Available online at www.sciencedirect.com
ScienceDirect Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 182 (2015) 325 – 330
4th WORLD CONFERENCE ON EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGY RESEARCHES, WCETR2014
Course Material Design Using the New Technologies in Language for Specific Purposes Teaching and Learning Mirela-Cristina Popa* a
Politehnica University of Timisoara, Faculty of Communication Sciences, 2A Traian Lalescu Str., Timisoara 300223, Romania
Abstract The study aims to present a course material design of a French specialized language developed using the new technology resources, as part of a distance study program in the field of civil engineering. The course was designed as a learning tool of French for specific purposes in the technical universities. The study presents the theoretical and methodological approach that was founded on the development of the course, the course material structure, the proposed educational resources, traditional and electronic, to meet educational objectives, the importance of using technical means of information and communication in order to improve the foreign language teaching and learning. © Published by by Elsevier Ltd.Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license ©2015 2015The TheAuthors. Authors. Published Elsevier (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Peer-review under responsibility of Academic World Research and Education Center. Peer-review under responsibility of Academic World Research and Education Center. Keywords: course material design; language for specific purposes; French specialised language; foreign language teaching and learning; new technologies
1. Introduction The integration of new technologies into the educational process has opened the way to the reformation of the educational system, both on a undergraduate, as well as a graduate level, to the rethinking of the pedagogical methods, strategies and resources used in the teaching, learning and assessment process, according to the type of training envisaged: on site, e-learning, distance learning or mixed (blended learning). The application of new technologies within the educational process involves the adaptation of the content of the training programmes, of the teaching and learning strategies and methods and of the educational resources.
* Mirela-Cristina Pop, PhD. Tel.: +00-40-256-40 40 12; fax: +40-256-40 40 13. E-mail address:
[email protected]
1877-0428 © 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Peer-review under responsibility of Academic World Research and Education Center. doi:10.1016/j.sbspro.2015.04.774
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The usage of new technologies in the field of foreign language teaching entails a careful analysis of the principles applied when designing the pedagogical resources developed using ICT or multimedia aids, thus creating “new research leads in the foreign language teaching and learning” (Develotte, 2007). This study aims to present the design of a specialised French language course developed by using new technology resources. The course entitled Le Francais du batiment (French for Civil Engineering) was designed as an e-learning tool for learning French as part of technical university specializations in the field of civil engineering. The manner of designing such material corresponds to a university training objective: “the internal creation of pedagogical resources by a member of a teaching staff” (Demaiziere, 2004) targeting a specific audience. The article describes the theoretical and methodological framework, the course structure (overview, objectives, skills, content, resources) and the content of a course unit considered as being representative of the topic course material. The research subscribes to the theoretical and methodological approach supplied by CEFRL (2001), according to which the foreign language teaching and learning is based on developing communicative language competences, supplemented by the results of the research conducted in the field of specialised language teaching, especially French, in what regards the pedagogical and methodological principles for the “competence approach”. 2. Specialised language teaching at a university level 2.1. Terminology The syntagma specialised language or language for specific purposes is generally used to indicate a linguistic sub-system that combines linguistic peculiarities of a specialised field, studied in relation to the general language. In a more narrow meaning, the term refers to an approach used in foreign language teaching that targets a specific audience. The theoretical studies related to the teaching of specialised French employ phrases such as francais sur objectif specifique / french for specific purposes (Parpette et Mangiante, 2004) or francais langue professionnelle / professional french language (Mourlhon-Dallies, 2005). In current studies, the term language for specific purposes tends to be replaced by communication for specific purposes, which entails the usage of the specialised language in specific professional communication situations (Guerguieva-Steenhoute 2008 : 33). The syntagma communicative competence in specialised language, used in this study, represents the learners’ or users’ ability to communicate by making use of the resources of a specialised language in specific contexts. 2.2. Aspects of specialised language teaching and learning in academic fields Foreign language teaching and learning at a university level corresponds to precise training objectives orienting the curricular design according to: the type of training (philological or non-philological profile), the specificity of the training (general or specialised), the students’ training needs (study or placement mobilities, linguistic training in order to be integrated within the labour market etc.), institutional constraints (the linguistic politics of an institution, the duration of the training, human resources and materials available, the type of partnerships with the professional environment) or exterior (the economic context, the foreign languages spoken within the geographical area where the training takes place etc.). Specialised language training is part of the general context of foreign language teaching, being determined by the following parameters, listed hereinafter in short (Stoean, 2009: 60): a. the linguistic politics dictated by the labour market, regarding the need for linguistic competences in various specialised areas; b. the concern of the international institutions and bodies with the enforcement of effective politics in the field of foreign language teaching; c. the structural and conceptual changes due to the reformations conducted within the national educational systems; d. studies and placement mobility entailing a high level of linguistic competences; e. the development of new higher education systems (bilingual and multilingual, non-philological and bilingual, scientific and technical studies); f. the generalization of the implementation of CEFRL and of the European portfolio as assessment tools for the level of competences in foreign languages. The designing of a curriculum in the field of foreign language teaching entails several phases (Stoean, 2013 : 168-172) : development of a referential competence inventory the required competences in the specialised
