Although there is no explicit language policy at our school, we are trying to put in practice a language strategy to motivate students in the area of language learning – the establishment of partnerships with other European schools within eTwinning, which is part of the European Commission’s Lifelong Learning Programme.
The first eTwinning project in our school – “Our Favourites” – was undertaken in the school year 2006-2007. It involved a fifth grade class and a school from Poland. In 2007-2008 there were two projects being developed: “We, our school and our town” and “I have a European friend”. The first involved sixth grade students, learning English as a first foreign language in partnership with a Bulgarian School (Sofia); the second engaged seventh grade pupils learning Spanish as a second foreign language in partnership with a Spanish school (Huelva). In the first case, it was the second year those students took on such an initiative – the previous year they undertook the project with the Polish school. At the present moment, there are two projects waiting for approval from the National Support Services – partnerships with Poland and Romania. There are other eight grade teachers (English and Spanish) designing their projects and searching for partners.
The ICT Plan at our school integrates, as an aim, the promoting of communication within the educative community and of the use of ICT tools in teaching and learning activities. One of the ICT Team’s intention is to broaden the development of eTwinning projects, i. e., to motivate teachers to engage themselves and their students in such projects. Therefore, this initiative (if we can call it so) is contextualized in a school purpose – learning through ICT tools.
This initiative does not target a specific category of pupils – it is aimed for the whole community - initiation and intermediate levels. It can also, in the future, involve groups of teachers sharing their experience and discussing educational issues with other European teachers.
As a strategy it is still in its beginnings. In this study case I will mostly refer to and analyse the two eTwinning projects held in the school year 2007-2008 and try to correlate the undertaking of the projects and the school results obtained at the end of the school year.
The targeted languages within the framework of the initiative are the ones imposed by law. In the fifth grade students have to choose their first foreign language (English, French or German – the regulation to add Spanish to the spectrum of languages students can choose at this level is in a period of public consultation at the present moment). In the seventh grade students have to take on a second foreign language (English, French, German or Spanish).
The eTwinning project “We, our school and our town” used English as a way of developing the planned tasks; the project “I have a European friend” used Spanish because it was the second foreign language this class took on.
The first project enclosed a multilingual perspective because students, in their contacts (using the eTwinning chat rooms and email messages), exchanged words and expressions used in their mother tongues. One of the tasks consisted on exchanging a list of Portuguese and Bulgarian expressions one can use as survival language.
The multilingual perspective for the second eTwinning project was the study of the language itself once it was the third language students were dealing with (Portuguese, English and Spanish). Even though the other seventh grade students were not involved in an eTwinning project, they shared this multilingual dimension (Portuguese, English and French).
With the dissemination of eTwinning projects it is expected to reach, in the long-term, the following learning outcomes:
Use of ICT tools in foreign language learning and in multicultural communication.
This language initiative is taken more within the official curriculum. The e-Twinning projects previously mentioned were and will be put in practice in a subject called “Área de Projecto” (Project Work), which integrates the students’ plan of studies. It occurs once a week and has the time span of ninety minutes. The life span of the projects was/is aimed for the whole year but future projects can have the duration that future partners desire.
Due to education regulation laws, in the sixth grade class there are two teachers who give support to students; in the seventh one there is only one teacher. Luckily, there was a language teacher in class in both cases. This situation is also valid for the present school year.
This kind of project demands the introduction of a novel learning environment once its realisation depends on ICT tools – the use of computers, the use of internet, the use of various software. The students and teachers’ tasks within the projects require either the usage of the portable personal computers or the occupation of the ICT classroom. Both scenarios are possible in Escola D. Afonso III.
There is no explicit language teaching in this activity. Students just have to use the foreign language as a means of carrying out the tasks they and their teachers have designed. Students work in groups and this methodology, allied to the teachers’ support, eases the solution of problems related to language matters. Therefore, it is expected that students, by accomplishing a goal connected to a relatively practical situation – the exchange of information, the communication with other students of other countries -, by performing an implicit learning of the language and by using knowledge they have learnt in a formal way, acquire better language competence, even though it might only be at a beginners level.
