During the spring of 1998 (when I was on sabbatical) and during the summer of 1998, I developed technologically-assisted materials to be used in conjunction with a course taught at almost every college in the United States: a survey course in Peninsular Spanish Literature. Working with a student assistant, I was able to complete more lessons than anticipated. In the fellowship proposal, I planned to focus on the literary works of medieval Spain because that is the part students find most difficult. By the end of the summer, however, I had completed not only the medieval works but also most of the Renaissance works as well. By the time I teach the survey course again in the fall of 1999, I plan to have completed lessons corresponding to all the literary periods in the course and to make the series available to all the students in the class.
The materials developed during this project consist of a series of lessons that focus on key writers who shaped Spanish literature and on the major characters portrayed in it. The lessons are on web pages designed to enliven the study of Spanish literature by going beyond what is available in printed textbooks. For example, in addition to providing background information about the author and literary selection as well as questions on them, these materials include virtual tours, numerous color illustrations for the writer's life and works, translation helps, music, maps, and web sites related to the topic of the lesson. The series of lessons begins with a page that displays a table of contents from which students can select lessons, such as "El Cid," "Alfonso el Sabio," "Don Juan Manuel," "Juan Ruíz," "El Marquéz de Santillana," "Jorge Manrique," "La Celestina," "Fray Luís de Leon," "San Juan de la Cruz," "Santa Teresa de Ávila," "Góngora," etc.
These works and authors included in this project were chosen from the Spanish literary cannon featured in "Required Reading: The Canon in Spanish and Spanish American Literature," Hispania 81 (March 1988): 2-19. They are correlated with the text España en su literatura, used at Millsaps College as the main text for Spanish 3200: Survey of Peninsular Literature. When I was developing these materials, I also examined the contents and sequencing in other anthologies and civilization texts, such as Texto y vida and Panoramas literaturos: España and examined electronic materials, such as a wide variety of web sites and two Spanish encyclopedias on CDS. Overall, I tried to design the lessons so that they would serve not only as lively, appealing multi-media presentations but also as a means of fostering more spoken and written interaction.
After all lessons for all the works and authors included in the survey course have been completed, they will be assessed by students and teachers using an evaluation checklist that will include a section for written comments and that will be similar to the software/web site evaluation checklist developed in the 1998 ACS language and technology workshop. After considering the insights gained from those evaluations, I plan to revise the lessons, then use them in the survey course that I teach at Millsaps. After we begin using them in the course, students taking the class will be asked to critique the lessons just before mid-semester and also towards the end of the course, by using an evaluation checklist and comment sheet similar to the one employed after the lessons were completed.
I plan to submit an article describing the development process, the evaluations and the instructional value of the model lessons, and ways the materials can be adapted for use by teachers in other fields in the humanities. I have begun approaching publishers about the feasibility of publishing a revised version of the lessons developed in this project.
In writing these lessons, I found that two activities required considerable time: first, selecting, sequencing, and incorporating the texts, illustrations, music, virtual tours etc., for the lessons; and second, developing interesting questions that truly require students to analyze and synthesize the material in order to apply what they have learned.
Because the lessons include copyrighted material as well as sections correlated to other web sites, the entire series cannot be displayed on the web until releases are obtained. Therefore, I will provide a sample lesson about Santa Teresa de Avila to give an idea of what the series is like.
Survey of Peninsular Literature tends to be a "make-or-break" class for most prospective Spanish minors and majors. They often take Spanish 3200: Survey of Peninsular Literature just after our bridge course, Spanish 2110: Contemporary Hispanic Culture. The bridge course helps them begin making the transition from lower-level classes (which concentrate mainly on speaking and listening skills) to upper-level courses (which focus principally on reading and writing). As a result of working on this research project, reading journal articles, conversing with colleagues at professional conferences, and re-reading student evaluations of Spanish 3200, I have concluded that upper-level classes should not only focus on reading and writing skills but should also include more "facilitated" conversational interchanges.
