Exploring the use of social virtual reality for virtual exchange

Mentored online intercultural interaction offers foreign language learners the opportunity to develop different competences, including intercultural, linguistic, and digital competence (O’Dowd, 2021). Such virtual exchange (VE) projects typically involve computer-mediated communication via, for example, Zoom. However, the use of high-immersion virtual reality (VR) for synchronous online collaboration in VE projects has received little attention. This study investigated the effect of VR on students’ levels of presence and engagement, on students’ communication and on students’ views on using VR for intercultural encounters compared to traditional videoconferencing tools. Twenty-seven university students from the Netherlands and Germany utilised VR to carry out intercultural learning tasks using English as a lingua franca during a four-week implementation period. Participants responded to pre- and post-intervention questionnaires, completed reflection journals, audio- or video-recorded their VR meetings and participated in interviews. Results showed that the levels of presence and engagement and preferences of social VR compared to videoconferencing for intercultural encounters depended on students individually. A VR immersion experience and comfortability scale was created based on the data which showed mixed experiences. VR influenced participants’ interactions, topics of conversation and communication strategies when they explored their spaces together. The results showed that students’ attitudes towards VR and their subjective experience of VR seem to play an important role in the VE-VR setting. VR provided a safe space for many participants. Positive attitudes towards communicating in the VR environment are highly correlated with positive attitudes towards meeting students from other countries in VR. Implications for language education are provided

Delivering Training and Coaching to Enable Teachers to Successfully Engage in Virtual Exchange

The E-LIVE project (Engaging Languages in Intercultural Virtual Exchange - https://eliveproject.eu/">https://eliveproject.eu/) is a three-year project (2022-2024) funded by Erasmus plus cooperation partnerships in school education (K1222-SCH). The project aims to enhance inclusive intercultural communicative competence development and digital literacies through the integration of virtual exchange projects in language-teacher education institutions and schools. In this presentation, we will share our experiences and outcomes from the first year of the project. To begin with, we will discuss the needs analysis conducted among our partner schools and educational institutions to identify training requirements and gain insight into their specific needs regarding intercultural virtual exchange (Clavel Arroitia et al., 2023). We will then present the pedagogical materials developed to address these needs, covering technological literacy skills, intercultural competences, citizenship, and finally, motivation and engagement –the twin driving forces behind virtual exchange. Furthermore, we will outline the coaching process provided by the E-LIVE team to primary and secondary school teachers during intercultural virtual exchanges (O’Dowd et al., 2019). We will provide details on the participation of teachers (n=16) and students ( n=414) from March to June 2023, highlighting the use of both asynchronous and synchronous activities. Synchronous activities included task-based videoconferencing and virtual world activities using customized E-LIVE task templates. During the presentation, we will specifically focus on teacher preferences for different activity types and, using questionnaire and focus group data, explore the reflections of participants who engaged in exchanges using tandems or the lingua franca exchange format (Kohn & Hoffstaedter, 2017, O’Dowd, 2018). We will discuss the outcomes of these interactions involving international peers in terms of intercultural learning and language development. The presentation contributes to the conference theme of promoting innovative practices in language education, particularly within the context of intercultural virtual exchanges in primary and secondary education. The insights and lessons learned from the E-LIVE project have significant implications for language-teacher education institutions and schools seeking to enhance digital pedagogical innovation and foster inclusive intercultural competence development

Learning episodes in an intercultural virtual exchange: The case of social high-immersion virtual reality

Computer-mediated communication tools facilitate international collaboration projects between foreign language learners and peers abroad (O’Dowd, 2018). Social Virtual Reality (VR) applications allow for synchronous interactions and task-based communication in which learners can experience telepresence and immersion and conversate in a foreign language. Based on previous pilot experiences (Jauregi-Ondarra, Gruber, & Canto, 2020, 2021), this Virtual Exchange (VE) project aims to investigate how the specific affordances of Social High-immersion VR (SHiVR) in conjunction with designed tasks influence interaction patterns, and learning episodes. The VE took place between two groups of university students in the Netherlands (N=15) and Cyprus (N=14) through SHiVR in March 2022. The main aims of the tasks were to raise student intercultural awareness, stimulate task-based communication processes using English as a lingua franca and digital pedagogical competences of language education students. Different sources of data were gathered and analysed. In this paper, we describe and present the pedagogical experience and the initial result