Students are asked to do intermediate assessments concerning the completion of the planned tasks and their self involvement/participation. At the end of the project, they will be asked to assess their gains in terms of language learning and transferable skills. Once teachers pay closer attention to their pupils, by spending more time with them in a language “implicit learning” environment, they can collect more information to assess their evolution concerning language competences.
If projects cannot be put to practice within the curriculum, whatever the reasons might be, they can find practical realisation as extracurricular activities which can integrate the teachers’ timetable and function as a “language club”.
Escola D. Afonso III, founded in 1969, is a lower secondary school with a community of five hundred students. It comprehends a range of five grades of education – from fifth grade to ninth grade – and the age range of pupils is ten to fifteen. This institution is one of four similar schools within the city of Faro, southern Portugal. Being the capital city of Algarve Faro aggregates the majority of administrative and public services as well as other private services. Thus, this is the foremost area of economic activity in which families are involved. Furthermore, the community in which the institution is placed in does not reflect social disadvantages that might reflect negatively in the way students and families conceive the value of education. Consequently, the social-economic nature of the school’s catchment area is not a sign of weakness that may influence the motivation of pupils towards language learning.
It is common sense that people think it is important to learn languages, particularly in Algarve since it is a tourist destination for many Europeans. Being able to speak languages comprises a valuable advantage in terms of employability, of being aware of technological advances, of better understanding other cultures, of having facility in continuing ones education… There is also a long-term tradition of foreign language learning at lower secondary level (at the fifth grade pupils take on a first foreign language and at the seventh they take on a second) – it is part of the government’s technological plan the learning of English at an early stage (primary education), now put in practice. These two perspectives could without difficulty generate the idea that the acquisition of a second language is an easy task for Portuguese pupils. However, at least at our school, there is amongst language teachers, mainly English teachers, dissatisfaction with the learning results obtained so far. English is one of the subjects showing worst results, as the following charts elucidate:
Percentage of negative marks at the end of school year
2007-2008 * - 5th Grade
English 14,39%
Mathematics 9,35%
Natural Sciences 8,63%
Portuguese 7,91%
History 7,19%
Percentage of negative marks at the end of school year
2007-2008 * - 6th Grade
English 16,67%
Portuguese 14,91%
Mathematics 14,04%
History 7,89%
Natural Sciences 7,89%
Percentage of negative marks at the end of school year
2007-2008 * - 7th Grade
Mathematics 31,51%
English 23,29%
Portuguese 16,44%
Geography 13,70%
Natural Sciences 13,01%
French 12,80%
History 12,33%
Physics and Chemistry 6,85%
Percentage of negative marks at the end of school year
2007-2008 * - 8th Grade
Mathematics 23,66%
French 20,43%
History 18,28%
English 13,98%
Physics and Chemistry 13,98%
Portuguese 11,83%
Geography 4,30%
Natural Sciences 4,30%
Percentage of negative marks at the end of school year
2007-2008 * - 9th Grade
Mathematics 32,37%
English 22,30%
French 15,13%
Portuguese 6,47%
Physics and Chemistry 10,79%
History 6,47%
Geography 5,04%
Natural Sciences 2,88%
Even though the official programmes for the teaching of languages reflect the development of communicative competences, there is a strong tendency to a system-based approach to language learning.
The pupil population at our school integrates a considerable range of nationalities form European and out European countries: Romania, Moldavia, Hungary, Ukraine, Brazil, Cap Verde... This diversity, although a minority, could play an important role in the field of multilingualism – initiatives based on the language background of these students and families could serve several purposes: the contact with one other foreign language, the cultural exchange/interaction, the easier integration in the community...
Although, in the past, this school has been involved in European projects, particularly Comenius, in recent years there has been a lack of projects targeting the teaching of languages or engaging pupils in partnerships with European countries where they could use the language they had been learning as a bridge to communicate and produce knowledge.
The ministerial document that details the essential competences concerning foreign languages – national curriculum of basic education – is based on the national language programmes and on the Common European Framework of Reference. Therefore, it echoes adaptation to European language policies.
The strategic goals and priorities of the school with respect to issues such as language learning is an extension of the national policy which implies the implementation of the national foreign language programmes and the promotion of language competences, as mentioned above. At the end of basic education, it is expected that student have achieved a B1 level of proficiency in language competence for the two foreign languages they have been learning. At the end of the sixth grade pupils are likely to achieve an A2 level of proficiency.
