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ITMELT '99 Conference Abstracts

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On this page are the accepted abstracts for the conference. They are indexed in 3 ways:

On this site: Conference Home Page; Call for Papers; Hotel Accommodation, Conference Schedule.

Index of abstracts (by title):

 

Index of abstracts (by author):

Index of abstracts (by conference theme):

Plenary sessions

The conference papers are grouped around four themes - although a number overlap in content.

1. IT in English language learning and teaching, with reference to:

2. The development and implementation of hypermedia and multimedia educational systems

3. Computer-mediated communication: the Internet, virtual classrooms, information exchange systems, e-mail, video-conferencing, MOOs etc.

4. The management of educational IT, including:

 

IT in English language learning and teaching

 

The development and implementation of hypermedia and multimedia educational systems

 

Computer-mediated communication

 

The management of educational IT

Plenary Presentation

Strategies, Styles and Problem-Solving Processes in IT-mediated Language Learning

Christopher N. Candlin, Chair Professor of Applied Linguistics, Director, Centre for English Language Education & Communication Research, Faculty of Humanities & Social Sciences, City University of Hong Kong, E-mail: enopera@cityu.edu.hk

IT-mediated language learning is both conventional and innovatory in terms of the demands that it makes on learners’ strategies and styles in language learning. Too great an emphasis on innovation may mask the continuing relevance and importance of those strategies and styles that learners make use of and display in conventional language learning, yet which need adaptation to new modes of communicating and learning. At the same time, IT does present learners with distinct challenges and opportunities for engaging their strategies and styles in new and more complex tasks.

In addressing the nature of these tasks, this paper emphasises those strategies and styles from conventional learning which continue to have relevance, and outlines those learning innovations new media require. Drawing on existing research into second language acquisition in conventional modalities, the paper argues for IT-mediated problem-solving tasks calling on learners’ communicative as well as cognitive abilities which can be tailored towards different attentional resources of learners, favouring differential development within both processing and performance.

 

Living Lessons for university learners of English
Dr. Gino Yu
Associate Professor
Head, Multimedia Innovation Centre
Hong Kong Polytechnic University

 

A recent innovation in teaching has been the use of the world-wide web to deliver on-line lessons. Education institutions are often keen to support this innovation, seeing the prospect of reduced costs, international exposure and global delivery of programmes to a larger, international body of students.

However, many existing on-line learning materials suffer from a teaching model that mirrors the lecture experience, and fails to take advantage of the many interactive possibilities of the Internet.

This paper introduces the concept of the ‘Living Lesson’ that evolves with student input. Learning through such lessons could be participatory, collaborative and involve ‘moderated exploration’. The paper presents a framework for the development of a web-based platform to create, deliver and support lesson-based education. The paper then describes the framework and considers how it may be applied to English Language Teaching.

Click here to read the full paper in on the Internet in HTML format.

Click here to read the full paper in Microsoft Word Format.

 

Student-centered frameworks for teaching IT

(Paper)

Gallian, Judy & Maggard, Jeff

Miyazaki International College

Miyazaki, Japan

 

The presenters will outline practical methods for integrating information technology into a first year content/EFL course at Miyazaki International College in Japan. Through the dynamic process of authoring and publishing course projects, students enrolled in Applied Information Science interact with technology through:

· word processing;

· scanning, manipulating and creating images, charts and graphs;

· collaborating on projects via e-mail;

· collecting information from databases;

· designing individual and group web pages.

In the first half of this demonstration, participants will examine the interactive syllabus developed for the course and will be given techniques for tailoring their own student-centered "IT" syllabi. The positive results of using this model will be shown in the second half of the demonstration through examples of web-authoring and on-line threaded discussions by first-year college students. Participants will explore how to design activities that integrate learning styles preferences, language acquisition, content study and computer literacy. Specific attention will be given to classroom strategies for teaching the use of e-mail, evaluating on-line sources, on-line citation, word-processing, converting documents into HTML, scanning, and adding graphical data.

At the conclusion, participants will be given a handout of the Benchmarks for Computer Literacy and materials on learning styles.

