Language, Education and Technology

Encyclopedia of

Language and Education

Series Editor: Stephen May

Language,

Education and

Technology

Steven L. Thorne

Stephen May Editors

Third Edition

Encyclopedia of Language and Education

Series Editor

Stephen May

Faculty of Education and Social Work

The University of Auckland

Auckland, New Zealand

In this third, fully revised edition, the 10 volume Encyclopedia of Language and

Education offers the newest developments, including an entirely new volume of

research and scholarly content, essential to the field of language teaching and learning

in the age of globalization. In the selection of topics and contributors, the Encyclopedia

reflects the depth of disciplinary knowledge, breadth of interdisciplinary perspective,

and diversity of sociogeographic experience in the language and education field.

Throughout, there is an inclusion of contributions from non-English speaking and

non-western parts of the world, providing truly global coverage. Furthermore, the

authors have sought to integrate these voices fully into the whole, rather than as

special cases or international perspectives in separate sections.

The Encyclopedia is a necessary reference set for every university and college

library in the world that serves a faculty or school of education, as well as being

highly relevant to the fields of applied and socio-linguistics. The publication of this

work charts the further deepening and broadening of the field of language and

education since the publication of the first edition of the Encyclopedia in 1997 and

the second edition in 2008.

More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/15111

Steven L. Thorne • Stephen May

Editors

Language, Education and

Technology

Third Edition

With 11 Figures and 3 Tables

Editors

Steven L. Thorne

Portland, OR, USA

Stephen May

Faculty of Education and Social Work

The University of Auckland

Auckland, New Zealand

ISBN 978-3-319-02236-9 ISBN 978-3-319-02237-6 (eBook)

ISBN 978-3-319-02238-3 (print and electronic bundle)

DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-02237-6

Library of Congress Control Number: 2017945921

1st edition: # Kluwer Academic Publishers 1997

2nd edition: # Springer Science+Business Media LLC 2008

# Springer International Publishing AG 2017

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Editor in Chief’s Introduction to the

“Encyclopedia of Language and Education”

This is one of ten volumes of the Encyclopedia of Language and Education

published by Springer. The Encyclopedia – now in this, its 3rd edition – is undoubt￾edly the benchmark reference text in its field. It was first published in 1997 under the

general editorship of the late David Corson and comprised eight volumes, each

focused on a single, substantive topic in language and education. These included:

language policy and political issues in education, literacy, oral discourse and edu￾cation, second language education, bilingual education, knowledge about language,

language testing and assessment, and research methods in language and education.

In his introductory remarks, David made the case for the timeliness of an

overarching, state-of-the-art review of the language and education field. He argued

that the publication of the Encyclopedia reflected both the internationalism and

interdisciplinarity of those engaged in the academic analysis of language and

education, confirmed the maturity and cohesion of the field, and highlighted the

significance of the questions addressed within its remit. Contributors across the 1st

edition’s eight volumes came from every continent and from over 40 countries. This

perhaps explains the subsequent impact and reach of that 1st edition – although no

one (except, perhaps, the publisher!) quite predicted its extent. The Encyclopedia

was awarded a Choice Outstanding Academic Title award by the American Library

Association and was read widely by scholars and students alike around the globe.

In 2008, the 2nd edition of the Encyclopedia was published under the general

editorship of Nancy Hornberger. It grew to ten volumes as Nancy continued to build

upon the reach and influence of the Encyclopedia. A particular priority in the 2nd

edition was the continued expansion of contributing scholars from contexts outside

of English-speaking and/or developed contexts, as well as the more effective the￾matic integration of their regional concerns across the Encyclopedia as a whole. The

2nd edition also foregrounded key developments in the language and education field

over the previous decade, introducing two new volumes on language socialization

and language ecology.

This 3rd edition continues both the legacy and significance of the previous

editions of the Encyclopedia. A further decade on, it consolidates, reflects, and

expands (upon) the key issues in the field of language education. As with

its predecessors, it overviews in substantive contributions of approximately

5000 words each, the historical development, current developments and challenges,

and future directions, of a wide range of topics in language and education. The

v

geographical focus and location of its authors, all chosen as experts in their respec￾tive topic areas, also continues to expand, as the Encyclopedia aims to provide the

most representative international overview of the field to date.

