Abstract
This project aims to develop a one-unit elementary online French course, FREN1001 “Invitation to French Online”, to engage students in exploring a new learning experience of French language and culture through innovative technology and pedagogical design. The course is designed for students without any prior knowledge of French. It will be offered via asynchronous online mode through KEEP, a CUHK eLearning platform to host open educational courses and resources. The course promotes learning of new foreign language with less pressure from assessment and grades through providing flexibility in course enrollment and study mode to students. It introduces some aspects of the French culture, some basic features of the French language and daily expressions in French with the aid of audio-visual materials, short texts, interactive tasks and online quizzes developed with the funding granted by Teaching Development and Language Enhancement Grant for the 2019-22 triennium for Language Enhancement Projects.
Brief write-up
Project objectives
The objective of this project is to design an online taster course which highlights the characteristics of French culture and the attributes of the French language for students without prior knowledge in French. Students will be able to have glimpses of the practical and cultural aspects in the French-speaking environment in a daily-life context, cultivating their interest in the subsequent and in-depth learning of the French language and culture, to foster cultural exchange and to nurture global citizenship.
Activities, process and outcomes
After the course was designed, 6 scripts for the videos were wrote, production and postproduction of 6 videos was supervised. 12-20 interactive exercises were created for the online units. Additionally, a final quiz was created for final online assessment. Uploading of the course and further enhancement of content will be made. In summer 2022, conduct a user test with a focus group for collection of feedback from students.
Deliverables and evaluation
The completion of the course development and the launching of the course on KEEP, the CUHK initiated cloud-based eLearning platform. The effective running of the course and the aforesaid components on the Internet, allowing users to gain interactive learning experience from these components. Duly changes will be made to enhance and enrich the website before it is officially launched. Enrollment figures of the online course to measure the popularity of the course and enrollment figures of students who continue to take French courses at the beginner’s level to measure effectiveness of the online course in motivating students to learn French. Course and teaching evaluation to be conducted by students upon completion of the course for quality assurance and collection of feedback for improvement.
Dissemination, diffusion, impact and sharing of good practices
The project outcomes will be disseminated in the workshops on teaching and learning or other official occasions organized by CUHK. Through the sharing, the project outcomes will be benchmarked with other similar projects and evaluated by the peers, fostering further improvements in the long run.
Impact on teaching and learning
The project enhanced the French programme team’s knowledge in the implementation of H5P components and the design of the interactive activities for online teaching and learning for courses of language and culture. It fosters the development of innovative online teaching and learning resources in the future, which may become indispensable in the COVID-19 pandemic and post pandemic era. The online modules and components will also enrich the classroom teaching of the French programme in the future, as the course teachers can incorporate the online components handily in their classroom teaching. The new online taster language course promotes the learning of French and cultural exchange, nurtures global citizenship and broaden students’ perspective, which has become indispensable in students’ career development in the future. It provides a new option of learning to students and enriches the offerings of the University.
