Decoding a Communicative Foreign Language Environment

LEML for Foreign Languages
July 22, 2016

In searching for patterns within Learning Environment Modeling, I immediately went to one of the most intensive courses I have taught:  beginning Italian.  This type of course presents a unique challenge in that students must absorb a great amount of content, but the best way to do so is through communicating with others.  I mapped out an approximation of how I would conduct my class sessions and noticed there was certainly a pattern that developed.

I begin each class with a discussion on the previous session's topic, followed by a practice quiz for which I give immediate feedback to the class.  I then introduce the new topic, whether it be a vocabulary set or grammatical structure, followed by a discussion between students and a oral/written practice.

You'll notice that within this environment, I subconsciously marked a pattern:

You can see here that I repeat the process of introducing a topic, having students hold a discussion on it, practicing problems in groups then individually with feedback.  This is a structure I repeat in communicative language teaching because it's necessary to have dialogue-centered instruction that includes ample opportunities for practice and feedback in the classroom environment.

Another pattern I noticed was at the beginning.  I always begin each class with a review and assessment of the objective from the previous class.  Because foreign language courses build continuously upon grammatical principles, it's necessary to maintain this continuum in each class session.

So, this model got me thinking about other intensively interpersonal trainings.  I think these two models combined would work well in a group training setting, such as mine when I became an academic advisor.  There's such great value in dialogue when you're learning a foreign concept, and often times it's the student dialogue and peer learning that I find to be most effective, as displayed in this environment:

As you can see, I would begin each training session with dialogue, practice, and feedback from the previous session's objectives.  Following, I would present the new content, followed by a discussion, group practice, individual practice, and feedback.  Finally, I added the evidence block  which would come in the form of an assessment or other measure of competency. Notice as well that there are multiple ways that feedback can be given in this environment.  Should an individual practice in an online course module with an electronic quiz, that would be a system action for grading.  Should it be in class, the instructor would need to take action.

Even after looking at this final version, now that I have it in front of me on a screen, I can see there are still modifications to be made.  For example, there could be more discussion or peer feedback given added after the group practice when introducing new content.  I look forward to hearing from you on how I could improve this model even further!