Shona Whyte

Nice Sophia Antipolis University | UNS · Bases, Corpus, Langages (BCL UMR 7320)

Implementing and Researching Technological Innovation in Language Teaching takes a case study approach to investigate the integration of the interactive whiteboard (IWB) into the teaching of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) in French schools. The study highlights the advantages of collaborative action research for stimulating and supporting lang...

This paper examines teaching English for Specific Purposes (ESP) to French graduate students in business, science education, and social science research. It takes a discourse domain perspective (Selinker & Douglas 1985; Whyte 1995) on interlanguage development according to which learners’ expert knowledge and investment in their fields of study aff...

This book draws on theories of second language acquisition (SLA) to illustrate how interactive white board technology can be exploited to support language acquisition. It examines interaction, collaboration and negotiation of meaning and focus on form in the communicative language classroom in primary, secondary and vocational schools. In recent y...

This paper discusses challenges and opportunities arising during the development of open educational resources (OERs) to support communicative language teaching (CLT) with interactive whiteboards (IWBs). iTILT1 (interactive Technologies in Language Teaching), a European Lifelong Learning Project, has two main aims: (a) to promote “best practice” or...

Classroom foreign language teachers using technology in task-based language teaching (TBLT) may experience pedagogical regression during technological development (Fullan, 2001), and fail to transform pedagogy because tools like interactive whiteboards (IWBs) support traditional as well as newer approaches (Avvisati et al., 2013). IWB-supported tea...

By adopting a historical perspective, this edited collection of papers takes a fresh look at a key concept in applied linguistics, that of innovation. A substantial introduction advocates historical re-evaluation of this notion via exploration of its rise to prominence, while the ten subsequent chapters present in-depth case studies of apparently s...

The 2022 EUROCALL conference was held in Reykjavik on 17-19 August 2022 as a fully online event hosted by the Vigdís Finnbogadóttir Institute for Foreign Languages, the University of Iceland, and the Árni Magnússon Institute for Icelandic Studies. The conference theme was Intelligent CALL, granular systems and learner data. This theme reflects the...

In contrast with other works on the history of language learning and teaching, this book is innovative in assigning a much more important role to practice and to the reciprocal relationship of policies and practice (rather than investigating top.down processes from policies to practice). The 14 contributions highlight various contexts of language e...

Teacher beliefs affect choices of methods, representations of learning, and classroom practice, and are important in understanding primary EFL teaching in France, where language teaching has been a compulsory subject entrusted to generalist class teachers for 20 years. This quantitative study explores questionnaire data from 254 primary teachers, a...

Conversations and networks are essential for transforming academics’ teaching practices as learning experiences (Palmer 1993). Yet, there has been little research reporting academics’ informal conversations about teaching (Thomson and Trigwell 2018). Teachers will generally access small significant networks (Becher and Trowler 2001) for nuanced and...

With today’s strong focus on communicative competence in second language (L2) classrooms, speech acts like suggestions, requests, refusals, and apologies are often investigated in interlanguage pragmatic (ILP) as well as instructional pragmatics. Even though there is strong evidence in ILP research that purports that L2 learners respond well to pra...

The distributed practice effect, which concerns the impact of the organization of learning time on the retention of repeated information learned, has inspired a large body of empirical research. Such research has generally shown, among other things, that longer temporal intervals between learning episodes (spaced learning) result in greater ultimat...

Since the turn of the century, the increasing internationalisation of French higher education has been felt in research and teaching across a broad range of disciplines. The challenges and opportunities affect different sectors of foreign language (FL) education, including modern foreign language (MFL) studies, languages for specific purposes (LSP)...

The term communicative competence captures the notion that the ability to use language in interaction requires not just control of linguistic form but also awareness of rules of use in different contexts (Hymes 1972). Communicative competence is a slippery term: different actors in second language (L2) research, education, and assessment interpret...

Digital technologies are increasingly finding their way into young learner EFL classrooms worldwide. Research has identified many advantages for technology integration in this context, such as increasing learner motivation and emotional engagement, enhancing cultural awareness and autonomy, and providing opportunities for authentic target language...

This paper tests a new method of teaching vocabulary to young second language learners through the medium of drama, specifically the effect of drama teaching techniques on vocabulary acquisition among primary school learners of Welsh. Vocabulary Acquisition via Drama (VAD) is based on principles derived from both process drama and communicative and...

Link to slides and references: http://wp.me/p28EmH-yL With the growing global networking and cross-cultural communication, interest in the teaching and learning of second languages has also increased. However, the bulk of research in interlanguage pragmatics (ILP) has revealed that foreign language learners, despite their grammatical and lexical p...

This paper focuses on specialisation in language teaching and research in French educational settings by comparing and contrasting objects and goals of language education, scholarship and research, and approaches to language and content across modern foreign languages (MFL) scholars, applied linguists working in languages for specific purposes (LSP...

