In this article I will discuss several kinds of Internet-based activities for the ESL/EFL classroom and describe some strategies to help ensure that the activities will keep the students' interest. I will begin by giving a brief summary of four basic ways in which the Internet can be used in the ESL/EFL classroom.
According to Garner and Gillingham (1996), Internet conversations can be intensely social activities. This will sometimes be the case, for example, if an email correspondence evolves so that the people writing to each other become close friends. Probably most email conversations, however, are casual. But even casual conversations are occasions for which the ESL/EFL student must try to make himself or herself understood to another actual person (other than teacher or classmates). This makes the act of communicating in English not just a theoretical problem, but a practical one. The requirement to solve that practical problem can be a strong motivator for students to try hard to construct clear, grammatical messages that communicate their thoughts.
However, even though Internet conversations have the potential to capture the interest of students, there are factors that can block this potential. For one thing, some ESL/EFL students are not advanced enough to be able to engage in such conversations. Even if most students in a class can correspond at some level in English, there may be one or more who are lagging behind and who would not benefit from trying to use email. The teacher must be sensitive to those students who may not yet be ready for email. Such students may need special preparation or may need to be furnished with alternative exercises. Requiring them to do what they are not ready to do will lead them to have little interest in the activity.
Another factor that can lessen the energizing and pedagogical value of Internet conversations is student anxiety about making errors. Some students may be capable of conversing in English via email but may also be afraid of making mistakes that others will see. Such fear can reduce the student's enthusiasm for the activity and in fact may lead him or her to attempt to avoid doing it. Care must be taken to try to reduce student anxiety about making mistakes. One way to do this is to offer to look over and correct the student's email messages before they are sent. In fact, going over a student's message with him or her can be an excellent learning opportunity for the student.
A third factor that can decrease student interest in Internet conversations is erratic replies. Sending email may be easy for the student, but to find a correspondent who will reply consistently may be hard. The teacher should assist students to find dependable, interested email partners. For K-12 classes, http://epals.com provides teachers information on classrooms around the world that are interested in email correspondence and collaborative projects.
In a simple task that I call ÒFinding Favorites,Ó each student first chooses a topic of special interest. This might be a place, person, animal, event, hobby, sport, or movie - whatever subject the student finds appealing. Then the student searches the Internet for three web sites that are related to that interest. The student finds the web site, reads the material, and downloads one or two pages from the site to a ÒFavoritesÓ folder. The student then makes two short reports, either written or made orally to the class. The first report is an evaluation of the web sites, telling which were the most useful. The second is a summary of the main information that was found. The activity can be done in small groups of two or three if the members of the group are interested in the same subject.
This is an activity that requires the student to practice several skills, including English reading comprehension, comparing information, and summarizing and reporting in English. It is also an activity that is designed to naturally engage the student's interest. It does this because the student's Internet search is directed toward a topic that the student is already interested in.
It is possible, however, for students to get frustrated and lose interest in the activity if they have to spend too much time searching for web sites. Searching also decreases the time available for the linguistic tasks. It is therefore important that students be well-instructed in the use of search engines before beginning the activity. Also, it is a good idea for students to provide their topics of interest to the teacher a few days before the activity begins and for the teacher to prepare for the activity by searching for and recording the addresses of relevant sites for each interest. These addresses can then be provided to the students at the beginning of the activity. Alternatively, they can be held in reserve and given to students who have trouble finding sites themselves.
The recommendation to instruct students in the use of search engines before undertaking the activity is part of a more general point about designing Internet-based activities. This point is that students should be taught the Internet concepts and skills needed to carry out the activity, and then, before the activity begins, the teacher should briefly observe each student to make sure that he or she is proficient in the needed skills. The teacher should be watchful for students, especially those with little computer experience, who find it more difficult than others to understand and use the Internet. These students will require additional instruction and practice.
Some examples of kinds of web pages that students might compose for a class website are brief autobiographies, day-in-the-life pages that tell of students' daily activities, and short stories. It is very important that student addresses and phone numbers not be included in these. Another possibility is for the website to have as its theme the class's home city or country. In this case, different individuals or small groups might be given the task of preparing pages of various kinds of information, such as geographic, economic, cultural, and so on.
One of the most exciting characteristics of a web publishing project is the students' knowledge that the pages they compose will be on the Internet for the whole world to see. Knowing this can lead them to try hard to do their best work. Of course, the knowledge may also cause anxiety for some students because - as with email - they may fear making mistakes that can be seen by others. To reduce any anxiety, the teacher can go over students' work with them before it is published on the Internet.
In such projects there is always the question of how much responsibility students should be given for creating the appearance of the web pages. One possibility is to teach the students basic HTML, including the coding to insert images on a web page, and to allow them to design their pages. Another possibility is for the students to write only the text and for the teacher to code the text. The advantage of the first way is that by allowing students to code their pages they will ÒownÓ their pages more fully and take the project all the more seriously. However, too much time spent in learning HTML and on page design can reduce the value of the activity. If students are given the opportunity to design their own pages, it is important to set limits that will ensure that their focus stays on practicing and developing their English writing skills.