Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Sarah Schulman
LLSS 480
We talked at some length this semester about incorporating differentiated instruction for
diverse student populations, including students with special needs (not limited to disabilities or
learning challenges), students from various socioeconomic backgrounds, and students with
varying levels of experience with the target language. The situations we discussed were always
considering a face-to-face classroom, but at the university level, there is a big push toward
adapting instruction to an online format. This presents an entirely new set of challenges for any
class, but for language classrooms in particular because of the general lack of synchronous
(requiring students to be engaged in activities online at the same time), verbal, and aural
interactions that are present in a traditional classroom. I was also fortunate enough to learn about
teaching multimodal composition this semester, and some of the strategies could be adapted to
help provide differentiated instruction as well as varied assessments for online language classes.
Learning a language effectively requires using all four of the main communication
practices: reading, writing, listening, and speaking. In an online setting, the reading and writing
practices are easily incorporated through readings (including, to some extent, videos), discussion
boards, written assignments, quizzes, and other “traditional” assessments. Listening activities are
more difficult, but manageable through the incorporation of video and audio clips focused on
content—which also allow for exposure to a greater variety of speakers and pronunciation
styles—and incorporated into quizzes for assessment of listening comprehension. All of these
activities can be completed asynchronously (without requiring students to be online at the same
time) and without requiring additional software, and students can mostly take as much time as
sessions are an option in online classes with the use of web conferencing software. This allows
for a more traditional set of interactions between the instructor and groups of students, with more
asynchronous opportunities can be provided through the use of easily accessible software—
either through the school’s learning management system (LMS) such as Blackboard, Moodle, or
The difficulties with requiring the use of additional software are that it may not be
possible for students to download and use the software if they rely on public computers such as
at a community library; additionally, many students may not be comfortable with new
technologies, so there will be a bit of a learning curve. One way to help students overcome this
particular obstacle is to ask students to complete a media lab—an ungraded assignment (or a
low-stakes assignment) that allows them to practice with the new technology without the
pressure of also being assessed on the content. An easy way to incorporate this might be to ask
students to download some free piece of software and use it to record an introduction during the
first week of classes, then post it to a discussion board. They can then watch each other’s
introductions, which has the added benefit of building a sense of community, and they can
respond either with a short written response or another short video response. After a low-stakes
assignment like this, incorporating the technology regularly through small group interactions and
Multimodal assignments are creative opportunities for students to practice a few skills at
once. These projects could potentially even be collaborative, asking students to work together
to—for instance—create a script for a video project, then to record and put together the video, or
to work together to design an advertisement or some composition with both visual and textual
elements to address the topic of the unit. In small groups, students can also create a series of
either written or video “letters” to each other, discussing various topics, as though they were pen
pals. Ultimately, as long as students are using more than one skill for an assignment, it is
multimodal and will facilitate and encourage a deeper engagement with the learning, particularly
While these types of activities will help differentiate instruction in an online classroom,
they could work just as easily in a traditional face-to-face classroom. Considering these options
can help instructors and administrators consider approaches that will help to reach a more diverse
population of students, especially those who may not be able to take a traditional class because
setting for teaching languages can also serve students who have specific learning needs or
especially those who would benefit from having additional time to read, write, and listen.