WEB 2.0 AND FOREIGN/ADDITIONAL LANGUAGE TEACHER EDUCATION: FOCUS IN A VIRTUAL STUDY GROUP

Abstract

Nowadays, it is imperative to reflect on how the resources provided by new information and communication technologies may serve to education and, more specifically, to teacher education. This study focuses on possible contributions and limitations of the resource provided by Web 2.0 “virtual study group”, developed from the discussion group Google Groups, to foreign/additional language teacher education. To that end, we analyse some data from the virtual interactions of the study group “Transição – Formação de professoras/es de língua estrangeira” and some of its participants’ considerations about this virtual teacher education resource, generated by a semi-open questionnaire. The analysis highlights the relevance of this resource provided by Web 2.0 to in service teacher education and incites us to seek ways to optimize it, problematizing its limitations, while making it more accessible to other foreign/additional language teachers.

Keywords

• Virtual study group
• Web 2.0.
• Foreign/Additional language teacher education.