To this end, some additional changes have been made. The emergence over the

last decade of “superdiversity” as a topic of major concern in sociolinguistics,

applied linguistics, and language education is now a major thread across all volumes

– exploring the implications for language and education of rapidly changing pro￾cesses of migration and transmigration in this late capitalist, globalized world. This

interest in superdiversity foregrounds the burgeoning and rapidly complexifying

uses of language(s), along with their concomitant deconstruction and (re)modifica￾tion, across the globe, particularly (but not exclusively) in large urban environments.

The allied emergence of multilingualism as an essential area of study – challenging

the long-held normative ascendancy of monolingualism in relation to language

acquisition, use, teaching, and learning – is similarly highlighted throughout all

ten volumes, as are their pedagogical consequences (most notably, perhaps, in

relation to translanguaging). This “multilingual turn” is reflected, in particular, in

changes in title to two existing volumes: Bilingual and Multilingual Education and

Language Awareness, Bilingualism and Multilingualism (previously, Bilingual Edu￾cation and Language Awareness, respectively).

As for the composition of the volumes, while ten volumes remain overall, the

Language Ecology volume in the 2nd edition was not included in the current edition,

although many of its chapter contributions have been reincorporated and/or

reworked across other volumes, particularly in light of the more recent developments

in superdiversity and multilingualism, as just outlined. (And, of course, the impor￾tant contribution of the Language Ecology volume, with Angela Creese and the late

Peter Martin as principal editors, remains available as part of the 2nd edition.)

Instead, this current edition has included a new volume on Language, Education

and Technology, with Steven Thorne as principal editor. While widely discussed

across the various volumes in the 2nd edition, the prominence and rapidity of

developments over the last decade in academic discussions that address technology,

new media, virtual environments, and multimodality, along with their wider social

and educational implications, simply demanded a dedicated volume.

And speaking of multimodality, a new, essential feature of the current edition of

the Encyclopedia is its multiplatform format. You can access individual chapters

from any volume electronically, you can read individual volumes electronically

and/or in print, and, of course, for libraries, the ten volumes of the Encyclopedia

still constitute an indispensible overarching electronic and/or print resource.

As you might expect, bringing together ten volumes and over 325 individual

chapter contributions has been a monumental task, which began for me at least in

2013 when, at Nancy Hornberger’s invitation, Springer first approached me about

the editor-in-chief role. All that has been accomplished since would simply not have

occurred, however, without support from a range of key sources. First, to Nancy

Hornberger, who, having somehow convinced me to take on the role, graciously

agreed to be consulting editor for the 3rd edition of the Encyclopedia, providing

advice, guidance, and review support throughout.

vi Editor in Chief’s Introduction to the “Encyclopedia of Language and Education”

The international and interdisciplinary strengths of the Encyclopedia continue to

be foregrounded in the wider topic and review expertise of its editorial advisory

board, with several members having had direct associations with previous editions of

the Encyclopedia in various capacities. My thanks to Suresh Canagarajah, William

Cope, Viv Edwards, Rainer Enrique Hamel, Eli Hinkel, Francis Hult, Nkonko

Kamwangamalu, Gregory Kamwendo, Claire Kramsch, Constant Leung, Li Wei,

Luis Enrique Lopez, Marilyn Martin-Jones, Bonny Norton, Tope Omoniyi, Alastair

Pennycook, Bernard Spolsky, Lionel Wee, and Jane Zuengler for their academic and

collegial support here.

The role of volume editor is, of course, a central one in shaping, updating,

revising and, in some cases, resituating specific topic areas. The 3rd edition of the

Encyclopedia is a mix of existing volume editors from the previous edition (Cenoz,

Duff, King, Shohamy, Street, and Van Deusen-Scholl), new principal volume editors

(García, Kim, Lin, McCarty, and Thorne, Wortham), and new coeditors (Lai and Or).

