Computer Assisted Language Learning Lesson Plan

One Computer-Assisted Language Learning (CALL) lesson plan available on the internet is called "Country Comparison," created by Al Ryter. The link to the lesson plan is available here: http://www.ryter.com/call/lesson.html.

The goal of the lesson is for lower intermediate English as a Second Language (ESL) students to learn and share personal information about their countries as well as to understand some aspects of geography. The language objectives are for the students to be able to write a paragraph using comparative and superlative adjectives to demonstrate the further ability of comparing different countries represented by the different students in the classroom, and to do so with fewer than two (2) errors. The computer-related objectives are for the students to be able to surf the internet to find information related to the other students' countries and for the content presented to be completely accurate.

The procedure of the lesson is to go as follows: First, the teacher reviews the forms of comparative and superlative adjectives if it is necessary. Second, the teacher discusses the United States, asking key questions related to the size of the country, its population, its major religions, and so forth. Third, the teacher and the students go to a website called "ABC News Country Profiles," available at the following link: http://www.immigration-usa.com/wfb/abc_world_fact_book.html. If necessary, the teacher helps the students to navigate to this page. Fourth, the teacher instructs the students to find information about other classmates' countries on this website. If necessary, the teacher also helps the students how they can use the hyperlinks on the website, among other things. Fifth, the students think of ways to organize the information providing comparisons between the countries. Sixth, the students get into groups of three (3), optimally groups that have different languages represented in them, where the students decide how they will organize the comparative information for their respective countries on a preset spreadsheet. Seventh, all of the students will interview one another to complete their chart of information about the countries. Eighth, the students return to their original groups and decide how to write some sentences using comparative and superlative adjectives about the countries represented within those groups. Ninth, students from the group present the sentences they have created. Tenth, the teacher prompts a discussion about the geographical information the class has learned.

Since students are generally comfortable with using the internet to look up information, and given that the internet is an integrated aspect of most people's lives, this lesson would be able to combine students' abilities to look up target information with learning English. This is the strongest aspect of the kind of lesson plan presented above. The information should, given low intermediate college-aged students, get the students to understand the internet as a language-learning tool. Furthermore, the exercise is reinforced with an emphasis on using target English grammatical forms, in this case the comparative and superlative adjectives. The lesson, then, combines some components of traditional language learning with new ways to gain knowledge.

The largest fault with the plan is that it is projected to be three (3) hours. Therefore, the activity as part of the plan would be very time-consuming. The website suggests that the activity be spread out over the course of two (2) class periods, yet if an ESL program does not allow for this kind of time, iut would be very difficult to integrate such a lesson as part of a normal course schedule. Alternatively, the projected time it would take with students could vary according to students' adeptness with technology generally, and it might be the case that the students actually finish far sooner than expected, perhaps under the three(3) - hour time span projected. If this would occur, then the project could seriously interfere with the teachers' ability to integrate the lesson.

Taking the primary strength and weakness into account, the lesson plan could still be a viable option for English language learning, especially as it relates to call. This is because, provided students eager or willing to do the activity, the available resources to do the activity within the classroom or at the school, and the time to carry out the activity, the lesson could be integrated. Nevertheless, if the above are not availability (student willingness, resources, and time), then the lesson would not be well integrated. The teacher, therefore, would have to find out how to incorporate this lesson plan given those constraints.