 

Giving learners something to do with concordance data

(Workshop)

Tom Cobb

Université du Québec

Montréal, Quebec, Canada

 

I have developed an approach to computer-assisted vocabulary expansion that takes advantage of two new insights on vocabulary acquisition and answers two old questions about learner concordancing.

The first insight is that the richness of word learning from multi-contextual encounters offline can be replicated online eliminating a good deal of time and randomness. The second is a proposal that the time-course of vocabulary acquisition can be reduced by taking advantage of what is known about massed vs. distributed learning. My corpus-based lexical tutor combines these ideas in an environment where learners find lexical information in a corpus and practice using it in CALL activities that are designed to maximise learning through principled spacing of episodes. Learner data from use of this program will be presented.

Finally, two questions about learner concordancing will be answered.

Click here for the full paper in Internet (HTML) format.

Click here for the full paper in Microsoft Word format.

Online learning communities: balancing the human and technical

(Paper)

Philip Latham

The Australian Centre for Languages

Sydney, Australia

Online learning communities for EFL: A case study"

The real power of the World Wide Web as a learning resource lies not with its ability to provide access to large amounts of data on computers from around the globe, but in its facilitation of communication between users.

This paper will present a case study of an EFL community web site. The ACL EnglishNet has been developed by the Australian Centre for Languages in Sydney. The site aims to, not only provide web based activities which can be done at any time, but also use these as a stimulus to facilitate synchronous and asynchronous communication between users - thus creating a more interactive learning experience.

Participants will be shown the various sections of the site and the educational rationale for their inclusion will be commented on.

Reflections on the process of constructing the site, and the various resources that were used will also be presented.

 

MultiMedia Movies

(Paper)

Gardner, David

English Centre, University of Hong Kong

Hong Kong

Target-language movies are an extremely popular resource in many self-access centres. This resource has a pedagogical value in that it provides language immersion. However, attempts to enhance the language learning experience through worksheets and activities are often not successful. The most common learner reaction is to ignore the additional resource and concentrate solely on the movie.

This paper describes a research project which explored the potential of computer control of target language movies as a way of providing an enhanced language learning experience that could not be ignored. The project studied the use of three interactive video programs by a mixed group of Hong Kong University students in a self-access context. All the programs provided supplemental language learning opportunities based around grammar, vocabulary and comprehension. However, each program used a different approach to providing information about the movie and offering the supplemental learning opportunities. Most importantly, the locus of control varied from one program to another.

The project exposed some significant differences in user behaviour and preferences which have implications for the future design of interactive media.

 

Using Virtual communities to create real bonds

(Paper)

Desloge Patrick & Wong, Lillian

English Centre, University of Hong Kong

Hong Kong

 

Using a class of adult part-time degree students as a model, this paper will describe the process and results of the integration of a course curriculum and web-based discussion forum designed to strengthen the ties between:

This paper will argue that the three factors critical to the successful integration of this technology are: firstly, active participation and moderation by the course tutors; secondly, seamless integration of the discussion board into the course curriculum; and thirdly, creating opportunities for students to take ownership of the board.

Two team-teachers will discuss the technical and logistical implications of creating and maintaining discussion forums as well as the challenges involved with making this virtual space become an integral part of the course curriculum and a place were participants can build a community. The authors will compare model tasks that are purely online with those that combine classroom and online collaboration. Finally, the authors will share and discuss empirical and anecdotal data revealing the students' perceptions of how the use of this technology affected their learning experience and their relationships with the tutors and peers.

(Link to Powerpoint presentation)

An EAP module via the Merlin internet learning environment

(Paper)

David Oakey

Language Institute, University of Hull,

Hull, England

 

This paper will present a component of a 10-credit English for Academic Purposes (EAP) module which is delivered via Merlin, a web-based learning environment being developed at the University of Hull. The students taking this module come from a wide range of departments, and their other course commitments mean that they cannot always attend classes. This paper will highlight the benefits which we have found to result from a shift to web-based course delivery and will argue that, in university contexts where student numbers are increasing and classroom contact hours are limited, web-based distance learning can offer a viable complement to face-to-face classroom interaction.

