Designing talk in social networks: What Facebook teaches about conversation

The easy accessibility, ubiquity, and plurilingualism of popular SNSs such as Facebook have inspired many scholars and practitioners of second language teaching and learning to integrate networked forms of communication into educational contexts such as language classrooms and study abroad programs (e.g., Blattner & Fiori, 2011; Lamy & Zourou, 2013; Mills, 2011; Reinhardt & Ryu, 2013; Reinhardt & Zander, 2011). At the same time, the complex and dynamic patterns of interaction that emerge in these spaces quickly push back upon standard ways of describing conversational genres and communicative competence (Kern, 2014; Lotherington & Ronda, 2014). Drawing from an ecological interactional analysis (Goffman, 1964, 1981a, 1981b, 1986; Kramsch & Whiteside, 2008) of the Facebook communications of three German-speaking academics whose social and professional lives are largely led in English, the authors consider the kinds of symbolic maneuvers required to participate in the translingual conversational flows of SNS-mediated communication. Based on this analysis, this article argues that texts generated through SNS-mediated communication can provide classroom opportunities for critical, stylistically sensitive reflection on the nature of talk in line with multiliteracies approaches

Negotiation of meaning via virtual exchange in immersive virtual reality environments

This study examines how English-as-lingua-franca (ELF) learners employ semiotic resources, including head movements, gestures, facial expression, body posture, and spatial juxtaposition, to negotiate for meaning in an immersive virtual reality (VR) environment. Ten ELF learners participated in a Taiwan-Spain VR virtual exchange project and completed two VR tasks on an immersive VR platform. Multiple datasets, including the recordings of VR sessions, pre- and post-task questionnaires, observation notes, and stimulated recall interviews, were analyzed quantitatively and qualitatively with triangulation. Built upon multimodal interaction analysis (Norris, 2004) and Varonis and Gass’ (1985a) negotiation of meaning model, the findings indicate that ELF learners utilized different embodied semiotic resources in constructing and negotiating meaning at all primes to achieve effective communication in an immersive VR space. The avatar-mediated representations and semiotic modalities were shown to facilitate indication, comprehension, and explanation to signal and resolve non-understanding instances. The findings show that with space proxemics and object handling as the two distinct features of VR-supported environments, VR platforms transform learners’ social interaction from plane to three-dimensional communication, and from verbal to embodied, which promotes embodied learning. VR thus serves as a powerful immersive interactive environment for ELF learners from distant locations to be engaged in situated languacultural practices that goes beyond physical space. Pedagogical implications are discussed

Using Technology-Supported Enrichment Activities to Extend Student Learning in a Chinese as a Foreign Language Classroom

The purpose of this study was to investigate whether exposing middle school students to content above their ability level produced significant differences in students’ confidence in their Chinese as a foreign language competence in each of the following four areas: reading, listening, speaking, and learning vocabulary. Participants (N = 30) were sixth and seventh graders. Results of paired t-test analyses indicated that there was no significant difference in student confidence in Chinese reading competence, t(30) = 0.78, p = 0.22; in Chinese speaking competence, t(30) = -0.50, p = 0.31; or to learn Chinese vocabulary, t(30) = -0.80, p = 0.21. However, there was a significant difference in student confidence in ability to learn Chinese listening, t(30) = -1.78, p \u3c 0.05. It is suggested that exposing students to content well above their ability level can increase their confidence in ability to learn Chinese listening

How does individualism-collectivism, forms of activities, and activity participation patterns impact college students' level of satisfaction with involvement in short-term interactions at a campus recreation center?

Scope and Method of Study: To understand cultural differences in experiencing short-term interactions at university campus recreation center, the purpose of this study was to examine how individualism-collectivism, forms of activity participation, and activity participation patterns impact university students' level of comfort and satisfaction with short-term interactions at a campus recreation center. An on site survey and quantitative analysis were applied in this study.Findings and Conclusions: The results of this study found that participants' independent self-construal tendency has stronger impact on their levels of comfort and satisfaction with short-term interactions than their interdependent self-construal. Specifically, participants of the Bicultural group reported being most satisfied and least uncomfortable with short-term interaction experiences at a campus recreation center. People in the Culturally-Alienated group were the least satisfied and the most nervous with short-term interactions. However, forms of activity participation and activity participation patterns had no association with participants' levels of comfort and satisfaction with short-term interactions experiences at a campus recreation center

Structural study in Highly Compressed BiFeO3 Epitaxial Thin Films on YAlO3

We report a study on the thermodynamic stability and structure analysis of the epitaxial BiFeO3 (BFO) thin films grown on YAlO3 (YAO) substrate. First we observe a phase transition of MC-MA-T occurs in thin sample (<60 nm) with an utter tetragonal-like phase (denoted as MII here) with a large c/a ratio (~1.23). Specifically, MII phase transition process refers to the structural evolution from a monoclinic MC structure at room temperature to a monoclinic MA at higher temperature (150oC) and eventually to a presence of nearly tetragonal structure above 275oC. This phase transition is further confirmed by the piezoforce microscopy measurement, which shows the rotation of polarization axis during the phase transition. A systematic study on structural evolution with thickness to elucidate the impact of strain state is performed. We note that the YAO substrate can serve as a felicitous base for growing T-like BFO because this phase stably exists in very thick film. Thick BFO films grown on YAO substrate exhibit a typical "morphotropic-phase-boundary"-like feature with coexisting multiple phases (MII, MI, and R) and a periodic stripe-like topography. A discrepancy of arrayed stripe morphology in different direction on YAO substrate due to the anisotropic strain suggests a possibility to tune the MPB-like region. Our study provides more insights to understand the strain mediated phase co-existence in multiferroic BFO system.Comment: 18 pages, 6 figures, submitted to Journal of Applied Physic