Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-dh8gc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-05T09:22:08.006Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Grammar and CALL: a review of current practice in some French language programs

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 September 2011

Michael Glencross
Michael Glencross
Affiliation:
University College of Ripon & York St.John
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Two of the most frequently voiced criticisms of the competences of the average language student entering higher education are lack of accuracy in the use of the written language and lack of knowledge of linguistic terminology or metalanguage for describing and reflecting on the language being learnt. For some useful background to the controversial position of grammar in foreign language learning with particular reference to CALL see Metcalfe (1992). However, far from becoming a laudator temporis acti of the precommunicative era and advocating a return to ‘traditional’ methods of teaching language and grammar, I want in this survey to examine the opportunities afforded by the growing interest in CALL to try to remedy some of the perceived shortcomings in students' performance and knowledge. The software I want to review covers a wide range, from dedicated grammar programs through content-free and level-free authoring packages to other pieces of software which while not specifically intended for improving students grammatical accuracy, can be applied for such a purpose. In studying these representative examples of current practice I hope to establish what may be the advantages of computer based learning over traditional methods and media in grammar teaching and learning and to identify the criteria for good practice in this type of CALL ware. For a recent survey of the evolution of CALL software see Last (1992).

Type
Research Article
Information
ReCALL , Volume 5 , Issue 8 , May 1993 , pp. 21 - 26
Copyright
Copyright © European Association for Computer Assisted Language Learning 1993

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Ansel, B and Jucker, A H, Learning Linguistics with Computers: Hypertext as a Key to Linguistic Networks, Literary and Linguistic Computing, Vol 5 No 2, 1992, pp 124–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Battye, and Hintze, , The French Language Today, Routledge, London, 1992.Google Scholar
Dayan, P, Working on Word-Processed French, ReCALL, No 7, November 1992, pp 27–8.Google Scholar
Glencross, M, Integrating Word-Processing into French Teaching in Higher Education, Integrating New Approaches, CILT/AFLS, forthcoming.Google Scholar
Hawkins, R and Towell, R, Second language acquisition research and the second language acquisition of French, Journal of French Language Studies, Vol 2, 1992, pp 97–121.Google Scholar
Last, R, Computers and Language Learning: Past, Present - and Future?, in Computers and Written Texts, Butler, CS (ed.), Blackwell, Oxford, 1992.Google Scholar
Maingueneau, D, Précis de grammaire pour les concours, Bordas, 1991.Google Scholar
Matthews, C, Intelligent CALL (ICALL) Bibiliography, CTI Centre for Modern Languages, Hull, 1992.Google Scholar
Metcalfe, P, CALL, the foreign-language undergraduate and the teaching of grammar: a linguistic and political battlefield, ReCALL, No 7, November 1992, pp 3–5.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Seedhouse, P, Communicative CALL: A Contradiction in Terms?, ReCALL No 7, November 1992, pp 9–13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar