Learning Generation Project

Foreign Language Cohort

Our area of interest is the availability of real oral Spanish language to students of Spanish with few opportunities to travel and/or to have access to oral manifestations of the Hispanic culture. Traditionally, oral language is presented to classroom students in the form of audio and videotapes, in addition to the oral skills of the language teacher. Because the Spanish language is so rich in dialects, students in the classroom are usually exposed to a very limited array of these varieties. At the same time, opportunities to communicate orally with actual Spanish speakers are also limited.

The purpose of the Foreign Language cohort is to facilitate access to authentic oral Spanish language to students of Spanish via the Internet. Because the Spanish language is used in many geographical areas (Spain, Mexico, Chile, Argentina, Venezuela…) with many dialectal varieties, we plan to create a bank of Spanish oral samples, showcasing the different accents and varied vocabulary and expressions found in each of the Spanish-speaking countries. For example, Spaniards say “coche” for ‘car,’ whereas Mexicans say “carro;” a “tortilla” in Spain is something completely different from a Mexican “tortilla,” and so forth. We would also like to include samples of bilingualism existing in many Hispanic areas (Quechua, Aymará, Catalan, Basque, …etc.) As a follow-up to this idea, we would also like to try to facilitate contact between real Spanish speakers and students via audio-mail, so learners have opportunities to actually hear and speak to real speakers of those varieties.

Initially, we will construct a website with two distinct parts: The main part will showcase the different accents, as well as particular vocabulary and expressions. For the follow-up part, native speakers of Spanish around the Hispanic world would be contacted (via educational institutions) and asked to volunteer to be “oral pen-pals.” The messages sent between these individuals and the users of our website will be audio-messages, that is, short oral recordings will be made and sent back and forth as audio-files. That way, users will not only have an opportunity to hear actual speakers of Spanish, from every variety, but they also will be able to practice their own oral abilities for real communication.

We will start by making some initial recordings (three or four samples of Spanish language varieties), and piloting the format of the project. Once we agree on one final format, we will continue with the recording sessions (initially, up to 10-12 samples, depending on speakers availability.) We will pilot-test the project in two ways: First, we will test it with ready-available undergraduate students of Spanish at KU, from whom we will elicit extensive feedback. Second, once refined with the undergraduates’ suggestions, we will pilot-test it with grade school students.

After this project is made available to every Spanish teacher and student, its content and possibilities could be expanded with the contributions of future users. We invite other individuals involved in both teaching and learning other foreign languages (French, German…) who might be interested in replicating the same idea (French oral varieties: France, Belgium, Canada, Louisiana…; German oral varieties: Germany, Switzerland…; etc.)

We hope that this project contributes to a larger educational plan involving the recognition and celebration of the human diversity.