ABSTRACTS

Challenges to an existing face-to-face peer-tutoring model grew into an opportunity to integrate online technologies as a support for English autonomous learning in two undergraduate teacher education programs at a Colombian public university.

This qualitative study examines how a group of tutees’ exposure to an online-based peer-tutoring model shapes their autonomy.

Informed by data from questionnaires, a focus group interview, tutees’ logs, and records of their engagement with the model’s internet resources,

researchers identified a change in participants’ conceptualization of autonomous learning and an impact on their self-directed practices rooted in the immediacy, accessibility, comfort and availability of resources that the online peer-tutoring model favors.

This article reports on a study carried out in a foreign language course at a private Colombian university. Its purpose was to identify the role of authentic materials and tasks, based on cultural topics, in the development of intercultural competence in third-level English students.

The pedagogical implementation of the activities was designed under criteria proposed by Cortazzi and Jin (1999) to evaluate the material with cultural content.

In regard to intercultural competence, Byram’s (2002) dimension of intercultural communicative competence was the support for planning and implementing the tasks.

In this qualitative action research study, two surveys, one interview, and teacher field notes were used to collect data.

Findings indicate that students were able to understand interculturality, to show respect for other cultures, and to demonstrate interest in getting to know other societies.

Likewise, the students reported their willingness to be open to discussing topics related to cultural aspects.

This article describes a pedagogical proposal, based on debates, to determine the type of arguments that pre-service English language teachers constructed at a public university in Tunja, Colombia.

We implemented a series of debate workshops about educational issues. Thirteen modern languages pre-service teachers in their sixth semester participated in the debates.

Arguments pre-service teachers built were based on examples

In this sense, the arguments built were based on their personal experiences and their partners’ opinions.

We argue for the need to implement more research proposals that will contribute to the understanding and awareness of what argumentation implies.