E-mail tells...

My third-year Chinese language students sometimes asked me questions via emails. I’ve noticed that most of them would like to compose their emails in Chinese rather than in English. Some of them, fearing that their Chinese would cause confusions, further explained their questions in English.
Although I didn’t have any problem understanding their Chinese, my first response was to reply them in English which I thought would be clearer than my Chinese that may include vocabulary and structures beyond their level. However, I then realized my English reply might discourage my students’ motivation of using Chinese, since it may be perceived as a negative reaction to their Chinese. Moreover, now that the students would take the effort to express their ideas with their limited Chinese, why couldn't I try to modify my Chinese for their benefit?
What I learned from the experience is: In native-and-nonnative online communication, it is a challenge for both sides to understand each other without the help of nonverbal cues. For nonnative speakers, the difficulty lies in how to make the maximum use of the limited amount of words and structures they learned to express complicated ideas; on the other hand, for native speakers, the problem is how to effectively manipulate the language by intentionally simplifying vocabulary and structures. At this point, both sides will benefit from their communication by overcoming the obstacles.

Does SCMC really help?

I still remember the other day when we practiced SCMC in class. The task assigned to me and my partners was jigsaw questions. We were supposed to find the differences between two pictures by chatting online. Without nonverbal cues, it took longer time to reach an answer than face-to-face communication. Also, as long as it did not interfere with understanding, noticing did not necessarily lead to negotiation for meaning. So, I was wondering what the point of the jigsaw task was and how the task performance could be evaluated.

If the task was simply designed to generate negotiation for meaning, then it seems to say the completion of the task is not as important as the discourse itself. Therefore, credits will be given to successful negotiations of meaning. The problem here is that it might not be valid for learners who do not have the need.

On the other hand, if the task is aimed to evaluate the quality of task performance, it actually focuses on how well and fast the learners can complete the task. Therefore, it seems that SCMC might not always be a good substitute for face-to-face communication, since it is not as productive as face-to-face communication for jigsaw tasks. If we could finish a task within five minutes by talking face to face, why should we double the time to play with the SCMC.

I do not doubt about the benefits of applying SCMC to certain tasks, but in the mean time I also believe it is necessary to think twice before we take the effort in classroom teaching. Factors need to be considered by the teacher are:

1) What is the objective of the task? What do I want to get from the task?

2) How proficient are the students?

3) What is the time allotment for the task?

4) How effective and efficient the SCMC is to complete the task?

5) How different is the SCMC from face-to-face communication when applied to the task?