This large-scale study used a survey to collect data on K-12 world language classrooms in Massachusetts public schools, focusing on core instructional practices, curriculum, and assessment. The study resulted in 383 individual teacher completed responses, representing 188 districts, which was analyzed using descriptive statistics. Results indicate…

This article reports on a multiliteracies-based experiential learning curriculum designed for intermediate French built upon the framework of a global simulation pedagogy. Students adopted the roles of fictitious characters living together in an apartment building in Paris and carried out written and spoken tasks through the voice of their…

The faculty and administration at Drake University made the decision in 2001 to alter radically how language instruction was delivered and received, beginning by disbanding the long-standing Modern Language Department. The dissolution of the department and the new pedagogy caused ripples of concern and shock among language instructors and…

As courses that once regularly met face-to-face are increasingly offered in blended or fully online formats, questions have been raised about the comparability of instruction, teacher and student roles, and overall quality of the learning experience. The present study offers a five-inference interpretive argument (Chapelle, Enright & Jamieson,…

Communicative language teaching has been hailed as revolutionary and has achieved a solid base of widely accepted principles, yet its transmission to scholars has been hampered by debate and confusion. This paper explores the reasons why and suggests ways of overcoming the disunity that hinders further progress. (119 references) (JL)

This article focuses on reasons for using foreign language experience programs (FLEX) with middle school students. Specific sections provide a description of an interdisciplinary FLEX program and discuss the goals, objectives, and roots of exploratory programs; uses of the exploratory approach; a multidimensional curriculum; and a "grass…

Describes the philosophical bases of confluent education, and provides examples of this method in language instruction. (AM)

Describes philosophy of Paulo Freire as foundation for an existential/humanistic curriculum and explores practical and theoretical implications of this curriculum for second language teaching. Expands curriculum design principles into sample second language curriculum design principles. (Author/BK)

Offers an alternative to the two approaches to teaching Spanish to adolescent and college-level bilingual native speakers interested in developing their Spanish abilities. This theory draws heavily from Freire's problem-posing procedure for critical dialogue and Vygotsky's theory of social learning. (28 references) (Author/VWL)

Problem-based learning (PBL) is an instructional methodology placing primary emphasis on students solving realistic problems in a team-oriented environment. In this article, authors discuss using PBL to integrate a language for specific purposes (LSP) track into an undergraduate biological engineering curriculum as a way to prepare students for an…

Discusses three obstacles to interdisciplinary cooperation in education: (1) compartmentalization of teachers and teaching, (2) reluctance of educators to tackle the problem, and (3) difficulties in intraschool and intrasystem communication. Recommends collecting, expanding, and sharing curricular components to achieve the goal. (PMJ)

Language departments in Britain have responded to the need for finding less costly alternatives for delivering instruction, by introducing autonomous language learning into the curriculum. This article warns that it is neither a cheap nor easy alternative, and that there are important economic, psychological, pedagogical, and practical issues to…

Studies involving teachers of both Spanish and English as a foreign language reveal that metaphors provide teachers with a useful image to represent their views and the elusiveness of cultural concepts. It is suggested that teachers become ethnographers investigating their own beliefs as well as those of others while developing sociolinguistic…

Explores aspects of successful foreign language teaching and learning that could be pertinent to the design of school policies; defines the current conception of "communicative competence"; discusses how cultural studies can be related to foreign language instruction; and describes a model policy developed during case studies across various…