At Lone Star College-CyFair, technology is a universal language.
Students at Lone Star College-CyFair learn French by going to the movies - and the movie theater is their Sony digital language lab.
This is just one of the creative ways Georges Detiveaux, Cy-Fair's Language Lab Coordinator and Lead French Faculty, uses Sony digital
technology to teach his students not just the French language - but French culture as well."After viewing a scene from the French film, students listen to an audio summary of the movie in the lab or record their own summaries," states Georges. "Or I will record a summary of the scene with the narration out of sequence and then ask my students to put it back in order by making a recording of their own. It forces them to construct a logical narrative but makes it fun and interactive.
Lone Star College-CyFair is a two-year college in Cypress, Texas that prepares students with "workforce" degrees or for a four-year college. Their progressive language program includes French, Arabic, German, Spanish, Japanese, ESOL, Mandarin Chinese, ASL, and an ASL Interpreting Program. Because the college is workforce oriented, some of their language courses are uniquely targeted to certain career paths, such as "Spanish for Healthcare Professions" and "ESOL for Machining".
Cy-Fair's two digital language labs employ Sony Virtuoso™ Software with Soloist® Digital Comparative Recorders. Both labs are used for spoken languages but one lab includes the ASL software video plug-ins that provide visual communication for their ASL and Interpreter Training classes. This new, fully digital technology follows the language department's original choice of the Sony Conductor™ and Soloist hybrid hardware/software language lab several years ago. "At the time, the faculty and administration made it their goal to acquire the best language lab possible. Basing their selection on reputation, ease of use, price and features, the committee chose the SANS and Sony solution through their local reseller, Teaching Systems, Inc.," said Georges. In addition to serving Cy-Fair's students, the labs are open to non-students several hours a week as part of a community outreach.
The importance of technology in language teaching.
The implementation of a digital language lab was an important facet in fulfilling Cy-Fair's mission. According to Georges, the college's
"vision, promise, and learning signature" include the application of emerging technologies to enhance learning." While digital technology
is an important educational tool, it is uniquely vital to teaching foreign language. What's more, at Lone Star College-CyFair, technology
isn't viewed as something to be afraid of, but a vital component of learning to be exploited to its fullest potential."A digital language lab is a special place," said Georges, "it's for people to make funny sounds and not be shy or afraid - a lab is a safe haven for experimentation. In general, students learn and appreciate more within a lab because it's a controlled environment - not a typical classroom. During class, while in the lab, you're more focused on the task at hand - the headphones, microphone, and camera make you react right away...outside of class, it's practice in a setting that you'll find in the real world...it's immediate, much like talking on the phone... and knowing you can accomplish these tasks puts you more at ease..."
What key benefits does the Sony digital language lab provide for his students? "The immediate application to the real world using the paired activity features and the partnered lab work," says Georges.
"It teaches students to negotiate meaning and is perhaps the most
communicative of all activities." George refers to it as the "now" aspect. "It provides real time synchronous communication with instant
feedback from an instructor who plays the role of facilitator: live, real time communication between student/student or student/teacher,"
he added.With a digital language lab, instructors can give an audio or video stimulus and the student can record a response right away. This immediate stimulus/response can be completed in or outside of class, adding flexibility to study time. How? "The recording feature is a great assessment tool," said Georges. "You have an archived file to refer to and even add comments to, which you can stop/pause/review, and all of this makes grading a lot easier."
With the Virtuoso software, all A/V content is centralized and kept in one place, making it easy for teachers to use. "Before this semester, only a few ASL instructors used technology for their classes because what we had was not very user friendly and the image quality was poor. Now with the Sony Virtuoso and Soloist ASL plug-ins, ALL of the ASL teachers use the lab because the digital video components make it simple to visually communicate with all students, easily collect students' work and assess each student's progress," said Georges.
The not too distant future.
For a community college or any institution of higher learning, Cy-Fair has a flourishing language program, and Georges and the other language faculty should be commended. As the next step in technology for the college's language program, Georges would like to offer a full spectrum of internet based language courses and feels strongly that synchronous communication has to be part of the equation to be effective. SANS' new SANSSpace™ Virtual Learning Environment may be in Cy-Fair's not too distant future.Learn more about the Sony Digital Language Lab Technology.
Georges Detiveaux is a Language Lab Coordinator and Lead French Faculty of Lone Star College Cy-Fair; an active member and VP of Houston Chapter-American Association of Teachers of French; Affiliate Representative of IALLT to ACTFL, and Secretary of the South Central Association for Language Learning Technology.
| Lone Star College, Cy-Fair Cypress, Texas The largest, newest and fastest growing member of the five colleges that make up the Lone Star College System http://cyfair.lonestar.edu http://cyfair.lonestar.edu/languagelabs Two Sony Digital Language Labs - (One with ASL Video Options) 65 Language Instructors Enrollment of approx. 12,000 Language enrollment of approx. 2,000 per semester Languages taught: French, Arabic, German, Spanish, Japanese, ESOL, Mandarin Chinese, ASL and ASL Interpreter Training |