Examples will be presented of how placing module content in a password-protected web-based environment has allowed our students to access the module independently outside scheduled class times; how it has enabled tutors to give written or oral feedback on students' individual or group performance of written or oral tasks; and how it has simplified to some extent the time-consuming administrative aspects of a module with a large and diverse student body. Discussion of unresolved distance learning issues such as student IT unfamiliarity, security, assessment, and the provision of staff training and support will be encouraged.

Click here to read the full paper in on the Internet in HTML format.

Click here to read the full paper in Microsoft Word Format.

Bridging the gulf between teachers and computers - a teacher-based action research project in CALL staff development

(Paper)

Ian Brown

Australian Pacific College

Sydney, Australia

Computers will never replace teachers, but teachers who use computers may replace those who don't. The use of CALL in teaching English requires teachers who are not only competent with the programs being used but who are also aware of the pedagogical and curricula reasons for using them. Good programs cannot bring about successful learning without proficient guidance from teachers aware of what they are doing and why. Teacher training and development is struggling to keep up with the requirements of these new technologies, often resulting in teachers being thrown in at the deep end, required to use CALL because of student expectations and school policy, yet not familiar or confident enough in its use. Consequently the full potential that CALL offers to language teaching is not fulfilled. A gulf often grows between those interested and innovative in the use of technology and those who, sometimes even begrudgingly, go along with its use.

This paper reports on an in-house action research project carried out among teachers at a TESOL college to update their expertise in CALL. Different methods were explored to allow the more computer aware to share their knowledge. The aim was to break down the gulf between the different users and the computers, to expand understanding and promote competent and successful use of CALL throughout the college.

Click here to see the whole paper as an Internet page.

Click here to see the whole paper in Microsoft Word Format.

CALL for Oral Skills in English: the development, implementation and operation of the Computer Assisted Voice Mail Oral Practice System (CAVMOPS) at the Open University of Hong Kong

(Paper)

Anita Y.K. Poon, K.C. Tang and Tang, Thomas

School of Education and Languages, The Open University of Hong Kong

Hong Kong

 

To develop essential oral language skills, learners need many opportunities to practise the language in realistic situations. This requires substantial face-to-face contact. Since the Open University of Hong Kong adopts the mode of distance learning, offering English language courses does pose a significant problem.

There has been a growing trend in the application of computer technology to language learning. The computerized voice mail system has become quite popular in the commercial world in recent years. Modifying such a system into a computer assisted voice mail oral practice system (CAVMOPS) is a possible way to resolve the problem posed by learning English through distance education.

The CAVMOPS allows students to dial in, listen for information and record their responses as voice messages. Tutors can dial in, listen to the responses of students, make comments in the format of voice mail, and award marks using telephone keypads. The system is flexible in terms of timing. The students and tutors can choose their own time to access the system.

This paper consists of three parts. It starts with a description of CALL technology and the system design of the CAVMOPS. The second part focuses on the functions of the system. The final part discusses how such a system can enhance the oral skills of learners of English.

Click here to see the whole paper as an Internet page.

Click here to see the whole paper in Microsoft Word Format.

Evaluation of an on-line rater training and monitoring system

(Paper)

Jan Hamilton & Sue Reddel

English Language Centre, Hong Kong Polytechnic University

Hong Kong

While conventional assessment rater-training processes involve face-to-face meetings of raters, the logistics of regularly bringing together a large number of raters for training and monitoring is problematic. Developments in IT have now made it possible for rater training information presentation and rater discussion to take place through computer-mediated communication channels rather than in face-to-face settings.

This paper will introduce an on-line system of rater training and monitoring being developed to support the Hong Kong Polytechnic University English Language Centre’s credit-based English for Academic Purposes curriculum. Accessed through the Centre’s computer intranet, this package enables the Centre’s service teachers to:

The researchers investigated the users’ perception of this package firstly in terms of its accessibility (system design, instructions and operation) and secondly its value as a system of rater training and monitoring. Data was collected by questionnaire, interview and think-aloud protocols. The findings from this study will have implications for research into rating training processes, rater behaviour and computer-mediated communication.

