Innovation in Language Learning

This paper presents the contribution of the Portuguese participants in the PETALL project which is dedicated to technology mediated task-based language learning. PETALL is a Life Long Learning project funded by the European Commission. Participants from 10 countries work in tandems involving a university or a teacher training institution and a secondary or basic school. The project is coordinated by the University of Algarve, in Portugal. Task-based language learning has a central role within the principles of language learning and teaching nowadays. ICT adds extra potential to the tasks and makes them very motivating and appealing to the students.

The main purpose of the project is to design language tasks that “travel well” which means that the tasks are adequate to several language teaching and cultural contexts. The project design implies that each tandem works with two neighbouring tandems. In this way, we have been working with the Spanish and Scottish participants. The paper presentation introduces the four language tasks that have been used with 9th grade students at Escola Alberto Iria in Olhão, in the south of Portugal. We explain the rationale and process of implementing the tasks, as well as students’ feedback and evaluation.