicative CALL rejected behaviorist approaches at both the theoretical and pedagogical level. They stressed that CALL should focus more on using forms rather than on the forms themselves. Grammar should be taught implicitly and students should be encouraged to generate original utterances instead of manipulating prefabricated forms (Jones & Fortescue, 1987; Philips, 1987).

This form of computer-based instruction corresponded to cognitive theories which recognized that learning was a creative process of discovery, expression, and development. The mainframe was replaced by personal computers that allowed greater possibilities for individual work. Popular CALL software in this era included text reconstruction programmers and simulations.

Integrative CALL

The current stage of computer-assisted Language Learning is integrative CALL.

Communicative CALL was criticized for using the computer in an ad hoc and disconnected fashion and using the computer made 'a greater contribution to marginal rather than central elements' of language learning (Kenning & Kenning, 1990: 90).

Teachers have moved away from a cognitive view of communicative language teaching to a socio-cognitive view that emphasizes real language use in a meaningful, authentic context.

Integrative CALL seeks both to integrate the various skills of language learning (listening, speaking, writing, and reading) and to integrate technology more fully into language teaching (Warschauer & Healey, 1998).

To this end the multimedia-networked computer provides a range of informational, communicative, and publishing tools that are potentially available to every student.

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Compounds in Tolkappiyam and Balavyakaranam - A Comparison | Automatic Nominal Morphological Recognizer and Analyzer for Sanskrit: Method and Implementation | A Critical Study of The Wasteland - Poetry as Metaphor | Communicative Language Teaching - An Overview | Cinema and the New Media | Culture and Second Language Learning and Teaching - An Exploration in Tamil | R. K. Narayan's Humour in Swami and Friends | Towards Meeting Global Challenge - Cyber Based Instruction in Foreign Language Teaching | Novel Technologies, Engines and Mobiles in Language Learning | Role of Language in Effective Managerial Communication | Pragmatic Analysis of Politeness Theory | The Varied Horizon of Multimedia & Web Tools for English Language Acquisition in the Information Age | Challenges and Problems in the Teaching of Grammar | Some Features of Tirukkural Telugu Translations | Issues of Social and Ideological Empowerment in Contemporary Indian Women Writing in English | Does Stress-Shift Lead to Word-Class Conversion in English? | Insight through Body Language and Non-verbal Communication References in Tirukkural | Think-Aloud Protocol -- Elicitation of Strategy Use and Solution to Learning Problem | Voice of the Voiceless: Eugene O'Neill's The Hairy Ape and George Ryga's Indian - A Comparative Study | Inside the Haveli: A Study | HOME PAGE of February 2010 Issue | HOME PAGE | CONTACT EDITOR