SWALLT Fall Regional Meeting Report

by Harold Hendricks, Brigham Young University

Digital Stream 6-CSU Monterey Bay

Once again, SWALLT co-located its Spring meeting with our friends and colleagues at CSU Monterey Bay's 6th annual Digital Stream conference, Seeing and Speaking: A Vision of Language, held March 25-27, 2004. Over 200 people from around the country and abroad joined for a very pleasant and informative meeting.

This year's keynote speaker was Mr. Thomas E. Welch, Director of Seeding Innovation for the Office of the New Economy for the state of Kentucky. As a former language teacher and principal, Mr. Welch has experienced first-hand some of the frustrations of teaching within the traditional system of education. His presentation, entitled "Take Off the Blinders, Unstop Your Ears" was a fresh look at the changes possible when administrators, teachers and students creatively use the tools that new technologies provide. In his role as innovator, he challenged the audience to redefine teaching and learning outside of the historic classroom and listen to new ideas that are made possible by the "anytime, anywhere" world we now live in. He also described how even more sophisticated technologies are emerging that can provide virtual reality language experience like never before.

One of the focused tracks of this conference was the use of SMART board technology in the classroom, with many presenters demonstrating various methods of use within their presentations.

SWALLT Sessions
Our membership was well represented in the DS6 program, with over a dozen presenters in the program:

Tomas Bevia from University of Nevada, Reno, presented a session demonstrating how collaborative writing can be enhanced by the use of Timbuktu Pro. He also discussed the pedagogical ramifications of computer laboratory integration as well as the perceptions of using technology in the writing process held by both faculty and students.

Robert Blake of UC Davis provided an evaluation of an online language learning program known as "Spanish Without Walls," and introductory Spanish course offered through the UC Davis Extension Service. This program uses an internet voice-chat tool along with web interactions and CD-ROM media. The students were tested using BYU's CAPE exam and a discrete-item grammar test. In comparison with the traditional Spanish control class, the online students performed better, but missed the face-to-face practice of the classroom.

Arlene Krebs, one of our hosts at CSU Monterey Bay gave us a view of the future with her presentation on e-learning, communications, and new media development for mobile teaching and learning.

Emi Ochiai Ahn from Mesa Community College presented a session on "Student ePortfolios for National Standards Using WebCT's Student Presentation Tool." Her presentation included examples of her students' ePortfolios incorporating the 5 C's within their multimedia presentations.

Also from the Phoenix area was James Abraham, Glendale Community College, presenting, "Servovia: Using Video to Incorporate Culture and Personal Experience into the Classroom."

Joseph Kautz of Stanford demonstrated The Russian Sign Language Project, a decade long undertaking that now includes over 600 video clips with glosses in English, Russian and Japanese developed by many participating institutions. He discussed the practical and theoretical issues of cataloging through metadata the resources of such a large collaborative online resource.

Françoise Sorgen-Goldschmidt brought us up to date on her digital language lab known as LangLab, created at UC Berkeley. She announced several new features and demonstrated practical applications for both monitored and unmonitored practice and testing.

Jeff Winters of CSU Long Beach provided a look at how Macromedia's Flash development program can be used by the average language educator to create tutorials, exercises, and other on-line activities. He provided a number of templates that can easily be populated with an instructor's own content to quickly provide focused activities.

Mimi Yu from UN Reno demonstrated how she streamlines the various aspects of language teaching through the use of QuickTime movies. Her presentation included examples of both passive and interactive movies that combine everything from the syllabus to the 5 C's into a cohesive delivery method that can also be used as the basis for an online course.

On Saturday, SWALLT presented the Featured Forum, headed by Gus Leonard of CSUMB with panelists Pat Miller, Carol Reitan, Jack Burston, Harold Hendricks, Timo Vasankari, and Joseph Kautz. After a short introductory presentation, each of the panelists discussed the general and specific challenges they faced as the nature of the language lab changes. This panel was followed by another one entitled "Language Learning Technology: Current Practical Implementations and Future Trends." Members of this panel included Harold Hendricks, Mimi Yu, Russell Hansen, Pat Miller, and Gus Leonard.

SWALLT Business Meeting.
The SWALLT Business Meeting was well attended and we welcomed several new members who we look forward to knowing better over the coming months. The continuing discussion of by-laws as well as a very positive Treasurer's report took the bulk of the business. The most exciting news is the finalization of plans to hold the fall SWALLT conference at Brigham Young University-Hawaii on the North Shore of Oahu Thanksgiving weekend.