Back to: WLE- LCTL Newsletter Page March 15, 2003 Vol. 1, issue 2.1	The WLE Newsletter Now available online at: http://nosferatu.cas.usf.edu/languages…
	This issue highlights: ü From the Head of the Department ü Games in FL Classroom ü Virtual Asynchronous Swap Shop Workshop ü WLE Faculty introduction ü February Events – Reflections	From the Editor
		The good news is that having fun can really make a difference in a Foreign Language classroom!!! This issue will be devoted to having FUN in a foreign language classroom. In February there were two events at the WLE Department that approached this topic: The Phi Sigma Iota Game Day The “The Fun with Grammar” workshop conducted by Dr. T. Erben from Secondary Education department especially for our TAs and instructors. In the newsletter, presenters and instructors share their view on and approaches to creative and fun activities in a foreign language classroom, as well as samples of students’ work. Also in the issue you can find faculty members’ introduction of their academic and research interests as well as reflective summaries on several WLE February events.
		Virtual Asynchronous Swap Shop Workshop Announcement Dear WLE Instructors, I would like to invite you to a Swap Shop workshop. Considering our busy schedules, the workshop will be conducted virtually. Where? on http://Nicenet.org – WLE LCTL classroom | Document section (refer to the last page of the newsletter for step-by-step instructions on how to get there). When? March, 2003 Who? Any WLE instructor who wants to share an activity that was successful in his/her FL classroom. The activity can be in the target language BUT please provide a short description in English. If you experience difficulties, I will be happy to assist the posting process, please email me your activities. Newsletter editor. Iona Sarieva sapicoa@chuma1.cas.usf.edu CPR 432 Phone: 4-3257 Back to Top
		WLE Newsletter is now available online! Now available online at: http://nosferatu.cas.usf.edu/languages… Many thanks to Jose Feliciano who made it possible!
			The WLE News Letter	March 15, 2003 Vol. 1, issue 2.2
			From the Head of the Department
The President Visit and Some Other Comments I view the visit of the president, provost, and dean as a great success for a number of reasons. First of all, so many people took an active part in the presentation we made, both with their ideas and their hands-on help. That is really gratifying. I think now that our visitors have a better idea of what we do, how well we do it, and how talented our faculty is. They also can see that we have done an awful lot with a very small faculty. I should point out as well that the displays we made both in 419 and at the ELI made a strong impression on the president, who appears to be fascinated with our international projects. The several weeks that have gone by since this visit have only confirmed how much we are engaged with our work and the tremendous energy we have. Our two searches, one in German and one in Spanish, are going full blast, and I believe we are attracting strong and talented candidates. The Classics Forum was a success – as always, and as I write this, our Classicists are performing on all fronts in connection with the activities of the AFGLC. (I am sorry we have missed the Olympic part of the program but I am too out of shape to have been much use anyway). The symposium on globalization sponsored by the Florida-France Grant and led by Christine Probes was also most stimulating and involved many. So, congratulations to all the participants. The outgoing workshops have been very well attended, and the last one given by Tony Erben on teaching grammar was extremely informative and should act as a stimulus for all of us to approach grammar delivery in more effective ways. At the present, we are assessing our needs for bringing both the language lab and our classrooms up to the technological standards we need. Finally, after Spring Break, we should meet again to discuss the language requirement and what if anything we would like to see happen to it. Dr. V. Peppard
			Upcoming Events
· The ELI would like to announce its 25th birthday party, which will take place on Thursday, March 27, at 3:00 pm at the Solar Rotary between CPR and CIS.  Cake and coffee will be served. For this month's screening, we are showing a Japanese movie on March 8, 2003 (Saturday) titled "Remembering the Cosmos Flower" at 1 p.m. in Cooper Hall Auditorium CPR 103.  This poignant story is about a high school girl who returns to Japan from South America with a stigma of having contracted the AIDS virus.  It has English sub-titles and 103 min. long.  It is free, but any amount of donation is appreciated.                    A series of CALL workshops will be conducted by Annmary Zoran, ELI CALL consultant and Iona Sarieva, LCTL coordinator: Hot Potatoes - Using and creating activities with Hot Potatoes. CPR 109 (downstairs computer lab). 03/21/03 - 11am - 1 pm. Nicenet Using a web-based organizational tool in an ESL/FL classroom – Nicenet. CPR 469 (ELI computer lab) 03/21/03 - 1:30-3:00. Create your on Web Page Overview of how to create your own web page using Netscape 6.2. Linda Carroll WLE LCTL instructor and Ray Cepko an ELI instructor will share their advices about creating your own websites for instructional purposes. CPR 467 (ELI computer lab). 03/28/03 - 1:00-3:00 Web Page (cont.) Continuation of building own web page and uploading content to web. CPR 467 (ELI computer lab). 04/04/03 1:00-3:00 . Back to Top

