LANGUAGE TEACHING RESEARCH IN THE FOREIGN LANGUAGE PROGRAMMES: AREA OF METHODOLOGY AND PRACTICUM PROJECT

Leyla Rojas

Publicado en Capital Letter No. 4

Noviembre de 2003

This Project was submitted to and approved by the DIB (División de Investigación, Sede Bogotá) and will be led by Leyla Rojas as Main Researcher, Augusto Carrillo, Alfonso Mejía and John Jairo Viáfara from the French, German and English areas respectively as co-researchers. It started officially in October, once all the requirements were accomplished, and will last one academic year.

The project is the result of the analysis of different needs and questions drawn from the group of teachers conforming the Language Teaching Methodology and Practicum Area. Its purpose is to facilitate and support research in the field of Education and it is mainly related to the teaching of Foreign Languages. (Plan de Desarrollo 1999-2003, Universidad

Nacional de Colombia)

The project involves professors of Didactics II and the student teachers who are taking the course and who want to take part in the process and are willing to conduct Action Research in their practicum. One of the main aims of the Languages Department at the Universidad Nacional is to prepare future "licenciados" with excellent quality, able to transform their teaching practice through research. As the Language Teaching Area is the place where theory is closely linked to practice and reflection, the Department is starting to promote Educational Research to give students the opportunity and necessary tools to perform it.

Thus, this research tends to answer the main question related to the change of roles of the participants in the process of teaching, reflecting and acting when they implement action research in their practice. The result of this will lend to the establishment of a well systematized programme in the Foreign Languages Department leading to the implemention and consolidation of a NET of investigations resulting from the project. 

It will also contribute to creating research lines related to Foreign Language Teaching in the Foreign Languages Department at Universidad Nacional de Colombia. It is also expected that the students of the three different programmes establish a relationship between the contents of the Didactics courses, the practicum and eventually with the research exercise they carry out as a requirement for graduation.

We, the team members, welcome all the students of the "pedagogic component" to participate in this project, because we believe we should lead educational processes of change and innovation in order to give a step to promote this policy in our Colombian context.