In today's networked world where English is a basic skill, essential for communication in many spheres of academic, professional and social life, the need to move beyond anecdotal, romantic views of language learning and use has never been more pressing. Master (2005) called for the field to build on empirical research findings instead of "war stor...

Among many dilemmas in educational practices in today's networked environments is the question of language teacher preparation for tomorrow's world. Secondary school teachers of modern foreign languages face multiple challenges in making the transition from the relatively closed scholastic tradition of university ivory towers, which are often resis...

Telecollaborative research often focuses on intercultural objectives rather than language learning, and highlights limitations due to technical difficulties and poor task design. This study redresses the balance by focusing on language and learner interaction in an exchange involving the EFL learners of 35 secondary school student-teachers in two E...

This paper tackles the question of research on the teaching and learning of English for Specific Purposes (ESP) in France and presents the initial stages of work on the development of a theoretical framework which is specific to this field of research. It examines arguments for the development of a concept of ESP didactics and the framework underpi...

La didactique des langues est, par définition, un domaine de recherche transfrontalier, se nourissant de l’apport de disciplines contributoires aussi variées que « la linguistique, la sociolinguistique, la psycholinguistique, les sciences cognitives, l’ethnologie, la sociologie, la psychologie, les neurosciences, etc. » (Tardieu 2014 : 86). Lorsque...

This book has reported on a study of the integration of the IWB into language teaching practice for EFL at a number of different educational levels in France. Using a collaborative action research framework and including a range of teacher perspectives involving constructs in teacher cognition, teacher efficacy and situated learning, the study inve...

This chapter provides a detailed analysis of the participating teachers’ use of the IWB over the course of the reflective cycle described in Chapter 2. The main data are video recordings of short classroom activities, which participants selected for inclusion on the iTILT project website as examples of effective IWB-supported teaching activities. T...

The next chapter draws on additional data to interpret the findings reported in Chapter 3. It begins by tracing the group’s views of IWB-mediated teaching practice over the course of the project using individual questionnaire data and collective reflection in focus group discussion. Next is an overview of teachers’ self-efficacy beliefs with respec...

In order for the reader to understand the present study of technological innovation by teachers of a foreign language in state school settings, and to interpret its implications for other teaching contexts, a certain amount of background knowledge is required. This chapter sets out background information in three areas related to our study, specifi...

We have now reached the point in the study where the findings from the first three chapters of Part III can be brought together, allowing us to synthesise our analyses of the different teacher profiles which were identified and draw conclusions about the patterns of professional development observed in the study. In this way we can make claims abou...

Another group of three teachers can be described as semi-peripheral CoP participants, contributing with greater frequency in both online and face-to-face discussion than the peripheral participants described in Chapter 5. Of these, one primary teacher was a fairly experienced IWB user, while the other two (lower and upper) secondary teachers were n...

Three of the project teachers can be described as peripheral participants in the project CoP: they contributed less in quantitative and qualitative terms in both online and face-to-face discussion, and this for a variety of reasons. In this chapter, we discuss Gilles, a very experienced teacher and teacher educator, and fairly experienced IWB user;...

Chapter 2 focuses on collaborative action research (CAR) as a framework for investigating classroom teaching and supporting teachers and learners in innovative practice. It presents the method used in the present study: participants, teaching contexts, data collection procedures, and includes information about participant training, filming, intervi...

The last group teachers can be described as core members of the project community of practice, making frequent contributions in a variety of ways to both online and face-to-face discussions, and addressing a wide range of pedagogical issues. These two primary and one lower secondary teacher were all experienced IWB users who began the project with...

Current theories of second language (L2) acquisition emphasize the key role played by interaction and negotiation of meaning in language learning. Interaction is central to language acquisition, as it provides opportunities for learners to produce and understand language, and obtain feedback on their performance (Swain 1995, Long 1996, Blyth 2010)....

Much recent research in digital technologies for language learning and teaching involves virtual environments, often the investigation of informal digital practices (e.g., Gee, 2003) or the replication or amelioration of face-to-face classroom practices through digital media (Levy, 2009). The physical classroom environment may be neglected, particu...

This paper reports on the development of an analytical framework for the observation and analysis of interactive whiteboard (IWB) use in the foreign language (FL) classroom. Developed from existing classifications of IWB activity in generic educational contexts (e.g., Armstrong et al. 2005; Bennett and Lockyer 2008; Hennessy et al. 2007), the instr...

To use technology effectively in the language classroom, pre-service teachers must develop basic techno-pedagogical competences for the classroom and learn to select from abundant online resources. Research underlines the importance of autonomous, collaborative and networked approaches to in-service teacher education and the present empirical study...

