Innovation in Language Learning

In a 21^st century language class we need to manage diversity and to adapt new ways of teaching the target language (Second language) to help our students to put into practice competences. Multilingualism must not be unperceived therefore the pedagogy of a language must be aware of that in order to achieve a successful learning. Plurilingualism needs to be taken into account too when teaching foreign languages.

Having in mind the Common European Framework of Reference for Learning (CEFR), we propose a set of activities to develop general competence, communicative competences (sociolinguistic and pragmatic) that help us to use strategies which allow the learning throughout student´s life at the same time they develop autonomy. Besides, in our proposal, the European dimension has a key role, we propose to deal with it through tasks using a variety of tools. As it is considered in the CEFR, the sociolinguistic competences are key, so these activities are designed following the Task Based Learning methodology with to increase student´s communicative skills. It promotes learning in a cooperative way and to encourage students to get autonomy. Using this methodology natural interactions appear helping the students to develop their self-esteem which encourage them to learn.

Emotional factors are taken into account when the activities are planned and also when they are carried out in the classroom. The learning environment provides materials that add this affective aspect, which allows the students to become aware that they play an active role in the learning process.

Another important aspect is that these activities are designed for students who are learning Spanish, however they could be easily adapted to different situations and learning contexts, ages and levels. The activities developed in this proposal will be available on the web for further study. The tasks in our proposal Sharing and Learning are the following:

1)     Our world: a critical look, another world is possible: political map representation analysis and the diverse realities in our world.

2)     A trip around the world: through geography and the map representation we will catch the attention and interest of our students to find out about other countries and exchange ideas.

3)     Together in Europe: bringing European culture, history and languages to the class.

4)     Discover the city: working with the environment, different parts of the cities and promote interactions between students.

5)     Let’s travel! : researching and sharing information about social and linguistic aspects in the new language using an interactive and motivational tool: the webquest.

6)     The story of my journey (Transmedia storytelling): through the use of questionnaires we will invite our students to share their own journey to the new country with their classmates