A FUNNY THING HAPPENED ON THE WAY TO THE FORUM:ELECTRONIC DISCUSSION AND FOREIGN LANGUAGE LEARNING

I have read an article recently called “A Funny Thing Happen on the way to the Forum: Electronic Discussion and Foreign Language Learning” In this article, a case study, which tells about four Anglophone students (David, Laura, Eleanor, Fleurie) that use electronic discussion lists in order to improve their French, is told. In the article, it is obvious that these forums are more concerned with the topics the students discuss rather than their aim of improving their French by practicing. Even though David and Laura, who join the political discussions, use English most of the time, not French, they are given more importance at the discussion forum than Eleanor and Fleurie, whose aim is only practicing their French. The article is discussing what the reason of this contradiction is and what language teachers can do about this problematic issue. It is clear that only practicing a language is not a good discussion topic for these discussion forums. Therefore, it is a crucial issue for teachers to be aware of these facts and also make the students be aware of so that they can make benefit from them.
To conclude, the article tells us a case study which is a very current issue and which need attention from both students of language learning and language teachers so that they can make use of discussion forums in a useful way.