As principal editor of Language Policy and Political Issues in Education, Teresa

McCarty brings to the volume her longstanding interests in language policy, lan￾guage education, and linguistic anthropology, arising from her work in Native

American language education and Indigenous education internationally. For Liter￾acies and Language Education, Brian Street brings a background in social and

cultural anthropology, and critical literacy, drawing on his work in Britain, Iran,

and around the globe. As principal editors of Discourse and Education, Stanton

Wortham has research expertise in discourse analysis, linguistic anthropology,

identity and learning, narrative self-construction, and the new Latino diaspora,

while Deoksoon Kim’s research has focused on language learning and literacy

education, and instructional technology in second language learning and teacher

education. For Second and Foreign Language Education, Nelleke Van Deusen￾Scholl has academic interests in linguistics and sociolinguistics and has worked

primarily in the Netherlands and the United States. As principal editors of Bilingual

and Multilingual Education, Ofelia García and Angel Lin bring to the volume their

internationally recognized expertise in bilingual and multilingual education, includ￾ing their pioneering contributions to translanguaging, along with their own work in

North America and Southeast Asia. Jasone Cenoz and Durk Gorter, principal editors

of Language Awareness, Bilingualism and Multilingualism, bring to their volume

their international expertise in language awareness, bilingual and multilingual edu￾cation, linguistic landscape, and translanguaging, along with their work in the

Basque Country and the Netherlands. The principal editor of Language Testing

and Assessment, Elana Shohamy, is an applied linguist with interests in critical

language policy, language testing and measurement, and linguistic landscape

research, with her own work focused primarily on Israel and the United States. For

Language Socialization, Patricia Duff has interests in applied linguistics and socio￾linguistics and has worked primarily in North America, East Asia, and Central

Europe. For Language, Education and Technology, Steven Thorne’s research inter￾ests include second language acquisition, new media and online gaming environ￾ments, and theoretical and empirical investigations of language, interactivity, and

Editor in Chief’s Introduction to the “Encyclopedia of Language and Education” vii

development, with his work focused primarily in the United States and Europe. And

for Research Methods in Language and Education, principal editor, Kendall King,

has research interests in sociolinguistics and educational linguistics, particularly with

respect to Indigenous language education, with work in Ecuador, Sweden, and the

United States. Finally, as editor-in-chief, I bring my interdisciplinary background in

the sociology of language, sociolinguistics, applied linguistics, and educational

linguistics, with particular interests in language policy, Indigenous language educa￾tion, and bilingual education, along with my own work in New Zealand, North

America, and the UK/Europe.

In addition to the above, my thanks go to Yi-Ju Lai, coeditor with Kendall King,

and Iair Or, coeditor with Elana Shohamy. Also, to Lincoln Dam, who as editorial

assistant was an essential support to me as editor-in-chief and who worked closely

with volume editors and Springer staff throughout the process to ensure both its

timeliness and its smooth functioning (at least, to the degree possible, given the

complexities involved in this multiyear project). And, of course, my thanks too to the

approximately 400 chapter contributors, who have provided the substantive content

across the ten volumes of the Encyclopedia and who hail from every continent in the

world and from over 50 countries.

What this all indicates is that the Encyclopedia is, without doubt, not only a major

academic endeavor, dependent on the academic expertise and good will of all its

contributors, but also still demonstrably at the cutting edge of developments in the

field of language and education. It is an essential reference for every university and

college library around the world that serves a faculty or school of education and is an

important allied reference for those working in applied linguistics and sociolinguis￾tics. The Encyclopedia also continues to aim to speak to a prospective readership that

is avowedly multinational and to do so as unambiguously as possible. Its ten

volumes highlight its comprehensiveness, while the individual volumes provide

the discrete, in-depth analysis necessary for exploring specific topic areas. These

state-of-the art volumes also thus offer highly authoritative course textbooks in the

areas suggested by their titles.