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field targeted; content selection leading to targeted skills training; progressive development planning skills; organization of teaching and learning activities; organizing the work of the teaching staff; skills assessment. As we have shown in previous studies (Pop and Tanase-Robescu, 2009; Pop, 2010, 2012), the training process within the field of foreign languages as part of technical university specialization may be conducted on modules, in three stages: 1. the stage of general communication skills; 2. the stage of development communicative competence in technical language, with two components: initiation into specialised communication, based on acquiring vocabulary and structures specific to the general technical discourse, followed by a stage of further development of the technical language; 3. the stage of professional communication oriented towards the development of techniques of written and oral communication, required by the current professional environments. The first two stages focus on the progressive development of communicative competences, from general communicative competences to communicative competences in specialised language (Pop, 2012). Each stage has precise training objectives and specific professional competences. 3. The design of a specialised French language course developed using the new technology resources This section offers an example of a material course design, developed using the new technology resources, as part of a distance study programme in the field of civil engineering. The first part presents the course structure (overview, objectives, skills, content, resources), and the second part describes the design of a course unit. 3.1. Course structure 3.1.1. Overview The course entitled Le Francais du batiment (French for Civil Engineering) is meant for Romanian students attending university specialization in the field of civil engineering who have opted to study French as a foreign language. The course addresses students who already have general communicative competences in French language, acquired during the general linguistic training stage, in a formal framework (high school, first years of university studies) or a non-formal one (certified communicative competences). The course has been adapted, in order to correspond to a particular type of teaching and learning of specialised French in e-learning context, based on providing of a structured content to be used in virtual platforms hosting distance learning study programmes. The course material combines aspects of online teaching and learning with elements of traditional teaching and learning (face-to-face), associating blended learning educational methods and strategies. 3.1.2. Objectives As stated in the introduction, the course corresponds to a university training objective: to ensure the linguistic training of the students, in a specialised foreign language, in order to facilitate their professional insertion at the end of the study programme attended. The general objective is for the students to acquire written and oral communication techniques in French for civil engineering. The specific objectives are related to the general objective: to develop written and oral communicative competence in French for civil engineering; to acquire by students the ability to document themselves in specialised French; to develop the students’ capacity to associate specialised notions in French and Romanian; to develop their competence of analysis and translation of technical texts specific to the field of civil engineering (translation from the foreign language into their mother tongue, in this case, from French into Romanian). 3.1.3. Competences An essential characteristic of the “competence approach” is formulating the objectives in terms of competences that are to be acquired by the beneficiaries of a study programme: “standards that serve the development and recognition of individual accomplishments and performance” (Spector et al. 2006), “an integrated set of knowledge, skills, attitudes and judgments that enable one to effectively perform the activities of a given occupation or function
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to the standards expected in employment” (Tardif in Curran et al. 2009: 297) or as a “way to define the knowledge, skill and attitudinal outcomes expected of the pre-licensure learner” (Curran et al. 2009: 297). In the field of foreign language training, the concept of competence is formulated by CEFRL (2001: 9) from the perspective of an action-oriented approach: “competences are the sum of knowledge, skills and characteristics that allow a person to perform actions”. The competences based on which the technical French course for civil engineering was designed may be formulated as follows: - Identification, based on technical documents in French, of images or certain audio-visual files, of specialised notions specific for civil engineering; - Documentation in French for civil engineering; - Assimilation of the civil engineering vocabulary in order to develop written and oral communication skills; - Analysis and translation of technical texts for civil engineering, from French into Romanian. 