E-mail and Second Language Speaking
Abstract
The purpose of this research is to investigate the potential of text-based asynchronous computer-mediated communication (CMC) for foreign/second language learning, with particular emphasis on the benefits that may accrue from such communication for the development of oral skills in the target language. The discussion will centre on that form of CMC known as electronic mail, more popularly referred to as e-mail. E-mail shares a number of features with other forms of CMC, both synchronous and asynchronous, which have been identified as beneficial to second language acquisition. It is suggested here, however, that the intrinsic characteristics of e-mail communication serve to recommend it in particular for this purpose.
Within the traditional four-skills approach to language teaching, the teaching and learning of second language (L2) and foreign language (FL) speaking skills do not receive as much attention as is the case with the more 'literate' skills of writing and reading, which would appear incongruous in the light of the prominence placed on 'speech' within the exposition of SLA theories. A variety of reasons for this state of affairs are proposed. It is further suggested that the potential of e-mail communication to nurture oral skill development may be particularly effectual in those settings where learners are denied the opportunities for receiving input and managing interaction in the target language or where those opportunities are limited. Language teaching has long had to cope with the difficult task of providing learners with the means to access to the input and interaction in the TL that have been identified as crucial to acquisition.
Such opportunities are clearly restricted within the limitations of the traditional language classroom set-up, and theorists and teachers have striven to overcome the difficulties in a variety of ways, such as group/pair oral in class, student exchanges, the use of L2 media, visits to the TL country, the recruitment of native speaker (NS) teachers. Whether difficulties are a result of geographical remoteness or a combination of economic and political factors, e-mail communication might be seen as providing a valuable, yet cost-effective, means of authentic interaction with native speakers (NSS) that might otherwise prove insufficient or impossible. The intention here is to investigate its potential to resolve such practical pedagogical problems.
Since the broadening of access to network technologies, at least in the West, priority has been placed on exposing learners to information and communication technology (ICT), the rationale being that familiarity and proficiency will be required for general life and work skills. Such sweeping predictions are often criticised for their lack of theoretical substance and research endorsement, and the same may be said with regard to the enthusiastic promotion of the technology in language learning; the need for research into potential applications is perhaps more pressing than ever before.
Computer-assisted language learning (CALL) has long endured criticism over what is seen as a technology-driven approach to research and implementation at the expense of what is seen as a proper concern for language teaching and learning theory. CALL has been associated moreover with discredited theoretical perspectives; courseware design involving activities and methodologies redolent of programmed learning and behaviourist perspectives, computer and design technology unable to offer the flexibility and processing power required for authentic communicative learning activities. While it is not the intention here to plead the case for CALL, it might be argued that its failure to live up to early promise has engendered entrenched scepticism and disillusionment that may dissuade, a priori, scholars, practitioners, and learners from the potential value to language learners of developing communications technology. To characterise computer network technology in the same terms as that of stand-alone CALL applications may deter researchers from investigating potential learning benefits and so represent a disservice to language learning.
A related issue is that of reservations surrounding the use of the Internet, often expressed in terms of fears over social dislocation at the individual and societal levels, access to unsuitable material, unequal access to the technology at national and global levels, literacy in crisis, and intellectual colonisation. These misgivings will be examined and judged in the light of how the related and often opposing perspectives in the literature conduct such debate, and invite us in some cases to redefine our frames of reference.
Over the past five years, there has been much interest in the implications of computer network technology for education. It has been claimed that the Internet represents a wave of change in human communication comparable to the development of writing and the invention of the printing press with powerful implications for societal and educational structures. Scholars assert that we are being compelled towards a new paradigm within which this ever more pervasive technology requires that we reassess traditional notions of society, education, and literacy. Research into computer-mediated communication in language learning has focused largely on the potential benefits of synchronous CMC for learners’ writing skills and motivation. Recent research (Weasenforth and Lucas, 1997; Biesenbach-Lucas and Weasenforth, 1998) has cast doubt on the capability of CMC activity to foster improvements in academic writing, and very little research (Beauvois, 1992, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998) has been carried out into the influence that such communication might exert on learners’ oral competence.
The discussion initially provides a societal and historical context for the present manifestations of CMC technology and their implementation in foreign/second language learning and teaching, with reference to its relation to CALL. The various forms of CMC are presented in terms of their characteristics and their implications for foreign/second language learning, thereby resolving some of the misconceptions surrounding terms of reference. The nature of the language and discourse engendered by CMC are analysed with reference to the important distinction between synchronous and asynchronous modes, and their relative impact in linguistic and pedagogic terms. Relevant evidence from the literature is adduced which places the language and interaction of e-mail nearer to the oral end of the written-oral spectrum, thus lending support to the suggestion that e-mail activity provides a form of interaction resembling face-to-face conversation, and as such may have implications for oral competence. Moreover, perspectives from the literature on the relative nature of orality and literacy (Ong, 1982; Goody, 1987; Tannen, 1982; Havelock, 1986) that argue against the conventional distinction between written and spoken forms of language appear to harmonises with similar claims for text-based CMC.
The discussion invokes theories of second language acquisition that have been identified as supportive to the view that CMC encourages general acquisition. Particular reference, however, is made to those perspectives that emphasise the role of interaction in facilitating SLA; it is argued that these theoretical frameworks, which derive from and extend perspectives that lend primacy to input, would appear to have the closest relevance to pedagogic use of e-mail, a computer-based application that is inherently interactive. Asynchronous e-mail interaction might be seen, in the context of themes derived from SLA theory, to have in common many of the benefits to learning claimed for synchronous CMC, while, it is argued, retaining additional affective and cognitive advantages relating to reduced anxiety and opportunities for reflective thinking.
A proposal for a research study is presented, that will test the claims made for e-mail interaction with respect to implications for oral skill development. The study involves the co-operation of a school overseas, in a location where students have minimal exposure to spoken English. It involves the collection of quantitative data at intervals during a semester from the assessment of subjects’ EFL speaking skills, using an interview format based on the IELTS speaking test. The subjects are divided into two groups: an experimental group engaging in school-based e-mail interaction with NS partners in TL countries, and a second group as identical as possible to the experimental group as possible, yet not engaging in the e-mail activity. Data is also obtained from analysis of the performance of both groups’ in recorded classroom discussion, and questionnaires completed by both students and teachers on their intuitions regarding e-mail interaction. The design of the investigation takes inspiration from previous similar studies (Warschauer, 1996a; Beauvois, 1997, 1998), which however differ from the present research in their orientation to synchronous CMC. Somewhat appropriately, perhaps, the details of organising the experimental study, from initial canvassing of potential collaborators to negotiation of details of the researcher’s first visit to the school involved, was conducted almost entirely by e-mail.
Word processing and EFL Part I