This 3rd edition of the Encyclopedia of Language and Education continues to

showcase the central role of language as both vehicle and mediator of educational

processes, along with the pedagogical implications therein. This is all the more

important, given the rapid demographic and technological changes we face in this

increasingly globalized world and, inevitably, by extension, in education. But the

cutting edge contributions within this Encyclopedia also, crucially, always situate

these developments within their historical context, providing a necessary diachronic

analytical framework with which to examine critically the language and education

field. Maintaining this sense of historicity and critical reflexivity, while embracing the

latest developments in our field, is indeed precisely what sets this Encyclopedia apart.

The University of Auckland

Auckland, New Zealand

Stephen May

viii Editor in Chief’s Introduction to the “Encyclopedia of Language and Education”

Volume Editor’s Introduction to “Language,

Education and Technology”

Across the history of human social organization, information and communication

technologies have had enormous effects on the processes they mediate. Some

technologies have amplified existing activities in areas such as reach or speed,

while others have enabled the emergence of novel informational, communicative,

and social practices. In the contemporary era, global networks enable culture, music,

and linguistic repertoires to propagate, mutate, and cross-pollinate across media and

communicative modalities. Recent sociological analyses have documented that the

Internet has qualitatively transformed everyday communication and information

practices in commercial, financial, professional, educational, recreational, and inter￾personal realms (e.g., Castells 2004), all of which provoke questions as to how

language educators and researchers should orient themselves to the perennially

changing contexts and conditions of linguistically mediated life activity.

Engineering advances in digital technologies have been prodigious over the

years, but to paraphrase Internet pioneer Tim Berners-Lee, the Internet is less

interesting as a technological fact than as a social fact. Evidence for this exists

from the very beginning of the Internet. The initial series of networked computers,

called ARPANET (Advanced Research Projects Agency Network), were created in

1966 and designed for file sharing and remote access to then rare computers. Email

emerged in 1971 and by 1973, use of email for professional but also interpersonal

and recreational purposes – the first listserv in existence, SF-Lovers, catered to fans

of science fiction literature – comprised 75% of ARPANET’s data traffic. From this

early point, the development of the Internet and associated connective devices has

continued to mirror the intensely social-relational nature of our species – evidenced

by mass participation in the sharing of user-generated content, the mercurial rise of

social networking sites, and the rise of infrastructure such as cloud-based computing,

mobile devices, and the Internet of things (network-enabled devices for collecting

and sharing data) – that perhaps in some ways problematically make technology

spatially and temporally ubiquitous in modern life.

This volume assembles the majority of technology-focused chapters in the 3rd

edition of the Encyclopedia of Language and Education. In the 1st and 2nd editions of

the Encyclopedia, contributions addressing various aspects of technology were dis￾tributed across multiple topical volumes. The genesis of this new technology-focused

ix

volume emerges from the unquestionably constitutive ways in which many areas of

educational practice, and life activity more broadly, are now affected by digital

mediation, a condition that creates opportunity but also friction, resistance, and

evidence for continuing global inequalities across world regions and social classes.

Contents of the Volume

This volume of the Encyclopedia, Language, Education and Technology, is

partitioned into five parts that in some cases include overlapping themes and topical

areas. In other ways, this volume is perhaps the most heterogeneous of all in the

series due to the extremely broad organizing domain of “technology.” Contributions

synthesize research ranging from discrete attention to particular technology envi￾ronments, instructional formats, pedagogical orientations, language and literacy

learning outcomes, and teacher professional development to issues of multimodality,

transnationalism, superdiversity, translanguaging, identity, and methodology (some￾times within the same chapter!).

Part 1, Perspectives on Technology, Multimodality, Literacy, and Language,

addresses a number of overarching issues pertaining to technology through the

lenses of criticality, literacy, ideology, multimodality, and popular culture content

and practices. The contributions in this part directly address the complexity of

analyzing and understanding language and literacy development in and through

digitally mediated practices and offer holistic and situated insights that help to

contextualize many of the more discrete and specific chapters appearing in subse￾quent parts.

