Resumen de Facilitating global citizenship development in lingua franca virtual exchanges
Chesla Ann Lenkaitis, Barbara Loranc-Paszylk
This article investigates how engaging students to discuss topics that reflect their ideologies in lingua franca (LF) virtual exchanges can help facilitate global citizenship development. A six-week virtual exchange is explored with students from universities in Mexico, Poland, Spain, and the USA. This study utilizes five key elements of CALL-related tasks and three categories of telecollaborative tasks in order to promote students’ global citizenship, defined as awareness, caring, and embracing cultural diversity while promoting social justice and sustainability, coupled with a sense of responsibility to act. During the exchange, 55 participants, registered for foreign language courses (English or Spanish) or for a content area course (such as business and pedagogy) taught in English, met weekly in groups via Zoom video conferencing. In addition to discussing weekly topics, via selected current event photos, and using either English or Spanish as a LF, participants completed individual weekly pre- and post-Zoom session activities. Qualitative analyses revealed that weekly topics offered opportunities to problem solve, negotiate ideologies, and make connections to participants’ belief systems. Also, results indicated that participants became more socially responsible as shown by their increased citizenship awareness and civic-mindfulness.
