Chat Rooms

This semester I teach my CCU (cross-cultural understanding) class at the English dept. My students are in their 3rd semester (2nd year) and  still in the intermediate level. As they are studying English, the curriculum set for them is introducing some cultures that they might encounter later on in their lives or when they are still studying at the university. I try to explore many cultures especially cultures of countries where English becomes the spoken language (England, The U.S, Australia, or even New Zealand). But I also introduce some cultures derive from countries having English as their second language such as Singapore, The Philippine, Malaysia, and India. My idea of introducing cultures of those Asian countries is that English is now widely spoken in those countries and Indonesian students now tend to continue their education or look for jobs there.
Why I'm talking about my CCU class? Yes, I want to tell you something about some assignments that I give to my students in that class. There are some assignments they need to accomplish during one semester. The assignments can be a culture visit (visiting a place/event that is foreign to them), life story (interviewing people especially from different countries and asking them about some stories in their lives), and video reports (watching movies that contain culture issues). Students must do  presentations and collect their papers to report what they have been doing with the assignments.
In this blog, I'd like to share the use of technology in my CCU class especially when my students are accomplishing the assignment. For instance, when they do the 'life story' assignment, they must interview foreigners and ask them their life story (of course they must ask a permission first before continuing the interview). As there are not many foreigners in my area (Malang, Indonesia), some of them interview foreigners using chat rooms from the Internet. The chat rooms can be through Yahoo Messenger (YM), MSN, Facebook, Livemocha, or even BBM (Blackberry Messenger).
Even though they cannot see face to face but the chat is real time, meaning that the response is received directly. This kind of communication is called synchronous as the speakers can communicate at the same time. The advantages of using 'real time' chat is that students (in this case still learning English) might give quick answer/response and it needs their skills that they have learned in their skill courses. This response will require them to practice more their English quickly. And students will not be scared if they make mistakes as they do not see each other face to face (although some use webcam).
Well, that is something about the chat rooms being used in doing the culture assignment. My students enjoy this activity very much and after they have completed the interview (could be many times) they must present it in front of the class using Power Point Slides.
I think that's all and thank you for reading.

Malang, 13 October 2010