Leren van vreemde talen in een veranderende wereld

De snel veranderende maatschappij en de digitalisering en globalisering ervan vragen van opleiders en docenten nieuwe inzichten, kennis en vaardigheden. Docentenopleidingen dragen de maatschappelijke en professionele verantwoordelijkheid om vakdidactische digitale innovatie naar, in dit geval, taal- en cultuuronderwijs, te initiëren, te begeleiden en te evalueren. Binnen dit lectoraat wordt onderzoek verricht naar innoverend en effectief taal- en cultuuronderwijs en naar effectief onderwijs over taalonderwijs bij de lerarenopleiding. Er wordt gekeken naar de rol die nieuwe media kunnen spelen in het optimaliseren van betekenisvolle leerprocessen. Welke toepassingen zijn beschikbaar voor het vreemdetalenonderwijs? Hoe kunnen die zinvol gebruikt worden? Welke didactiek hier hierbij? Wat zijn de rollen van opleiders, docenten en studenten? Wat zijn de kenmerken van effectieve werkvormen en taken die betekenisvolle leerprocessen bevorderen? De onderzoeksopbrengsten worden vertaald naar het talenonderwijs van de lerarenopleiding én het voortgezet onderwijs. Bovendien zullen deze resultaten bijdragen aan een sterke vakdidactische kennisbasis en docentcompetenties en aan een onderzoekende en innovatieve houding van opleiders, leraren in het veld en studenten in de snel veranderende educatieve sector. Dit impliceert een levenlang leren

Teacher training perspectives for virtual exchange: Initial actions from the E-LIVE European project

International audienceVirtual Exchange (VE) is a lingua-culture learning-teaching practice that fosters meaningful exchanges between learners in geographically distant locations and from diverse lingua-cultural backgrounds through internet-based tools and innovative online pedagogies (O’Dowd, 2018). E-LIVE (Engaging Languages in Intercultural Virtual Exchange) is a three-year project (2021-2024) funded by the Erasmus+ Cooperation partnerships in school education (KA220-SCH). The project targets primary and secondary school education and teacher training institutions. The project consortium gathers a team of specialists in CALL from the Netherlands, France and Spain and school teachers experienced in virtual exchange and collaborates with 32 associate partner schools and teacher training institutions. In line with the Digital Education Action Plan (DG EAC, 2021), the key project objectives are to:-innovate and enrich language teacher training programmes in higher education to develop digital literacy skills and organization, pedagogical and intrercultural competences of (trainee) teachers by mainstreaming virtual exchange projects within teacher training programmes;-enrich and make foreign language teaching programmes at primary and secondary level schools more meaningful by offering learners opportunities to engage in virtual exchanges with peers from other cultures;-exploit the possibilities that online interactive tools (virtual and augmented reality) offer with a view to enriching and diversifying teaching for intercultural language learning.This presentation will begin with a brief overview of the E-LIVE project and will then focus two of the project’s initial actions. Firstly, we will report on the results of a questionnaire and a series of focus groups conducted to better understand the teaching beliefs, experiences, conditions, and training needs (related to VE pedagogy, digital literacy skills and intercultural mediation) of a heterogeneous group of 25 language teachers from five European countries collaborating with the E-LIVE project as associate schools. Our analysis will underline implications for the manner in which the E-LIVE project can put into place an inclusive teacher training approach within the project to prepare and accompany teachers in designing and implementing virtual exchange projects. Secondly, we will report on a virtual exchange conducted between French, Dutch and Colombian teacher training institutions for which the macro task was for participants (n=48) to co-design a virtual exchange task for secondary language education (Dutch, English French, German, Spanish languages). The exchange was organized around three tasks that utilized the affordances of both synchronous and asynchronous tools (Flipgrid, Moodle, BBB videoconferencing, Genial.ly, Padlet) to introduce virtual exchange and virtual exchange task design to the trainee teachers. We will describe the pedagogical design and challenges encountered, showcase some of the tasks designed by the participants and report on the feedback from trainee teachers regarding the exchange

