Online Intercultural Exchange

Abstract

This volume provides a state-of-the-art overview of Online Intercultural Exchange(OIE) in university education and demonstrates how educators can use OIE to address current challenges in university contexts such as internationalisation, virtual mobility and intercultural foreign language education.Since the 1990s, educators have been using virtual interaction to bring their classes into contact with geographically distant partner classes to create opportunities for authentic communication, meaningful collaboration and first-hand experience of working and learning with partners from other cultural backgrounds. Online exchange projects of this nature can contribute to the development of learner autonomy, linguistic accuracy, intercultural awareness, intercultural skills and electronic literacies. OIE now has reached a stage where it is moving beyond individual classroom initiatives and is assuming a role as a major tool for internationalization, intercultural development and virtual mobility in universities around the globe. This volume reports qualitative and quantitative findings on the impact of OIE on universities in Europe and elsewhere and offers comprehensive guidance on using OIE at both pedagogical and technological levels. It provides theoretically informed accounts of OIEs relevant to researchers in computer-assisted language learning (CALL), computer-mediated communication or virtual education. Finally, contributors offer a collection of practitioner-authored and practically oriented case studies for the benefit of teachers of foreign languages or in other subject areas who wish to engage in developing the digital literacy and intercultural competences of their learners.