Sessions /
Teaching Language Classes Online: A Learner’s Perspective #1076

Sun, Feb 28, 11:00-12:00 JST | Main Stage
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Many teachers used to doubt that a language class could be taught effectively online. However, a worldwide pandemic has forced language instruction to go online in many parts of the world and we have all seen how some areas of language teaching have changed now. Because of COVID-19, both experienced online teachers and novice online teachers have now had almost a year of real experience teaching English and other languages online. When this is over or when a majority of learners and teachers can go back to a somewhat normal teaching situation again, how might instruction be different?

I am a very experienced language teacher (40 years) and language learner (7 languages). In the past six months, I have also gained another type of experience: I have been an online language learner in an asynchronous university German course.

In this talk, I will offer some interesting and sometimes unexpected insights I gained about online language instruction based on my perspective as a real learner in a real language course that was completely online.

Dr. Keith Folse, Professor of TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages), University of Central Florida, teaches undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral classes. Originally secondary certified in English and French, he has taught English as a Second Language for 40 years in Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, Kuwait, Japan, Spain, and the United States. For the last eleven years, he has also taught online courses, both synchronously and asynchronously.

Dr. Folse is the author of 70 English and teacher education textbooks and is a frequent conference presenter all around the world. His presentations often deal with best teaching practices, vocabulary, grammar, and speaking. He has won numerous teaching and research awards from his university, TESOL International Association, and National Geographic Learning.

Presentation Assets

Keith Folse

Keith Folse

University of Central Florida (USA)
Hello, everyone! It is my great pleasure to present at this year's KOTESOL event. :-) I am a professor of TESOL at the University of Central Florida in the US. For the past 40 years, I have taught English in the US, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, Kuwait, and Japan. I have also taught Spanish and French. I have studied French, Spanish, Arabic, Malay, Japanese, and German. I am very interested in materials design, especially for vocabulary, grammar, writing, and speaking. I have written 78 textbooks for several publishers. My latest book, "Teaching with Zoom," was informed by my own teaching and learning experiences, especially by my own experiences as a learner of German in an completely online university course. I have spoken at KOTESOL conferences twice before and look forward to this year's event very much!