THL Toolbox > Instructional Resources > Using Language Instructional Units
Using Language Instructional Units
Contributor(s): David Germano
Using Language Instructional Units with limited technology
1. Overview
Our Tibetan Language Instructional Units have been created to take full advantage of emergent digital technologies. However, we realize that many people and institutions can not take full advantage of such technologies due to infrastructural problems – a lack of broadband access, consistent Internet access of any type, or even computers themselves. This page is thus devoted to offering creative solutions to still use these materials even when an Internet connection and/or computers are lacking. We hope eventually to create off-line computer programs for the instructional units that are fully functional and don’t require the Internet. However this requires considerable funds to accomplish and will not happen soon.
2. Questions
First take stock of the situation:
- Do teachers have computers? Are they powerful enough to watch the videos and run the QuillDriver software?
- Do teachers have private Internet access?
- Is it broadband or narrowband? How narrow is it? How constant is it?
- Do students have computers? Are they powerful enough to watch the videos and run the QuillDriver software?
- Do students have private Internet access?
- Is it broadband or narrowband? How narrow is it? How constant is it?
- Are there electronic classrooms with at least one computer for the teacher to use?
- Do they have a projector system?
- Does it have an Internet connection? Broadband or narrowband? How narrow is it? How constant is it?
- Does each student have their own computer in the classroom?
Possibilities:
- Teachers and Students have broadband Internet and computers
- Teachers and Students have narrowband Internet and computers
- Teachers and Students have computers, but no Internet access:
- Teacher only has computer:
- No one has computer, but VCR or DVD player available:
- No one has computer but tape recorder available:
- No equipment of any type available:
3. Solutions
The optimal situation is of course broadband Internet and high powered computers for each teacher and student, along with an e-classroom that has a broadband Internet workstation for each student. This allows teachers and students alike to use TLLR Instructional Units as they were designed to be used straight from the Web for self-study, and for classroom use. However few have this optimal situation, so the following is designed to allow people to adapt the Instructional Units to their infrastructural situation.
The potential problems of limited infrastructure as as follows:
- Narrowband Internet access means audio-video will be hard to get
- Errartic Internet access may mean the entire site is hard to use
- Lack of student computers and computer labs could mean its impossible for students to use any form of computer materials, online or offline
Firstly, there is the issue of accessing the media which holds the crucial speech around which units are built:
- The optimal situation is to access high quality video directly from the Web site using broadband Internet
- Use the lowest quality video on the Web which looks terrible but is a lot easier to deliver
- Use the audio-only option on the Web which is generally easy to deliver
- If Web access is absent, get them downloaded onto a CD and distribute via CD
- If computers are the problem (either none, or not powerful enough), then get the audio-video transferred to a VCD, DVD, video tape or audio tape, depending on what technology students and teachers have; we are working now on trying to provide an easier way to generate subtitled media for such usages
- If all forms of technology are absent, get the transcripts printed out and simply use the transcripts
Secondly, there is the issue of accessing the actual textual components of the site, including the exercises and interactive exams:
- The optimal situation is to access all text from the Web site directly from the Web site using broadband Internet
- If Internet is a problem, one could download the HTML pages and print them on paper or in PDFs for local use; as the project matures, we plan to provide easy ways to download a unit as a whole for such purposes.
Thirdly, there is the issue of using the materials in a classroom by showing students audio-video for teaching, exercise or testing purposes:
- The optimal situation is to show materials from the Web site, including exams, using broadband Internet
- If the teacher has a computer with a projector, then materials can be easily downloaded for offline use and projection in the classroom
- Likewise if the classroom has a VCR, DVD, video-tape player, or audio player, the media can be used in those formats