The strategic goals of the initiative, being a scheme within the institution, are obviously oriented to the accomplishment of the national policy: to increase language learning in general, to prop up cultural openness, to develop pupils’ autonomy, to motivate students to undertake further language learning by enhancing study skills. On one hand, it is intended to be a way of putting in practice their knowledge of the language; on the other hand, it is a way of improving their skills in order to communicate with their eTwinning partners.
The first eTwinning partnership was established in the school year 2006/2007 with a Polish school. Last school year there were two eTwinning projects put in practice – one began in October and the other in March. At this moment there are two projects being undertaken and one waiting for approval. Even though it does not represent a significant change, it can be considered as a variable that makes some difference.
Pupils have produced written texts introducing themselves and presenting their own school. They have gathered information about their hometown and sent them to their partners. They have contacted their partners via email or via chat rooms. The seventh grade students have visited the Spanish school and have received their Spanish colleagues in July; so, they have had direct personal contact which demanded direct communicative interaction. To some extent they became more confident in using the foreign language to communicate.
Comparing the final school results in English, the sixth grade students that undertook the project had better marks. While the average success percentage was 83.3%, they achieved 84.6%. The quality of their success stood also above the average. 57.7% of these students had good or excellent results – the average for good or excellent results among sixth graders was 45.6%.
The seventh grade students that undertook the project in partnership with a Spanish school achieved 100% of success in their final results concerning the second foreign language. The quality of their success was 33.3%. However, it is impossible to present a comparative analysis because they were the only class taking Spanish as a second foreign language.
Throughout the development of the projects, students used ICT tools to execute the planned tasks (Microsoft WinWord, PowerPoint, internet...) under the supervision of their teachers and became more competent using them. Their self-assurance in the field of new technologies improved, they became less and less dependent of help from teachers and colleagues.
Nevertheless, in my opinion, it is still early to fully assess the success of the initiative in terms of improvement of skills. There must be continuation; pupils need to take on new projects throughout their basic education so that cultural awareness can be enriched and communicative skills enhanced.
The dissemination of eTwinning projects is a variable that can only be observed in the long-term as well as the achievement of better results in learning languages and improvement of language competence. If this initiative spreads, as we expect it will happen, it will surely be a strong success indicator.
By having analysed the indicators, which, in my opinion, show a partial success of the initiative – there must be undertaken an effort to guarantee the continuity of projects throughout the students’ academic education – I can identify three main success factors: institutional support for the language initiative; practical contacts with the language; use of ICT.
The development of the first eTwinning project, back in 2006-2007, was due to the initiative of the school’s headmaster who has always supported the idea that, in the field of learning and teaching languages, students and teachers should be engaged in meaningful activities and projects which promote communicative skills and the intercultural dialogue. Therefore, the institution has assured the conditions to develop these projects in terms of material resources as well as in terms of human resources. The first are connected to portable computers and to the ICT classroom, which can be fully used. The second refers to the distribution of some hours per week to a member of the ICT team in order to develop projects and help other teachers to start and maintain their projects as well.
To accomplish the planned tasks of each project, students need to communicate, by using ICT tools, with their partners. This way, partnerships allow them a practical contact with the language they are learning. Pupils realize that the only way they have to perceive their partners culture and their ways of life is trough the language they both are learning. Thus, the language becomes a powerful tool; it is the vehicle that permits them to achieve the proposed goals. Starting in a low level and continuously using it as an instrument both to communicate and to get a process to an end, students will improve their skills and their competences.
Through the establishment of eTwinning partnerships schools of different countries create bridges between them and culture, experiences, ways do perceive the world interchange – an intercultural dialogue takes place. All this is possible by using a language which, in the majority of cases, is a foreign one for both partners. It is the tool that allows them to communicate and, consequently, endorses intercultural awareness.
Nevertheless, to fully assess the influence of eTwinning partnerships in language learning, continuity must be assured. Students who start such an initiative in our school must regularly develop projects throughout their basic education. This is something we must put on our efforts. Thus, at institutional level there must be an increase of teachers involved in eTwinning partnerships. Otherwise, these activities will only be sporadic actions which might have insufficient echo on language learning.