Click here to see the whole paper as an Internet page.

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The Effects of Media on Listening Tasks in Different Classroom Settings

(Paper)

Juei-ching Chung

Taipei, Taiwan

This paper discusses a research project which compared the effects of audio, video and multimedia on the learning outcomes of 102 low-intermediate Chinese students of English in Taiwan. It was hypothesised that the students would take advantage of each medium's cognitively relevant capabilities to access listening comprehension and language production.

Three separate groups of students were presented with listening strategies in authentic contexts delivered respectively by audio with pictures (audiocassette), video with advance organizers (videotape) and interactive multimedia (CD-ROM). The latter group was simultaneously involved in an e-mail keypal project with topics relating to each listening task. The advance organizer class was also attended as the control group to take the comprehension and production tests after viewing the video.

This paper will first discuss the characteristics of each of the above media as it was implemented in language pedagogy. It will then discuss the nature of email writing. It will conclude by demonstrating how learners' achievements were related to the structure of mental representations and cognitive processes.

 

The use of a bilingual corpus in the teaching of legal English: an experimental study

(Paper)

XU Xun-feng & May Fan

Department of English, Hong Kong Polytechnic University

Hong Kong

This presentation will present the findings of a study that attempts to discover the usefulness of a bilingual corpus in the teaching of legal English.

The English/Chinese corpus has been built by collecting English and Chinese texts from the World Wide Web with hyperlinks inserted at the sentence level. The corpus has been made available on-line together with a KWIC concordancer. To explore the usefulness of the bilingual corpus, a small case study was conducted and the findings indicated that students considered it useful.

The aim of this project is to conduct an experiment to find out the effectiveness of a bilingual corpus in the learning of legal English. The subjects who participated in the experiments were two groups of year-three students. The instruments for data collection included comprehension tasks and interviews. The process of data collection was also be video-taped.

In the presentation, the use of the bilingual corpus will be introduced and the findings of the experimental study will be reported. These findings will be of relevance to teachers of legal English and all those who are interested in how a bilingual corpus may be of help to students in learning legal English in the Hong Kong context.

 

Bringing the text closer

(Workshop)

John Milton

Hong Kong University of Science & Technology

Hong Kong

This presentation will focus on an interactive program (WordPilot) that allows learners of English to address lexical error while acquiring a more effective vocabulary than can normally be learned from traditional 'stuffing-the-duck' methods.

The program overcomes many of the limitations of current electronic references such as concordancers and dictionaries. It combines the features of a concordancer, a dictionary, and a thesaurus, while also giving users access to web content. In particular, it provides learners with:

It also provides teachers of English with the means to generate reliable classroom tasks. Examples of such electronic and paper-based classroom tasks will be distributed.

 

Production of web-based self-access materials

(Workshop)

Leong, Terri

English Language Centre, Hong Kong Polytechnic University

Hong Kong

The Internet is becoming a powerful option for teaching and learning. It is important for teachers to be aware of this pedagogical option and equip ourselves to meet changes in the way we teach. One way to address these changes is to be able to use the materials available on the Internet and adapt them to the needs of particular groups of students.

The focus of this presentation is on the use of authentic materials to develop self-access web materials and activities. Ideally speaking, such materials and activities should neither involve too much time nor too many technical skills. The development of such materials should be an on-going process with an integration of IT into teachers’ daily chores.

A number of free authoring tools and utilities are available for teachers to create web-based materials. A user-friendly interface in the tool-design is a key to successful use of such tools. It helps to ease the feeling of alienation felt by the users. The presenter will demonstrate the use of some free utilities or tools to create study materials for students. The rationale behind creating such materials and activities will also be discussed and a successful experience of using some web-based tasksheets will be shared. Participants will then work on designing some web-based activities for language learning.

 

OACES: laying the foundations for adaptation of a teaching unit
to IT-integrated practices

(Paper)

Bruce, Nigel and Desloge, Patrick

English Centre, University of Hong Kong

Hong Kong

 

OACES - Online Academic Communication Environment and Support - is a project supported by the Hong Kong University Grants Commission that is aimed at creating a supportive environment on the Web where tertiary teachers and students in Hong Kong can use internet technology to promote their educational goals.