Initiating meaningful social interactions in a high-immersion self-access language learning space

Virtual Reality (VR) has paved the way for learner interaction in immersive environments, simulating authentic cultural conditions in the target language and encouraging collaborative opportunities. This article describes how the high-immersion VR social application AltspaceVR served as an immersive Self-Access Language Learning (SALL) space in a collaborative online international learning (COIL)

Teacher training perspectives for virtual exchange: Initial actions from the E-LIVE European project

International audienceThe E-LIVE project (Engaging Languages in Intercultural Virtual Exchange) is a three-year project funded by Erasmus+ Cooperation partnerships in school education (KA220-SCH). In this short paper, we report on two of the project’s initial teacher training actions. Firstly, a training needs analysis conducted via questionnaire and focus groups with 39 in-service L2 teachers from associate partner schools (nine primary and 30 secondary). We report on felt needs and anticipated training needs and three key project actions that the needs analysis informed: teacher voices workshops, expert webinars, and virtual exchange coaching. Secondly, we describe a virtual exchange conducted between trainee teachers enrolled in French, Dutch, and Colombian teacher training institutions. The pedagogical design of the virtual exchange is detailed and two of the final task productions showcased. Post-virtual exchange questionnaire and focus group data allow us to report on the trainee teachers’ perceptions of the virtual exchange activities. The paper concludes with a discussion of how to ensure the success of future virtual exchange initiatives based on the analysis of the questionnaire and focus group data

Learning episodes in an intercultural virtual exchange: the case of social high-immersion virtual reality

Computer-mediated communication tools facilitate international collaboration projects between foreign language learners and peers abroad (O’Dowd, 2018). Social Virtual Reality (VR) applications allow for synchronous interactions and task-based communication in which learners can experience telepresence and immersion and conversate in a foreign language. Based on previous pilot experiences (Jauregi-Ondarra, Gruber, & Canto, 2020, 2021), this Virtual Exchange (VE) project aims to investigate how the specific affordances of Social High-immersion VR (SHiVR) in conjunction with designed tasks influence interaction patterns, and learning episodes. The VE took place between two groups of university students in the Netherlands (N=15) and Cyprus (N=14) through SHiVR in March 2022. The main aims of the tasks were to raise student intercultural awareness, stimulate task-based communication processes using English as a lingua franca and digital pedagogical competences of language education students. Different sources of data were gathered and analysed. In this paper, we describe and present the pedagogical experience and the initial results

A Road Map for Language Teachers on How to Extract Accurate Data for Research From Inside a Quest 2 Virtual Reality Environment: The Case of The Social VR Application Altspacevr

Virtual Reality has permeated our educational landscape in various forms and has unequivocally created new opportunities for language learning. As many VR devices became more accessible and mainstream, many educators have taken the opportunity to experiment with some kind of Virtual Reality. From simple smart phone-supported devices to more advanced and tethered VR systems that require extensive technical experience and a healthy budget in order to achieve the desired immersive experience that could be exploited for educational purposes. Nevertheless, as there are various VR systems and a myriad of applications constantly becoming available on various online platforms, a lot of research needs to be done by educators in order to establish the efficacy and impact of the chosen VR system or application. As language teachers, we might lack the technical experience and understanding of this tool. Furthermore, we might not have the required technical support in order to successfully capture and extract data that is necessary for research from inside the Virtual Reality world. These aforementioned aspects can be discouraging for language teachers when conducting VR-related research. This paper describes the challenges, technical steps, and technical requirements that were necessary to overcome the obstacles that I encountered in order to record and extract data for analysis of the virtual interactions from inside the virtual world of the social VR app AltspaceVR for a Virtual Exchange research project in 2022 with the VR headsets Oculus Quest 2