Digital Transmission of Language
and Culture:
Rethinking Pedagogical Models
for E-learning
D. Victoria Rau & Meng-Chien Yang
Providence University
Web-based interactive language
learning materials
 Southeast Asian languages: Henry &
Zerwekh’s (2002) SEAsite
(www.seasite.niu.edu)
 Indonesian: Hoven’s (2003) MMInteraktif
 Tagalog: McFarland’s (2006) CAI program
for teaching Filipino
CALL and endangered languages
 Ward & van Genabith’s (2003) working
example of Nawat courseware, an
endangered Uto-Aztecan language of El
Salvador
 Rau & Yang’s (2005-2007) Digital Archiving
Yami Language Documentation, an
endangered Austronesian language on Orchid
Island
Developing a pedagogical e-learning
model
 Scollon & Scollon’s (2004) ethnographic
nexus analysis
 Three central tasks: engagement, navigation,
and change
 E-learning pedagogy
 (1) the pedagogies of the e-learning,
 (2) planning for e-learning
 (3) e-learning implementation
Context
 Austronesian Linguistics Seminar at
Providence University since 1999
 Participants in Yami e-learning
University
students
Community
Members
University
Researchers
Learners
Content
Providers
E-learning
Developers
E-learning
Website
Significant cycles of discourse
 (1) how the participants came to be placed at a particular moment
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and in a particular way to carry out a particular action;
(2) what aspects of the place were central or foregrounded as crucial
to the action on which we were focusing and what aspects were
backgrounded;
(3) what discourses in that place were central or foregrounded as
crucial to the action on which we were focusing and what discourses
were backgrounded;
(4) what discourses were ‘invisible’ in that action because they had
become submerged in practices;
(5) what the history of a particular object was as a mediational
means for that action;
(6) what the history of a particular concept was as a mediational
means for that action.
Two significant cycles of discourse
 (1) Classroom interactions
 (2) Developer meetings
Classroom interactions
 Language learning activities
 Students’ homework assignment
 Videotaping
 Featuring the formal (instructor-led),
technology-based, convivial, and directiveoriented ends of the learning.
Developer meetings
 Two activities which brought changes to the
relationship of the team.
 (1) Co-teaching of a course on “Technology
and Second Language Learning”
 (2) Holding a workshop on Revitalizing Yami
on Orchid Island
Changes
 (1) what the key points were in the cycle where there was a
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change or a transformation (resemiotization) and what was
happening in the intervals between those points as anticipations of
(or reflections upon) those changes;
(2) what the material-physical timescales were on which those
cycles operated and how those were constructed discursively by
the participants;
(3) how those elements had just come together at just that moment
to produce that particular action;
(4) whether the action under examination was a point at which
resemiotization or semiotic transformation occurred;
(5) what the narrowest and widest timescales were on which that
action depended.
The collaborative teaching experience
led the PI to take two actions:
 Transform her language pedagogy from more
people-based to more technology-based and
accelerate the process of developing the elearning materials
 Test the acquisition order of Yami
morphology
The workshop led to three major
actions taken by the co-PI:
 to design the e-learning model based on his
interviews with the instructors and the
learners;
 to organize a group of undergraduate
computer science majors to work on an
animation project for the e-learning;
 to suggest the developers use the e-learning
materials to study Yami for a year and pass
the proficiency exam
The role of E-learning for an
endangered language
1. An application of digital archiving and
documentation
2. A tool for teaching an endangered language
3. An attempt to preserve an endangered
language
Proposed Learning model for an
endangered language
Six components in the model
 Individual: The learners are the focus of the whole learning
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process.
Information: The whole documented materials related to the
Yami language, including texts, recordings, video etc.,
provide the sources of information.
Cultural Practice: The learning is linked to unique Yami
cultural items.
Social: As the learning process involves interactions with
tutors and peers, the learning process can be described as
collaborating or mutually beneficial activities.
Experience: The learners’ on-site experience will enhance
their learning strategies and increase their Yami language
proficiency.
Documenting and annotating: The learning is integrated into
the process of documenting and annotating the Yami
language.
Planning for E-learning
1. Collection of learning materials for the
Yami language
2. Design of learning activities
3. Production of online materials
Developing the e-learning course
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Analyze the learning goal of the learners and describe the
characteristics of the learning activities.
Use the proposed model to highlight key components of
the learning activities and map these highlighted
components to a pedagogical template.
Use this pedagogical template to organize the learning
materials and learning activities. The outcome of this step
is a set of e-learning courses.
Refine the contextual links of these e-learning courses and
provide specific information to these courses.
Introduction to Austronesian
languages: Yami language
 Course Characteristics:
– Basic Yami structure
– Yami lessons following a mixed grammatical and
functional syllabus
– Course instructor and Yami instructor give
examples and lead the learning activities
Proposed model for the Course (grey
circles vs. blue circles)
E-learning Implementation
 The Yami language materials collected to
build the e-learning platform include:
– Yami language course materials by Rau et al.
(2005),
– sound tracks of each utterance in the forty
lessons,
– images and video clips collected by three Yami
staff members (i.e. Dong and two recruited
community members).
Current Components in e-learning
platform
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the Yami course materials, classified into three levels:
beginner, intermediate and advanced; in each lesson, the
materials include the Yami text, Chinese and English
translation, word analysis, grammar, learning activities,
and exercises,
the Yami dictionary, organized in alphabetic order,
the system setting tool which includes the interface setting,
the learning log setting, and the web display setting,
the online learning activities which students can use to
practice on their own,
the virtual learning group which allows the students to
email their learning logs to their own mailbox and the
teacher’s mailbox.
Conclusion
 The process of developing the e-learning
program for Yami
 The six components in e-learning design for
endangered languages
Thank You