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AUTHENTIC TASKSAS AMEANINGFUL AND
RELEVANTFRAMEWORKFORTEACHINGCONTEMPORARY
TARGET CULTURE

• BY
• ELVIRA SANATULLOVA-ALLISON, PH.D.
• State University Of New York College at Potsdam,
  New York, U.S.A.
• sanatue_at_potsdam.edu
• MARAT SANATULLOV, PH.D.
• Wichita State University, Kansas, U.S.A.
• marat.sanatullov_at_wichita.edu

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AUTHENTIC TASKSDEFINITIONS

• Authentic task is an assignment given to
  students designed to assess their ability to
  apply standard-driven knowledge and skills to
  real-world challenges.
• In other words, a task that teachers ask students
  to perform is considered authentic when
• students are asked to construct their own
  responses rather than select from ones presented
• the task replicates challenges faced in the real
  world.
• As teachers, we are ultimately less interested in
  how much information students can acquire than
  how well they can use it. Thus, our most
  meaningful and relevant assessments ask students
  to perform authentic tasks authentic
  assessment as compared to traditional
  assessment.
• (J. Mueller, 2003)

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AUTHENTIC TASKSCHARACTERISTICS
TRADITIONAL AUTHENTIC
selecting a response performing a task
contrived real-world
recall/recognition of knowledge construction/application of knowledge
teacher-structured student-structured
indirect evidence direct evidence
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AUTHENTIC TASKSTYPES
CONSTRUCTED RESPONSE PRODUCT PERFORMANCE
short-answer essay questions essay conducting research
show your work research reports performance
concept map portfolio oral presentation
figural representation poster debate
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COGNITIVE APPROACH

• Promotion and use of learning and teaching
  strategies that reflect the way knowledge is
  organized in the human brain should be a language
  teachers major aim. Understanding specific
  processes of human cognition helps the teacher
  understand the fundamentals of human learning
  and, thereby, how to build and improve
  instruction. The inter-relatedness of the
  processes of acquisition, transfer, and retention
  of information in the mechanism of human learning
  emphasizes the importance of the relationship
  between teaching and assessment, language
  acquisition and language production, previous
  knowledge and new information in the
  instructional practices.

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Blooms TaxonomyOfCognitive Development
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Information Processing

• SLA is seen as the building up of knowledge
  systems that can eventually be called on
  automatically for speaking and understanding. At
  first, learners have to pay attention to any
  aspect of the language which they are trying to
  understand or produce. Gradually, through
  experience and practice, learners become able to
  use certain parts of their knowledge so quickly
  and automatically that the are not even aware
  that they are doing it. This frees them to focus
  on other aspects of the language which, in turn,
  gradually become automatic (McLaughlin, 1987).
  Practice, in this context, is not seen as
  something mechanical, but rather as something
  involving effort on the part of the learner.

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Constructivism

• It promotes the view of learning as a
  constructive and reconstructive process. It
  emphasizes the learners active role in
  constructing their own knowledge through both
  individual and social activity and interactions.
  The aim of constructivist teaching is not so
  much to transmit information as to encourage
  knowledge formation and metacognitive processes
  for judging, organizing, and acquiring new
  information (Bruning, Schraw, Ronning, 1999).
  Vygotskys Zone of Proximal Development as an
  example of his dialectical constructivism is one
  of the most powerful concepts of mutual influence
  between the cognitive and social aspects of human
  cognition.

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Connectionism

• It attributes great importance to the role
  of the environment in language learning arguing
  that learners gradually build up their knowledge
  of language through exposure to thousands of
  instances of the linguistic features they
  eventually learn. Language is viewed as a complex
  system of units which become inter-connected in
  the mind as they are encountered together. The
  more units are heard or seen together, the more
  likely it is that the presence of one will lead
  to the activation of the other.

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INTER-DISCIPLINARY APPROACH

• Movement in the profession from the emphasis
  on particular methods of language teaching toward
  a proficiency- and performance-oriented
  instruction, curriculum, and assessment that
  define learners language ability in terms of
  functions, contexts/contents, and accuracy (Buck,
  Byrnes, Thompson, 1989) helps language teachers
  to skillfully organize their instruction based on
  what language learners should know and can do
  with the target language on different levels of
  proficiency, in the integration of skills of
  listening, speaking, reading, and writing, and in
  different goal areas such as Communication,
  Cultures, Connections, Comparisons, and
  Communities (Standards for Foreign Language
  Learning Preparing for the 21st Century,
  American Council on the Teaching of Foreign
  Languages).

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OBJECT LESSON

• What are its physical qualities? (shape, size,
  texture, etc.)
• How was it made? (by hand or machine, etc.)
• Was it designed for a particular use?
• What facts can we determine about the culture by
  looking/touching/tasting/smelling/etc. the object?

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SIX INSTRUCTIONAL GOALS(H. N. Seelye Teaching
Culture Strategies for Intercultural
Communication 3rd ed., 1994)

• GOAL 1 INTEREST
• The student shows curiosity about another
  culture (or another segment or subculture of
  ones own culture) and empathy toward its
  members.
• GOAL 2 WHO
• The student recognizes that role
  expectations and other social variables such as
  age, sex, social class, religion, ethnicity, and
  place of residence affect the way people speak
  and behave.
• GOAL 3 WHAT
• The student realizes that effective
  communication requires discovering the culturally
  conditioned images that are evoked in the minds
  of people when they think, act, and react to the
  world around them.

