Increasing Time on Task
A traditional classroom inherently contains limitations and challenges that affect language learning. For example, the teacher/student ratio limits the amount of time that a teacher can spend with each student. And even if the teacher is a native speaker, students are exposed to only one dialect. It is difficult to expose students in a classroom to authentic language, especially oral language. Interestingly enough, the use of technology not only provides students with more time on task, but it also provides a way to minimize some of these classroom limitations.
For example, the online video materials entitled Portuguese Communication Exercises expose students to over 300 brief video clips where native speakers from various regions of Brazil and Portugal discuss over 80 different topics, all of which are transcribed in Portuguese and translated into English. The topics are subdivided into four general levels of difficulty.
- Beginning tasks require single-word answers or simple memorized chunks.
- Intermediate tasks are at the sentence level.
- Advanced tasks require paragraph-level story telling.
- Finally, Superior tasks require the use of hypothetical language.
The individualized study of these materials provides opportunities for increased time on task.