This paper begins with a retrospective review of the incremental and often unforeseen steps that needed to be taken in order to establish the basic hardware and software infrastructure necessary to bring a team of 35 tertiary English-teaching colleagues towards a "comfort zone" with computer-mediated practices. Our pedagogical position from the beginning was that IT's educational potential was better realised through interaction and feedback than curricular "delivery". Central to this project was the provision of a tutorial and workshop system of support for teachers wishing to integrate IT into their curricula. The tutorial and workshop program needed to address issues of computer apprehension among teachers brought about by a radical change in institutional expectations, as the University moved to a laptop campus. The OACES team needed to provide support that would demonstrate the relevance, usefulness and ease of execution of various IT-based functions, features and programs, and show how users could incorporate these into their teaching and learning practices.

 

How can I stimulate my colleagues to use IT for teaching English? Some ideas for promoting the use of software on networks and the web among less enthusiastic teachers

(Workshop)

Andrew Stokes

Clarity Language Consultants

Hong Kong

Some teachers are extremely interested in using IT to help their students learn English. They actively seek out effective software, interesting web sites and other IT materials to help them in their teaching and they often develop very innovative ways of using IT in their teaching. These resources, however, are often underused and under-appreciated because other teachers in the department are not as comfortable with the use of IT in their teaching. How can enthusiastic IT teachers to provide effective assistance to their colleagues?

In the workshop, we will focus on the following areas.

 

 Lexicon driven learning on the internet: a design strategy for a WWW "virtual language learning classroom"

(Paper)

Greaves, Chris

English Language Centre, Hong Kong Polytechnic University

Hong Kong

The Hong Kong ‘Virtual Language Centre’ (VLC) is a dedicated language learning web site which provides a broad range of language learning and teaching materials for self-access study or for teachers to use in their classes. A central feature of the VLC approach has been the development of a customized bilingual lexicon specifically designed to help Chinese students, which at the same time can be fully integrated into the diverse language learning activities on the VLC.

A guiding principle of the VLC methodology is "Lexicon-driven learning" (the integration of vocabulary, lexicon, concordancing and multimedia in a unified way). It results from the convergence of the various traditions in CALL and is the key design feature of the VLC. The VLC web server is designed to be an accessible medium for the integration of various approaches to language learning and aims to bring these disparate traditions to as wide and diverse an audience as possible

This paper describes the "lexicon-driven learning" strategy employed in this approach to WWW language learning with particular reference to the following VLC features:

 

Click here to see the whole paper as an Internet page.

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 A Guide for Evaluating ESL Listening Resources on the World Wide Web

(Paper)

Howard Hao-jan Chen

Foreign Languages Division, Department of General Education

National Taiwan Ocean University

Taiwan

 

Penny Ur (1997) pointed out that language learners need to be exposed to different authentic listening materials to successfully develop their listening competence. Advances in web-based multimedia technologies such as streaming audio and video have transformed the World Wide Web into a rich listening resource for ESL/EFL learners. Numerous audio and video programs are available online and can be accessed easily via any web browser. However, the overwhelming amount of English listening materials, including authentic materials for native speakers and specially prepared materials for non-native speakers, needs to be evaluated carefully so that teachers and learners can make effective use of them. Although there are various evaluation criteria available, they are not necessarily suitable for ESL/EFL sites.

This paper proposes several evaluation criteria to examine the potential of web sites as good listening resources for ESL/EFL learners. These criteria are drawn from the suggestions made by language acquisition researchers and newly published theses on Web site evaluation. The paper also demonstrates how these criteria were applied in a survey of twenty web sites, discussing the contents, access, and design (e.g., interactivity) of the individual sites. Participants will gain a clear view of the potential and limitations of existing listening resources on the Web and will take away a useful guideline for conducting their own future surveys of Web resources.

 

Exploring the use of PowerPoint in the Secondary English language classroom

(Workshop)

Sarah Rigby and Kitty Wong

Addison Wesley Longman Ltd.

