Recent studies of emerging technologies have shown that mobile phone production now exceeds one billion devices globally per year (Johnson, Levine & Smith, 2008). With a level of production that signifies a shift in the ownership of "networked machines" from institutions to individuals, the broad appeal of portable technologies now…

A long-standing debate in native and foreign language learning revolves around the use of computers to promote genuine social and professional communication. Webquests are a very common way of using Web resources to research a variety of topics, and if appropriately used can trigger the situations necessary to develop both written and oral…

The use of computers in the foreign language classroom in the Czech Republic is viewed with suspicion. Many teachers assert that computers prevent engagement in communication and teamwork, and that a computer could never replace a good teacher. This paper argues that from within a cognitive framework of language acquisition computers do indeed…

Synchronous computer-mediated communication (CMC), more commonly known in the Internet world as "chatting," has become an increasingly popular way to communicate for a variety of purposes. While CMC is still primarily recreational in character, educators are waking up to the possibilities of harnessing this activity for pedagogical…

Foreign language students experience added difficulty when they are isolated from native speakers and from the culture of the target language. It has been posited that MOO (Multi-User Domain Object Oriented) may help overcome the geographical isolation of these students. MOOs are Internet-based virtual worlds in which people from all over the real…

The focus of this practitioner brief is: What happens when students identify the skill areas they feel need the most work and then are given class time, resources, and strategies to work in these areas? This learning strategy was tried by one teacher of adult English as a Second Language (ESL) because the students in his class were either too far…

Investigates the use of computer conferencing in a second-language context with five English-for-Academic-Purposes students for the purposes of conducting discussions and introducing the students to writing as a process. Students dominated during discussions and received increased commentary on their writing; although the technology did not cause…