Classroom foreign language teachers using technology in task-based language teaching (TBLT) may experience pedagogical regression during technological development (Fullan, 2001), and fail to transform pedagogy because tools like interactive whiteboards (IWBs) support traditional as well as newer approaches (Avvisati et al., 2013). IWB-supported tea...

Today’s technology-rich environments present a number of challenges and opportunities for language learning. In educational circles, new methodologies based on blended learning, the flipped classroom, mobile learning, and game-based learning, to name but a few, are recommended for digitally literate and digitally motivated learners. For language te...

Language learning and the development of learner autonomy via effective integration of learning technologies in language classrooms depend heavily on the learning opportunities provided by language teachers. While contemporary language programmes for state school contexts in many European countries emphasise communicative and task-based approaches,...

Although the interactive whiteboard (IWB) is becoming increasingly prevalent in classrooms throughout the more affluent parts of the world and research has shown how this tool can increase the effectiveness of teaching and even transform pedagogy (Kennewell & Beauchamp, 2007), research literature overviews (Higgins, Beauchamp, & Miller, 2007; Koenr...

This paper discusses challenges and opportunities arising during the development of open educational resources (OERs) to support communicative language teaching (CLT) with interactive whiteboards (IWBs). iTILT 1 (interactive Technologies in Language Teaching), a European Lifelong Learning Project, has two main aims: (a) to promote “best practice” o...

This paper examines teaching English for Specific Purposes (ESP) to French graduate students in business, science education, and social science research. It takes a discourse domain perspective (Selinker & Douglas 1985; Whyte 1995) on interlanguage development according to which learners’ expert knowledge and investment in their fields of study aff...

This paper reports on the preliminary findings of an EU-funded project called Interactive Technologies in Language Teaching (iTILT). The project aims to produce a range of training materials and resources to support teachers using the interactive whiteboard (IWB) in foreign language (FL) teaching. The project involves 7 European countries (Belg...

The past 15 years have seen radical changes in the contexts of second and foreign language teaching. In European schools and universities, language instruction is offered to more learners in more diverse circumstances, and this teaching is increasingly delivered by generalist teachers rather than language specialists. At the same time, a paradigm s...

Recent emphasis on target language interaction in task-based, technology-mediated language classrooms makes the interactive whiteboard (IWB) an attractive tool: it constitutes a “digital hub” particularly suited to younger learners who require greater visual support and active learning. However, recent research in UK and French primary classes sugg...

Recent CALL research suggests that the arrival of new technologies in the language classroom has led to an increased dominance of the socio-constructivist paradigm (Felix, 2006). Borg (2006) suggests, however, that the hegemony of this paradigm may not extend beyond well-researched university and private ESL contexts. The present study tests this p...

This qualitative study investigates the relationship between learning opportunities and teacher cognition in the context of a videoconferencing (VC) project for foreign languages (FL) in French primary schools. Six generalist primary teachers were followed throughout the initial six-month stage of the initiative, and data were collected from learne...

Second language study in French universities includes both modern language (literary) and foreign language (communicative) approaches, although teaching is dominated by the literary strand. Traditional educational models based on the transmission of knowledge are unable to accommodate recent progress in our understanding of learning theory, which o...

The recent increase in the use of interactive technologies, particularly interactive whiteboards (IWBs), in foreign language classrooms is creating a need for teacher training and pedagogical support in this area. Research suggests that the pedagogical exploitation of IWBs is limited by the availability of suitable teaching resources, as well as te...

Cette étude empirique de l'effet des activités médiées par ordinateur pour la motivation en apprentissage de l'anglais langue étrangère à l'école primaire en France s'inspire de l'offre grandissante de jeux en ligne conçus à cet effet. Les participants sont dix-huit élèves d'une classe multi-niveaux qui ont travaillé en autonomie à l'ordinateur ; n...

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Indiana University, 1994.

This study investigates learner's construction of oral texts on topics of specialization. Using the framework of the discourse domain hypothesis, which holds that second language proficiency is acquired with reference to individual, specialized contexts of production, termed discourse domains, the study tests the prediction that learners will const...

ACQUISITION D'UNE LANGUE ETRANGERE: COGNITION ET INTERACTION. JorgeGiacobbe. Paris: CNRS Editions, 1991. Pp. 256. - Volume 16 Issue 3 - Shona Whyte

This study tested a refined version of the discourse domain hypothesis, which defines the discourse domain as a topic area in which second language learners demonstrate extensive, current, and important knowledge, including both cognitive and affective dimensions. The study tested the results of previous studies, which showed that learners show enh...

A study attempts to refine the discourse domain hypothesis of second language learning, which holds that a second language is acquired with reference to speaker-specific topic areas rather than as a general, context-independent competence, by examining the discourse domains developed by one non-native speaker of English in conversations with two na...