Google hangouts, glitches and all…

Hello everyone… is anyone out there? 

Thus began my google hangout at 8:30pm last night. I kept a solo running commentary going for an amazing 3 minutes and 57 seconds before Garth joined in and I concluded (too soon) that no one else was watching.

When I hung up, I noticed that Carolyn Bilton, Susan Armstrong and Sandy Gibson were trying  to join my hangout…

I quickly started a video party instead of a Hangout on Air to catch everyone before they disappeared, and we had a great conversation about our Action Plan ideas. I can’t post a youtube video of our chat online – video parties don’t get broadcast over youtube – but at that point I just wanted the hangout to work.

It took awhile to get everyone online, as you can see from our chat timeline. I’m glad we persisted, because I really value the conversations between Cohort members that sometimes start at our face-to-face sessions but need to continue when we’re back in our corner of Ontario. I encourage everyone who starts that kind of conversation at our 3rd face-to-face to keep it going using google hangouts! (yes, despite the initial frustration, I still value this tool!)

I’m also glad to be practising google hangouts with fellow Cohort members before trying this technology out with my students. Imagine if I decided I wanted my students to figure this out on their own? I wonder if they’d breeze through the hiccups and process of starting, recording and sharing their hangout with me if it was part of a homework assignment? If not, I’d be alienating them from using a tool with great potential for the language classroom. I’m looking forward to my next chance to practice, and iron out those kinks. Hopefully you’ll be part of the next conversation!

I should add here that my action plan centres around (surprise!) increasing students’ oral fluency using tools such as google hangouts. My department has been focusing explicitly on improving oral communication for real life tasks this year, which has led to some significant changes in our daily class routines, the way grammar structures are taught, and what students are asked to practice at home. I am interested in developing genuine experiences for students to practice spontaneous interactions in French. I will be looking for ways to responsibly introduce these to my courses this year and next.