The first entry in this part, by Karin Tusting, describes the ways in which

contemporary technologies have transformed everyday literacy practices in multiple

ways, such as the inclusion and prevalence of multimodal expression and the

entwining of written communication with socially relevant issues of participation

and identity formation. The array of technologies now mediating “informal learning”

include participation in online gaming and virtual worlds, social media environ￾ments, multilingual digital literacies, and the curation of identities and social pres￾ence across many of these settings (e.g., Ito et al. 2010). Of particular relevance to

language educators, Tusting directly addresses the clashes with accountability

regimes in educational settings that informal and recreational use of technologies

has provoked in recent years. In the following chapter, Ron Darvin presents a

critically informed discussion of digital literacy and argues that technologies are

never ideologically neutral. Rather, Darvin notes that technologies and the ways they

mediate the circulation of representations, meanings, and identities have redefined

notions of private and public space and in so doing, privilege and marginalize certain

ideas, cultures, and peoples. Building from a base in Bourdieu, forms of capital, and

the notion of sens practique (e.g., Bourdieu 1991; Darvin and Norton 2015; Thorne

2013), Darvin makes a powerful argument for the necessity of attention to how

power operates in digital spaces with the implication that language learners and

x Volume Editor’s Introduction to “Language, Education and Technology”

educators should develop a sustained critical stance regarding biases, assumptions,

and the ideological work that occurs in online interaction.

Multimodality is an omnipresent feature of much communicative activity in

online environments. Carey Jewitt describes the complexity of multimodal semiotic

repertoires that can include written and spoken language, image, gesture and haptics,

and three-dimensional forms, among others, and explicates these forms of meaning

making through the lens of multimodal social semiotics (e.g., Jewitt 2014; Kress

2010). Bringing together theory and methodology from psychology, sociology,

anthropology, and systemic functional linguistics, Jewitt encourages multimodal

analysis across school curricula as a way to visibilize new forms of learning in

digital environments and to enhance the recognition and acknowledgement of

multimodal learning in classroom contexts.

It has been obvious for decades that access to technologies and the Internet is

unequally distributed across world regions and within communities (e.g.,

Warschauer 2003). Tamara Tate and Mark Warschauer present a contemporary and

international overview of what is known as the “digital divide,” focusing here on

language and literacy education in particular. The authors note that while initial

concerns regarding uneven access to devices and Internet connectivity remain

relevant, the simple binary of haves and have nots does not address the equally

relevant issues of individual’s and community’s opportunities to engage in mean￾ingful economic, social, and professional transactions.

The following three chapters turn more specifically to instructed language edu￾cation and use various disciplinary frameworks and school-external resources.

Lawrence Williams employs sociolinguistic criteria and theory to examine generally

text-based computer-mediated communication (CMC) in instructed university-level

language learning settings. The particular focus of this chapter is on the development

of sociolinguistic competence and includes extended discussion of the variability of

language and discourse. The application to language education is that appropriacy

and effective communication extends beyond correctness and rather is contingent on

a wide range of contextual factors. Addressing early childhood education from

multiliteracies (New London Group 1996) and multimodality (Kress 2010) perspec￾tives, Heather Lotherington challenges the fundamental assumption that emerging

literacy needs necessarily to focus on alphabetic literacy in isolation from multi￾modal expression. This chapter, drawing upon innovative multimodal policy, cur￾ricula, and assessment methods in Canada, Finland, Singapore, and beyond, suggests

that the increasing availability of digital tools enabling multisensory learning offer

valuable opportunities for complex multimodal and multiliteracies expression that

potentially enhance not only traditional literacy development, but also the develop￾ment of social and emotional intelligence and critical thinking. The final chapter in

this part, by Yiqi Liu and Angel Lin, engages the interface between expectations of

formal genres of language in school settings and the broader social world of popular

culture relevant to students’ interests and lives outside of school. The authors take a

critical approach and acknowledge the tensions between institutional directives to

prepare students for high-stakes tests and the potential benefits of popular culture as

Volume Editor’s Introduction to “Language, Education and Technology” xi

a resource for the production of identities and exploration of various ethnic, sexual,

and socioeconomic themes and societal conditions.

