French  611.12 
L2 Reading and Technology 

Calendar 

This Calendar is tentative.

Date	Class	Preparation Work
January 15	Introduction.   Planning.  Quick overview of Reading Comprehension problems and research.	Read Goodman  on The Reading Process.  Prepare short written account of the reading process according to Goodman (one page).  (This is a first run at a web page text.)  Purchase Carrell.
January 22	Discussion of The Reading Process (Goodman, Rumelhart, Stanovich;  emphasis on Word Understanding). Students choose areas to specialize in.  Discussion of needs for our website.. Technology Work: Some uses of web pages + Creating a simple web page (see also http://www.ict4lt.org/en/en_mod3-3). Online discussion of reading comprehension for reference:http://www.umanitoba.ca/faculties/education/edlab/81529/theopape.html#menu	Read Chapelle, Ch. 1 and Warshauer.  Begin research on your selected areas.  Prepare preliminary bibliography and short oral report (5 min.) on one article from your area, with questions if appropriate.
January 29	Oral reports on articles. Text Types Technology Work: More about web sites.  Check out the UofC IT Instructions about how to create your own website. Some text-type references:  David Lee: http://llt.msu.edu/vol5num3/lee/default.html (contains useful  references to other work, but has a corpus focus, not a reading focus) http://www.horringercourtmiddle.suffolk.sch.uk/pdf/other_guidance/writing_frames.pdf  http://www.thezaurus.com/slovenianlinx/csftextypes.htm http://www.spx.nsw.edu.au/src/research/texttypes.html http://www.delmar.edu/engl/instruct/stomlin/1301int/lessons/content/expositi.htm Swales, J.M. 1990. Genre Analysis: English in Academic and Research Settings. Cambridge: CUP. de Beaugrande, R. 1981.  Design criteria for process models of reading. Reading  Research Quarterly, 16, 261-315. Beach, Richard and Appleman, Deborah  1984. Reading strategies for  expository and literary text types. In Purves. A.C. and Niles, O.S. 1984.  Becoming Readers in a Complex Society, Chicago: Chicago UP. (U of C library) Freedman, Aviva, & Medway, Peter. 1994.  Learning and Teaching Genre.  Portsmouth, N.H.: Boynton/Cook Publishers.	Go to the IT4LT site and choose one module.  Prepare a ten minute presentation based on it for the next class. Look at the instructions on the U of C website, to learn how to upload a web page for your contributions called 611.html Continue research on selected areas.
February 5	Presentation of IT4LT modules. Text types, genres (including Murray's article) History of CALL (Warshauer etc.) Practice uploading a web page and creating a site.	Read Carrell, Ch 5 on Schema Theory and Ch 8 on The Short- Circuit Hypothesis.  Prepare and upload web page and send url to Brian
February 12	Discussion of Schema Theory and the Short-Circuit Hypothesis Link for schema theory: http://cognet.mit.edu/MITECS/Entry/brewer1 Cognitive Psychology: http://chiron.valdosta.edu/whuitt/col/cogsys/infoproc.html	(1) Add content to web page, good draft of first topic or topics (3-4 pages). (2) Read Part 4 of Carrell, pp. 221-277 (three articles).  (3) Prepare a set of clear answers to the 7 questions on p. 221.  (4) Make an annotated list of teaching suggestions dealt with in the three articles (list with page references and short descriptions of each).
February 19	Reading Week.  No Classes
February 26	Catch up on previously assigned work: Claudia's and Murray's ICT4LT modules, and Clarke's Short-Circuit Hypothesis. Lab work on web pages and activity types on the web.
March  5	Presentation and discussion of web page drafts previously submitted Discussion of Carrell pp. 221-277, responses to questions, consideration of teaching suggestions. Lab work on web site.	(1) Follow up on the references given in Carrell 221-277 to flesh out the lists of instructional techniques.  (2) Report on one article next time (1p handout)  (3) Prepare an original exercise in English or Spanish which implements one of the suggestions (page to hand out).  (4) Continue work on web pages.
March  12	Reports on articles and updating of instructional techniques' list (1 and 2 of March 5 Preparation work) Discussion of exercises presented (3) Applying instructional techniques to computer-based learning. Lab work on website.	(1) Read Lomicka on online glossing and follow up references where possible. (2) Study online glossing in Reading French course (click on the Texts) and prepare suggestions and critique.
March 19	Catch up on previously assigned work. Glossing and technology: results of studies, parameters to consider, and practical applications Applying these parameters to glossing by Bougaïeff: https://oraprdnt.uqtr.uquebec.ca/pls/public/atxw007?owa_no_recueil=1&owa_nom_recueil=ELF and in the Reading French course.	Finish web page work (Explanations, instructional techniques, and list of L2 Reading Resources sites). Template Visit the Hot Potatoes site, download the program and use it with a reading text to create a well-designed exercise.
March 26	Review of findings so far: models of the reading process, experimental evidence, short circuit, schemata, instructional techniques, glossing. Study of our Hot Pototoes reading exercises created on the web.
April  2	Test (10%) Using the web to teach reading. Link to activity template Link to Maija's Instructional Suggestions
April 9	The evaluation of reading comprehension.
April 16	Conclusions
April 20	Final Essay due

Reading Comprehension Website

• A brief overview of what we know about Reading Comprehension in a Second Language, with a page on each aspect dealt with in the course.  Each text will include bibliographical references and the initials of those who prepared it.
• An alphabetical list of terms, with definitions and links to the explanatory texts.
• Links to other Reading Comprehension Sites and Materials
• A Selected Bibliography

Prepare an annotated list of 20  web resources having to do with L2 reading comprehension which you think would be particularly useful for a teacher wanting to find out more.  They can be sites for students or teachers, theoretical sites, practical, reference, evaluation (sites that offer suggestions for evaluating reading skills), electronic periodicals, or anything similar, and preferably a good mix of these types.  Your list should only include good quality sites which you have tried out, in English, but they may deal with any language (Japanese, Spanish, French, ESL...). 

An example of an annotated entry  would be 

ACTFL Guidelines for Reading

This site provides Guidelines for evaluating reading proficiency at the five levels developed by the influential American Council for the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL).  This is  the U.S. Standard.  Compare the levels of the  Common European Framework.

Use Google (L2 Reading Comprehension, ESL Reading, etc.).  About.com has some useful links too. 

http://esl.about.com/
http://french.about.com/library/reading/bl-readingindex.htm
http://french.about.com/cs/readskills/index.htm?terms=Reading
 

This activity is a replacement for the previously announced "Reports on L2 Reading Processes" and is worth 10% of the final grade.

The final essay will consist of an article (3000-4000 words) about a study you did to investigate some aspect of the L2 reading process.  You will not do the study, so the results will be invented, but should be reasonable. The article should be in the usual format: Abstract, Introduction/Discussion of previous research, Research Aims and Hypotheses, Method/Design, Results, Discussion, Conclusion.  It is not necessary to use complex statistical analysis, though some statistics should be provided.   An appropriate bibliography, in standard format, should be included.

It is up to you to think of a suitable topic, though some are suggested in Carrell 1988 and in the conclusions of many studies.  You should discuss your choice with the instructor before embarking on the research.  A study involving the use of technology would be particularly appropriate.

The article will be evaluated using typical publishing criteria, such as the interest and originality of the study, the clarity of the structure and the prose, the solidity of the research method, the discussion of previous research, etc.