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• GOAL 4 WHERE WHEN
• The student recognizes that situational
  variables and convention shape behavior in
  important ways.
• GOAL 5 WHY
• The student understands that people
  generally act the way they do because they are
  using options their society allows for satisfying
  basic physical and psychological needs, and that
  cultural patterns are interrelated and tend
  mutually to support need satisfaction.
• GOAL 6 EXPLORATION
• The student can evaluate a generalization
  about the target culture in terms of the amount
  of evidence substantiating it, and has the skills
  needed to locate and organize information about
  the target culture from the library, the mass
  media, people, and personal observation.

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LICENSE PLATES

• GOAL 1 INTEREST
• Bring in and display as many license plates as
  you have available. (R)
• Ask if anyone knows what they are and where they
  have seen them before. (LS)
• Ask if anyone drives and how many of them
  like/would like to drive a car.
• Have students read all of the information on the
  license plate and then explain its meaning.
• Lead into the importance of driving in U.S.
  culture and how it is similar and/or different
  from their native cultures.

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• GOAL 2 WHO
• Ask students where people drive cars in the
  United Sates. Brainstorm different types of
  roads in this country.
• Talk about American free spirit and Americas
  obsession with driving automobiles all over the
  country.
• Show several advertisements of various vehicles
  (cars, trucks, RVs, SUVs, etc.). Focus on images
  of wide open America and the freedom of movement
  in this country. Have students pick out the
  advertisements that represent the American driver
  the best in their minds.
• Connect the previous to the importance of knowing
  how to drive in this country/state (Drivers
  Manual).

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• GOAL 3 WHAT
• Bring out a large road map of the United States
  or a road atlas. Pass out U.S. road maps or road
  atlases to each student or break class into small
  groups. Going around the class or around small
  groups have students take turns reading each of
  the states names.
• Display a large poster containing cut out
  pictures of each states license plate. As a
  class (one student at a time) match each license
  plate with the corresponding state by taping them
  up on the large road map in the front of the
  room.

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• GOAL 4 WHERE AND WHEN
• Break class into small groups. Give each group a
  large picture of different state license plates.
  Have each group discuss together the symbols they
  find on the license plate. Have the group write
  down the following
• What the symbols mean to each member of
  the group.
• What the symbols make them think about
  the state they are representing.
• Bring class back together and have each group
  read to the class what they wrote down in their
  group discussions.

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• GOAL 5 WHY (conclusion)
• Discuss the purpose of license plates. Discuss
  the use of so many different symbols on plates.
  Talk about different parts of the United States.
  How are they different? What do symbols mean to
  different people across the country? Focus on
  Nebraskas license plate.
• GOAL 6 EXPLORATION
• Pass out to each student a piece of paper with a
  blank rectangle shaped like a license plate.
  Have students design a license plate for their
  native country/province/state/city/town/etc. On
  the back, have students write down what symbols
  they used and what those symbols mean in their
  own culture.

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EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGIES

• Furthermore, research and practice have
  shown that teachers knowledgeable use of
  educational technologies in the language
  classroom can contribute to enhance input
  processing by bringing context into language
  teaching (Shrum Glisan, 2000). Moreover,
  according to Garrett (1991), technology enhanced
  language learning and teaching allows for further
  integration of language, literature, and culture.
  In our second/foreign language methodology
  courses we use PowerPoint and HyperStudio
  multimedia programs as well as a web design
  program Dreamweaver 4 and Inspiration software in
  order to create activities and materials that
  relate language learning to other disciplines,
  academic content, and to the world at large.
  These programs have become common tools in
  language learning and language teacher
  preparation programs (Pusack Otto, 1997).

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Dreamweaver 4

• Dreamweaver 4 a program for Professional
  Web Site Design of Macromedia Web Design Studio
  enables the language teacher to create
  interactive web activities developing students
  skills of searching, selecting, and using
  information on the web in relation to the target
  language and culture. A WebQuest is an example of
  such activities.

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WebQuest

• A WebQuest is an inquiry-oriented activity
  in which most or all of the information used by
  learners is drawn from the Web (Website of the
  College of Education at San Diego State
  University, the WebQuest Page). WebQuests are
  designed to support learners' thinking at the
  higher levels of analysis, synthesis, and
  evaluation that Blooms Taxonomy of thinking
  processes emphasizes. In French Foods (K-6
  level) and French Olympic Games 2012 (K-12
  level) two bilingual WebQuests that we have
  built inquiry-based approach is complimented
  with proficiency- and group-oriented learning
  individual and group rubrics enable students to
  evaluate their own and others performances
  according to the specific tasks assigned and web
  resources analyzed. In these activities learning
  a foreign language is also integrated in studying
  the content area of social studies geography,
  lifestyle, and eating traditions are closely
  addressed by the instruction. Authenticity of
  resources, increased visual input, structural
  organization of materials and their availability
  are definite advantages of WebQuests.

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Please, feel free to visit our instructional
websitehttp//www.msanatullov.comto explore how
these task-based technologies and activities
workfor teaching contemporary French culture.