Hong Kong

Ever since the announcement of the IT initiative in the Chief Executive’s Policy Address in 1997, schools have felt an increasing need to incorporate IT into their teaching practice. However, teachers vary in their degree of readiness to use IT. The majority of them have little experience and lack confidence in using IT to teach.

At Addison Wesley Longman, we are exploring the use of the PowerPoint presentation software in the language classroom and developing materials to support our series of textbooks. At the moment, PowerPoint is mainly used in the commercial sector or tertiary institutes for presentations. It is seldom used in secondary schools for language teaching purposes. However, we believe that PowerPoint is an effective tool in language teaching. It has the potential to make lessons more interesting and interactive, and to encourage students to think more actively.

The presentations we have prepared tie in closely with the course materials. They include four main aspects: vocabulary, grammar, writing and study tools. This study aims at sharing the experience of developing PowerPoint materials for language teaching and the data we collected from teachers from questionnaires and interviews.

 

Exploiting an electronic alternative to the red pen

(Paper)

Hilary Bower

English Language Centre, Hong Kong Polytechnic University

Hong Kong

Mono-cultural language students with a common educational background will, when given a written task, tend to generate a broadly similar pattern of error. Teachers may recognise these patterns but are often constrained in the amount of corrective feedback they can give by, among other things, the physical "between the lines" space available on the document. One way around this is to eliminate paper entirely from the feedback process by giving feedback in electronic form.

This paper describes the rationale, development, and operation of a method of combining the Comment and AutoCorrect features of Microsoft Word to place comments directly on to a word-processed document, rather than a hard copy. The method enables teachers to devote as much time as they deem appropriate to provide a constantly evolving commentary on commonly-occurring errors. Through consultation with the learners concerned and comparative examination of the amended drafts that result, the comments that prove most effective can be stored in a "bank" and attached semi-automatically as the error recurs. The student benefits from receiving a much fuller, more explanatory feedback than is normally possible, in the form in which the document was originally created.

 

The Mystery Photo Album: defining a CALL paradigm

(Paper)

Ken Keobke, City University of Hong Kong

Hong Kong

Computers in the classroom have (in some cases, some places) fostered changes to the practice of the teaching and learning of languages and give rise to new models or moves toward new ways of thinking, about how language learning may take place. Such models change or shift over time as the factors within the teaching and learning process itself are revised.

This paper takes Dunkin and Biddle’s 1974 model for the study of classroom teaching as a traditional view of what goes on in the classroom and examines how it fits and does not fit CALL. For the purposes of this paper, a CD-ROM work-in-progress The Mystery Photo Album is used as an example of the changing role of CALL materials. The Mystery Photo Album, supported by a Hong Kong Language Fund Grant, offers a multiple narrative learning adventure set in the Hong Kong context both to directly teach language and to encourage learners to adopt autonomous language learning practices.

Encouraging creative writing through Information Technology

(Paper)

Grace Pow

St. Paul’s Convent School

Hong Kong

This paper focuses on how the integration of Information Technology in an English Language project has nurtured students’ creativity in writing and aroused their interest in current affairs. The contents are related to the four aims stated in the Education Blueprint for the 21st Century - creativity, language, enjoyment and commitment.

In the project, students were divided into groups of six or seven. They surfed the World Wide Web (WWW) for articles related to the local education system. After reading, they created a webpage, entitled ‘The cyberclassroom in the 21st Century’, which consists of a weekly diary of a student in 2050. Some sections of the diaries are hyperlinked to other useful educational websites. Follow-up activities for the entire class included writing synopses of recommended websites.

The paper evaluates the ways in which the project provided opportunities for students to initiate new ideas, share opinions and polish their writing skills.

Click here to see the whole paper as an Internet page.

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Using a corpus of student report writing

to help students write a better report

(Paper)

Linda Lin

The English Language Centre, Hong Kong Polytechnic University

Hong Kong

This paper describes a project focusing on the use of a corpus of student report writing to improve students’ report writing skills and that will also facilitate teachers’ ESL research. The project uses a corpus of about 100,000 words built up from students’ writing.