Part 2, Plurilingual Practices in Digital Contexts, remains focused on school

externalities. All chapters in this part continue many of the themes addressed in

Part 1, including use of multiple literacies, multimodality, and identity formation in a

variety of digital settings, here ranging from web-based communities to online

fandom and social media sites such as Facebook. A defining quality of the chapters

in this part, however, is an explicit emphasis on the use by participants of multiple

languages. As a brief meta-commentary, while multingualism is pervasively evident

in digital environments, terminology associated with the use of multiple languages

within and across communicative encounters has become increasingly complex. In

common usage, “plurilingualism” and “multilingualism” are often seen as semanti￾cally equivalent, but both terms have been critiqued in recent sociolinguistics

research as problematic ideological abstractions, as they evoke the notion of multiple

discrete and stable linguistic varieties rather than the mixing and hybridity that are

often evident in contemporary communicative repertoires (e.g., Blommaert 2010;

May 2014; Pennycook and Otsuji 2015). Terminology describing mixing and

hybridity include translanguaging, a descriptor for bilingualism that does not

observe diglossic functional separation of the linguistic resources used into separate

monolingual idealizations of independent languages (for a discussion, see

Blackledge and Creese 2010). Use of multiple semiotic resources from diverse

linguistic varieties within and across utterances has been described by García as

transglossia (2009), while the term polylingualism (e.g., Jørgensen 2008) refers to

the intentional use of multiple languages that may not typically be found in combi￾nation with one another (in digital contexts, see Thorne and Ivković 2015). The

chapters in this part use differing terminology, but each addresses the Internet as a

massive language contact zone and each illuminates various aspects of the multilin￾gual and linguistically hybridized communicative activity visible in many online

environments.

Wan Shun Eva Lam and Natalia Smirnov review research on migrant and

diaspora youth and address issues of mobility, transnationalism, and identity con￾struction in online interaction. Describing primarily ethnographic research, this

chapter emphasizes the resourcefulness illustrated in online participatory practices

and shows how young people access, remix, and propagate language and cultural

practices as they create transnational pathways and relationships across digital

spaces. In an examination of digitally mediated multilingual and multimodal prac￾tices, Sirpa Leppänen, Samu Kytölä, and Elina Westinen review investigations of

informal, interest-driven participation in contemporary technology contexts that

include issues of heteroglossia, resemiotization, and agentive opportunities for

exploration of multiple positionalities. This chapter also critically frames challenges

associated with the compatibility of informally acquired competences in relation to

formal education, the problem of Anglophone centrism, and the need to remain

vigilant regarding inequalities of access and participation in geopolitical peripheries

(i.e., the Global South). Concentrating on themes of popular media and participatory

culture, Shannon Sauro explores burgeoning online fandom communities that

xii Volume Editor’s Introduction to “Language, Education and Technology”

include fanfiction archives, gaming forums, and online interest groups within social

media platforms. Research on such affinity spaces (Gee 2005) shows significant

relevance for language learning, opportunities for language socialization, and explo￾ration of identity construction that may be particularly helpful for marginalized

youth (see also Thorne et al. 2015). Sauro touches on pedagogical approaches for

interaction with fandom communities and elsewhere has designed curricula that

bring together task-based language teaching with participation in interest-driven

fandom communities (e.g., Sauro and Sundmark 2016). The final chapter in this

part, by Brook Bolander, continues to explore identity construction through an

examination of multimodal and often multilingual participation on the social net￾working site Facebook. By far the largest social networking site, with two billion

reported monthly users, Facebook use is perhaps most importantly positioned as

interwoven with identity construction in offline contexts (Bolander and Locher

2015). Bolander traces the global evolution of Facebook use, describes specific

Facebook practices such as status updates, reactions to status updates, and the

template-driven “about” section as acts of positioning and identity claims. The

chapter concludes with an insightful discussion of methodological and ethical

challenges to research on social networking sites and encourages continued and

internationally focused diachronic and longitudinal research on the relationship

between changes to the Facebook interface, mobile versus computer-based access

of the site, and effects on patterns of linguistic and multimodal communication.