March 15, 2003 Vol. 1, issue 2.3
Faculty Introduction	Dr. Jeffra Flaitz
Faculty Introduction	Jeffra Flaitz began her undergraduate studies intent on earning a degree in Fine Arts, but the direction of her academic career changed when she enrolled in her first Russian class. Charmed by the language and culture, Dr. Flaitz interrupted her studies in 1978 to work for a year as a “nanny” for a U.S. military family assigned to Moscow. In 1980 she earned her bachelor’s degree in Russian Language and Literature from the University of Minnesota. Her master’s and doctorate, both in Foreign Language Education, were earned from the State University of New York at Buffalo. After completing her Ph.D. coursework, she accepted a one-year assignment in Beijing to direct SUNY-Buffalo’s English Language Training Center. Upon her return to the U.S., she completed her dissertation, which was published in 1987 by Mouton de Gruyter under the title The Ideology of English: French Perceptions of English as a World Language. Dr. Flaitz joined the Department of Curriculum and Instruction as a Visiting Assistant Professor after graduation, taking a two-year hiatus to serve as Assistant to the President of SUNY-Buffalo. In 1992 she became Assistant Professor of Linguistics at USF, earning tenure and promotion to Associate Professor in 1996—the same year she became Director of the English Language Institute. Dr. Flaitz’s primary research interest lies in the areas of language attitudes and the cultural adjustment of international sojourners. She is passionate about the theory-to-practice connection; thus, she and her ELI colleagues kept the students of the Applied Linguistics M.A. program in mind when they researched and wrote the recently released volume Understanding Your International Students (University of Michigan Press, 2003). A similar focus on application can be seen in the work of Drs. Flaitz, Zhu, and Pichette as they study the academic language needs of USF’s international students.
	Dr. François Pichette
	I am originally for Quebec City and got my degrees from universities in Quebec.  USF is my third university as a professor.  My Ph.D. is in the psychology of language, and is a degree in linguistics, even though my dissertation is far more psychology than linguistics, and one of my directors was a psychologist.  I teach linguistics courses in the M.A. program in Linguistics and in the Ph.D. program in SLAIT.  My main courses are Applied Linguistics, Cross-Cultural Issues in ESL, and SLA.  In addition, once a year I teach a Spanish or a French course for our Spanish or French M.A. programs.  My main interests lie in the areas of psycholinguistics and neurolinguistics, and on how brain functions are involved in second language acquisition.  Because of the professors I have had and my functionalist / comparativist linguistic formation, I am also very interested in the history of language and languages, especially the history and dialectology of French and Spanish.  My main research projects currently focus on the effectiveness of reading activities in language courses, on reading and writing for enhancing science learning, and on mental imagery.  I also just finished revising a book manuscript written in French on reading.
	Back to Top

		March 15, 2003 Vol. 1, issue 2.4
	ESL Testing at the ELI Sha Balizet
WLE and ELI researchers and teachers are currently piloting an alternative approach to college admissions testing for ESL students. When deciding whether to admit an ESL applicant, U.S. universities commonly use TOEFL or other language proficiency test scores. These, however, are poor predictors of academic success. The new test takes a different approach -- it is a simulation of typical college work. The Cultural and Linguistic Evaluation of Academic Readiness (CLEAR) is a performance test that includes inter-related tasks. "We created a simulation because we wanted a test to have a high degree of congruence with real-world tasks," explained Sha Balizet, the Project Coordinator. In the CLEAR, examinees read a course text before attending a lecture, taking the subject test, and writing an essay related to the topic. The test development team (Sha Balizet, Jeffra Flaitz, Wei Zhu, Amna Mohamed, and Debbie Mitchell) has been working on the CLEAR for months. They are pleased to announce that the test is one step closer to release: the CLEAR was recently piloted with volunteer ELI students. Data from the pilot testing will help the researchers revise the test. The revised CLEAR will be validated with ESL test-takers throughout Florida before the final version of the exam is released. For more information, contact Sha Balizet at sbalizet@chuma1.cas.usf.edu .