3.1.4. Content The content of the course is structured in such as manner as to correspond to 14 hours of lectures and 14 hours of applicative activities. The course is divided into 3 parts, each of them containing between 2 and 4 course units. Each course unit includes an overview (objectives, skills, structure, content), followed by the material course (lectures and applicative activities). The first part, entitled Civil engineering vocabulary, contains 4 course units: basic civil engineering vocabulary used in French language; graphical elements; description of a building; professions in civil engineering. The second part, Written and oral communication in French for civil engineering, includes three course units: documentation in French for civil engineering; written communication in French for civil engineering; oral communication in French for civil engineering. The third part, Analysis and translation of technical texts in French for civil engineering, includes two course units: information and documentation for translation; translation of technical texts from French into Romanian. The lectures focus on a topic and have, in turn, a specific structure, identical for all course units of the entire material. The applicative activities accompanying the lectures are preceded by a brief description of the skills to be acquired by students and practical ways of solving tasks. The types of activities and the practical methods vary according to the specific activities and corresponding to types of communicative activities (communicative language activities) described by CEFRL (2001: 57-87): receptive activities (listening and reading activities), focusing on audio-visual reception, productive activities (speaking and writing activities), interactive activities (i.e. written interaction) and mediating activities (i.e. written mediation). 3.1.5. Educational resources The lectures and applicative activities are accompanied by specific educational resources. The educational resources are divided into two categories: resources used for the documentation of lectures (bibliography and webography) and educational resources aiming to consolidate knowledge or to be used as aids for specific activities. Educational resources include technical materials, printed or electronic: books, articles, glossaries, dictionaries, technical documentation, written or audio and video documents, images, charts, tables, questionnaires etc. 3.2. Description of a course unit The course unit selected is entitled Basic civil engineering vocabulary. The unit starts the series of the 4 course units that form the first part of the material.
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3.2.1. Objectives The objectives of this course unit follow the general thematic of the entire material course: acquiring basic civil engineering vocabulary in French language by students and discovering essential aspects of the French professional culture. 3.2.2. Competences The skills that are to be acquired by the students when completing the course unit meet the objectives set: to identify, based on images, printed or audio and video aids, the words and phrases of specialised French; the usage of basic civil engineering vocabulary in written and oral communication. 3.2.3. Content The unit is structured into lecture, applicative activities and educational resources. The lecture includes the principle notions that are to be assimilated by students, structured on sections: reading; vocabulary; grammar; course summary, bibliography and webography. The opening text for the lecture (How to build a building?) aims to familiarize the students with specialised French notions. Vocabulary section contains both specialised terms, as well as lexical and grammatical structures presented in context. Vocabulary is not exhaustive, but covers the usual lexical and thematic categories that respond to the communicative needs of the students: construction of a building, a building structure, materials, technologies, process and vehicles. Grammar section introduces grammatical notions as examples, followed by an explanation of their usage rules: nominalization in French for civil engineering (transformation of verbs into nouns designating notions from the thematic categories mentioned before) and formation of compounds. Speaking part includes basic communicative structures serving to define specialised notions. The applicative activities aim to verify the assimilation of technical French notions: to identify, define or use notions, based on images, texts or audio and video resources accompanying the applicative activities. The assimilation of technical French terms is indispensable from the students’ knowledge of the notions and concepts they designate, in the language of the study programme. 3.2.4. Resources The lectures are accompanied by sheets listing technical terms specific to the French language for civil engineering, which aim to deepen the specialised notions presented: structural elements of a building, pouring a foundation, elements of roofs, vehicles, types of bricks, bricks mounting technique. The applicative activities are accompanied by audio and video resources that serve as support for task solving: French-Romanian glossary of terms used in civil engineering, images of vehicles used in this field, video documentation showing the stages of building a building. 4. Conclusions Designing and developing a language course, in general, and a specialised language course, particularly through the use of new technologies, involving, on the one hand, the adaptation of the content according to the specific training (face-to-face, online, e-learning, distance learning etc.), the specific study programme (professional skills), the users’ needs proficiency (course objectives formulated in terms of skills) and, on the other hand, the adaptation of the educational resources. In this study, the course content has been adapted according to the specific training (distance study programme), the specific study programme (academic specialization in civil engineering) and to the needs of the beneficiaries (acquiring communicative competence in written and oral technical French in professional situations specific to the field of civil engineering). The educational resources described may be used in order to consolidate the knowledge taught and as educational aids in order to solve the tasks proposed.
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Acknowledgements The author is grateful to the initiators of the DidaTec project for the financial support granted in order to elaborate the course, developed with the resources of the new technologies, as part of the training programme attended at the Politehnica University of Timisoara during March-November 2012.
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