Part 3, Technology in World/Second Language Education Contexts, is the largest

in this volume and comprises 13 chapters. While the previous two parts primarily

outlined broader themes and informal learning in digital contexts that are generally

exogenous to formal education, this part presents an array of pedagogical uses of

digital tools that interface with, or are situated within, instructed language-learning

settings. Also included are chapters focusing on teacher professional development,

computer-assisted assessment, open educational resources, and various second lan￾guage acquisition research perspectives on computer-assisted language learning (i.e.,

sociocultural theory and complex dynamic systems theory). This part begins with

two chapters addressing overarching issues, namely distance (or location indepen￾dent) language education and open education resources. Robert Blake synthesizes

research on the digital delivery of second language instruction across traditional,

blended, and fully online formats. He notes that there is an increase in student

interest (e.g., flexible scheduling), that digital materials can serve multiple instruc￾tional formats, and that despite understandable hesitation on the part of some

instructors, multimodal digital teaching and learning environments are here to stay

and have been demonstrated to foster learner autonomy and developmental benefits.

In his chapter, Carl Blyth describes the history and evolution of the open education

movement, focusing particularly on digital open education resources for foreign/

world language education. Supported by an ethos that promotes the openness of

intellectual property, open education encourages collaboration between educational

stakeholders, the creation of free and adaptable content for widely taught languages,

and makes available curricular resources for less commonly taught languages that

are less well served or entirely ignored by commercial publishers.

Volume Editor’s Introduction to “Language, Education and Technology” xiii

Many of the contributions to this part present overviews on specific pedagogical

approaches relevant to, or requiring, digital mediation. Alex Boulton describes the

use of language corpora and students’ guided but largely autonomous efforts to

search out and find answers to language usage questions pertinent to their learning.

Termed data-driven learning (DDL), this approach marks a shift from traditional

practices such as consulting the teacher or ready-made reference materials. DDL is

premised on the notion of student-directed inquiry and exploration of large corpora

of authentic texts. Effectiveness research in this area shows that DDL both fosters

language acquisition as well as improves language awareness and noticing. The

following chapter presents task-based language teaching (TBLT), a method widely

used in traditional instructed settings. Marta González-Lloret argues that TBLT

represents an optimal approach to fully realize the potential of technology-enhanced

language learning. She traces the history of TBLT in digital settings and explores the

intersection between task design and a variety of new media, including online

gaming virtual environments (see also González-Lloret and Ortega 2014). Another

area that the advent of digital technologies has radically transformed is writing. Greg

Kessler reports on second language writing in new media environments and

describes a coevolutionary dynamic linking digital writing environments with the

development of collaborative and co-construction pedagogies. Kessler advocates for

collaborative writing pedagogies, in part because of the increasingly collaborative

and multi-party participatory dynamics of text production in the online world outside

of education.

Two chapters in this part discuss online intercultural exchange (OIE). OIE,

alternatively labeled virtual exchange, telecollaboration, and e-tandem learning,

involves instructionally mediated processes such as collaborative tasks, collective

inquiry, and opportunities for social interaction between internationally distributed

partner classes. OIE has been tremendously powerful in transforming participating

language learners’ experiences from a predominant focus on “language” toward

processes that make salient the need to develop the linguistic, intercultural, and

interactional capacity for creating and maintaining social relationships of signifi￾cance. In his contribution, Robert O’Dowd, a primary proponent in this area, pre￾sents the origins of OIE and outlines the primary approaches currently in use. Also

discussed are extensions of OIE that include intercultural learning in open Internet

environments, facilitator-based OIE projects, and an overview of frequent problems

and difficulties faced by instructors. Taking an explicitly critical theoretical stance,

Francesca Helm reviews OIE research and pedagogical innovations that include

lingua franca exchanges (where the language of communication is an L2 for all

participants), which challenge the assumption that native speakers are necessarily the

ideal project partners. She makes the case that lingua franca exchanges potentially

offer a wider range of identities for participating students that extend beyond that of

the deficient communicator that the native speaker target implies. Helm additionally

problematizes other widely held assumptions, for example, that intercultural contact

necessarily leads to understanding and fosters equality and the erroneous view that

technology is a neutral medium.

xiv Volume Editor’s Introduction to “Language, Education and Technology”