The project aims to explore possible ways that a corpus of student report writing can be used in helping students improve their report writing. It intends to do this by presenting the common derivated usage in verb tense and voice, syntactical structure, idiomatic use and vocabulary use - especially that of conjunctions and connectives in the genre of reporting writing so as to raise the awareness of their such use in this genre.

This paper will first of all look into ways of employing the data from the corpus of student writing to help classroom teaching. It then investigates ways of integrating the data into exercises composed for students’ autonomous learning through multi-media. Suggestions on the use of the corpus of student writing for teachers’ research on the principles of ESL teaching and second language acquisition will also presented for consideration and discussion.

Click here to see the whole paper as an Internet page.

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Putting Individual Writing Tutorials On-Line

(Paper)

Geoff Millar

Centre for Communication Skills & ESL, University of Melbourne

Australia

With the growth of internationalisation and concern for issues of cultural diversity and equity in Australian universities, campuses across the country have seen the need to establish one-to-one tutorial services to which NESB [non-English-speaking background] students can submit drafts of written assignments for help with problems of language and presentation. One-to-one tuition is, of course, not only a labour-intensive form of instruction, but one which can pose substantial logistic problems particularly at peak times in the semester, when two to three times more students may seek sessions with the service than it has the physical space to accommodate.

This paper describes a Web-based system designed to extend the flexibility with which such a service can respond to student needs. Simple in conception, such a system turns out to be surprisingly complex to implement within a specific institutional setting, and given the current limitations of web-based technology. Pedagogically, it raises a question with ramifications for CALL in particular, and for other forms of computer-aided distance learning: to what extent can asynchronous computer-mediated communication supplement or replace face-to-face communication between tutor and student?

This presentation will demonstrate the system described, discuss problems encountered in its implementation, and consider some theoretical issues pertaining to evaluating its effectiveness as a medium of language instruction.

 

The use of concordancing to assist university students

with the writing of final-year dissertations

(Paper)

Kate Mead

English Language Centre, Hong Kong Polytechnic University

Hong Kong

Almost all final-year students at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University are required to submit a substantial dissertation, in English, as part of their degree programme. This is a demanding piece of work but, because of a lack of curriculum space, no English language programme is offered to support students in their final year of study and with the writing up of the dissertation. To overcome this lack of a formal programme, students are now able to obtain assistance with their writing through the use of computer concordance software.

A corpus of over 500,000 words of academic writing has been compiled which students are able to search in order to locate examples of the language used in this particular genre. This paper will describe and demonstrate how concordance software can assist students with analysing texts to identify how language is typically used. A demonstration of examples of specific usage will include common collocations with such nouns as 'procedure', 'experiment', 'research', 'conclusions'; the most common use of tense, prepositions and articles; the language used to refer to the work of other authors; and the language used to 'hedge' statements.

 

An interactive multimedia package for developing English communication skills in job interview situations

Richard Pemberton (Hong Kong University of Science & Technology) and Phil Milton (City University of Hong Kong)

English communication skills and interview performance continue to be important factors for Hong Kong employers when hiring graduates. However, there is an acute shortage of teaching/learning material to develop interview skills that is appropriate for the HK tertiary students, particularly in the forms that are likely to have the most impact, i.e. video or interactive multimedia.

This presentation reports on a project to develop such teaching/learning material. The initial step was the production of a video (involving the same inter-institutional team) titled "Through Other Eyes" which is now widely available throughout the tertiary institutions in HK. A second proposal was submitted to the University Grants Committee (UGC) for allocation from the Teaching Development Grant to take the project into its second stage. Funding was approved in 1997/ 98 to produce an interactive CD-ROM aimed at further helping Hong Kong students develop effective communication skills in job interview situations. The CD-ROM currently in its production stage should be available for distribution (free of charge) to all UGC institutions in February 2000.

In addition to providing a sneak preview of the CD-ROM, the presentation will present an overview of the package together with an insight into how the original video was developed into a complete multimedia interactive package. The CD-ROM provides interactive tasks, which complement the original video segments and also presents advice, feedback and interaction with authentic Hong Kong employers and Company web sites.

 

Click here to see the whole paper as an Internet page.

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