	Review of Last Month Events
o Globalization Symposium - "Globalization" includes "worldwide compression of space and time," "intensification of consciousness about the human and natural world as a whole," social and economic interactions and "increased efforts to understand these," "contending worldviews," "growing awareness of connections, commonalities, and differences".  These perspectives and others were discussed in the Symposium presentations!  o Phisigma Iota's GAME DAY – Participants played scrabble in Hebrew, Russian games, Chinese. Spanish had theirs a few days earlier in conjunction with the Spanish Club. German students also played scrabbles at one of the student’s home. Many thanks to Dr. Probes, Dr. Dunchin, and Dr. Nemchonok! o Teaching Russian the Fun and Easy Way - Dr. Nemchonok addressed creativity and game activities in a workshop designed for the Russian WLE instructors and visiting scholars. She shared specific materials that she use in her classroom as well as ideas and suggestions. This workshop was very useful since it provided practical background to the theoretical framework of using constructivist activities in a FL classroom. o Having Fun with Grammar workshop conducted by Dr. Erben was a also great success. Dr. Erben shared a practical ideas how to approach grammar in a foreign language classroom in a creative and meaningful way thus expanding the idea of “fun” in a language classroom beyond games activities. o Difficulties in Teaching Arabic Language -In his presentation on Arabic Language, Boualem Bouchama discussed the difficulties of teaching Arabic as a Foreign Langage which are related to the language and culture specifics of the Arabic world. His presentation triggered a great interest in three different groups of our academic community – WLE-LCTL instructors, ELI instructors, and SLAIT students. (read more about this presentation in this issue) Back to Top

March 15, 2003 Vol. 1, issue 2 .5	The WLE News Letter
	Specifics of Arabic Language – Issues in FL Classroom Nader Morkus
	The Arabic Teaching Workshop given on February 28, 2003 by Bu Allam Buchama was very exciting and informative. About 18 SLAIT and WLE faculty and students came to this event. Bouchama started by explaining how people in different Arab countries speak different dialects that are, in many cases, mutually unintelligible. He mentioned that this is particularly true in Arab countries that are geographically separated (e.g., Egypt and Alegeria). To illustrate his point, Bouchama gave an interesting example of how a simple greeting such as How are you? is realized differently in Algerian Arabic and in Egyptian Arabic. He explained that although people all over the Arab world use the same written form of the language, that is MSA (Modern Standard Arabic), there are major differences in the spoken varieties; such differences usually lead to communication breakdowns. He also explained that different linguistic factors influenced these various dialects. For example, Algerian Arabic was highly influenced by the French language due to the French occupation of Algeria; in the same way, Egyptian dialect was influenced substantially by both the Turkish and English languages, due to Turkish and British occupation of Egypt. One of the questions raised by the audience was how this dichotomy between the written and spoken varieties of the language is approached by teachers of Arabic as a Foreign Language (AFL). Bouchama explained that most AFL teachers teach the standard variety (MSA) since it is the language variety used in all written Arabic communication and is also understood by all educated speakers of Arabic. However, individual Arabic dialects can certainly be taught and learned if the learner’s goal is to interact with speakers of a particular Arabic dialect.
	2nd Annual 'Olympic Challenge' mounted by the Classics Program Nicole Fafalios
	This spring saw the 2nd annual 'Olympic Challenge' mounted by the Classics Program in WLE, organized by Dr. Ava Chitwood.  The 'Challenge', which consists of Olympic-like games and contests (emphasis on the like!) began as a fund-raiser last year to benefit Special Olympics, and as part of Hellenic Culture Week organized by Classics and ICHS.     Guided by the Classics Club, the challenge featured the 'Achilles Race' (a 3-legged race), 'Ova Easy' (an egg and spoon race), 'Oedipus Wrecks' (the human chariot event), and the 'Friscus Throw' (a Frisbee thrown like a discus).  Participants came primarily from the Classics Club, from Dr. Chitwood's Roman Civilization course, and from the Philosophy department, whose team won first place.     From donations and grants, we were able to raise five hundred dollars for Special Olympics, and urge the WLE community to join us next year!  Let's see if a WLE team can't beat Philosophy in the Games! Back to Top

	The WLE News Letter		March 15, 2003 Vol. 1, issue 2.6
	Why Games in Foreign Language Classroom? Dr. I. Nemchonok		Fun in FL Classroom Puppets are Welcomed in Dr. Nemchonok’s classes: Izabela Rekawek Mary Striby Katherina Mccartny Regina Dunn Back to Top
Children learn foreign languages easier than adults: they have better memory, their speak production is flexible, their native language is still developing, and they don’t have any desires to reflect on the peculiarities of the foreign language they are learning. But most importantly, children perceive it as a game to use new words when naming things that surround them and when expressing their feelings and ideas. Children perceive the world differently, they use images rather than simply vocabulary units, this helps them to play “what if” and “let’s pretend” games. My teaching experience convinced me that inviting my students back in the world of childhood promotes a less “painful” way of acquiring a foreign language. Riddles, puzzles, conundrums, rhyme, coloring, following commands to indicate understanding – all this constitutes teaching through games. This style of teaching lowers the affective filter – the tension, the fear to make a mistake, the fear of the foreign language. One of the most successful methods for teaching through games is puppetry. When students use puppets, puppets are those who speak; thus the responsibility for the mistakes is “removed”, the emotional involvement in the puppetry act helps students to concentrate and produce more creative and correct utterances than when simply communicating with the teacher “face-to-face”. Of course, to apply play and games in the classroom, the teacher herself has to have a “playful” personality and even to be a little of an actor. The students also need to be educated about how games and play positively affect language learning. However, every instructor can and should plan for games. Students are always ready to play; the game can be focused on one student, or a group of students or the whole class. To teach through games is easy and fun. Let’s play J.
