CyBer ClAsSRoOm

HERE ARE SOME ADVANTAGES OF USING NEW TECHNOLOGIES IN THE ESL CLASSROOM... MAYBE YOU AGREE MAYBE NOT, SO I WOLUD APPRECIATE YOUR COMMENTS ON THIS TOPIC:

The used of new technologies for ESL students incorporates the four language skills as we know them, writing, reading, speaking and listening developing all of them at the same time for the language acquisition improvement. Breaking the traditional teaching in classrooms, not only the implementation of this tool expands the amount of resources for the student with a huge field of information but it also makes the process of acquiring material much quicker than habitual methods. At the same time, because of its flexibility, the pupils are allowed to manage their own time, they are able to contribute to their own pace and to decide when to take the next step: if they feel that it is necessary to go backwards, to stay more time in certain point or to advance faster, it is their own choice.

Consequently, students tend to perceive online discussions as less threatening and inhibiting than oral interactions, participating to a high degree and all producing several turn/messages per session. This occurs because they are less worried about being evaluated by the teacher, and thus more willing to participate. As well, learners are less affected by wait time, turn-taking, and other elements of traditional interaction, which makes possible to participate as much as they want, whenever they want, with opportunities for contribution being more equally distributed among participants. Now, they have also opportunities for participating outside the classroom, in non-class time. Why? Because through the internet it is possible to maintain offline discussion, which can spread over time and it is not required for everyone to be in one place at the same moment.
In addition, students engage in productive L2 strategies and processes since they have the opportunity to take time to plan their messages and edit them, using their creativity and the interactive writing for the employment of interactive moves on the computer and to take control of the managing discussion; simultaneously pupils receive input form other peers at their same level.

Now then, the student is not the only participant in the classroom, there is another one whose role is also influenced by the implementation of new technologies in the ESL: the teacher. As the conventional class method is changed, the teacher’s function is not as an element of authority any longer. He/she becomes a guide helping students to get through the right path. Besides, as he/she is not in front of the students now, the teacher becomes one of the participants totally changing his/her former position before the pupils.