Skype and Language Learning

[Dale McCreery]

Hi All, I’ve done some learning over Skype and over the phone as well, and
while it works, it is definitely slower.  It’s something similar to the
effect of trying to footbag under a strobelight as compared to natural
lighting. Outside in the sun your reactions are full speed.  with
artificial lighting you can’t track moving objects as well, at least until
you get used to it.  With Skype I found that my learning was slowed down,
and I required far more repetitions to be sure I was hearing things.  Once
I became fairly competent it worked okay, but I know it would have taken a
lot longer to get to that point using Skype - even video chat with an
extremely good connection.

dale

> Hi, all. Phil, I can't really comment on using Skype to teach any
> languages, but I can comment on my own experience with the technology.
> At my school, we have a large international population. Sometimes,
> students or dissertation readers are unable to be physically present
> for meetings, so we use Skype. The delays and interferences can be
> troublesome at times, and they prevent us from understanding each
> other. One of our IT people said to use a direct link to our LAN, but
> that hasn't improved the quality of our communications using Skype.
>
> I'm perfectly willing to admit we're experiencing operator error here,
> though, as I'm the person who knows the most about using Skype ....
>
> Resa
>
>
> On Tue, 21 Jun 2011 08:04:53 -0700
>   Phillip E Cash Cash <cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU> wrote:
>> Greetings ILAT,
>>
>> How is your summer?  Just to encourage some discussion and interest,
>>I
>> want to ask if any of you are using Skype as an online medium for
>> learning and teaching an indigenous language.  If so please feel
>>free
>> to share your experience(s) here.  What might be the benefits and
>> challenges using this medium (including any online exchange sites
>>that
>> you might be using)?
>>
>> If there are any articles/citations/links that are relevant to this
>> discussion, please feel free to post these as well.
>>
>> Much thanks in advance,
>>
>> Phil Cash Cash
>> UofA
>