Email Communication in the EFL classroom
4. Email communication in the EFL classroom
4.3 Integrating emails in a collaborative language learning classroom
There are many ways in which to utilise email communication in an EFL class- room that go beyond coursebook exercises. These fall broadly into two categories:
writing email messages as part of authentic writing tasks, for example as part of a task in a Task-Based Language Teaching (TBLT) context, or discussing email writing and examining emails that leaners have sent or received in the past to initiate a reflection on appropriateness and context of language use.
4.3.1 Email for out-of-class communication
Bloch (2002: 131f) argues that communicating with the teacher outside the class- room setting allows learners to experience a form of communication not normally present in a traditional classroom:
The students in this study seemed to intuitively understand that email is more than just language; the ability to send and receive messages provides a writing context where rela- tionships can be negotiated through written language. Thus, to be successful email users
requires more than simple fluency; it always requires the ability to both express oneself using a variety of language forms and rhetorical strategies as well as to know when it is appropriate to use these different forms.
Apart from communicating with classmates and tutors outside the classroom, an- other scenario that is widely advocated is that of establishing email links with other learners, ideally matching native and target language in a tandem or so-called key- pal projects (the electronic equivalent of penpal schemes; see e.g. Dudeney/Hockly 2007, chapter 5; see also Eisenmann, this volume; for a more detailed discussion of learner preferences for different online tools, see Schenker/Poorman, this volume).
These would allow them not only to engage in authentic communication, but also provides an opportunity to exchange information about a number of topics. When learners engage in keypal projects and the correspondence is maintained for any length of time, then they also may have the opportunity to witness how they de- velop their own Community of Practice and may thus be able to reflect on how the email communication evolves over time and is shaped by, among other things, by communicative immediacy or distance. In order to raise pragmatic awareness, keypal schemes should not solely be relegated to out-of-classroom activities, but need to be appropriately integrated and scaffolded during class time (see below, section 4.3.2. and also Legenhausen, this volume).
Dudeney/Hockly (2007: 65) add that email can also be used as a collaborative writing tool outside the classroom: “For example, in groups, learners are asked to produce a story based on a painting, with Learner 1 starting the story, which is then forwarded to Learner 2, who adds to the story […], and so on”.
4.3.2 Reflecting on appropriateness
Discussing authentic emails during class and thus scaffolding the potential out- of-class communication, is another option. Younger EFL learners may already be well versed in communicating using social networking sites or other means of communicating online and may transfer the strategies used in these contexts to email messages. This, however, may be perceived as impolite, as outlined above, particularly in a context where there is a perceived difference in status between sender and recipient or a high degree of communicative distance.
Students could also exchange emails with their classmates and then exchange their perception of these messages to facilitate a classroom discussion on the difference between intended meaning and perceived meaning of these messages, highlighting that emails lack some of the cues available in face-to-face commu- nication. The different strategies that are employed to overcome this could then be discussed, for example including the many different functions emoticons can
have in CMC (see e.g. Skovholt et al. 2014). In this context, the use of guides on how to write emails could also be used, for example to initiate a discussion on what constitutes an appropriate greeting in different contexts, comparing differences in cultural preference where applicable and the context-dependence of any kind of communication (see also Bloch 2001), regardless of whether it is CMC of not.
Economidou-Kogetsidis (2015) suggests the use of examples of appropriate and inappropriate emails by both NS and NNS speakers which are compared, evaluated and discussed. She (ibid.) also advocates discussing different politeness norms depending on recipient status and cultural norms in the L1 and L2 cul- ture, leading to a discussion about language, sometimes referred to as languaging:
“Languaging about language is one of the ways to gain new knowledge about a language or consolidate existing L2 knowledge” (Storch 2011: 284).
For more advanced learners, for example in a tertiary education context, Koch and Oesterreicher’s model (see above, section 3) can be used to explain and dis- cuss the cline of conceptually oral and conceptually written language, leading to heightened register awareness.
4.3.3 Email tasks
In a Task-Based Language Teaching (TBLT) context, email communication can be included to create tasks that necessitate the use of the L2. González-Lloret and Ortega (2014b: 5) in their introduction to a volume on technology-mediated TBLT stress that tasks should be chosen “so that new technologies can be chosen and yoked with real ‘tasks’, rather than being chosen as mere translations or extensions of exercises and activities of various kinds into computer platforms”. They go on to argue that “technology in itself has created a whole set of real-world target tasks”
(ibid.: 6) and list corresponding by email among these.
For example, emails can be used to communicate with other people (either from the target language culture or with other participants using English as a lin- gua franca) to learn more about the respective cultures of the participants. Here, the main focus of the task is not on the language itself, but rather the content.
Investigating different email messaging conventions in different countries and comparing these with the learners’ own practices is another potential task that could be incorporated in a TBLT classroom.
5. Conclusion
Email communication is multi-facetted and ubiquitous, but also not without challenges for both inexperienced L1 and L2 users of English. Because of the
array of factors that influence the language used in emails, effective and context- appropriate email communication skills have to be fostered, either by explicit instruction or exposure to authentic email communication in a variety of settings or a combination of both.
Discussing email communication in the EFL classroom is a way of addressing several goals of communicative language teaching, among them engaging in au- thentic communication, providing learners with language in a variety of different contexts and raising pragmatic awareness. By incorporating this authentic form of communication both inside and outside the classroom, discussions about language, adding to the learners’ knowledge of register and appropriateness, can be initiated.
By engaging in keypal projects that allow learners to communicate with their peers in the L2, their sensitivity to the difference of language used in different Commu- nities of Practice can be enhanced and they are given a first-hand opportunity to observe how communication evolves over time. And in general, composing emails as part of larger tasks, whether in a TBLT setting or not, is an authentic writing task that hones many different skills, one of them being writing in the L2.