A major difficulty in this type of course lies in taking students with limited skills and helping them--in a systematic and organized way--improve their reading comprehension and writing ability as well as helping them make progress in their listening comprehension and speaking skills. At the same time we are helping students with language skills, we are also trying to teach them to appreciate and learn from great literature written in Spanish. Since many students are not "language naturals," they often find this challenge overwhelming or frustrating and decide not to continue their study of Spanish.
In evaluations of the survey course at Millsaps, many students comment that they want more in-class conversation, even though at this level most are not fully confident of their ability to converse well in Spanish. Many students have difficulty understanding the selections and then discussing in Spanish their reactions to the philosophical or psychological ideas involved in literary texts. At the same time, teachers often feel the need to "cover the material" and make sure that students understand the introductions and reading selections. Like many fellow teachers, I consider it important to relate the literary selections to the students' lives, and I have used the comprehension and interpretation questions (listed at the end of reading selections in textbooks) as a point of departure for classroom discussions.
At Millsaps, many students really want to converse in Spanish and learn to use the language well, but they are often unable to respond in class, whether that is because they may not have prepared the lesson, may not have understood it fully, may not be able to express their ideas as fluently in Spanish as in English, or may feel intimidated by speaking in a large class. I've divided class into small study groups and that approach, according to evaluations, is working better for most students. In the future, I plan to have small groups (threes) that go to work on compute lessons together.
In a Peninsular survey course, the teacher is faced with a number of tasks, such as covering material from another culture and another age that students have difficulty relating to, helping students improve their language skills, and verifying comprehension. Compounding this difficulty is the fact that, due to ever-increasing enrollments in Spanish, teachers are faced with classes that are larger than ever and that are increasingly diverse--which means that it is difficult to provide adequate individual attention in class and more difficult to meet the learning needs of students and accommodate their learning styles.
To meet these problems, I developed materials that are more attractive and attention-holding than textbooks, that students can use outside of class for individual or group study to prepare themselves better for class, that capitalize on the advantages of illustrations and discussion as well as comprehension questions, that can be revised or improved more rapidly and readily than printed textbooks, that can include music, maps and illustrations in color, and that address various student learning styles.
As a result of this project, I understand more clearly the present limitations of technologically-assisted instruction and the importance of carry-over from work done at the computer to work done in class. For example, I am more convinced than ever that students can benefit more from well-written, multimedia presentations on the authors' works and times than from well-written textbook presentations on those topics. At the same time, I have come to value even more the need for interesting, practical, thought-provoking questions that engage students and encourage them to express their ideas in Spanish. More than ever, I also see the need for including in a well-sequenced, consistent way activities to help students develop their language skills while learning to express their ideas cogently.
I also understand more clearly the need for individual guidance and help in this course, which presents a real challenge to some students. With increasingly larger classes, it becomes more and more difficult for the instructor to provide individual attention. Since individualized guidance and practice can be provided via well-written computer-delivered lessons in a lab, laboratory work should be a key and integral component of upper-level classes like this one. To provide such individualized attention, however, it is essential that the lessons include guiding feedback. If the students prepare themselves well in the lab, as they practice individually or in groups of threes, the instructor will be able to dedicate more class time to spontaneous conversations and discussions in Spanish--something that computers can't do.
Thus labwork should be coordinated with classwork, and the roles played by the teacher and the student using the computer should be complementary. After learners used well-designed, computer-assisted lessons to master the facts presented in the background information about the author's life and works, the teacher can engage them more readily and more meaningfully in conversational interchanges and discussions.
Our profession is already taking the next logical step by beginning to develop technologically-lessons and web pages correlated to textbooks, but it is important not just to use technology to produce an "electronic textbook." Instead, we should be developing an electronic learning aid that will not only present information and ask comprehension and discussion questions but also assist students in a systematic way that appeals to multiple intelligences and that can provide the impetus needed to encourage students to analyze, relate, and synthesize, and then express in Spanish their reactions to the great ideas and ideals of Spanish literature. This project can contribute in a positive way to our ultimately developing such an electronic learning tool as well as beneficial teaching techniques that can be used in conjunction with it.