	Russian and Chinese Students Having Fun with Language
Oksana Lutsyshyna’s Russian 1 class

March 15, 2003 Vol. 1, Issue 2 .7		The WLE News Letter
	A Japanese Game – Animal Matching Game Ann Welsh
	One of the most popular matching games that Japanese children play is called “Doobutsu-awase” (Animal Matching Game). This is a fun and competitive way to practice common phrases, and can be used for all languages.  It takes very little effort to produce a game kit. First, find side-view illustrations of some animals.  Using a scanner or a copier, bring each picture to the same size, so that they’d fit 4”x6” cards (or any other sizes.)   Paste each picture on a card, then cut it into three parts vertically.  Give each animal a different value, so that at the end of the game the player with the most points becomes the winner. Players memorize the names of each animal and the three parts of the body:  head/ face, tummy/abdomen, and tail/rear end.  After all the cards are dealt, a player calls another player by name, and ask for a piece by saying, “Please give me ---‘s ---“ or “Do you have ---‘s ---?”, with the name of the animal and body part.  The respondent must answer in a whole sentence, such as  “Yes, I have it.  It’s yours”, and “No, I don’t have it.  I’m sorry”. If given the card, the first player must say “thank you” properly before he touches the card; otherwise, the card goes back to the original holder.  A player can continue until he hits a “no” answer.  Lay down all three parts of an animal when completed. The game ends when a player gets rid of all cards. This can be expanded to suit more skilled speakers by utilizing both colloquial (abrupt) and polite (honorific) styles of language, which are more complex, yet still appropriate and fun to say.  Students may use many other greetings and exclamatory or respondent remarks often uttered in an ordinary course of conversation. I hope you have fun using this game in your classroom!
	Hebrew Students About Games
Students About Studying FL with Games Puppets are Welcomed in Dr. Nemchonok’s classes: Troy Cluft Jerry Swan	Leaha Widrowitcz I think learning a language requires some hands on activities. …Most importantly, learning is most successful when one is having fun. Merav Schlesinger Using games in the classroom is a wonderful idea... It’s not only learning experience but a fun one as well. Lee Govaz I believe that it is better to play and learn. Children and adults understand more when you play a game with them, which has to do with the subject that is taught Tommer Mann Games give a different dimension to learning Hebrew….
	German Students Play Charades Deana Tate
	A while back I decided that instead of simple memorization for my German vocabulary, I wanted to add some zest to studying. Therefore, I decided to initiate “German Charades” or “Deutch Scharaden”. Other than the usual party necessities (buying food or making everyone else bringing food or money since I am broke), I typed up the vocabulary words from the chapters covered in this semester into a table and scrambled them. These vocabulary words were mainly nouns and verbs with a few adjectives. Once everyone arrived and we began, I simply told them to pick a word from the list, cross it off so we know it’s been done and act it out. Whoever guessed correctly had to go next. Charades were a little bit difficult to do for a lot of words (or I may just lack the imagination to do some of them), so this idea could also be extended to pictionary.
	Join Our WLE-LCTL Virtual Community! To do it, just follow these simple steps: Step 1: Type www.nicenet.org Step 2: Enter the class key: Q63759W40 Step 3: Fill out the registration form (suggestion - to make your name unique, just add the last two digits of your phone number) Step 4: Welcome you are in the WLE-LCTL Virtual Community! Go to the Document section to post your Swap-Shop Activity and to read the activities posted by your colleagues. Back to Top