Approaches to language learning: Blending tradition with innovation

Abstract

Experienced language learners have always tended to work out their own strategies to maximise their effectiveness; examples of this would include consciously incorporating newly learnt words and phrases in one’s own speaking and writing, reading real texts on topics that are of interest to one and learning to paraphrase so as to utilise one’s knowledge to the greatest possible effect. Such approaches will probably always continue to have considerable validity. However, the age of the internet and mobile technology is enabling the activity of language learning to be enhanced and supported in new and innovative ways. Firstly, the vast amount of user-generated content now available in many languages on the web (including video content on sites such as Youtube) on every topic under the sun can now be exploited for language learning purposes. Secondly, there are now a wide range of apps (such as reading aids or flashcard utilities), each of which is designed to support particular aspects of the learning process. Finally, wikis and other collaborative writing projects help to make language learning a more active and even creative activity. The paper will present a few examples of these new kinds of approach. Chief among these will be the showcasing of a user-driven wiki for learners of Mandarin Chinese that is based at University College London. One of the emphases throughout will be on considering the extent to which the new approaches and technologies considered are in the spirit of traditional language learning or should be considered a new departure.