The Use of Foreign Language Teaching Techniques in the

Computer Science Laboratory to Support Oral Presentation and

Group Work. John.Woodward@nottingham.edu.cn

UNNC ESP in Asia Conference 2010

Computer Science at UNNC

• Students do the following over 4 years • 1 year of almost all English (with two course

on introductory computer science). In China• The first year of their undergraduate course

(in China) (I teach here and speak slowly). • The 2nd and 3rd years of the course of taught in

England as a normal UK undergraduate degree

My Background

Teaching Computer Science(China4 years)

Teaching English asA Foreign Language(Japan 4 years)

My Aim

Computer ScienceLaboratory

Teaching English asA Foreign LanguageTechniques

My Aim is to work at the interface.Is there an exploitable overlap.

Computer Science

• Computer science students are typically shy, introverted, not good at languages, poor communicators....

• But the software industry needs good communicators.

• The vast majority of software was not what the customer wanted!!!

• Courses focus is on the software engineering and not on communicating the needs.

Bad News - Typical Conversations in Labs

• Teacher: What language do you program in? • Student: English• T: No, I meant do you use Java, or C#, or C++,

what programming language do you use.• T: double click on the X icon.• St: (no response at all)• T: (after a student does well) Good boy. • St: saves his file as “Goodboy.doc”

Good News – Very Restricted Language

• The first goal it to get the students understanding basic utterances needed in a lab in China or the UK

• The language needed in the lab is very restricted (e.g. Open a file, close that program, I am trying to recover a file, I did not want to do that, how can I UNDO it, what is the command for help).

• Students do not need “everyday English” (nice weather we are having for this time of year isn’t it darling, “the cat sat on the mat”).

• Students need very limited functions (“I am terribly sorry to ask but would you mind moving table”)

• A very achievable task. (SMART)

Java – keywords/reserve words

• A very restricted vocabulary...• abstract do import public throws boolean

double instanceof return transient break else int short try byte extends interface static void case final long strictfp volatile catch finally native super while char float new switch class for package synchronized continue if private this default implements protected throw

typical commands (sed/awk/linux)• % echo "123 abc" | sed 's/[0-9]*/& &/'

123 123 abc• awk -F: '{if ($2 == "") print $1 ": no password!"}'

</etc/passwd• ~”search engine” -google• echo "It is now $(date +%T) on $(date +%A)" • Students need to learn to pronounce and

recognize all the punctuation characters (drilling will do). (and can form a short part of a test i.e. Dictate standard commands e.g. 2^{n-1} 2^{n}-1 )

Storyboarding• Storyboarding is a technique used by Walt Disney

to plan out moving cartoons with a series of still pictures (saves time).

• Instead of implementing software ...• Just draw picture on paper with pencil. • Students can start designing “the look and feel” of

software, and discuss Human Computer interaction issues.

• Students walk thru the code – give basic functionality.

Dictation at the keyboard

When the teacher does something• Tell the student what you are going to do, • And then how you are doing it. When the student does something

tell the teacher you intention and how you are going to do it. Total Physical Response – Immediate Feedback.

Teamwork

• Usually delayed towards the end of a degree. • Maybe because then you work on big projects. • Why work in a team?• Get students to work in a team from the start• E.g. Storyboarding/small projects (component

parts e.g. Typing tutor with password + history or a basic inventory program)

• The point is not getting them to do something that needs teamwork, but getting them to gel.

One minute presentations

• As computer science is high context students can give one minute presentations

• Oral multiple choice (set by students). • Storyboarding presentations• Debugging in class. • E.g. On a unix command ls –l – Describe the command (ls) and an option (-l) and

the output.

Classroom Dynamics

• Typically in a lab students sit in rows (and don’t move!).

• In a language lab, students sit in clusters/pairs depending on the task.

Conclusions

• Computer Science is typically taught to individuals sitting at a computer, with little emphasis on oral skills or teamwork.

• Foreign Language teaching techniques can be imported into the computer laboratory.

• This course aims at addressing the main weakness of our students,