Blog 8

Language Learning Challenge Week 4 (Futur Simple)

Week 4 Summary 

I began the week with a Lingolia definition of the futur simple. 

I then completed the Lingolia quiz and scored averagely.

After the Lingolia quiz I completed the 20 sentences outlined in the LLC plan.

I then completed another quiz to see if I'd improved. 

After the quiz I looked on the French Stack Exchange forum, however did not find it particularly helpful. 

To conclude I listened to News in Slow French for five minutes. 

Week 4 Reflection

Even though this is the mid-semester break, it has probably been the busiest week of the year for me, it's been extremely difficult to keep up with the Language Learning Challenge. There has been course work due for other courses, work has been quite full on, not to mention there have been family events. This week was a pretty typical week in terms of the work I actually did for the Language Learning Challenge, I completed what I'd set out to do in the plan and have undoubtedly completed tasks in line with my LLC learning goal. I personally struggled quite a bit with the futur simple (as you can see in my quiz scores) I think this is because we haven't had a chance to cover it completely in class this week, so it is a new concept to me, however I do believe that because of the exercises I have a better understanding of the futur simple, it has at least laid the groundwork. I also took the time to look at a French language forum called "French Stack Exchange," this only lasted 5 minutes however, for the reason that I think I was just uninterested, basically what people were saying was boring and I couldn't really find any examples of language that was pertinent to my goal of learning the futur simple. To close out the week I went back to listening to the News in Slow French podcast, again it did not last long because I was unmotivated and was a bit overwhelmed with the work I had to do this week. 

Revisiting Cultural Influence on the Pedagogical Framework

As was previously mentioned in last weeks blog, I visited a French language forum called French Stack exchange, it was my hope that the forum would allow me to look at French tenses used in an authentic context, as well as allow for me to use the research of Levy to analyze this form of language learning., this was not the case. The first issue was that the forum was mainly used by those that are learning French, meaning that authentic language is difficult to come by, this was most definitely my fault as I failed to comprehensibly research the site before I used it. The second issue was that I just didn't care about what they were talking about, it was mundane things about their life that was in simple French, for me personally it was just uninteresting.  As the text was inauthentic there were very few examples of culture that I could see in the text, as everyone participating was from similar cultures (The majority was British, American and Australian). 

Translation in my Language Learning Challenge 

As much as all those that have attempted to teach me French will hate to hear this, translation, google translate specifically, plays a role in my French language learning, whether I'm reading a French novel or just trying to complete an activity in the textbook, I will use translation to help. Translation has been criticized for its propensity to traditional grammatical structures and the much maligned grammar translation method, it's seen as ineffective. Translation emphasizes form rather than meaning, an issue that has actually affected the LLC, as when I check the sentences I write out, google translate often fails to recognize the context. 

However, there has been a paper written by Inga Dagilienė that advocates for translation as an effective language learning tool, it argues that "When integrated into daily classroom activities translation can help students develop and improve reading, speaking, writing skills, grammar and vocabulary." Dagiliene found that translation was useful for preparation, and also found that more proficient language learners utilized translation. For me personally, I use translation because it is an autonomous activity that usually involves authentic French texts, I do not think that it is a harmful exercise. For this reason I will continue to utilize translation in my language learning challenge. 

See you next week.